Posted on October 5, 2014 at 12:00 AM by Jeffrey Bruner
Dear readers,
We love that you read our books. Really, we do.
Nothing makes us happier than to know that someone is reading -- and hopefully enjoying -- what took us many months (and sometimes years) to create.
We love writing. It makes us happy. But you know what? Sometimes it's agony. AGONY. Telling a story isn't like turning on the tap in your bathroom -- it doesn't just pour out in a nice, steady stream. It can be like pulling teeth some days. Next time you go to the dentist, give that some thought.
But today is not a bad day because you, wonderful reader, are reading our book. So thank you! We know you don't hear that enough during the day, what with the kids needing to go to soccer practice and the roofer not showing up on time and the nine loads of laundry that need to be done before dinnertime. Again, thank you.
But you know what makes us even happier? BUYING our books. Don't get us wrong -- lots of us give away novels as a way to introduce ourselves with the hope that, once you see we're pretty good at this, you'll actually part with cash for our next novel. So we totally want you to download our novels and books when we offer them for free.
We just don't want you to download ONLY free books. We deserve to earn a small amount of money for all of this hard work we put into writing this book for you.
Like a dollar. Really. That's all a lot of us ask for these days. Less than a candy bar. Less than the tip you leave for your server at the restaurant. A heck of a lot less than a ticket to the movies.
It's not like we get wealthy off that dollar. Amazon, for example, gives us 35 cents and keeps the rest. So what we get isn't the candy bar money. It's more like the loose change that's hiding under the cushions of your sofa.
But that 35 cents adds up if every one of you (75,000) buy an ebook, say, once a month. It would amount to $37 for each of the 700 of us that promoted a book during September at The Fussy Librarian. It's not enough to pay the fees we paid to the professional copy editor and the graphic designer who created the cool cover that caught your eye. But it's enough to keep us stocked in coffee or Diet Pepsi, which you should know fuels the brains of most authors.
And here's something you probably didn't know -- a lot of these retailers (like Amazon) even let you return the ebook for a refund if you think it stinks. Now the odds of getting struck by lightning are probably greater than one of our books being a dud, but in the rare event that happens, you can get your money back.
Bet the manager at the movie theater wouldn't do that after you spent $9.50 to see that "Transformers" movie.
