Amazon appears to be slackening its hold on the publishing group Hachette, according to The Huffington Post. Certain titles, which were originally listed as out of stock, or had prices raised have been restored.
Hachette group is one of the largest publishers and includes Little, Brown, Hyperion and Grand Central Publishing. According to the Washington Post, the Amazon tactics include marking a book as delayed or out of stock, or ushering customers to other books by different publishers. The authors affected included Malcolm Gladwell, Stephen Colbert, J.K. Rowling and many others.
These ruthless methods are allegedly part of a bitter publishing tiff between the tech company and Hachette over e-book prices. Both companies released full statements about the stalemate at the end of May.
However as of Tuesday morning, "Instinct" by T.D. Jakes was reported by a Hachette spokeswoman to be available on Amazon. Also, according to the Huffington Post who spoke to the spokeswoman, "The Closer" by Mariano Rivera was marked down to its discounted price after being listed previously as full price. Salon has reached out to Hachette and Amazon for confirmation on these titles and others, and will update accordingly.
The companies are currently negotiating, according to the Huffington Post, however due to a confidentiality agreement no details of the deal have been made public.
Though it's unclear how these methods help Amazon, the third largest book retailer, they have however been a boon for other large book sellers including Target, Barns and Noble and WalMart, the Huffington Post is reporting. The tactics have certainly hurt authors.
“I spent three years on this book, and I’m very happy and excited by it,” Meryl Gordon, author of "The Phantom of Fifth Avenue" (and my former professor), told the Washington Post. “But it’s devastating as an author to see the market power they have. It just comes as a bit of a sucker punch when you are trying to reach an audience.”
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