I don’t know about you, but my book budget is never as big as the list of books I’d like to buy. Here are five ways to learn about books on sale and library access.
Newsletter & social media
If you’re interested in a particular author, check their own spaces – their website, newsletter, and social media.
Many authors will have a page that lets you know about free books. Quite a few also have info about sales and upcoming promotions. Some may have bundles, discount codes, or other options available via their website.
Authors (and publishers) will put books on sale for all sorts of reasons, like to encourage people to check out the first book in a series. Sales can run for a day (24 hours), a few days, or longer – it depends on the sale and who’s setting it up!
Sales on my books
I’m currently rotating sales on all my books that have been out for a bit, so people can get something to read for a little less money. I usually put my books on sale for a longer period (a week or so for one-day sales promotions, longer for books in the sales rotation.) I think that helps give people a little more of a chance to get the books.
You can check out my current and upcoming sales here on the website. My newsletter is the best place to get the timely announcements of sales and promotions. There’ll usually be a note on my social media. I also have pages for free books and for bundles and books available at a discount via my direct store.
But that’s not your only option! There are three tools I use regularly to keep an eye out for books on sale or that I can get via my library systems.
eReaderIQ
eReaderIQ is a free (donation-supported) browser extension that helps you track sales prices for ebooks based on conditions you set. For example, “this book is on sale for $1.99” or “the price has dropped by $5.00”. You can also track sales for all books by a given author or check out their lists of price drops by genre and other aspects.
You just need to set up a free account for the tracking and install the extension. Once you’ve tracked a book, you’ll get an email when the price drops to the criteria you set.
The extension only works on Amazon’s sites. But you still might want to check it out if you get your ebooks elsewhere. Many times, when a book is on sale on Amazon, it’s also on sale on the other distributor sites.
If you’ve read the author notes of my books, you know I go through a lot of background research reading. I find eReaderIQ particularly helpful for tracking books on sale that I don’t need yet but know I’m going to need in a few months. I’m also using it to fill out ebook collections for authors I read in print but don’t own in ebook yet (Elizabeth Peters for me, for example).
The website also lets you sort books into different lists, so I can also use it as a place to keep the titles I want to get sometime. If I can get them on sale, great, but if not, the list is right there. I can look at getting the books I need without worrying about forgetting some.
Library Extension
Want to get your books from your library? That’s what the Library Extension is for! This one (also free) will check the library systems you’ve set up. You can even check if a book is available through Libby, Hoopla, and other options based on your library cards or other access.
This one works on a huge range of book sites. That’s everywhere from specific distributors like Kindle and Kobo and Smashwords to sites like GoodReads and Storygraph. And it works for audiobooks, ebooks, print, and a range of other formats. (Or you can turn off formats you don’t use in the settings.)
Once you install the extension, you set up the specific libraries you want to check. They include more than 3,000 libraries across Australia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States. When you’ve got your library systems linked, it’ll even tell you how long the wait is for a specific book in each system. It’s just a click or two to put a hold on the book or check it out. There are options to find books via other tools, too.
BookBub, sales lists, and promotions
Another source of books on sale is BookBub and other sales and promotion lists.
Authors (and publishers, for trad published books) submit their books to be featured on these lists. In the case of BookBub, there’s a selection process. On other lists, author’s pick a date and their pricing and schedule it.
What’s great about these – though also dangerous for the book budget in other ways! – is that you get an email with books in the genres you selected or the genres that list covers that are on sale that day. That can make it easy to check out a new author or book without spending a ton of money.
Sales Lists
How do you find lists? This is going to depend a bit on your preferences for reading. Try a search on genre and subgenre terms and see what you find. If one list doesn’t work for you, consider checking out others.
Because BookBub has selection criteria and balances their scheduling, I usually find the most ther./ But if you’re looking for specific romance subgenres, their categories aren’t as nuanced as some of the romance-specific lists.
Promotions
You may also have seen promotions in an author’s newsletter that include a bunch of books on sale that share a genre, theme, or other grouping. These can be a really fun way to explore! Usually authors in the promotion commit to sharing it with their newsletters and/or social media, so that’s the way to find out about it.
Another form of promotion out there are the “stuff your ereader” days, where many authors get together and share a free or deeply discounted book. Usually these involve going to a webpage that lists all the books with some helpful categories or tags to let you filter. I do these periodically, and they’ll be listed on my sales page.
Sometimes the date for these is not shared with readers until the day of, so being on an author’s newsletter or following their social media is the best way to find out about that day’s sale.
Smart Bitches, Trashy Books
Smart Bitches, Trashy Books has been around for more than two decades now! Besides being a fantastic source of news and reviews of romance books (across a wide range of romance genres).
They also run a regular (every couple of days) highlight of current sales for romance books. They link to the review on the site, which is a great reminder of why the book was interesting!
