I’m gonna start selling some books here on the site. This may be a short-lived experiment, but let’s chat for a minute about book buying.

I buy a lot of books from Amazon. I like the Kindle app better than the Nook app, I don’t have an iPhone, and I guess I’ve always just assumed Kobo didn’t have an app (though now that I’m writing it, that seems silly).

I should look into the Kobo app idea. I could stand to support Kobo. I don’t sell in double digits over there, but they’re real supportive of self-publishers. Like, they occasionally say “Um, please don’t keyword stuff your book descriptions, thanks very much.” Which I appreciate. Anyway. End digression.

Book Sale

Book Sale by Phil Roeder on Flickr

I buy from Amazon, but I don’t trust Amazon.

As a business person–that’s fuckin’ professional to my podcast viewers–I do not like the idea of Amazon owning my ass (professionally speaking). I’d like to spread the love a little bit more on the off chance that the next algorithm change over there at the ‘Zon disappears all X books. (A lot folks like me relied on strong free books to sell the rest of their books, back when the free lists were obvious to all viewers. When Amazon cleverly changed the website to make it a little harder to find free books, a whole lot of people’s incomes plummeted.)

So, that brings us to: selling direct.

This may be a terrible idea. I’m not sure. But seeing as how this site is pretty low-traffic, I’m gonna give it a shot. It would allow me to do on-site preorders, which has some fun potential (like a bonus short story bundled in), and it would allow me to do larger series bundles for astronomical prices (I know, I’m really selling the idea). For folks who already buy at ARE, Smashwords, or publisher sites like Samhain, there wouldn’t be much of a learning curve. And obviously, I’m just putting the possibility out there; I adore everyone who reads my stories, even if they haven’t bought them all, even if they read and return. (Note to read-and-returners: I can watch you buy-read-return every single book from the sales dashboard, yo. Truth. And I’m totally doing that I’m watching you thing with my two fingers and my eyes right now.)

Ah ha ha, I crack myself up. I mean, I’m not actually watching you. Ha.

All righty. So, look forward to that in the next few weeks and we’ll see if it’s a dreadful fucking idea that’s such a clusterfuck we never speak of it again. But even with a very low number of sales, the percentage of earnings is significantly higher, so it’s at least worth a shot.

Ramble, ramble, ramble, ramble…

After Christmas sale

This totally makes me want to write a story about something that happens on that couch. Ahem. After Christmas sale by Kevin Dooley on Flickr