ebooks

Kindle edition of Homestead

[It’s up and available here.]

After a lot of fussing (OCD is a life-long companion, like living with Felix and if you don’t know who that is, never mind) I have edited Homestead for publication as an ebook with Kindle. It should go live sometime tomorrow and at that point I’ll post the link here. In the meantime, here’s the cover.

Lots of good news:

1. I’ve slightly revised most of the chapters, which makes me happy to get rid of little niggles and clarify some things.

2. I’ve added illustrations and photos, as well as a map. I may add more, if the response is positive. And if I do, anyone who has already purchased Homestead/Kindle can download it again at no additional cost.

3. I’ve moved the clan charts to the front of the book, for those people who needed them but didn’t think to look in the appendix. If there’s any complain about Homestead it usually has to do with the complicated relationships between the characters, and I’m hoping easy access to the clan charts will solve this problem.

4. It’s priced at 4.99, and there will be at least one “download for free” promotion day in the next week. Check back here or on my FaceBook page for that announcement.

And two requests:

1. Reviews are very important on Amazon, as you are probably aware, in terms of sales. Homestead has a lot of really excellent critical reviews from big places, but not so many personal reviews. If you have read it and liked it and have a moment to post a short review, I would very much appreciate the support.

2. Please spread the word. Oh and, if you know of a good marketing strategy that doesn’t cost money, please leave me a note. I’d love to hear about it.

The controversy over ebook pricing is not going to resolve itself anytime soon, and here’s the reason why: publishers are confounded.

A hardcover novel is on the market for a year before they release a softcover edition, specifically because they count on recouping a big part of the investment through hardcover sales. The higher the hardcover sales, the longer it takes to put out the softcover. This approach has been set on its ear by ebooks, because people expect (quite reasonably) to pay less for a product that has so much less overhead (no paper, printing, transportation costs).

So if the publisher releases the hardcover ($25) and the ebook ($12) at the same time it’s pretty clear that the traditional sales strategy is no longer going to work. The are two obvious solutions to this: (1) charge as much for the ebook as the hardcover; (2) don’t release the ebook until the softcover version is released (thereby protecting hardcover sales).

Readers don’t like either of these options. So publishers came up with an alternate approach. For example:

Publishers seem to indulge in a lot of magical thinking.

Assume for a moment this is a book you really want to read, and your first choice is the Kindle ebook. What do you do?

You've stumbled across my official website and landed on the front page of my weblog.

My name is Rosina Lippi. I'm a former academic and tenured university professor, writing full time since 2000. Under the pen name Sara Donati I am the author of the Wilderness series, six historical novels that follow the fortunes of a group of families living in upstate New York from about 1792-1825. A new series based on later generations of the same families was launched September 1, 2015 with The Gilded Hour. The next volume in the new series, Where the Light Enters, was released in 2019.

Please see the pinned post for an overview of what you'll find on this weblog, and what has been moved to the wiki (including the FAQ page).

homestead is up on kindle

ebook readers, can I get your feedback, please?

You've stumbled across my official website and landed on the front page of my weblog.

Wise Guys

Meta