Not available for Kindle - why?

[Buran]

I've read all the books so far, of course, though my favourites still remain the original three, the fourth, and Book of Night with Moon. I've still got all the hardback, though I like to pick up favourite books for Kindle so I can read them whenever and wherever I like -- my Kindle's always tucked in a side purse pocket.

But ... for some reason, books 1 and 2 of the first three are available for Kindle, and this one isn't. Why is that?

[Lee Enfield-Burke]

But ... for some reason, books 1 and 2 of the first three are available for Kindle, and this one isn't. Why is that?

DD mentioned to me some months back that there was apparently a rights issue pertaining to the Steve Perry material (and the quotes at the front) and the publisher wouldn't release the ebook version until this was resolved.

At the time she didn't have an ETA for when this was likely to happen. Edited to add: The problem has been resolved and the missing books are expected to appear online at Amazon and B&N in late January - earlly February 2011. Read further down the thread for more details.

[Buran]

It's been a while since I read the book, since I've had to put a lot of things into storage, but I don't remember there being a lot of "material" quoted. If that's what's really going on, I'm offically surprised.

If this happens again for any upcoming books, there will be no sale to me as I've stopped buying paper books. I no longer have the space - 783 sq. ft. house requires sacrifices. That, and the convenience of having all my books with me anywhere I go, mean that if it's not on the Kindle store, I'm not interested. I want to keep reading books by authors I love -- don't get me wrong.

I read Wizard of Mars on my Kindle and was pleased with that. Amazon now sells more e-books than paper books. We can't stick our heads in the sand and ignore the future. I may be relatively "rare" on this forum as I think a lot of the posters here are younger and don't have e-readers or may not be able to afford them yet, but people like me are only going to grow in number...

[Nights Mistress]

Yeah, Nita quotes the first five lines of Running Alone on page 180 (the chapter is Pattern Recognition, if my edition is different), which is a fairly sizeable chunk of the song. I could believe that it has to do with licensing under those conditions!

I'm not really fond of the e-reading phenomenon, because the way the contracts work. I'd rather own the book rather than lease it indefinitely from Amazon and the like. It's very hard for Amazon to take back a hard copy of a book, however there are reports around about how Amazon have removed books from people's Kindles. Once that contractual issue is worked out - that is, that if I buy the book, the data that constitutes the electronic copy is mine - then I'll consider swapping.

[Lee Enfield-Burke]

Yeah, Nita quotes the first five lines of Running Alone on page 180 (the chapter is Pattern Recognition, if my edition is different), which is a fairly sizeable chunk of the song. I could believe that it has to do with licensing under those conditions!

DD tells me that she's been in touch with her publisher over the past week, and the Frost and Perry quotes are indeed the problem.

ETA (20 December 2010): Word has come down from DD's agent's office that the problems with the release of High Wizardry and A Wizard Alone have now been resolved.

As has been mentioned earlier, A Wizard Alone simply got omitted from the previous set of contract amendments that were intended to enable the publication of the ebooks. AWAL's amendment has now been signed, and the ebook can go into production.

More importantly, the rights issues that were delaying High Wizardry have also been resolved. The rights which were in question have been re-cleared with Warner Music (which handles rights issues for Steve Perry's music publishing company), and the book can now appear as an ebook as well as in its present print form. The clearances will also apply to the new "international" ebook edition and the forthcoming revision of HW.

Meanwhile, normally it takes a couple of weeks for the ebooks to become available after all the paperwork arrives at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt's offices. Since we're now coming into the holiday period when everything slows down, this probably means that the final two YW ebook editions will become available in January.