Before I get into the nitty gritty, please enjoy this picture of me using the female as my pillow. She’s such a good human slave, doing what I want, when I want, and how I want. See? She was doing a good job. How do you know? I’m smiling!
Now that you have been brought into line with the cuteness of my sleeping self, I am barring the female from working to discuss a surprisingly complicated and controversial subject: ARCs. Advanced Reader Copies. AKA, free books exchanged for review.
The female doesn’t do them. This upsets people.
If you want free books from the female, ask your library to stock them. If your library doesn’t stock them, ask why they don’t have access to either Overdrive, Baker & Tayler, Bibliotheca, or Hoopla. Ingram also distributes to libraries, so they can purchase print editions, which are available a few weeks following the digital edition on average.
The books are available at most libraries, but if you want access to them, you need to ask. Bring a list of my titles you want to read and give them to your librarian. Have friends or family in the area? Have them bring a list of my titles, too. The more people that request the books, the better the chances that your library will stock them. If people check them out, the library may just order my books at release because they know their patrons want to read them.
The female loves libraries.
The female does not love being a library. She also doesn’t love when people steal tens of thousands of dollars from her because they’re unwilling to use the library. (That’s how much she’s had stolen from her on Playing with Fire alone. And no, most of these readers never do end up buying a book, so please take the excuse of ‘it gets more readers for you, doesn’t it?’ and return it to the pits of hell where it belongs. They’ll just steal the next books, too.)
Since starting her career, she has heard every sob story in the book, but the answer is going to be the same: please make use of your local library! They often do digital delivery now, so you don’t actually have to go to the library unless you don’t have an account or library card, in which case you may need to if their system doesn’t offer digital account creation.
Some do.
The only people who receive ARCs are volunteers who are looking for proofing errors before publication, and therefor aren’t even receiving the ARC for free as they’re paying for it in their time and effort to report mistakes, or the female’s paid staff.
There are currently no opening for beta proofreaders, who receive the manuscript shortly before its release to help locate any additional errors that slipped through the paid staff.
Every now and then, she selects a few new bodies from The Fantasy Worlds of RJ Blain readers’ group to join the beta crew, but this is few and far between, and the invited people are usually those who have done things like politely and accurately reported an error. (You would not believe the number of people who claim they are grammar nazis and file incorrect reports. The female loves picking up her copy of Chicago Manual of Style, flipping to the appropriate page, and laughing at those who proclaim they are some deity’s gift to grammar… and get it wrong.)
It’s pretty common.
The female often gets it wrong. She uses regionalisms that break the rules, she uses slang, which also breaks the rules, and she plays with words to see what will happen. As such, mistakes happen. Some of the mistakes are intentional. Some aren’t.
Also, as a part of making her books more accessible, the female is working hard at getting all of her print books into large print. They’re more expensive, but they’re a fuckton easier to read. We’d be sorry they’re more expensive, but we’re really not.
She’s still on the fence over whether or not she’ll do the original trim size. As she figures it out, she’ll let you know.
We like supporting people with poor vision, and if you have a problem with the trim size adjustment because it looks wrong on your shelf, we ask you to consider those with disabilities.
Your local library might love a set of the books if you’re unhappy with them. Please ask. Libraries will accept donations of books they want if they think their patrons will use them. Just make sure you ask first, as every library has different policies.
What? Were you expecting us to grovel of that issue? We won’t. We are making this change to help people with vision AND arthritis problems. That trumps matching books on shelves. Sorry, but we’re not sorry for that choice.
Size matters, and the smaller books are much easier to hold in the hand, so it helps people with arthritis, too. Hell, the female doesn’t have arthritis, and they’re easier for her to hold and read, too.
We care about our readers, and we’d rather have mismatched books on a shelf than continue to exclude this readers.
Now, with that out of the way… onto some happier things!
Humor for the Holidays: a Bernadette Franklin Collection is now available!
You can grab the collection, which includes Claustrophobic, Shammed, Bat out of Hell, and Ginger Snapped at the following retailers: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Apple Books. Kobo is coming soon.
It costs $9.99, which saves you almost $7 on the set. So, it’s a good deal for you.
