Feb 13 2010

Saturday Midday Links: Some Valentine’s Weekend Special

By Jane • Publishing News • • Tags: , ,

I was browsing books last night and came across Patricia Briggs’ Silver Borne (non affiliate Kindle link).   Right now the Kindle price is $9.99 if you pre-order.   My understanding is that Kindle pre -orders do count for bestseller lists so you can get the book now and still help out a favorite author.

Amazon is playing around with pricing so you might want to check in every so often to see if you can get a deal before the March agency pricing kicks in. Charlaine Harris’ May book, Dead in the Family (non affiliate Kindle link), is priced at $10.80 today.

Here are some weekend specials:

The Wall Street Journal did an article on basketball player’s reading habits. Quite a few of them read, particularly the international players. Remember Julie James’ book, Practice Makes Perfect, when J.D.’s friend Tyler explains about using P&P as a pick up tool?

Tyler shook his head. "Lit 305: Eighteenth-Century Women's Fiction." He caught J.D.'s look and quickly defended himself. "What? I took it because of the girls in the class. Anyway, I see a bit of a P and P dynamic going on between you and Payton."

J.D. didn't think he wanted to know. Really. But he asked anyway. "P and P?"

Tyler shot him a look, appalled. "Uh, hello-’Pride and Prejudice?" His tone said only a cretin wouldn't know this.

"Oh right, P and P," J.D. said. "You know, Tyler, you might want to pick up your balls-’I think they just fell right off when you said that."

Up front, the cabdriver let out a good snicker.

Tyler shook his head. "Laugh if you want, but let me tell you something: women go crazy for that book. And even crazier for men who have read it. If I plan to bring a girl back to my place, I might just so happen to leave a copy of it sitting out on my coffee table and, let's just say, hijinks frequently ensue.”

Seriously? Is there anything more sexy than a well read man? What about One Summer by Karen Robards (lord, I love that book) and, of course, there is the English literature major in Jennifer Crusie’s Crazy for You.

Shoot. I should have saved this for a Tuesday article.

Anyway, this is a long way to say that men who read are sexy and Dwayne Wade saying that one of his favorite books is Pride and Prejudice just made him exponentially more so.

Miami’s Dwyane Wade isn’t afraid to admit that one of his favorite books was Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice,” which he first read as a student at Marquette.

TechCrunch posted a rumor from a “reliable source” that Amazon wants to give the Kindle to all its Prime members. Thank god I signed up for that in December. I’ve often wondered why device manufacturers haven’t done a subscription service + device package much like cell phones. Sign up for a two year agreement to spend $20 per month and get the Kindle/nook for free or something like that.

USA Today will include nook and Sony sales in its bestseller compilations. It already includes Kindle numbers. I hope that the Times start to do this as well. I wonder if the urge to get these books on the bestseller list will affect pricing? One thing that I would love to see would be reverse windowing or the release of ebooks before print editions come out. You could charge more for this and it could be a win for publishers as early buzz of the book sweeps across the internet and on review sites by the early and anxious readers. These pre print sales would need to be included in the bestseller tabulations, though, for publishers and authors to like this option.

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By • Publishing News • 19 • Tags: , ,