Curious Behavior of Resellers

Here’s another interesting word of caution. My book, Living with Your Past Selves, has only been up on Waterstones for a few days, and already a seller in New Jersey is offering new copies of the book–for almost twice what Waterstones is charging. I noticed a similar odd pattern on Amazon UK (where another seller offered it for three times as much) and Barnes and Noble (more than twice as much). On the other hand, Amazon.com has someone offering new copies for 40% of what Amazon is offering them for. Has the world gone mad?

What reasonable book consumer would buy a new book for twice as much (or more) than it is being offered for on the same website? Would reasonable seller would offer new copies at a price that would cause them to lose money on them? I don’t get it. And what about the UK seller who was offering used copies (at more than new) before anyone had bought one in the UK? That has to be the weirdest example of virtual inventory I have ever heard of. I guess he was planning to rub them on the ground a little before sending them out, to make them look used.

The moral of all of these situations is to check the current new price before buying from an independent reseller. It is one thing to buy out-of-print books for above cover price, but don’t buy something still in print that way–it makes no sense.