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As a newbie author I wrote The Roaring Road and when I found it was way too big I separated it into two books, and the ISBN titles were registered as:The Roaring Road Book #1 with the subtitle The Road West.
The second is The Roaring Road Book #2 with the subtitle The Road East. The overall series name is The Roaring Road, which I have in mind to become a six book set.
At the time I thought the subtitles would eliminate confusion. I was wrong. Should have made a completely different title for Book #2 and not bothered with subtitles. I promise that in the future I will always have separate and distinct titles.
So here's the ISBN setup. In my mind I see a large can of worms being opened, but here goes:
TRR Book #1 Kindle .mobi format: 978-0-9964861-2-5
TRR Book #1 .epub format: 978-0-9964861-4-9
TRR Book #1 paperback format: 978-0-9964861-0-1
TRR Book #2 Kindle .mobi format: 978-0-9964861-3-2
TRR Book #2 .epub format: 978-0-9964861-5-6
TRR Book #2 paperback format: 978-0-9964861-1-8
I learned later that separate ISBNs are not needed for the electronic formats as long as they are the exact same cover and text, and that I probably don't need one at all for Kindle, as Amazon assigns their own ASIN. However, I had already registered the ISBNs. Which led to something else I just found - that the epub ISBNs for TRR #1 and #2 are not shown under my name because I neglected to add the period to the author middle initials, and from my author dashboard I cannot change that, since I am Johann C.M. Laesecke (with the periods in the initials) on my profile. Can you help with that or should I post a separate request? Lesson learned - I see that I could have just sent a book setup request to the Librarians and it would have been right the first time! [facepalm]
FYI - I gave Road Trip Blues (TRR series book #3) the same ISBN for .mobi and .epub formats: 978-0-9964861-7-0
Road Trip Blues paperback ISBN: 978-0-9964861-6-3
RTB electronic books are published but the RTB paperback is technically still in process as I am waiting for the printed proof book before listing it for sale on Amazon, which should happen next week. I really do appreciate your help straightening out my mess.
Tim, I'm from Chicago and the series starts in Long Grove, where my father was born. If you know Long Grove you may have been to The Village Tavern, which my grandfather owned and operated during Prohibition. But that's another story. As for page count, all of them are over 300 pages, about 125,000 words each. I originally wrote 280,000 words for The Roaring Road, and even cutting it down to 250,000 was too much for one book, ergo, Book 1 and Book 2. Anyway, don't worry if it takes a little longer to track down and fix, I am a big fan of fixing things properly rather than fast. I should take my own advice...
That solution concerns me because Amazon does show it as: "The Roaring Road: Book 1 - The Road West (The Roaring Road series)" and in the lower line that shows the series it says:
"Book 1 of 3 in The Roaring Road Series"
Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B014LUHO6C?...
I searched Amazon for "The Road West" and my book did not show up at all in the first ten pages of results, which creates confusion if a potential reader sees that title on GR then goes to Amazon and can't find it.
Kobo shows it nearly the same as Amazon: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/search?Que...
As does Barnes & Noble:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-...
On all the websites I checked the title always shows "The Roaring Road" for the first two books, and the book number of the series. I fear that using the subtitle will create confusion and lose sales.
The 'get a copy' links on Goodreads use the identifiers (ISBN or ASIN) to locate books on booksellers' sites, so there is no need to search by title.
That's all well and good if the link is selected, but some will look it up by title on the retailer sites and not find it, or they may see the book title in large type and think they have the wrong book. Too much confusion calling my books by subtitles. It does not make sense that GR would find it necessary to show my books differently than Amazon and other book retailers. I have been promoting the first two book titles as The Roaring Road and that's not unusual since they were the leadoff books of the series, so if someone went to GR they would not find The Roaring Road by doing a word search.
Mod
Book Title (Series #1)
which how is how the books have been set up.
Mod
Since the series name is in the title field, the books will show up with that search string.
https://www.goodreads.com/search?q=Ro...
But that is not the title of the book. The title is clearly printed in large type on the cover. The ISBN titles are legally registered as The Roaring Road. The books have been promoted as The Roaring Road, as titled. The book titles are listed on all retailers as The Roaring Road. That the series name is the same as the title of the first two books and adding Book 1 and Book 2 is not confusing. As the author, having properly titled my books, I do not want them listed under a false title that will only confuse readers and future readers by adding confusion where there is none. The fact that the book title and series title are the same should not be a reason to arbitrarily, and without my consent, show something that is not the title. Please advise how I can appeal this decision.
I had to cancel my series promotion this morning and have lost money because Goodreads is not listing my books by their legitimate titles. A Goodreads rule does not change the title of a book, and in fact I cannot find any evidence of such a rule that allows a librarian to change the title of a book. Regardless, just because someone doesn't like the title or series does not give them authority to change it. My book titles have been properly registered with ISBN numbers and that cannot be changed or the words re-ordered on a capricious whim, not even by the author.
The bottom line is: My books, my titles. Any other change or re-ordering of the words is misrepresentation and theft of my work. I do not consent to the renaming of my published work. The books are to be listed with the correct titles.
Librarians are volunteers and have to adhere to Goodreads policy. If you don't agree with the policy (which is anything but a capricious whim), please complain to staff: support (at) goodreads (dot) com
Your page counts are incorrect. Book #1 is 310 pages. Book # 2 is 312 pages. Book #3 is 342 pages. Each of the books contains approximately 125,000 words, Book #3 is slightly longer because I used a point size larger font by request of my readers. Fonts and pages on electronic books are inconsistent with the reality of the size of the book. Please advise where the Goodreads rule shows that my book titles can be arbitrarily changed. My legal advice is that the ISBN title cannot be changed.
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The Roaring Road Book 1 (#1 in The Roaring Road series)
The Roaring Road Book 2 (#2 in The Roaring Road series)
Road Trip Blues (#3 in The Roaring Road series)
-The listings for TRR Books 1 & 2 show they are part of a series called The Road West, which is the subtitle of Book 1 and not the series name. Request the series on these books be corrected to The Roaring Road, Book 1 is #1, Book 2 is #2 in the series.
-Road Trip Blues (recently published) does not show any series identification, request it be listed as #3 in The Roaring Road series.
Thank you!