Is that not correct? I mean, sure, they offer most of their books in print as well, which I think is awesome for the authors, but uh..I thought that first and foremost they were an eBook publisher.
If that’s the case, can someone explain to me why I can’t find this** book in eBook format? I was screwing around on Amazon and decided it sounded good and I should buy it. I went to My Bookstore and More to order a d/l of it and guess what? I could only find it in Print. So then I checked Samhain‘s site and couldn’t find it there either. One of the reasons I like Samhain is because I can always get books in eFormat there. For those of you not familiar, let me explain my situation to you:
I live in a small town out in the middle of nowhere. We have a Wal-Mart and two grocery stores that sell new releases. That’s it. We also have two used book stores, one of which stocks romance novels. But it’s the most unorganized place I’ve ever been in, and the owner sneers at me every time I buy one, which doesn’t bother me, but since she obviously looks down on them, that means she doesn’t keep many in the shop.
The closest bookstore to me is about 55 miles away. Approximately an hour drive. You understand what this means, right? If I want books, I have to either drive an hour to get them (which is so not happening now that gas prices are close to $5.00 a gallon here in So. Cal) or I have to order them online. Although I love that I get free 2-day shipping with Amazon Prime, I hate that I have to wait 2 days for the books. Especially if I see something I want now. Like Sins of Summer.
Which is why I love eBooks and Samhain. I can buy books right now. Immediately. Instant gratification, hello! But how am I supposed to do that if they aren’t offered in eFormat? And from an e-Pub at that. Help me out here, would you? I need books today! Not two days from now.
**Each novella is being offered separately in E-format for $2.50 each. But why make me buy/download each separately if I want them in E-format? I realize it probably has something to do with word count and needing it a certain length to offer it in print, but why not offer it in E as a collection? (thanks to Sybil for being a jerk and pointing out the word count/buy them separately in E thing)
I was going to tell you what Sybil told you but she already told you. LOL Don’t know why, but it is what it is. Sorry they annoyed you, Holly. HUGS!
*snerk* on the ‘stop torturing holly’ tag
i’m not quite at the opposite extreme (which would be in easy reach of both bigbox chain bookstores as well as independents), but I do have relatively easy access to print if i want it (which i do, but my wallet usually doesn’t) so i’ve been slow to jump on the ebook bandwagon. but – as of yesterday, i’m an ebook virgin no more! a friend has a new release out with cerridwen press (amy ruttan, ‘fox’s bride’) and i braved the checkout process to get it. must admit, cerridwen made it very easy and reassuring, and seconds later, voila. lovely new book in my inbox. it is very, very seductive.
so i tried again, with another friend’s newly released book (kimber chin, ‘breach of trust’)but found the checkout process by contrast a little intimidating.
so my question: ever had any misadventures in the world of ebook purchasing?
The first time I ordered an eBook from My Bookstore and More I couldn’t get them to upload to my reader, so I emailed customer service to see if they had any suggestions and not only did they tell me what I was doing wrong, but they included a different format in their reply, just in case. I was muy impressed.
Otherwise I haven’t really had any issues. I absolutely adore them.
Anne,
Thanks! It’s just annoying b/c I’m lazy. LOL not really Samhain’s fault (well, except for that they torture me w/ the “Look what you can’t have” thing..jerks). 😛
Holly – apparently you can buy the stories from MBAM but you have to buy them all individually. How stupid is that? Well, I guess if there was one that didn’t sound good to you you could skip it! You just have to look up the different authors and they’ll have it.
Ouch. We got called jerks and stupid in the comments. I hope my explanation redeems us in a small way.
From previous publishing experience, we found that anthologies sell better in ebook format, if people have the choice of picking and choosing which books they can buy. Rather than charging $9 for an ebook anthology, we split them all into their individual books. It allows the readers to choose, the authors don’t split their royalties, and more books are sold.
One of the things we plan on doing with the new (soon to be revealed) My Bookstore and More website is offering books in bundles at a discount. So if you wanted to buy all the books in the anthology, but it’s well after their first week of release (when they’re discounted) then you get a discount for buying all three of them.
I promise, we didn’t do it because we wanted to frustrate anyone, but because we actually heard what the majority of customers were saying when it came to anthologies in ebook–and trust me, when we put it in terms of talking with their wallets, readers are talking louder now that the books are offered individually 😛
Don’t lie, Angela, you did it for no other reason that to torture me. It’s ok, I know.
If it makes you feel better, though, Sybil got called a jerk in the actual body of the post.
Joking aside, I do appreciate where you’re coming from. I just found it frustrating that I spent more than 30 minutes searching for the antho in “E” and couldn’t find it. It wasn’t until later, when I was complaining to Sybil, that it dawned on me why I couldn’t find it in “E”.
We need to do better about that. Someone else mentioned to me something similar about the cat shifter titles, that it was difficult to figure out all the titles that were involved. We’ll have to work on coming up with a better solution, so it doesn’t frustrate people who want to buy them all.
Sorry – didn’t mean to call you stupid. Just a frustrating moment there on my part. I apologize. I think the part that was frustrating for me was when I put in the anthology name only the print book came up. After I found the individual books I thought how nice it would have been to have had them all come up. Maybe that will happen with the new site! 🙂