After several months of trying different prices for the eBook version of the first two books in my Novum series, ranging from 99 cents to $2.99, I have finally made a decision to go with a fixed prices of $1.99 for each of the five books (two available now and three more coming up).
Why $1.99 per book? Several reasons actually. At the lowest price Amazon allows, which is 99 cents, I only make 35 cents per book, and considering what I pay for a professional editor to proof each volume, that's just too little. Conversely, the upper end of 2.99 per book I feel is too much to charge for a 25-30 thousand word story, especially one that is part of a series. At this price, I would be asking a reader to shell out nearly $15 to complete the series, and I just can't do that.
That leaves the middle price of $1.99, which boosts my royalties a bit, but more importantly, my readers will end up spending just $9.95 for the complete set, which is the price of many single novels on Amazon. When all five books are released, I will also release a single "combined" book, which will sell for a bit less, maybe $7.99, since additional editing will not be required.
See my next post for details on what happens between writing and publishing a book - the dreaded EDITING phase...
