What most people don’t understand is just how much hard work authors put into writing their books – whether the books are fiction or nonfiction. And anymore these days, I look on Amazon or talk with my author friends on Facebook and see offers for lots of books for 0.99 cents and even an entire bundle of books for 0.99 cents. While this is great for my hard budget, as a fellow author, it makes me so saddened.
We pour our hearts and souls into our writing. I know I do and a lot of my other writer friends do as well. Just like with anyone else who works hard, we deserve to be compensated for what we do. I don’t know of anyone who would live on 0.99 cents a day, even if there are multiple copies sold. Which, if you’re doing that, then that’s great!
Also, I don’t mean to insult any author who is selling a book for 0.99 cents on Amazon or wherever. That isn’t entirely a bad thing and hey, it’s amazing that you finished a book and are able to sell it at all. So congratulations for being a published author, especially if you’re self-published because that’s really hard to do. But try to remember all the hard work you put into your book. That is your baby and you worked hard to get it to wherever it’s at. Value your work and yourself as an author enough to show what you and your book are worth.
Yes, I realize I have a book on Amazon Kindle for 0.99 cents myself but my publisher controls that and I don’t and it’s a very, very short eBook, not a full novel, so I wouldn’t make anyone pay much more than that for its length even though it’s high quality. Plus, it’s the introduction to a series and the first two books are full length novels both 11 to 15 dollars a piece.
What I’m saying is, authors, don’t sell yourselves short!
And for any reader or customer out there, you guys can make our jobs so much easier if you and others would be more willing to pay more than a dollar for books. You may more than that for a movie. Try to remember that we authors work hard and we deserve compensation for what we do – which is entertain all of you!
