Why I No Longer Sell on Amazon

When I published my first book in 2011, I used Lulu. At the time, it was one of the few print-on-demand options that allowed authors to retain control over content, pricing, and distribution. Over the years, I explored other publishing routes, including limited digital placement on Amazon Kindle, but I remained consistent with Lulu for physical books. As of this writing, I am still evaluating whether those remaining Kindle titles will stay available.

This is often where new authors assume the story should begin. They are told, implicitly or explicitly, that publishing means Amazon. That an Amazon Author Page is a requirement. That visibility, legitimacy, and income move through one platform. Creating a free Amazon Author Page can provide modest surface benefits. It allows an author to centralize a biography, link titles together, and appear searchable within Amazon’s internal system. For some, it functions as a digital business card rather than a source of income.

What is rarely explained is what that page does not do.

• It does not guarantee sales.
• It does not ensure reviews.
• It does not trigger algorithmic favor.
• It does not compensate authors fairly.
• And it is not required in order to earn money from book sales.

I write across many platforms because writing is not a marketing strategy for me. It is a lifelong practice. I publish without monitoring engagement metrics. I do not track likes, shares, comments, highlights, or rankings in real time. At the end of each year, I compile everything I have written across all platforms into a single bound volume. A year book. That practice exists for one reason. Preservation. If a platform collapses, sells, censors, or disappears, the work remains accessible to my family and future generations.

Most new authors are not operating from that position. They sit by the stats button. They watch dashboards. They wait for reviews to appear. They give away copies, knowing people have read the book, then wait for confirmation (in form of reviews) that never arrive. When no reviews appear, disappointment sets in. Expectations collide with reality. The silence feels personal.

But the problem is not usually the author.

The problem is that none of this is explained up front.

• Authors are not told how difficult it is to convert a free copy into a review.
• They are rarely told how often readers leave no feedback at all.
• They are not told how algorithms de-prioritize slow-moving nonfiction.
• They are not told how pricing pressure erodes royalties.
• They are not told that third-party resellers may profit from their work without their knowledge or consent.

As of now, the only traditionally published books authored by me that appear on Amazon and similar platforms are sold by third-party resellers. I no longer list books directly on Amazon. I no longer participate in global distribution through Lulu either. That decision was not ideological. It was analytical.

I stopped because of math. Because of repeated exposure to systems that quietly extract labor while presenting themselves as neutral.

After decades working in forensic casework and behavioral science, I learned to study structures rather than stories.

Amazon is a structure. When you examine how it functions, the outcome for independent authors is not mysterious. It is predictable.

Amazon does not exist to compensate authors. It exists to move inventory at scale. In that model, the author is not the primary beneficiary of a sale. The platform is. Then come printers, distributors, fulfillment partners, advertisers, and third-party sellers. The author appears last, if at all.

Many readers assume that buying a book on Amazon directly supports the writer. In most cases, it does not. After printing costs, distribution fees, platform percentages, discounting pressure, and algorithmic controls, the remaining royalty often falls below the cost of producing a single physical copy. In some reseller arrangements, the author receives nothing. This is not a malfunction. It is the design.

I have spent much of my career studying why people comply with harmful systems without overt coercion. The pattern is consistent. The system presents itself as inevitable. Amazon does the same. Authors are told exposure is compensation. That volume will eventually offset loss. That leaving means invisibility. None of those claims survive close inspection.

There is another disconnect that authors are rarely encouraged to articulate.

Some work has value that does not register in online retail systems at all. Some books matter because they are cited in courtrooms. Because they inform clinical practice. Because they are used in classrooms. Because they preserve historical or cultural record. Like my books do.

That kind of relevance unfolds over time. It does not spike. It accumulates.

• Amazon measures none of that.

• Amazon measures velocity only.

It tracks how quickly a book sells in short windows. How often it is clicked. How fast it converts. How well it feeds continuous motion.

It does not measure whether a book is used in legal proceedings, referenced in professional training, relied on by educators, or returned to years later by readers who needed it again.

Those are different value systems.

When authors confuse one for the other, they internalize failure that does not belong to them. A book can be relevant without being fast. It can be necessary without being visible. It can do real work in the world without ever pleasing an algorithm designed to move inventory rather than knowledge.

Understanding that difference is the point of this examination.

And the examination begins with how money actually moves inside the system.

• Royalty structures

Amazon royalties are often framed as generous until the deductions are examined. Print-on-demand costs are non-negotiable. Platform fees are fixed. Discounting is frequently controlled by the platform, not the author. When a book is discounted to remain competitive, the author’s share shrinks again. In practical terms, this means authors carry the creative labor, the reputational risk, and the production burden while the platform retains pricing control.

• Algorithmic suppression

Visibility on Amazon is not neutral. It is governed by opaque algorithms that reward rapid sales velocity, advertising spend, and trend alignment. Serious nonfiction, investigative work, and long-form educational writing do not perform well under these conditions. Books that challenge dominant narratives or address uncomfortable subjects are often buried, not because of content violations, but because they do not convert quickly enough.

• Third-party reselling

Once a book enters Amazon’s ecosystem, authors lose control over how it is sold. Third-party sellers can list used or overstock copies at inflated or distorted prices. Readers often assume these sales benefit the author. They do not. The author is not notified, consulted, or compensated.

• Psychological pressure on authors

I have worked with enough trauma survivors to recognize coercive framing when I see it. Authors are told that opting out is professional suicide. This creates compliance through fear rather than informed consent. The result is a population of writers quietly absorbing financial loss while blaming themselves for not marketing harder.

This model rewards scale and speed. It does not reward depth, accuracy, or ethical restraint. That is not accidental. Platforms optimized for volume cannot prioritize work that requires time to read, time to understand, or time to integrate.

I moved my books off Amazon and now sell through a platform that allows direct author compensation, pricing transparency, and reader clarity. When someone buys one of my books now, they are no longer subsidizing a logistics empire. They are purchasing work from the person who produced it... me.

I urge independent authors to examine the following:

• who benefits from each sale.
• who controls pricing.
• if visibility that does not pay you is actually visibility at all.

This is not a call to boycott Amazon; it is a call to literacy. When you understand how the system operates, you can make decisions that align with your goals rather than your assumptions. Once you see how this one works, participation becomes a choice rather than an obligation.

VIEW MY NEW BOOK STORE

Sources That Don’t Suck

Doctors, R. (2019). The business of being an author. Journal of Cultural Economics, 43(2), 213–229.

Epstein, M. J., & Yuthas, K. (2014). Measuring and improving social impacts: A guide for nonprofits, companies, and impact investors. Berrett-Koehler.

Gillespie, T. (2018). Custodians of the internet: Platforms, content moderation, and the hidden decisions that shape social media. Yale University Press.

Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Thompson, J. B. (2012). Merchants of culture: The publishing business in the twenty-first century. Polity Press.