Amazon Kindle arrives in India

The Amazon Kindle e-reader has arrived in Indian stores, and Amazon has opened its publishing platform to Indians. To celebrate this, I have reduced the Indian prices of some of my books to encourage my Indian readers to go ahead and get themselves a digital copy of my books. The Kindle platform presents one big advantage to an Indian independent writer: freedom of expression, and the ability to bypass gatekeepers and distributors and reach the reader instantly, without shipping or other costs. For this one reason alone, Indian independent writers who publish on the Kindle deserve the support of fellow Indians and others; for with its feudal traditions, cronyism, and corruption, India needs writers who write without fear of being muzzled or shut out by the Gatekeepers of Publishing and by the government.

My books are at:
http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B001ICH6H4

You can also download Kindle-friendly mobi files and epubs from here (the selection of books is a bit different):
https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/richardcrasta

I have been publishing on Amazon Kindle for nearly 2 years, though seriously only since the past 14 months, and I have between 9 and 12 books out (a few under pen names, and a few books that are in and out of "print"). Having bought one myself around two months back, I have to say: the basic Kindle Touch (black and white, e-ink) is a stunning buy--I mean, it is light, can carry hundreds of books, has variable font sizes, and can even carry your documents and turn text to speech. It feels like a book, reads like a book. And if you were going somewhere and needed to have an address book, or some other instructions along, just mail them to your kindle account and they will appear on your Kindle.

My heritage, growing up, and early adulthood are completely Indian, and the subject matter of my books is half-Indian. Some of my best reviews have come from Indian media and Indian readers, who have reacted most warmly to my books. 

The books with major Indian content include "The Revised Kama Sutra",  "Impressing the Whites," "Eaten by the Japanese," and, to a lesser extent, "The Killing of an Author."

Here is a sample of a few of the reviews: 
http://bit.ly/eFzXjn

Please take advantage of this sale, but please remember that I am a mostly independent writer with high overheads and low sales, and that most Kindle owners, even Indian, are reasonably well-to-do (certainly a lot better off than I am at the present moment), and smart enough to understand the years of labor that can go into a book, and the high cost of intellectual labor.  India, which aspires to become a superpower (the sixth member of the nuclear club, and now a space power that has successfully launched satellites), does not need to be condescended to. Which is why racing to the pricing bottom is an idea that would be destructive of quality and idealism, and not sustainable except for writers who write mass market books; therefore this sale will last only for a few days. 

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