If you’re in a low-income situation, the female will be attempting to get a bookbub deal for this set sometime in September or October. But if you think your friends would love this variant of the female’s writing, this is a great way to get them hooked–and feed me treats. And pay for the female’s dental bills. You know, that sort of stuff.
Also, we would like to take a moment to remind people that thieves suck, pirate sites are usually trying to rob you of your credit card information or infect you with a virus, and nothing–and we really do mean nothing–comes for free.
If you can’t afford the female’s books, please visit your library. Otherwise, you’re stealing food out of my mouth, and I don’t like that. It makes me hope you pick up all sorts of nasty viruses from pirate sites, and that you have your hard-earned money stolen from your bank account, because that’s what you’re doing to us.
What? Did you actually expect us to shower you with confetti and say it was okay to steal?
Yeah, no.
Pirating books is theft, and it will always be theft.
Use your local libraries. That is what they are there for.
Signed,
The Department of Grumpy Kitties and Grumpier Females.
The theft is sad, because if they will do something like that, what will they stop at? Is there some way to help put something out there to reduce this? I would pay for a collection of books, even though I have all of them, that proceeds could be put to putting the books in libraries, or gifting the books? I dont want to reduce the profits that you have rightfully earned, but maybe something additional? The idea might not be greatest, but, because of my own selfishness, I do not want to see a reduction of your writing or choice of access because of some inconsiderate, immoral bastards.
Honestly? Call or write in to your local libraries and request the ebook collections. When they get them in, share them with your local friends and family and get them reading for free through the libraries. I get paid by the libraries, and people get to read my books. It works for everyone! You can always ask your library if they are accepting donations of the books, too, in which case you can order on their behalf, but you need to ask first because some libraries can only stock books they’ve purchased themselves. <3
I really appreciate you asking! The best way really is to just keep buying books and requesting them from your libraries--and checking them out so the librarians see these books are actually wanted. <3 (Especially print copies if they order them!)
I have to support the recommendation to use your public library (full disclosure: I worked in a library for more than 40 years before retiring). Almost all librarians will go out of their way to help you obtain the items you want — just ask politely please. I can’t tell you how many times I’d have to say “I’m sorry that we can’t do [blank]” and before I could get to the “but we can try to…” they’d be exploding at me. If you aren’t offered any, always ask for explanations and alternatives. For example, if your question of “do you have X” is answered with no, ask if there’s any way you can get access to a copy.
Yes! ALWAYS ask and wait for the but. Librarians are amazing. <3
Way to go cat! You keep your human writing now, no excuses. So her teeth hurt, that doesn’t buy your kitty treats.
Theft of copyright sucks!
I love your books and I am so sorry you have to deal with evil people who want them for free. I always say if you want to try a book read a sample from amazon I find if I can’t get interested from the free sample then I likely won’t like the book. But your samples on amazon are epic and always get me hooked. So looking for ward to buying both the digital and print copies for you next up coming books.
Love,
Lonely little book dragon
I have a quick question that is slightly off topic. Kind of. I love your books and I always buy them, even multiple copies, as I tend to get the collections and audiobooks as well as the digital copies. However, I do use my audible credits to purchase the audiobooks as it is a bit cheaper. I save about seven dollars. Does that effect your bottom line? How does that work?
Use your credits. I still get paid. <3
Hate to ruin your righteous lecture, but no, bigger font is not better for all people with vision problems. Some of us are actually get physically sick trying to read large fonts. And have to set up fonts on all devices to the smallest available. I don’t care about the cover sizes much (though I do prefer to have series in same format), but larger font is definitely not a good news for me.
That being said, I don’t actually think it’s going to be too big of a problem, since you’re choosing the smaller book size and I don’t think that means the print is going to be LARGE large (or so I hope). I once bought a large print book by mistake. Couldn’t read it without getting sick, so I’m not trying that again.
I would just appreciate if you called it like it is—choosing large font is prioritising people with SPECIFIC disability. It is definitely not easier for EVERYONE to read. So if we have problems with it, it sometimes is not because of how books look on our bookshelves, or because we are close-minded bulls who don’t want to think about people with disabilities, but because humans tend to choose to make something that was good for us a little worse, act like other disabilities matter much more than yours does, and be all righteous about it.
