Book Cover Illustrations

I like used books. Used books fill about half my office and many were bought at bargain prices. If my office ever sinks into the earth without warning, it will likely be the weight of these books that caused the disaster.

For authors there is secret hardship that comes with each sale of a used book. Each used book you buy helps the seller, but not the author that wrote the book. Yes, the author made money on the book when it was printed, but after that, each time the book is resold as a used book, the author gains nothing. Worse, that sale may displace the sale of a new book of the same title.

Of course if you like the used book you read, you might seek out other titles by the author. But chances are you’ll buy those used as well if you can. Folks who buy used books understand the bargains offered in buying used rather than new. Buying used is a habit not easily broken.

There’s no real solution to this situation that will help authors.

I’ve always felt in an ideal world, the author would get a tiny payment for each sale of any used book that he wrote. Certainly in an age of computers, that might easily be done by any large company like Amazon.com where thousands of books are sold with each one keyed to its ISBN information. It would be a noble gesture if those selling used books put a little gift into the pocket of an author with each sale that was made.

Of course, we don’t live in an ideal world. So authors will continue to fight against this somewhat unfair competition with themselves.
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Duncan Long is a freelance magazine and book illustrator for HarperCollins, PS Publishing, Pocket Books, Solomon Press, Fort Ross, and many other publishers and self-publishing authors. See his book illustrations at: http://DuncanLong.com/art.html
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