TL;DR - Ebook pre-orders for Waybound have been canceled, and Amazon says there's nothing they can do about it.
Audiobook pre-orders are unaffected. I woke up this morning to a phone call that Waybound was down on the Kindle Store and people were getting messages that their pre-orders had been canceled. Obviously, that's a red alert around here. After talking to a senior support specialist at Kindle and checking with our team members, we think it's OUR FAULT. We had uploaded a manuscript and we had multiple people check it, to the point of going through it page-by-page to make sure there was nothing wrong. But there was a final step we were supposed to complete, and our team member didn't know that. When something like that happens, Amazon automatically removes the file 72 hours before the listed release date. Apparently with no way to undo it. We have calls out to different people at Amazon, and we're hoping they know a secret way to reverse all this. If we hear from them, I'll let you know immediately. If we don't, we'll be uploading the book manually. In that case, it'll come out on time or a little earlier, but it won't be exactly at midnight in your region like the pre-order would have been. Which is one of the major reasons why we did pre-orders in the first place. On the bright side, hey, we might get you the book early! FAQ: Does this affect audiobooks or paperbacks? It does not! Only the ebook pre-order was affected. Audible pre-orders are completely separate, and in fact you can still pre-order through Audible, and paperbacks didn't have a pre-order process so they're still unchanged. If I pre-ordered the book, will I get it? Right now, it looks like you will not. You won't be charged either--the entire thing was canceled. So unless we hear from someone at Kindle who knows the forbidden magic to get it back up, pre-orders are dead. If your uncle is Jonathan Kindle, by all means give him a call. Is Waybound still coming out on June 6th? Yes. I will do everything I can to make sure it is available on or before the 6th. I'm very sorry. That's not a question, but I am sorry. We've been doing pre-orders to prevent problems like this, so there won't be any errors in the upload process, and there still was. This is our biggest release ever, both for me and for you guys, and to let you down on this one is absolutely devastating. I'm sorry, and I still hope we can fix it. Rough day today. -Will
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Ten years ago today, historians generally agree, I released House of Blades on Kindle.
The actual date is somewhat disputed by the academic community. Some sources record House of Blades’ release date as the second of June instead of the first, but these are lies intended to defame my good name. I uploaded the manuscript on the first of June, Anno Domini Two Thousand and Thirteen, but it took Amazon some hours to build the book’s landing page correctly. By the time I had made my first sale, it was already June the second. But it was June first on which I published a book for the first time. Seriously though, it’s hard to believe it’s been ten years. Even harder to believe that Cradle is about to turn seven. I feel like there have been three major eras in my writing career so far: the Traveler’s Gate era, the Elder Empire era, and the Cradle era. Going by feel, I would say that the Cradle era was about half. As in, five years for Traveler’s Gate and Elder Empire (at least, the first four books of EE) and five years for Cradle. But it’s actually 7 years for Cradle and 3 for the others. That doesn’t sound like that much of a difference, but it feels weird for me. 70% of my writing life has been focused on Cradle, and now it’s about to come to an end. Crazy times. As you’d expect, my family and I have been reminiscing about the last ten years during our nightly mind-melds, and we have a lot to be thankful for. I would describe our overall emotional reaction as “Overwhelming gratitude.” We wanted to thank you, so we’re doing what we can, but it’s hard to beat you guys. Yesterday, we gave away about 485,000 ebooks for free. We’ve done this kind of giveaway three times in the past (we’ve done a lot more giveaways than that, but only three of these big ones). Yesterday, more people got more free books than in all those other three giveaways combined. You know why? Because of you. You all push these books so hard we’re giving more and more away each time. You’d think we would run out of people by now. You fans are great. Not only are you the reason why I’ve been able to keep writing for so long, but it’s you all enjoying the books that makes the journey fun. The lengths you’ll go to get people to read Cradle truly astonish me. I thought firing paperback copies of Unsouled through people’s windows with a T-shirt cannon was a little much, but it was when you rented an airplane and began raining copies from the sky that I started to wonder if you’d gone too far. Thanks for making it a great ten years! Especially those of you who have been fans from the beginning. I don’t know how you found me during House of Blades or why you stuck with me for so long, but some of you were there from the very beginning. Special shout-out to you, for having patience with me for ten years. The main thing we have going on this week, of course, is the release of Waybound in less than a week! But to celebrate that, we also commissioned a sort-of-but-not-quite-recap comic of the Cradle series so far, illustrated by u/meadblossom* (who did the Reaper comic too). I say it’s not quite a recap because it doesn’t really summarize the story. It’s more like a selection of highlight moments from Unsouled all the way through Dreadgod. Some of the coolest scenes, or just Sam’s favorites, illustrated and strung together for your enjoyment. (This hardly needs to be said, but SPOILER WARNING for all of Cradle so far, Unsouled through Dreadgod. Nothing from Waybound in here, but you know, it's a comic of all the series highlights. If you haven't read the series, there will be spoilers. Also, it won't make a ton of sense to you.) Read the comic here! You’ll hear from me again before Waybound—and we’ll have my usual pre-release stream on YouTube this Sunday night at 6 PM Eastern—but I’m looking forward to your reactions! I hope the finale to Cradle lives up to your expectations, and that you’ll continue on this journey with me to The Last Horizon and beyond. For ten whole years, thanks for reading! -Will *(That’s her Reddit username. Also find her at @bloomejasmine on Instagram and @keithbday on Twitter.) For today only, all my ebooks are free on Amazon!
Here's a tip: if you have the ebook, you get the audiobook for a much-reduced price, usually only like $2 or $3. Since the ebooks are free today, here's your chance to get the audiobook for almost-but-not-quite-free. FAQ: --They ARE available in other regions, you just have to go to your regional Amazon site. --All the ebooks are free except the collections, but that's still every individual novel I've written. --Will, where have you been? Why have you forsaken us in our hour of need? I'm sorry you had to fight all those hell-beasts on your own, but my sword was needed elsewhere. I will blog more fully tomorrow, on the ten-year anniversary of releasing my first book. Still can't believe it's been ten years. Enjoy the free books, and I'll talk to you again tomorrow! -Will A big, planet-sized thank-you to all of you who have already checked out The Captain!
We really had no idea what to expect from this book launch. As I've mentioned before, this is the first series I've started since Unsouled in 2016, and I didn't know how many people would be interested in reading something new that's so different from Cradle. But tons of you read it, the reviews are better than I expected, and all the discussion on Discord and Reddit has been incredible to see. I know it's a risk checking out a new series, even from an author you like. I salute you, brave explorers, boldly going where there are no Amazon reviews to guide you. You all are awesome. So many of you read the story that we got up to #12 on the Kindle Store, which is insane for any first book. I know it's only been out a couple of days, so most of you probably haven't read it yet, but many of you have. I hope you enjoyed it, but thanks for giving it a shot either way! I look forward to seeing you all in space again soon...but first, of course, we have to finish things up in Cradle. Thanks for reading! -Will The Captain is now available as an ebook!
And as an audiobook! And NOT as a paperback for some reason! Amazon needs to hurry it up! In some other regions, the paperback is up, but not in this one. I don't know why. A curse, I think. Anyway, I hope you enjoy the book! Some intrepid readers, or those from future time zones, have already finished. I hope they enjoyed it too. Happy reading! Thanks for giving the new series a chance! -Will |
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December 2023
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