Digilibraries

I'll never beat The Art of War.

But let me explain why.

About a month ago, I received an invitation from DigiLibraries to post my books there. Obviously, they post free ebooks. I have several ebooks I have authored and I post them for people to download for free, even though I retain the copyright. It's free for the reader, but that doesn't mean people can use my writing without my permission.

Anywho, I decided to visit and see what they had. Here's what my questions were:

1. Do they keep track of how often something has been downloaded?

This is a MUST. I am a much happier person and a much happier writer if I don't worry about making money as a novelist, but that doesn't mean I don't like to see progress. I like to run the numbers at the end of each month and see how many times my books have been downloaded. If a site doesn't keep track--I'm out.

Lots of free ebook sites keep track of downloads differently. Some of them keep track so only the author can see how many times their book has been downloaded. Some of them post it on the ebook's page. DigiLibraries posts it on the ebook's download page. Fine.

2. Did I receive a special invitation or can anyone post there?

It looks like anyone can post there. Fine.

3. Can you remove your book at any time?

Yes. Fine. Good. If I hated the experience, I could pull my book down without a problem.

4. What kind of books are there?

They make you choose FICTION as a book category before choosing a genre. I think that's pretty insulting toward fiction. However, when I first went there everything on their most popular book list (that took up most of the home page) was fiction, so I felt like it balanced out. They also seemed to have a decent science fiction section and since I write a lot of science fiction, it looked fine to me. Most of their books are public domain books with slap-dash covers.

Well, that decided it for me. If there were people out there who wanted to download Pride and Prejudice with a crappy cover, maybe I'd get some readers.

I went in and uploaded two of my science fiction novels, Rose Red and Sleeping Prince.

So... That was fun. I watched my cute little book, Rose Red, climb the charts of the most popular list until...

It all came crashing down.

It turned out that DigiLibraries reset their download stats at the end of each month.

No.

Not going to do it.

I said it was a MUST.

So, I crafted a well-written email and explained to DigiLibraries that as a living author (unlike most of their other authors), I could not recommend their site to other writers or continue to post there myself unless this oversight was corrected. Living authors like to see their books spread around. They like to know they have readers. If they don't get to see download stats (whether they are public or private), there's no point in posting on their site.

I received a well-written reply explaining that they were working to fix the problem and they would fix it immediately. They restored my book's download stats and now my book, Rose Red, sits in the second highest spot on the most popular books on DigiLibraries, right after The Art of War. It has quite a few more downloads. I don't think I'll be able to overtake it, but I did beat out Pride and Prejudice.

My books occupy the first two slots on the Most Recently Added board because no one else has posted anything.

If you're an author here and you have posted a free book here, you might want to look them up and give them a try. Besides, I can't let that site be the Stephanie Van Orman show. Other authors need to contribute to make a library. Give it a go!