[ficbot]

I have been doing some comparison shopping trying to put together another article for Teleread, and I don't know what end is up anymore.

How about this one: inspired by my recent shelf space liberation due to Anne-Marie Macdonald's massive doorstopper of a first book hitting Kobo, I did a search for her second book. Here is what I found:

- Fictionwise: Not listed
- Sony: Not listed, but they had book #1 for $13.99
- Kobo: $13.39 with a list price of $23
- Amazon ebook: $10.99 "this price was set by the publisher"
- Amazon.com cheapest print version: $11.66 paperback
- Amazon.ca cheapest print version: $16.79 paperback

So I guess Kobo, being Canadian, will not be able to compete on price because they will have to base their e-price on the Canadian paperback, and our print books have always been more expensive. But they have been more expensive because of import and distribution issues in the print chain, so this doesn't really seem fair. And it doesn't explain why the ebook list price is $23 when even the highest-priced paperback is cheaper.

I thought the 'price set by publisher' thing would standardize the book prices. I also thought they would drop as the book aged. This book was published in 2004 so giving us a whole $2-3 off the paper version doesn't really seem like much of a bone.

I am so bitter about this. I'll happily pay for the books I want to read, but it seems they are really taking advantage and not playing fair here, and ebook readers are some of their most loyal customers (I mean, we read enough to shell out for the devices, that's saying something). Bottom line is, $12 for an ebook is about my maximum ceiling, and I'd have to really want the book to spend that much. Any higher and it goes on my wishlist until either the price drops or the library gets it, whichever comes first.