The Best Books in Life Aren’t Always Free

If you’re like me (and pretty much every other author on the planet), your most fervent desire is to find readers who’ll love your writing and be ready, willing and able to pay for the opportunity to read all those beautiful words you’ve toiled over. But, to paraphrase our dear writer pal, Will Shakespeare, “therein lies the rub.”

Turns out not everyone so readily forks over their hard-earned cash for a novel. That fact is especially galling, when you realize that many e-books can be bought for as little as $0.99.

Let that soak in.

That’s less than $1.00 for work that has taken months, if not years, to complete. Not to mention the cost of writing workshops to hone your craft, hiring an editor, or paying for marketing and promotions.

And that’s not even counting all the giveaways, which are de riguer these days or that it’s often required that you buy your own books to give away.

Oh and there’s mailing costs. And don’t forget the expense of sending out copies to reviewers in the hope that at least one will love your work and spread that love. Plus, there’s the cost of self-publishing, if you go that route. I can’t think of another skill, service or product that requires so much capital (both labor and cash), yet costs so little to purchase.

When my first novel, You’ll Be Thinking of Me, came out, I signed up for some promotions that cost me quite a bit and I ran some that offered the book for free. My ranking on Amazon soared when I offered You’ll Be Thinking of Me for free.

But, I was taken aback when someone I’d known for years, excitedly announced to me that she had downloaded my e-book during a free promotion. I don’t think it even occurred to her that it would have been a supportive gesture to pay the full price (a whopping $2.99). I guess the logic was, why buy the milk when you can get it for free?

My new novel, Le Remède, which will be released on November 7th, is with a different publisher and the e-book costs $5.99. If readers, even readers who are friends, are unwilling to pay $2.99, I worry that no one will be willing to dish out the $5.99 it takes to purchase Le Reméde. I don’t even allow myself to consider the possibility of someone buying the paperback, which is listed at $16.99 on the Wild Rose Press website.

Yes, I’m fully aware that best-selling authors with one of the big five (or is it four now?) charge much more for e-books, paperbacks and hard cover books, but I’m really thinking about the rest of us, who are unknown or at least lesser known, and either self-publish or are picked up by smaller publishers. For us, it’s harder to convince potential readers to part with their money, no matter how small the dollar amount.

So, I’ve been thinking (fretting) about the seemingly illogical psychology of how we spend our hard-earned dollars and why there seems to be a barrier to spending money on a book, when we often spend that amount, and far more, on items that last for a far shorter period of time and, to my mind, provide far less satisfaction.

For example, I would venture a guess that few of us think twice about spending at least $3 or $4 on a latte at Starbucks—sometimes on a daily basis—or $5 at Jamba Juice for the occasional (small) pick-me-up. What about $5.00 for a tin of Altoids from Amazon?

I just received a greeting card in the mail from a friend. I doubt she hesitated before buying the $4 card and paying $0.50 for a stamp.

Or what about a movie ticket? A movie lasts maybe a couple of hours and, according to that well-known authority on all things, Google, the average price of a movie ticket is about $9.00, but can go as high as $17.50. Unless you’re a speed reader, it’s doubtful you’ll read a book in two hours or less.

Even a pay-for-view movie on HBO or Amazon Prime or any of the other streaming services can run you as much as $14.99 for a single viewing. These examples are far from inclusive, but they illustrate the countless items that most of us never give a second thought before coughing up the bucks.

So, what’s so different about spending that money on books? I wish I had the answer. I don’t.

But behavioral psychologist, Daniel Kahneman, has written about what goes into making value decisions and it’s just as simple and just as complicated as an individual’s value system and past experiences, which are as infinitely varied as proverbial snowflakes.

But I believe there’s also a collective value system that has changed over time. It could be that giveaways have become too common. I mean, you just know that if you wait around long enough, that book you’ve been eyeing will be free or at least deeply discounted. Or maybe $0.99 e-books have become such an everyday occurrence, that readers feel like they’re being ripped off if they pay more.

A case in point—two twenty-something sisters I know refuse to buy e-books that cost more than $0.99. Or maybe it’s the explosion of indie publishing and the plethora of smaller publishers that make books a less rare commodity and therefore less valuable in readers’ minds.

But not everyone is looking for a bargain. I posed the book-buying question to Danna Walker, a Maryland-based journalist and decades-long friend of mine (who’s also an avid reader) and she takes the opposite viewpoint. “I’m cheap,” she said, “but not so cheap that I don’t know value.” She’s more of the mind that “you get what you pay for.” She says she’s actually reluctant, maybe even a bit skeptical, of books that cost so little or are offered for free.

Let’s hope there are plenty of readers like my friend, Danna, who are willing to pony up for more than $0.99 a pop to gain access to entertainment drawn from the blood, sweat and tears of all us hard-working writers.

—

Densie Webb (no, not Denise) has spent a long career as a freelance nonfiction writer and editor. Her most recent novel ” Le Remède.” (https://bit.ly/2jmdhVt) was released by Wild Rose Press on November 7, 2018. Her debut novel “You’ll Be Thinking of Me” was released by Soul Mate Publishing in January 2015. She is an avid walker (not of the dead variety), drinks way too much coffee and has a small “devil dog” that keeps her on her toes. She is currently working on her third novel.

Find out more about her on her website http://densiewebb.com/ and follow her on twitter https://twitter.com/dlwebb

Le Remède, Densie Webb

Andie Rogé craves control like some people crave chocolate. But she can’t control her feelings when she encounters Vincent Dubois at Lizzie Borden’s Bar.

Tortured by blood lust that has ruled him for almost two hundred years, Vincent is unprepared for the pull he feels toward Andie. He can only surrender to what he knows is fate.

Offered a cure from a rare black orchid, he faces an agonizing choice—take the only dose and join Andie in the human life he so deeply desires or give the cure to his Kindred brother to stop his bloody rampage. Fate brought them together but will it destroy their chance at a future?
BUY THE BOOK HERE

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Category: Contemporary Women Writers, How To and Tips, On Publishing