Major Macmillan titles not yet restored on Amazon
Publishing watchers have been riled up by the fight that erupted Friday evening, when Amazon.com suddenly stopped selling books by Macmillan, one of the (smaller) big six parent companies of publishing, over an e-books pricing dispute. On Sunday, in a message board announcement, Amazon said it would "ultimately...capitulate" to Macmillan's new pricing plan.
Yet here it is Tuesday afternoon, and major Macmillan titles are still not for sale on Amazon.com. Although the titles can be found on the site, they can only be purchased from third-party vendors, and there are no e-book/Kindle versions available. Notably unavailable titles are Andrew Young's John Edwards tell-all, "The Politician," which is topping Barnes & Noble's bestseller list; "Wolf Hall" by Hilary Mantel, which won the Man Booker Award; and Atul Gawande's "The Checklist Manifesto."
Publishers Lunch, which requires paid registration, found one Macmillan book that had surfaced on Amazon full-force: "Winter Garden" by Kristin Hannah, "one of the few Macmillan books you can buy right now from Amazon for your Kindle."
Earlier today, the Kindle price was $29.99, which may have been in error; it has since dropped to $16.49. And while "Winter Garden" is available from Amazon.com in a large print edition, the standard hardcover version of the book is not available from the site.
What exactly is Amazon.com doing? Are the two parties still in negotiation? Who authorized the message board statement? And will no one at the company come forward, as Macmillan's Chief Executive John Sargent did, to address readers directly?
-- Carolyn Kellogg
Amazon views books, authors and publishers as simply a marketing investment. Why invest $50 to $100 or more to acquire a customer via online marketing when you can rape the IP creators and get a customer for $9.99. Now the industry will have to contend with another vulture in waiting which has similar motives and biding its time and licking its chops.
Posted by: Joe Reader | February 02, 2010 at 04:34 PM
As an author whose latest book was released today (And God Said: How Translations Conceal the Bible's Original Meaning from Thomas Dunne Books, part of St. Martin's Press, part of Macmillan), I have to say that Amazon's decision to attack authors in this way seems almost guaranteed to create resentment.
Posted by: Joel Hoffman | February 02, 2010 at 05:29 PM
Carolyn, Thank you, thank you, thank you for staying on top of this. As always, Jacket Copy is my first source for publishing news! You're a goddess!
Posted by: Randy Russell | February 02, 2010 at 06:13 PM
No production, labor, and shipping costs... Why on earth would someone pay more than $10 for an e-book that you can not lend out and does not cost much to publish? The publishers are out of touch with reality and refuse to accept that times are changing (much like the music industry with MP3).
What's next? full hardcover price for e-books?!?!?!?!
Posted by: David | February 02, 2010 at 07:24 PM