Stop Book Piracy.. A Letter to my Readers

Dear Readers,

I am going to age myself a bit with this story, but here goes. I was a freshman in college. I had my first car and had wanted a cd player for my car more than anything. I saved and pinched every penny and finally had enough to buy the one I had been eyeing.  I loved cruising around town listening to my favorite music, and knowing that I worked for this and paid for it with my own money.

During my summer breaks from school I worked two jobs to save money for my next school year. I left work one afternoon to discover that my car had been broken into and my cd player had been ripped out of the dash. To add insult to injury the culprit had also went through my cd collection and taken only the cd's they wanted.. I guess they weren't fans of Mariah Carey or the Backstreet Boys. I will never forget that silent ride home that night and the feeling of having something that I worked so hard for stolen from me.

Last night I read that one my new favorite authors was informed her new book, set for release in February was available on a pirated book site.  The worst part about this story is that this book was only available through publishers and Edelweiss, one of the sites used to distribute ARC's. This was stolen by someone that was trusted to receive this ARC, and then pirated. She is not the first author I have heard this happen to recently. This enrages me! Authors give their all to write these amazing stories for us. I hurt for the feeling of betrayal they must feel when they realize something they put their heart and soul into has been stolen from them.

In a random act of kindness, someone close to me replaced my cd player as a surprise. The replacement cd player had a removable front that allowed me the security of knowing it would be very hard for someone to ever steal from me again. Once a book is stolen there is no replacing the authors loss.

Authors, even best-selling authors are making pennies on every book sale. EACH sale matters to them and if you are a true reader and fan, spend the money. Spending money and buying these books is a way to insure that more books like these will be written.  If there is a book that you want to read and you can't afford it, check out your local library. Most local libraries even have lendable eBooks now! I am writing this blog to encourage others to report book piracy if you see it happening. Send a note to the publisher, find the author's email address or  facebook page and let them know. If people stop looking for FREE books, then the demand for pirated books will disappear.


Support your favorite authors, encourage others to do the same and until next time… Happy Reading!

Love,
Melissa