Completely agree on the library issue though, but have a feeling that people who are upset about ARCs are upset more because of some ideas of exclusivity, and being ‘being cool people who receive ARCs for reviews and pretty pictures on Instagram, and can read books before everyone else’, rather than just wanting free books.
There is no way to please everyone, but larger fonts are better for the highest number of people. I happen to be one of those people who can’t read small font because I’m gradually going blind.
I’m sorry you’re offended by my choice to do it. “Going blind” is a disability that a lot of people have. Larger font is easier for most people who are going blind, such as myself.
I have received many, many complaints about the font being too small for people to read. I have never received a single note thanking me for small print.
Take that as you will. I have taken photographs of the two font sizes side by side.
I recommend you don’t purchase any of my print books in the future, because you won’t like them.
I’m not going back to small print because I exclude far more people than I include that way. Even if it’s a ‘specific’ disability.
There is no one font size that will work for everyone. But there are more who need large font than the other way around.
I’m not offended by your choice, I’m only offended when saying that I dislike this choice and it doesn’t work for me and my disability somehow makes me into a bad person who doesn’t care about other people’s disabilities.
And if you can say ‘people who need smaller font to be able to read should just stick to the electronic format’, you can say just as well ‘people who need larger font to be able to read should just stick to the electronic format, because then they can make their letter as big as they want’.
I don’t even want you to change your mind. I just wanted to point out that when you say ‘I’m doing this thing because it is a good thing to do and it will make things fuckton easier for people, and if you don’t agree than you are wrong’, maybe it’s important to remember that world is not one-sided thing, and there are many kinds of reading disabilities, and while you have all the rights to pick a side that works better for you, saying that one disability is more important than others is not a good thing to say. People with autism have as much rights to be a able to comfortably read printed books as people who ‘gradually go blind’.
I’m sorry you’re offended by my choice, and I’m sorry you find larger print books difficult to read.
And I do mean that. I *cannot* cater to every reader. It’s impossible. My complaints, to date, before you said anything was, “But the books won’t match on my self!”
You’re the first person I have ever met that has a problem with larger print sizes, and I AM sorry this change will bother you. But I get constant floods from the other side, and I’m very, very tired of receiving complaints people are upset because the change unbalances their bookshelf. It’s very, very frustrating for me.
Anyway, I apologize for losing my temper, as from top to bottom, the print books have been a pretty terrible and expensive experience for me.
I’m sorry as well, while I didn’t mean to ‘take it out’ on you and this specific issue… sometimes, when you live with autism, you just hear the ‘it may be bad for you, but it’s better for the majority of people, so who cares?’ (not that this was how you said it, that’s just how people usually do it in everyday life…’majority is important, you are not, deal’) a few too many times and it kind of gets really frustrating.
I suspect that the reason why you have never heard about such issues is that when it comes up, 9 times out of 10, an autistic person will choose to shut up and think ‘well, not like I could’ve expected any different’.
I imagine that hearing people not being enthusiastic and supportive about a change that you made for them and that you had to work hard to carry through is very painful. If you let it be.
I’m very probably going to quit print editions all together because I do my best, it’s not good enough. Print creates a great deal of stress for me because I try to please as many people as possible. I work hard to accommodate those with disabilities. I picked the sizes I did because of a great deal of feedback into what is hurting the most number of people.
But, please note in the original post, the line very specifically said “For those of you who are upset that the books no longer match on the shelf.” This is literally people who just wanted their books to match on the shelf and had ZERO bearing on the text inside of the book.
I am very sorry you interpreted this to mean anything other than that, because that was never my intention.
It’s enough. Doing your best, I mean.
But, honestly? Maybe justifying it as doing best for someone else is not working out. I hope you feel stronger about the decision you made because it’s about YOUR books, and they are beautiful and you love how they look and feel in your hands, and you’d like for people to have them and hold them in the shapes you feel fits your books the most.
