Amazon has introduced Kindle First, a program where customers can access Kindle books a month before their release date.
Amazon Publishing editors will select several titles to be part of the program every month. Customers can choose to read one for $1.99 – however, Prime members would be able to get the book free.
All Kindle First books become part of your permanent Kindle library.
The first Kindle books part of the program include Things We Set on Fire, by best-selling author Deborah Reed; No Place for a Dame, by best-selling romance author Connie Brockway; Silent Echo, by best-selling mystery author J.R. Rain; and We Will Survive: True Stories of Encouragement, Inspiration, and the Power of Song, by Grammy-award winning recording artist Gloria Gaynor.
All books will be published in December but are available to Kindle First members starting today. You can visit www.amazon.com/kindlefirst for more information.
Penguin debuted a similar program several months ago ‘First to Read,’ where readers can request a selected book early. If they are chosen to get that book, they can read it for free before it is released to the public. Readers also get points that can be used toward guaranteeing an early copy of a specific book.
Another similar program includes NetGalley that supports a number of publishers, including indies.
Update:
We reached out to Amazon to get clarification on a few points.
Above you stated: 1. There is no limit as to how many books can be bought/downloaded per month. However, as a Prime member, you can only get one book free under the Kindle First offer. It states on the Kindle First page: “Prime members can choose one featured book for FREE every month.” If you wanted one of the others you could pre-order it and pay the price listed.
If Amazon wants this to take off, it’ll need to add more variety. Three definitely seem to the chick lit and the fourth is about vampires. I not only don’t want to be the ‘first to read’ them. I don’t want to read them at all, free or not.
Sorry Mary … There is no limit as to how many books can be downloaded per title. Meaning, if 1,000 people want to download one title, they can. There is no cut off limit for how many times one title can be purchased/downloaded.
Post has been update to make the limit clearer (I hope.)
And Michael, Silent Rain isn’t about vampires. It’s a mystery. The author has previously self-published vampire books. Amazon didn’t select the best teaser display text. I grabbed it once I realized what it really was.
This is a great eBook deal.
“Three definitely seem to the chick lit and the fourth is about vampires.”
None of them appear to be about vampires. Nor do any of them meet the actual definition of “chick lit’.