Kelly McClymer's Blog

Rupert Murdoch says $9.99 for an e-book devalues a book. As do others. [Picture me scratching my head, wondering, "If a paperback can go full price for $6.99 (as my Getting to Third Date goes for on Amazon, though it is discounted to $6.29 at B&N; and the respective  e-version is $5.59 at both online stores), then how is a $9.99 e-book devaluing that author or her story? Am I chopped liver?"]

Sarah Weinman says that Amazon has lost the battle with Macmillan, but wonders if they may have already won the war. As she notes: “Readers, so far, are clearly on the side of the cheapest price — and seem impatient with publishers who want to save their business model rather than sacrifice it on the altar for $9.99.”

As a reader and a writer, I care about the price point battle that is raging, because I want to be able to buy affordable books, and I want my publisher to make a profit and stay in business (and, most importantly, I want to make a profit from my own writing).

Not only that, but I am in the process of cleaning up my out of print books to release in e-book form (as many formats as I can, including Kindle). I can’t resist exploring the incredible myth that Weinman’s question seems to be built around: that consumers are clueless about what constitutes a fair price for a book and that Amazon — with ten solid years in the business of online selling and e-book pricing — doesn’t know what the market will bear.

I’m going to do this in Q and A format (I have the questions. The answers? I’ll take a stab from both reader’s perspective (RA) and writer’s view (WA), but I don’t really get it yet, so I’ll borrow from others to try to make some sense of this battle).

Q: How does a $9.99 price tag on an e-book devalue the work involved?

RA: ???…???… because it is so much less than the hardcover price of $20 or more, I guess? But aren’t paperbacks even less than that?

WA: Because if my publisher sells fewer hardcovers than they planned two years back, when they bought my book and figured out profits vs expenses, that means the losses are higher than expected and my book looks like a loser on the profit and loss spread sheet.

Q: But doesn’t a hardcover cost more because it costs more to produce, distribute, and store than a paperback or an e-book?

RA: Yes. And it’s bigger and sturdier, and takes up more space on my bookshelf. That’s why I usually just buy paperbacks and borrow the hardcovers from my library, or from a friend.

WA: A hardcover costs more for those reasons, but also because the publishers use hardcover to indicate the book is more valuable than the ones that come out only in paperback…except, please don’t tell paperback writers that, so we can keep up the pretense that’s not true. Although, if this discussion keeps up much longer, I guess the cat will be out of the bag because publishers will need to explain that quality reality to readers directly instead of subliminally. Maybe they’ll put gold stars on the covers, so readers can see these e-books are really, really valuable compared to the ones without gold stars?

Q: I’m confused. Don’t hardcover books come out in paperback, too? Does that mean they become less valuable?

RA: Well, I want the latest Stephen King right away. But for some authors, I’m willing to wait so I can pay less for my read. So I guess it doesn’t become less valuable for some people.

WA: Time is money. Publishers put a big push on their big commercial releases because they’re hot and they expect to sell hundreds of thousands of copies. After the first month, that’s it. Publishers figure they’ve gotten the “early adopters” to borrow a phrase from the tech world. For most books, it is the first month sales that count.

Q: But what about sleeper books? The ones that get popular when the publisher doesn’t expect it. Like Harry Potter. And Twilight.

RA: Ooooh, I loved Harry Potter. Read them all right away. I even bought them in hardcover and needed wrist splints after every readathon. That was a sleeper book?

WA: When you’re a writer, you know by the advance your publisher offers (and whether they put you out in hardcover, trade size, or mass market paperback) if you’re going to be a hot book, or if you’ll have to cross your fingers and hope to be a sleeper. With bookstores closing, and/or stocking less on the shelves, it is getting harder to become a sleeper success. The book has to be available for readers to buy — new, not used, because used sales are invisible to the publisher — for a publisher to see an opportunity to go back to print and push the book again.

Q: So, back to the value of a book, then. You’re saying it all boils down to whether the publisher thinks the book is gonna be a market hottie? Like movies book theatres based on whether they think a film is a blockbuster?

RA: Well, the publisher prices it according to how big a hottie they think it is. But we readers don’t always agree. We vote with our pocketbooks, just like movie goers. Remember Water World? Then the books disappear from the main shelves and end up on remainder shelves, or in jumbled tables at your local deepest discount store. Readers are really the ones who make or break a book, although it doesn’t feel like publishers know that. If they did, they’d publish more of the kinds of books I like.

WA: Yes. And ditto Reader’s answer. We have to trust our publishers to price our books right, or we lose sales. Remember, the publisher sells many books a year — a writer usually only sells one. If the publisher gets the formula wrong, we’re the one who pay for it, whether on our harcover sales, our paperback sales, or our e-sales.

Q: Oh. So it really matters that publishers get the e-price thing right?

RA: Well, if they want me to buy their book, they do.

WA: Well, if I want to make good royalties, not just for the first month, but for a long, long time, it is critical.

Q: Last question. In this piece, on Media Alley,Weinman perfectly voices the frustrations of many publishers and authors: “Amazon has done a great job of marketing the illusion that an e-book should be $9.99,” Weinman said. “So how can publishers tell consumers, in clear terms, why $9.99 is bad and convince them that discount culture shouldn’t screw over the authors they profess to love?”

RA: LOL! What? I’m a reader, not a publisher-subsidy program. You price the books based on your perceived “value.” I’ll buy them if I agree. And I won’t if I don’t. Isn’t that the linchpin of capitalism?

WA: Only publish the books readers will definitely assign hottie value to…oh, wait. You haven’t got that figured out for hardcover or paperback yet. Amazon has good data. Ask them to share. Sigh. Please don’t pull out the crystal ball, that only tells you what you want to hear. Tap the readers. You know, those folks you’re separated from by distributors and bookstores. They’re the only one with the answers. And they give it in dollars and cents.. [Writer wanders off, mumbling an ancient chant, fingers crossed behind her back.]

LAST OFFICIAL WORD: James Surowieki wrote an interesting piece on the price war for online merchandise (not just e-books) by Amazon and Walmart. Last November, he wrote that Amazon and Walmart were drawing the publishers into a battle that could hurt the industry badly. How prophetic he sounds now, less than three months later. Publishers are taking a gamble that they know the value of an e-book better than Amazon. And better than their e-reading customers.

Unofficial last word from little old me: Ultimately, I think the consumer will pay only what they believe the book is worth, no matter what Amazon, Macmillan, or Rupert Murdoch says. Or what I say. So when I e-release my out of print books, I’m going to take a leaf from the publishers’ page and set the price point that will serve me best: One. Million. Dollars. [picture that evil dude from Austin Powers, with his finger on his cheek.] I may only get one reader, but I can live with that…

Kelly