Ebook Buying Addicts' Support Thread

[PurpleStar]

Originally Posted by issybird

^^I really, really should know better than to post in order to pat myself on the back. It's as if I'm begging the universe to trip me up; the universe obliged. Within 12 hours of the above I got an email from ereaderiq to tell me of four wishlist books that had dropped in price. Well, one must, in that instance. Right? But August is shaping up to be my worst month yet this year and by a long shot - I've spent nearly as much in August alone as in the first seven months of the year.

Yes if it's on your wishlist absolutely. I bought one too that went on sale today. Couldn't pass it up since it was a huge price drop and I've been wanting to read it.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by issybird

^^I really, really should know better than to post in order to pat myself on the back. It's as if I'm begging the universe to trip me up; the universe obliged. Within 12 hours of the above I got an email from ereaderiq to tell me of four wishlist books that had dropped in price. Well, one must, in that instance. Right? But August is shaping up to be my worst month yet this year and by a long shot - I've spent nearly as much in August alone as in the first seven months of the year.

Hubris will get you every time.

I won't even pretend I'm under control this month. The good news (if there is any in this) is that I've managed to keep the per book cost down well under $5. But even so, the actual number of books is fairly embarrassing. And now Kobo sent me a 40% coupon. Not a huge amount off, but for a book I already wanted...

[Bookpossum]

Oh well, I made the mistake of clicking on Kobo’s daily deals and there was a book I wanted for a mere $1.99. You know what I did about it. At least it was only one!

[Rev. Bob]

Of late, I’ve been feeding my jones to acquire by monitoring multiple series. I have enough of those flagged in a certain genre that I’ll commonly get a couple of freebie “hits” in a given week, and watching those lists keeps me from straying into actual costs-money territory.

Well, mostly. Sometimes I’ll see a full-priced volume drop to under three bucks and pick it up on that basis, but not frequently. Most of my paid acquisitions this year have been graphic novel markdowns, which I almost always read immediately. There have been a couple of exceptions, in which sales skipped Book 3 and reduced Book 4, and I picked up Book 4 with confidence that Book 3 will eventually go on sale and I can read both at once.

[DrNefario]

I totally blew it early on this month with the omnibus pricing error, and I've been struggling not to take that as blanket permission to buy my entire wishlist. I mean, I've already failed, right?

I'm trying to look at it as 8 things bought, rather than 30+ individual books. That still gives me an achievable target for my reading.

[BookCat]

I've become addicted to scouring Amazon for free Kindle ebooks; does this count for this addict's group? Very occasionally, I'll spend actual money on an ebook, but I'm extremely frugal.

[pdurrant]

Whether it counts is up to you. Several of us now consider freebies to not be worth the time spent on obtaining and curating them - it just takes up valuable reading time!

Of course, this only applies if you already have a stock of unread ebooks.

[BookCat]

Grand Mousey: I do have an ENORMOUSE stock of unread books, particularly classics, but sometimes I feel like kicking back and slumming it with a romance. If it's badly written, that encourages me to "do better than this" and get writing.

[pdurrant]

There's nothing wrong with romance novels in general. I view reading as entertainment. Read what entertains you.

Although whether the clunkier self-published freebies are worth anyone's time is another matter

[issybird]

August was not a good month. I bought seven books for $25. I can hide that in my YDT stats which still are not disastrous at 20 books for $54, but extrapolating from August alone tells a different story. Also, while my TBR for the year is still down 14, it's up two for August.

Five of my purchases were wishlist-on-sale, but I need to hope, perversely, that doesn't happen again soon. No excuses on the other two, where the price created the want.

Just shows; I thought I had this licked, but the addict remains and requires constant vigilance.

[Fbone]

I bought three books in August totaling $2.47 none on my wish list. Entrapped by the sale prices I'll admit.

Year-to-date numbers are still good, though, and I'm well under my annual budget.

[pdurrant]

My August total was the lowest of the year, just six books bought. But that was probably helped by being on holiday and away from easy computer access for two weeks.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

My August total was the lowest of the year, just six books bought. But that was probably helped by being on holiday and away from easy computer access for two weeks.

Hmm... Now up to six books bought in September already. Two were subscriptions. I was always going to buy them. Two were John le Carré on special offer, more for my wife than me. And two were wishlist (ereaderiq.com) books on special offer, that ereaderiq.com told me about.

I've been waiting two years for one of the special offer books!

[PurpleStar]

Well I bought 7 books in August and read two of them. Might read a couple of the others soon. Hope to purchase less in September. Maybe since I can now download books straight from overdrive I’ll borrow more instead of buy buy buy.

[DrNefario]

August was fairly disastrous for me, as detailed above, thanks largely to what I believe was an error in the pricing of omnibuses. I also reactivated my Prime at the end of the month, after less than two months off, thanks to a deal, and borrowed three books from Prime Reading/KOLL.

I gained:

2 books from the summer sale that I'd deferred from July
1 book from my wishlist that had a price drop (this is the only one I've read so far)
3 books in a 3-book omnibus from my wishlist that had a price drop
2 books from a 3-book where I'd already read book 1 and had book 2 on my wishlist
7 books from a 10-book omnibus where I'd read book 1 and already owned books 2 and 3
14 books in a 14-book omnibus by someone I was sort of thinking about reading
3 books in a 3-book omnibus I found while searching for things I could get during the deal
2 books borrowed from Prime Reading
1 book borrowed from the KOLL

I think that's it. 35 books added and only 10 read. I'm working from memory, since I'm on my iPad and it will probably lose this message if I switch to my google sheet to check. You can see my decline in fortitude by the time I hit the 14-book omnibus and know the battle is lost. Still, it did only cost me £3.99, and is now back up to £54.99(!)

Obviously I have begun September by borrowing a book from the library.

Edit: Having checked my records I have removed the 1 Monthly Deal book, which was actually July. Luckily I'd already allowed for that by getting the arithmetic wrong, so the total is still 35.