Convening the Smart Bitch Court of Justice

Smart Bitchery member and fab author PC Cast wrote me the following rant, and I’d be a bad, bad bitch indeed if I didn’t pass it on verbatim to the rest of the world:

[S]everal of us (authors) are really getting pissed off at the horrid proliferation of the internet selling of our ARCs.  It’s come to a boil lately (and you can check out my last 2 postings on my blog to get the dirt) because we’ve (MJ Davidson, Susan Grant, Gena Showalter, moi) discovered copies of our Mysteria ARC for sale on fucking ebay.  Well this REALLY pisses us off because the goddamn copies are “like new no spine broken at all” which fucking means the fucking reviewers didn’t even bother to read the damn thing before they scurried out like cockroaches to sell their copy and make a damn buck.  (One copy went for $30 something the other went for $20 something.)  And we were only given limited ARCs for Mysteria, which we sent out at our own fucking expense to reviewers.  So I feel fucked twice up the ass with no lube. 

Okay, so here’s the point that we’re trying to get out there to readers: WHEN YOU BUY AN ARC YOU’RE RIPPING THE AUTHOR THE FUCK OFF.  Not only do we not get any damn money from it, but no review, no numbers increase, and the publisher has an expensive ARC printed that doesn’t do us shit for good.  Not to mention that legitimate, ethical reviewers and booksellers get fucked up the ass too when we (authors and publishers) run short on ARCs because unbeknownst to us we’re sending our limited supply to asstards!

Naturally I confronted the asshair sellers on ebay and got bullshit responses.  I’ve reported their listings to ebay, too, as unethical.  I mean PLEASE.  It says clearly across the cover ADVANCED REVIEW COPY NOT FOR SALE.  But ebay would sell its mom’s soul if it could turn a profit.  Luna is actually trying to track some of these sellers to stop up the reviewer/bookseller leaks.

Anyway.  It makes me mad.  So fans who lurve us pay big money to rip us off?  Okay, I can’t do math word problems, but this just doesn’t seem right.

Categorized:

News, Random Musings

Comments are Closed

  1. J—there are a number of reasons why buying an ARC is not the same as buying a used book in a used book store, and why selling an ARC is more damaging to the author. 

    A book in a UBS has been purchased once, so the author has been paid for it.  Not so with the ARC.

    ARCs often have errors in them, which is why they bear the “Uncorrected Proof” banner.  No author wants books sold before they’ve been proofread and corrected to the max.

    An ARC, because it’s an advance copy, may reveal information from a character or series that the author wishes to remain secret until the book is released. Perhaps there’s a huge promotional campaign around, to use a current possibility, the name and sex of Mavis’ baby in the J.D. Robb books.  Reselling the ARC can have a damaging effect on the author’s sales and promotions.

    Finally, it’s just not cricket.  The reviewer gets the ARC with the understanding it should not be sold.  Therefore, it should not be sold.  There’s an implicit agreement between the publisher/author and the reviewer when the reviewer accepts the book.  To violate that agreement doesn’t say much about the reviewer.

    As I said in an earlier post, I review, and I have a visceral response to the idea of throwing away books I don’t want to keep.  I compromise by waiting until the novel is on sale to the public, and then donate the ARC to a non-profit for their use, either a shelter or the Friends of the Library, who distribute books to various organizations.

  2. J says:

    I understand the comments on selling ARCs i really do. I also see the collectability of them as well. As a collector. Granted i’m also not going to pay an outrageous amount for a book i want. I’ll eventually come across it else where for a reasonable price.

    Onto the comment about typos and errors. I’ve read my fair share of finished books and found typos out the wazoo. Some books it’s almost every other word where as other books it’s once a chapter. Although the more times i read a book the more typos i find. So the ccomment about not wanting ARCs being sold because of typos bother me.

    I don’t know maybe the perfectionist in me is speaking but i wouldn’t let something less than perfect leave my studio..
    and of course that would also be why i don’t get nearly enough sleep…
    J

  3. pam says:

    Okay, I am no doubt in the minority on this, but I have a very different take on the situation.

    I see it as a huge win-win for the author. Think of it as dirt cheap PROMO! I mean seriously, if someone is willing to bid on your book and pay above the price (or not), but is just so anxious to read your book, how can that be bad?

    It’s an uncorrected proof, designed for reviewers, well aren’t these readers who love you so much that they’ll buy your arc the best possible reviewer you could imagine?

    If they love your book, they’ll tell all their friends, or better yet, give that reader some credit, maybe they will buy multiple copies of your book and give them to friends as gifts. Friends who will then turn into repeat readers for you.

    This is a good thing for the author. If it happened to me I’d be tickled to think someone was so anxious to read my book that they bought an arc off e-bay. It’s a huge compliment.

    And seriously, in general aren’t we talking about a handful of books? Not thousands? The impact of this is next to nothing to the author.

    I LOVE the idea another commenter had of posting on your site that someone paid a nutty amount for an arc…try and get as much mileage out of this as you can.

    🙂 Pam

  4. rae says:

    Well the authors of the rant can take their effin books and stick ‘em where the sun doesn’t shine. That sarcastic enough for you?

    I have no intentions of buying ARC’s, heck I didn’t even know there was such a thing as ARC’s before this rant. The tone of the rant has put me right off ever buying any of these author’s books. There’s better things to spend my money on that a bunch of authors who look down their nose at their readers.

  5. Tara says:

    Just a response to Lucy’s “nobody would bother” with the rental market… since as an avid reader I’ve had to start paying 10 dollars for an “Easy to Read” (wtf?!?!) but hard to afford paperback, there IS now a Netflix for Romance Novels… its called Luvlibrary.
    Greedy Publishers and authors who rush out shoddy work that no one considers a keeper – be warned.

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