Marianne Boutet asked Jordan Castillo Price:

I have been followiing you on Facebook recently and have really enjoyed your pics and commentary. My question follows: I have been seeing (on Amazon) books and even book series (compendiums) offered at really low prices (or even free). Do authors get any kind of return on these "bargains"?

Jordan Castillo Price Early on, the 99¢ box sets might make money for the authors, before the market became saturated with the ultra low-priced bundles. They'd make the profit on sheer volume. Nowadays 99¢ has become the norm on many genres and established authors are finding that unless they have a dedicated following, casual readers aren't willing to pay a regular price for their work anymore. Anything below $2.99 earns half-royalties on Amazon, too, so you need to sell a lot of 99¢ books to earn a reasonable return.

For my own work, I earn a very small royalty for something that's 99¢ (like a short story) and anything free would be a promotional item I'm giving away to attract new readers and reward current readers. It's less about having a reasonable return and more about having a story to tell that I don't feel I can charge $2.99 for due to its brevity.

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