Wherein Michelle is irritated

[msagara]

Someone on Facebook kindly pointed out that someone appears to be selling a used (!) copy of Cast in Silence on Amazon.com.

Cast in Silence doesn't exist as a new book yet. It doesn't exist as an ARC yet. It barely exists as a finished manuscript, because I am still working my way through the AAs mentioned a couple of days ago.

The "merchant" in question is asking how much? Guess. The answer is here.

I'm not entirely sure what he -- or to be fair, she or they -- hope to gain from this, and mine is not the only "used" book offered for sale at this price. The other one thirty seconds of perusal turned up is Maria Snyder's also as yet unpublished book. I cannot imagine that anyone--besides a publisher--would pay 1,000.00 for a book of mine, let alone one that doesn't even exist.

So. Just in case you're curious: He isn't selling an ARC. Because it doesn't exist. He isn't, as far as I can tell, selling anything genuine. If anyone asks you about this, please pass it on, or point them here.

Comments

[debmats.livejournal.com]

Same company is trying to sell a copy of Steve Miller and Sharon Lee's Fledgling for the same price.

[jhghendriks.livejournal.com]

You could buy it.
It would save you the time writing it ;-)

[desayunoencama.livejournal.com]

Not sure what the scam is but he's asking for $1000 for a copy of Jean Redmann's not-yet-out mystery, too:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/1602820759/ref=dp_olp_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1239401649&sr=8-1

[nightsinger.livejournal.com]

Can I assume you've reported them to Amazon? Your word will have a lot more weight than ours in the matter, methinks!

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

Michelle, I just had to write to the SAME GUY -- charging that same absurd $1,000 -- for one of our books that won't be published until September. He did take it down; said I was "right" and he didn't have that book at all. It was "an error."

Well...duh.

used unpublished copies...

[e-booklover.livejournal.com]

I was browsing Amazon and he is also selling one of Maya Banks unpublished books for the same price with the same description.

[stillnotbored.livejournal.com]

He has an unpublished Twilight Book up as well. If Meyer's lawyers get wind of that this guy will never see daylight again.

I will say this scam takes a lot of guts and very little brain.

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

I agree, reporting it as a scam to Amazon is good--if commenters could go report it to the other writers, that would be a huge favor to them and to readers who might get scammed.

[wolfsilveroak.livejournal.com]

Please report him to Amazon. He needs to be banned.

[bobafet.livejournal.com]

Less banned and more arrested and charged, but yes.. ;D

[braider.livejournal.com]

No chance a person got hold of a draft?

[hascape.livejournal.com]

I sent a headsup to Jane at Dear Author and she has posted an alert on the blog. Plus I have checked at this store and Jayne Ann Krentz plus a few others are also affected. I hope this gets sorted out soon and amazon will finally do something.

[msagara.livejournal.com]

No chance a person got hold of a draft?

No chance whatsoever. And none of the ARC, either; the AAs are the step -before- the page proofs that their internal proofreaders read. Those pages are the ones that will be used for galleys; the ones I'm working on now lead directly into those ones.

[msagara.livejournal.com]

Thank you -- I did call amazon.com, and I filled out a web-form stating the problem clearly; the call, with holds, took about an hour, but hopefully some good will come of it.

[twiegand.livejournal.com]

Maybe the guy has a time machine that he is using to bring such items back from the future. More likely, this sounds like wire fraud and would be a federal offense if he is in the US. I hope someone gets him.

However, I am looking forward to reading a legitimate copy of the book when it is available.

[mmarques.livejournal.com]

An hour? wow! Even if they didn't believe that you were the author, the "new" tab clearly states that a purchase is a pre-order. So it should totally be obvious that there are no used copies!

Amazon.com shouldn't make it possible to sell used copies of books that are only available new by "pre-order".

[msagara.livejournal.com]

They took the initial complaint, after some confusion, and then had to escalate it (what this means is that I was on hold while they were talking to someone else. Then on hold again).

What it also means is that I haven't finished my AA pages for the day =/

[damedini.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. And how much do you wanna bet that some poor dork does fall for it? I mean /one/ of the scams, not necessarily your book.

[dancinghorse.livejournal.com]

It's weird because he lists books that are actually published for normal used-book prices. Has a storefront and everything.

It's remotely possible he could have a bug in his system. Will be interested to find out what happened there.

[motteditor.livejournal.com]

Especially when you also consider the positive comments on his profile. I guess he could set up some bot to do that, though.

[msagara.livejournal.com]

Not really. For an on-line vendor, from an ebay buyer perspective, he has an abysmally low rating for the number of sales he actually has. I wouldn't order from him. Basically, anything less than about 99.5 with that number of sales is a no-go, for me.

[motteditor.livejournal.com]

Whoops, shows what I know. : ) I generally don't buy used books online.

Now get back to writing the House War sequel. I want to know what happens when Jewel gets back from the Dominion or when Angel will show up (and what the story is with that hair) since he (IIRC) was the one den member not in book one! : )

[msagara.livejournal.com]

Whoops, shows what I know. : ) I generally don't buy used books online.

And that, on my side, was incredibly terse, which I didn't intend, and for which I apologize. I generally buy no fiction at all on-line, because I really like to browse in bookstores. But I have bought a number of dictionaries on-line because you can find them for 9 or 10 dollars used, when they cost 80.00 new. And on ebay, losing even half a percent at 13k customers means you and the customer couldn't come to some reasonable conclusion. 100%, on the other hand, probably means that you're losing money on some people who know you don't want to drop your approval rating...

And as for the latter, Angel is the opener for the next book, in a longish sequence that does, in fact, involve his hair, in part :)

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

What is that seller thinking? Cheats and con artists can be so clumsy and stupid about it.

[arouraleona.livejournal.com]

Actually just a straight report from her doesn't do much good because they don't have a lot of ways to verify her as the author. Her publisher/vendor might be a better option. Reporting the seller is a great idea though. Since it is obvious from the main page that the book isn't out yet and he HAS to be selling an illegal copy. (I worked for Amazon for a while).