I just found out Mitch’s Win, Boaz’s Wager, and Patty’s Gamble are not available on the Amazon UK site. I knew Patty’s Gamble hasn’t been available on the Amazon Australia site. Meanwhile, Google Play isn’t showing Shane’s Deal, Just Good Friends, or the pre-order for Kidnapping the Viscount.
This hasn’t only been limited to those two sites. I’ve had this happen on Kobo in the past, too. As far as I know Apple and B&N have been okay. But I haven’t received feedback from people telling me they can’t find them on those sites, so at one time, maybe there was something missing. I have no idea what to think.
Sometimes there’s a glitch in the system. It’s no one’s fault. It just happens. But this is why I have never been exclusive to only one retailer. No matter what the retailer is, I refuse to be exclusive to it.
Okay, in the course of writing this post, someone in a FB group said they found Just Good Friends and Kidnapping the Viscount on Google Play. So within ten minutes, the books went from missing to being there. True story, guys. I’m not making this up!
See what I mean about unpredictability? Sometimes there’s no rhyme or reason to some of this stuff.
But that’s why I’m on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple, Google Play, and Smashwords (and the smaller channels Smashwords distributes to). I want to be available in as many places as I can. I don’t know if you will want to go to another retailer to get a book that isn’t on the one you prefer. (I, myself, am pretty loyal to my retailer, so I understand why you might not want to.) I am sorry if you can’t get one of my books on the retailer you prefer. I am doing all I can to rectify that issue, but I can’t promise my efforts will work.
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I wrote the stuff above yesterday evening. Then I put this post in my draft folder since I wasn’t sure I wanted to publish the post. This morning I got an email from an author friend who had a pre-order up on Barnes & Noble. The book had been on pre-order without any problems. Then the book released today. And it disappeared from the Barnes & Noble store this morning. She had no warning. This is a horrible thing to happen on a book’s release day. So now I know of a case where this happened on Barnes & Noble.
This tells me that no retailer is immune this kind of thing. And this is why it’s best for all authors to be on every retailer possible. It’s also best for readers. I know it’s inconvenient to buy a book from another retailer, but at least there’s the choice to do that. If the author only published the book on one retailer and that retailer didn’t show the book (for whatever reason), at least the book can be found somewhere else.
Ruth Ann Nordin's Author Blog 
Are you still putting books up on Smashwords?
Yes. I put every book I publish up there. 🙂
It’s just nuts how things like this can happen. But with digital books, not surprising. Computers have glitches and there’s not stopping those from happening. Though I DO think there are ways to minimize them. Some stores just don’t seem to care though.
I agree. The retailers have their part, too. I know they have a lot of books being uploaded every day, but it helps if there’s someone who can assist authors if authors run into any issues. I hear some retailers are better than others on this count.
The stuff that goes on at some stores is just insane. Authors are getting threatened with their books being removed from Amazon because THIEVES have stolen their books and put them on pirate sites. Known pirate sites. And the victims – the authors – are being punished because the stories the worked so hard to write were stolen.
And the book stuffers making big bucks… Bad enough that some stores aren’t putting all of an authors books up but the stuffers are making sure the rest of their books aren’t as visible as they could be. All each retailer would need to do is hire ONE person to check the top 100 best sellers (free and paid). That would allow 2 1/2 minutes per book. That’s more than enough time to skim it to make sure it’s not stuffed. They wouldn’t even have to check any book shorter than 400 pages so yeah, more than enough time.
As for the other things, I don’t know. Maybe just have existing tech support deal with the issue immediately after an author contacts them. They seem to be trained to give us all a hard time instead of just fixing the problem when they’re first told. Just like changing a price. It would take seconds, but for some people, it can take days and weeks of email and chat to get it done. I know a woman who has been trying to get a book out of Kindle Unlimited for a couple of months. Why? That should happen within 3 days of the request.
In a perfect world, all that stuff would be done. But it’s not so being wide is definitely the wisest course of action. None of the stores will work right all of the time – but the majority of them will work right most of the time. 🙂
Sorry if that was all disjointed. LOL…so many interruptions with everything today, my trains of thought keep getting derailed. 😀 😀 😀
You summed it up perfectly when you said, “None of the stores will work right all of the time – but the majority of them will work right most of the time.” I can’t say it any better than that.
It is totally wrong for authors to be punished for something book pirates (the thieves) do. Authors have no control over what these pirates are doing. So why should they be penalized? Amazon has to be aware of how pervasive book piracy is. I can’t imagine anyone involved in the book world NOT knowing about book piracy.
The scammers definitely put in a huge dent into things, and I hear they’re alive and well and expanding to other genres. Romance isn’t the only one being attacked. Last I heard, science fiction and fantasy was starting to take a hit. I don’t know if that’s still going on, though. I don’t think authors in other genres are as outspoken as romance authors are. These could be handled by an employee whose job is to sort through this stuff, but if they ever did this, I hope they make sure they aren’t attacking innocent authors. I hope they do their due diligence and make sure they are getting actual scammers. That is, IF they ever hire such people. I’m inclined to think they’ll have to if they want to keep their reputation intact. Everything that’s happened in KU has damaged Amazon’s reputation, in my opinion. I don’t see them sitting idly by and letting this continue. I suspect they will do something. I worry that what they do could inadvertently hurt innocent authors. I know Amazon isn’t trying to hurt innocent authors, but with all the books on their site, I don’t know how it can be avoided. I do feel some sympathy for them.
Great tech support at any retailer would be great. I hear some retailers are better than others. I’m surprised it’s taking that person so long to get out of KU. She could get out of it tomorrow if she uploaded everywhere and let the bots find her. Or, since she’s waited so long anyway, she can dis-enroll from KU soon. Most authors who ask to be out of KU get out within a day or two. *shakes head* I guess it all boils down to WHO gets your email or phone call. How frustrating.
I have had that happen on ITunes I buy one book and go back to get the others and they aren’t there. I also wonder why you all change the cover of your books. I have so many books on my iPad that I remember books by cover as I scan through them quickly.
Sometimes books disappear without a reason, but sometimes authors take their books off of iTunes and enter them into Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited program. So in that case, either could be responsible for it. Kindle Unlimited requires authors to be exclusive to Amazon, which means they can’t sell anywhere outside of Amazon. In return, Amazon is supposed to give these authors special perks.
As for my covers, I need to periodically go in an update them because the landscape of publishing demands authors get more professional with their covers. My older covers look cheesy and needed to be redone. I also need to go back and update some others that I haven’t gotten around to yet. If you go into Apple books, there is a place to update the files, and Apple will update the covers on the iPad. I know it’ll take some getting used to. (I always get thrown off when an author updates a cover, so I understand your concern.) It’s just that if I wish to keep writing, I need to keep up with the times, and part of that is having covers that fit the current market. (Sorry for the ramble.)
I had several authors tell me that their books disappeared on April 1st. For one of the authors, it was her release date. Everyone was scrambling to get it fixed but what a nightmare.
It is a nightmare! I don’t know how this happens. The problem is that authors can only do so much. The retailers also have to do their part to ensure the book is available.