(And now I feel like people are going to stone me because I’m to blame for making you believe you should discontinue print… Please don’t discontinue print, I don’t want to be murdered)
All I can say is please re-read the post very carefully, and choose to not be offended by what you think you read and read who was actually being addressed.
I’ve apologized, and I’m done having this conversation with you. Have a good night.
Also, when the complaints are “My books won’t match!” on my bookshelf, yes, I’m going to get ‘righteous’ about it.
Have a nice day.
P.S.: I’m not changing my mind or my reasoning for the print size changes, even if you’re one of the few who won’t like it. Please stick to ebook moving forward. You can read as small as you like, then. The print formatting has zero bearing on ebook settings.
Honestly, no problem with any of this! I love your books, they are worth the cost to own so I can reread.
I do however want to know if I have just missed the story about Perky and his mad scientist wife.
Any time you want a new beta crew member, I would love it, AND I bake! Just saying! 😉
Perky and Perkette are only found in Playing with Fire and Burn, Baby, Burn, sorry! <3 They'll be back in the Flame Game as well.
I’m so sorry for the loss of income. I always buy the books I’m interested in. I do however enjoy entering contests that give signed copies and no I’m not saying you should do that either. It’s just away for some of us to have the personalization from the author they adore. Thank you for all your hard work it’s very appreciated by most of your readers.
I’m mad at you! Why? Because I discovered you and your many pseudonyms about 1 year ago and you’re costing me a bundle because when I find authors that I really like I refuse to get them from the library I want to own them! Thank God, my 60th birthday was right after I discovered you and I got Amazon g.c.’s for it!!!
I agree with you! If a few people need bigger print they and get higher power reading glasses….or an ereader which can up the print to huge or larger.
Not disparaging those with eyesight problems but there are ways to read without huge print paper – E-readers. I do that when the font is tiny on my ereader. I’m not sure if all libraries have e-readers for folks to use/check out but some do. Samsung Tab A basic e-reader is about $12 and can use kindle or Epub books. I have several sizes of Samsung tablets (Kindle prices are sky high). If customers can buy paper books they can get an ereader. Paper has gone sky high now for popular books and series (around $20 avg if not on sale).
I also do some tiny cross stitch and needlepoint (22- 30 count) and I have +1.50 to +4.50 reading glasses for it. Dollar Tree is my friend, LOL. I forget to slide them up on my head some times and that is an eye rush. If they can afford to buy books they can spend $1 for reading glasses.
When the ereader and ebooks first came out, Sony in 2005 (they invented the reader and the e-ink that everyone uses now), I was hooked on them. I still use my Sony reader (have 6 backups). I got a kindle as a gift a few 4 years ago but didn’t like it – not user friendly enough for me. My grandkids have kindles though.
So don’t spend the money for large print. It is definitely not worth it no matter how many people whine about it.
FIY, I have about 94K ebooks I keep in Calibre on my laptop. Yes I back up frequently. The Calibre program came out in 2006 when I was in iraq; I just knew someone would make program store/catalogue ebooks LOL. Strangely enough, most ebooks come from Amazon. B&N stopped letting one download their books in 2008. Caliber can format Amazon to all other formats available worldwide. The program is free but I donate a few times a year.
I’ve bent your ear enough. I love your books.
Yeah, I have vision-based problems, and I almost exclusively read on e-readers because of them. I DO understand why people like print, especially library patrons. Many libraries don’t offer e-readers for rent, and many people don’t *have* computers, especially older people. They rely on print books they can order on their phone, and phones are *terrible* for people with vision-based issues when trying to read a book. I totally understand that.
And the e-readers that are good for people like me, with the vision based issues requiring e-ink, those things are expensive. My favorite device is a $250ish monster. Kindle is decent at $80ish but no yellow-light mode (which is a factor, especially for people like me.)
So, I do understand both sides of the fence.
Some people get annoyed at larger fonts, but there are people who, even WITH magnifiers, can only read the larger font. And I get that.
That’s why I try to do something that’s accessible for everyone… and being annoyed with large font and not enjoying it is NOT the same as “Simply can’t read it at all even with tools to help.” And the old versions… had very small print.