Friday, February 22, 2013

The Departure - Cheaper than Chips

16 comments:

robann said...

How does that work for you though? Does it mean you only get about 2p per copy sold or do you still get your usual royalty and the publisher makes a loss?

Should you be so keen to promote this?!

Phil M said...

Ok, you've talked me into it.

Neal Asher said...

robann, I agreed to it. The reality is that I want more people reading my books and this way might acquire a few more fans. As for how much I get ... not sure.

Antony said...

This is what Mark Lawrence wrote about selling his ebook cheap on Amazon...

"So Amazon.com ran a promotion on Prince of Thorns before Christmas and I was very glad to get it. For a day they offered the ebook at $1.99 and put it on their daily deals.

Excitement! The book charged up the charts, became #1 best seller in fantasy, knocking Game of Thrones etc out of the way, and reaching #18 in fiction as a whole.

I get 25% on ebook sales. But it's 25% of what the publisher get, and on books selling for less than $2.99 the publisher gets 35% of the sale price rather than 70%. So I got 25% of 35% of $1.99 ... which is 17 cents.

So, if the book sold a thousand copies that day (it probably didn't do that well, but that would be awesome) I made $170. Once I've paid 15% to my agent and 20% tax I'll pocket just under 12 cents a copy or make $120 on the thousand copies sold.

Today I just came back from the post office having spent $30 mailing out two copies to reviewers and a prize from a blog competition.

I'm doing very well compared to most fantasy writers.

We are not rich.

Yesterday some ....person... commented on my blog that he had stolen my book because buying it involved some effort.

That's all I have to say about that."

Interesting and rather tragic to be honest.

egz said...

I just got "The Departure" Kindle Edition. But I had to buy it from the US site, so it was $13.62 instead of 66p. I have absolutely no objection to paying the full amount for your work :-)

egz said...

Apparently pressing back on an iPad reposts the comment quite vigorously on Blogger. I'll stop doing that then…

Unknown said...

Purchased. I have the hardback which I haven't read yet, but another 66p is well worth it for not having to hold the book up in bed.
Yep, I'm a lazy fucker.

Ed said...

It's currently only $1.06 on Amazon US, and listed as Tor. I thought Night Shade had the US rights and their's is $6 from Baen Books.

I got the UK Kindle edition and must point out that, despite what the listing on Amazon and the start of the ebook says in line with current Tor policy, it was NOT DRM-free.

Neal Asher said...

Heh, zipped it up to number 14 on Amazon best-selling SF ... which is cheating of course: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bestsellers-Books-Science-Fiction/zgbs/books/279292/ref=zg_bs_nav_b_1_b

Anonymous said...

Noticed that 'snow in the desert' is also 66p at the moment on the kindle store! Why not get both?!

Aidan said...

$1.26 for me on Amazon. And I thought "Mind Games" was good value!

Neal Asher said...

'Snow in the Desert' is just a short story!

Anonymous said...

It's still a great read :) actually one of my favourite from the gabble.

Andy said...

Bargain! just got it, funny as it was a 99p offer of Gridlinked in Waterstones that got me into your books back in 2005ish...

Tigger MK4 said...

66p by a book by one of my favourite authors? Sold !

P.s. At the risk of sounding like a fan boy half my age : can we have another sniper/sm-13 novel? Please ?
I love the originals, and love the audiobook versions even more !

Neal Asher said...

Thank you, Phil M.

Anthony, yeah, authors don't make a great deal per book sold, and generally when they're discounted the author takes a hit on that too. Those pirating books are thieves, plain and simple. Complaining about the difficulty in buying a book when we've only just moved into the era when you don't have to go to a book shop is a tad picky.

egz, thanks for that!

Unknown, yes, and with some of the doorsteps nowadays you're probably avoiding RSI.

Ed, I have no idea what that's all about. I just write the buggers.

Aidan, Mindgames is actually up for its original price of many years ago.

Andrew, and that is entirely the point of putting out books at such cheap prices - to get readers hooked.

Tigger MK4, maybe one day. But I do like creating new characters, just like one called Tigger...