Welcome to the Jungle -- notes on ebook selection

In the kindle store, the brave new world of self-publishing has changed everything. It is now possible for any semi-literate schlub to upload his unedited, poorly written, derivative John Sanford’esque “thriller” in about fifteen minutes flat, priced at 2.99.

So, from a veteran of the E-book revolution, some tips before you buy:
First, don’t ever pay money to buy a book from an author unknown to you without reading the sample first. Yes, this is inconvenient. However, the sample is generally 10% of the book. If the book sucks in the first 10%, it is not going to get better. It’s just not. Although, honestly, even if the sample is all right, that is no guarantee of quality. Sad to say, there are authors out there who hire someone to edit and polish only the first 10% of the book. Because that is what the prospective purchaser sees when they sample.

Second, the review system on amazon.com is almost completely broken. Five-star-reviews are often not to be trusted. Before you buy a book on the strength of 75 five-star-reviews, ask yourself the following questions: do any of those five-star-reviewers have more than one review to their credit? Do all of the reviews sound like marketing copy? Are there any one, two or three star reviews? Because if there aren’t, someone is probably gaming the system. How do we know this? Look up your favorite book in the whole world. The one that, in your opinion, exemplifies the Most Amazing Writing ever (whatever that book is.

Chances are, it has about 70% 5-star-reviews, about 20% 4, 3 & 2 star reviews, & about 10% 1 star reviews. There has not been a book written that legitimately gets only 5 star reviews. My personal favorite, To Kill a Mockingbird: 1,644 (73.9%) 5-star-reviews; 499 (22.4%) 4, 3, & 2 star reviews, & 81 (3.7%) 1-star-reviews. And this is To Kill a Mockingbird, for crying out loud. Very few books of this level of quality are published & still, 25% of its reviews are less than 5-stars.

Many authors see the review section of their books page as just another place to market their books. They enlist friends & family to provide “reviews” of their book, whether they’ve read it or not, without disclosing the bias. They set up sock puppets and review themselves. There are actually companies that will provide reviews for a fee. All of this is completely dishonest and fraudulent. You can decide for yourselves whether you want to reward this kind of behavior by sending the author your money.

Third, learn to identify publishers. It is helpful to know the names of traditional publishing companies & their genre imprints. This will help you to separate books that are traditionally published from books that are self-published. Many self-published authors understand that self-publishing does not have the best reputation right now. They are publishing their books under “publishers” that they have made up. So, if you’ve never heard of the publisher, don’t assume that it IS a publisher. I could publish a book under the “Harper Dove” imprint, and that wouldn’t mean a darned thing. Because I literally just made it up. It will also be helpful for you to know that PublishAmerica and Authorhouse are generally considered vanity publishers. They will pretty much publish anything, as long as the author pays them to do it.

Fourth, forget that you ever heard the phrase “don’t judge a book by its cover.” Because, when you are looking for kindle books, to some degree, you can judge a book by its cover. A cover that is scary, ugly, or just plain amateur hour offers a clue that the prose beneath the cover will be scary, ugly, or just plain amateur hour. The bottom line is: professional authors want their book to look professional. Yes, pretty covers are probably expensive. So are editors. So an author who can’t (or won’t) invest in a decent cover, probably can’t (or won’t) invest in editing, either. It is my vast experience that the professionalism of the cover is directly proportional to the professionalism of the prose that is contained therein.

Finally, understand this: the “slush pile” of yore is the equivalent of the dragon. It is a mythical beast that now exists only in some parallel realm. The “slush pile” has been uploaded to amazon.com, book by book, and is waiting for you there. The gatekeepers are gone, the barriers of entry have fallen. You are your own gatekeeper.
Not all self-published books are bad. Please, do not leave this thread thinking that I am telling you to never buy a self-published book. I’ve read a number of them that were darned good – very entertaining. Beautifully edited. Extremely professional. I’ve also read some that were genuinely dreadful. And, I’ve sampled and deleted more than I care to count.

Caveat Emptor applies here, in the kindle world, just like it does anywhere else. And, if I do nothing else but disabuse new kindlers of a lingering, but false, sense that all of the books that have been uploaded have undergone some sort of “quality control” process then I have done what I intended to do.