How much do you pay for fiction ebooks?

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by stevenaleach

Why? In order to read the book. It would be a vast understatement to say that I don't have extra income to spend on books - after rent and my phone bill are paid, I have $276 left each month to cover all expenses, starting with food. Does my downloading a book cost the author anything? Well, of course not! Because if it weren't free it never would have made it into my collection

So you think you have some god-given right to steal books, merely because you can't afford to buy it? Do you apply that same logic to other aspects of life, too?

Oh, and if you hadn't noticed, a significant number of posts to this forum are ebook uploads. In fact that's how I found this forum to begin with - googling for an epub/mobi copy of something that I ended up downloading here.

They are all LEGAL uploads (a good many of them by me, as it happens). There's a lifetime - many, many lifetimes, in fact - of books in the public domain that you can perfectly legally download. Why steal? For heaven's sake - if you enjoy reading, which you obviously do, BUY books.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Why do you steal from authors? Don't you think that people who write books deserve to be paid for their work? You won't make any friends in these parts by telling people that you're a thief.

Because he needs to own 28,000 books and that trumps any moral or legal considerations.

Originally Posted by stevenaleach

However, my netbook contains around 28,000 books in epub/mobi formats (in a VERY slow Calibre library) plus a couple hundred gigabytes of PDF's on an external drive. When I hear a book mentioned that I think I might want to read, I usually google it immediately and have added it to my collection within minutes. <snip> The other day, two older ladies were sitting behind me in a coffee house and one was describing and recommending Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere to the other. Since I've never read anything by Gaiman, and it sounded interesting, I pulled out my tablet while listening - and had downloaded the book before she finished describing it. I have spent nothing on media in many years. Having less than $300 to live on once my rent and phone bill are paid each month, I don't feel guilty about this - I am not denying anyone sales that they would receive without my piracy.

[stevenaleach]

Again, having less than $10/day to live on doesn't leave much of a book budget . The difference comes down to the author getting $0.00 or $0.00.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by stevenaleach

Again, having less than $10/day to live on doesn't leave much of a book budget . The difference comes down to the author getting $0.00 or $0.00.

That's your problem, pal. It doesn't justify stealing. Ask in the "Reading Recommendations" forum and you can get recommendations for books that you can perfectly legally download in any genre you care to name.

[Dr. Drib]

Moderator Notice

stevenaleach - MobileRead requires that you stop your comments on acquiring copyrighted media via illegal means, whatever the justification. This is your only Official Warning. Further comments will result in a permanent ban from our site.

[mr_nihilism]

Right around $10 is my limit, although there is the rare exception.

[Tarana]

I don't think I've paid more than $9 for any fiction ebook ($14 for a non-fiction). I personally don't have any limit on what I will pay for an ebook since I can usually wait (a long time) for the price to drop or for it to be available at the library. I have actually been getting most of my new stuff on audiobook through my Audible membership. Some books, especially some British authors, I've only been able to get by buying through the author's website because of country restrictions. They usually cost more, but at least I can get them. I used to be able to get them from Kobo, but then they added that region restriction thing early this year. Bummer.

No different from the old days. I never bought the hardcovers except for 3 authors - I just waited until the paperback came out and I nearly always bought new.

[kyrilson]

I will not pay more than $10. However, my price tolerance varies widely from there.

For books I'm taking a chance on, I will go up to about $4. I rarely do this. Most of the time, books I take a chance on are from the Kindle Daily Deal, which are usually less than $3.

For books that have been recommended by friends that appear to like the same books I do, I will go up to $8 or so.

Books by my favorite authors do not have an upper bound, typically, I will buy no matter what, unless the price is ridiculous (over $15).

Is it me, or have prices been going down lately?

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by stevenaleach

Again, having less than $10/day to live on doesn't leave much of a book budget . The difference comes down to the author getting $0.00 or $0.00.

If you do not have a book budget, I suggest that you get an Amazon account (if you do not already have one) and sign up for any of the half-dozen or so Free Kindle emails.

Do that, and you can get your choice of dozens of different free books every day, all of them legal.

They may not be the exact books you want, but there is more free fiction out there than anyone could hope to read in a lifetime.

[CWatkinsNash]

Most books I pay very little for, either because they are inexpensive to begin with, or because of sales or coupon codes. I also get many from the library. Of course, I have lots of freebies from Amazon. But if a book is next in a series that I've been waiting on (Dresden Files, especially) I will pay whatever it costs, without hesitation.

So, generally less than $3, sometimes between $3 and $9, and occasionally much, much more.

[speakingtohe]

Originally Posted by stevenaleach

Again, having less than $10/day to live on doesn't leave much of a book budget . The difference comes down to the author getting $0.00 or $0.00.

If you borrowed from the library then the author would get something at least. Perhaps there are no libraries where you live?

Be that as it may, it is your choice to do as you wish but it is pretty déclassé, perhaps downright ignorant to brag about it.

Helen

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

[…] only one was $9.99. All the rest were $6.99 or less […]

I forgot to mention the maximum price I've ever paid for a fiction ebook. That was $13.76 in February 2009 for the newly released last book in Lois McMaster Bujold's Sharing Knife series.

I have paid 'higher' prices for certain books at Fictionwise, but only when they were on very high rebates. The highest priced fiction in that category was, I think, The Lord of the Rings, which I bought for $20.94 (with 100% rebate) in February 2009.

[Sydney's Mom]

There are so many free and library books, I rarely pay anything. But if it is an author I want to support, I will pay anything less than 14.99 (which is Agency. I spent 10.99 for Dr. Sleep and 11.99 for Double Down). But there are a lot of .99 books I refuse to buy--I am cheap, and since I may never read the book, even that is too much. For example, there is a book on the bestseller lest that is 5.00, and the fact that I have too many books on my TBR list right now, I won't buy it. So I guess I only pay for books I plan to read immediately.

[CommonReader]

Those are extremely low average prices that are being quoted here. Do you really get recent books by major authors at such low prices?
I find it quite difficult to get anything - fiction and non fiction - for less than 7 €, and that includes both German and English ebooks. I was quite happy to get Barbara Tuchman's "A Distant Mirror" (hardly a very recent work) for just 2 € at Kobo, that price has shot up to an unbelievable 10,34 € again right now.

Anyway, I don't have a fixed budget for what I am willing to spend. I spent 20 € on the third volume of Murakami's 1Q84 on the day it was released, but I had waited for it for months and I considered it as reasonable to reward a publisher who had commissioned a translation from Japanese into German well ahead of the release in English - instead of taking the cheap route of waiting for the English version and then have it translated from that version.

I save a lot by using my the ebook offers of my public library, though. It's getting better all the time and costs just 10 €/p.a.

[Synamon]

I don't often pay more than $3 for ebooks or $8 for audiobooks. I get a lot of material from the public library and wait for deals.