I don't know how often I've heard people going on about how eBooks are just too expensive. Actually, I thought they were, too--which is why I decided to offer affordable electronic fiction. All of our books start at a buck for the first month, and our regular pricing is only $3.99. A great deal, right? I thought so, until I read the blog over at Pink Petal Books slamming me for charging so little. Here's the link: http://www.pinkpetalbooks.com/?p=19. My sister (one of two economists in my family) reminds me that prices have signal value. Thus, part of the reason a Rolex is so expensive is because that's how Rolex sends the message that you're getting a premium product. Considering that you can buy the same Nobel Literature prize-winning book for thirty dollars in hardback and $6.99 in paperback, I hadn't thought that the pricing would carry the same baggage in the world of books but Pink Petal certainly does. (Thanks to Dave Rothwell over at www.teleread.org/blog for the heads-up on this comment.

How about this--for the next thirty days, if you read one of our books and think we charged too little, you're welcome to send an additional ten dollars.

It was a pretty lazy day. Karen and I walked to breakfast at Normas, then down to Bishop for an art fair on the square. Karen did the meet and greet with some of her artist buddies and I wished I'd changed the batteries in my Palm before I'd left--one of the great advantages of eBooks is that you can carry them to places where you can't carry even a paperback--but you do have to be at least a little bit prepared.

I'm going to make DEAD ON by Michael Paulson the www.BooksForABuck.com book of the day. Deacon Bishop heads to south Texas--just in time to find his new client's murdered body. Without a client, he doesn't have a job but he decides to stick around and watch what happens. It turns out to be a dangerous decision. Only $3.99. Learn more, read the free excerpt, or buy the entire eNovel here: www.booksforabuck.com/mystery/mys_06/dead_on.html. (Available in HTML, Adobe Acrobat PDF, Palm Reader/eReader, and Microsoft Reader formats). Here's the cover (cover design by Karen Leabo):

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