I grok this cartoon

Artist: Tom Toro
I found it at Fiction Writers Review

Annie's chart

To help me think the pricing situation through, Annie made this chart.

Looks like it's hard to make any money at 99 cents. Unless the book is a major blockbuster, the money won't roll in.

Much as I'm not into money, it would be helpful to have some change to pay for things.

I'm leaning toward 2.99 now but I'm going to research this further. Thanks, Annie!

Amazon's payment scale for self-pub authors

The great Moolah.

It's getting close to the time when Xmas Carol will be released to the public. Since I plan to make the book available on Amazon, I went there the other day to check things out. It wasn't what I'd imagined.

If you sell your book for $2.99 or more, you get 70% of the purchase price. But if you sell it for less (I was thinking 99 cents for Xmas Carol) you only get 35% of the purchase price. In other words, Amazon is pushing authors toward the higher price range.

I think books should be as cheap as possible. Authors want people to read them, right? So I like the 99-cent price. It's easy to click "buy" when something is under a buck. The only thing that worries me is that people sometimes view lower-priced items as junk, and treasure expensive things simply because they're expensive. This prejudice is rampant.

I sometimes visit a web site run by an established author who is publishing all his new books digitally (after being published many times in the brick and mortar world). He rails against the terrible deal publishers give authors, and I must say he extinguished any idea I had of going the traditional-publisher route. His take on Amazon's pricing is that it's better to publish at 99 cents because you'll sell many more books and in the end, you'll make more money.

I'm not sure what to do. Should I let Amazon force me into the $2.99 price (and tell myself it fluffs the book up in potential buyers' eyes because they'll see it as having greater quality than the "99-cent junk")? Or should I go with the 99-cent price and the lower remuneration? I'd like reader input on this. Which way do you think I should I go?

Scrivener files may become artistic relics

Will embiggen a bit, if clicked.

I use Scrivener to write. It's a Mac-centric program that's about to be released in Windows format. On the Mac it's been around for a while and it's the best program to write with, bar none.

One thing Scrivener allows you to do is collect research materials. You can include recordings, articles, video, web pages, pastes of anything, photos -- all sorts of things. You just tuck them into the "Research" area of your Scrivener files for the book.

I also toss the detritus from the cutting-room floor there. Scenes I've cut, ideas I decided in the end not to use -- they all end up in in my Scrivener book file.

One day, if a book I write (or a book by anyone who uses Scrivener) becomes hugely popular, I imagine these source files will be of interest. They might sell for a pretty penny in our money-crazed culture. I could see them being bid on at Southeby's in ten or twenty years.

Even if my files don't become sacred relics, if there is a fan base for my books I plan to release cut scenes on the blog, to give people another taste of a book they enjoyed. I see this as a real bonus. I'd love to read more of a book I thought I'd finished long ago. Extra scenes! Sounds hot.

There are no negatives with Scrivener. It's all gravy. If you haven't tried it, you might want to check it out. And if you're on a PC, hang on. I expect there will be a version for you later this year. It is so easy to write with Scrivener. Just open it up, take a sip of espresso and you're writing. It's really that simple. (Well, okay, it isn't; but when you're ready to write, Scrivener can help.)