Book Piracy

                                 Pirating of my e-books and ARC's

    You never really think that much about piracy until it happens to you. I've always heard about it, I'd even been offered it before when searching for things on the internet, thought I didn't take it. But I tell you, to work on something for months all by yourself, to spend time away from your family and kids working on a book, doing research, editing, spending SO SO SO much time on on the interent and email about it. And to have someone come in and give it away to others or even sell it themselves for profits is the lowest blow.
    To be honest, I figured when I started this whole process that eventually, something like this would happen. It seems almost inevitable these days and I even got the vibe from some people when they found about about all 5 of my published books being pirated that it wasn't really a big deal. That there wasn't anything I could do and just don't worry about it. My hubby and some fans even tried to cheer me up and say that I was 'cool' enough to be pirated. I laughed but in the end, the whole sitting back and doing nothing thing...well, that sucked to me.
   So I reported the ones I found to the BSA. I even found some pdf copies on EBAY of all places. I contacted the people directly and some of them have removed the books from the sites and some have not. I've heard tons of stories about other authors  books being pirated also and it seems we're all in the same boat. A whole lot of our work and time being given away and not a whole lot that's being done to stop it. As I said, it sucks.
    My books are only $0.99 or $2.99 to begin with.....
    I released my latest book, Accordance, early but only advertised that it was available on my Facebook fan page. And to find it also pirated the very next morning, before it was even officially released was just the final blow. I won't blame anyone who was given an ARC because it's just inconceivable. I unpublished from Smashwords, and I'm not bashing them, but I'm not ok with my stuff being taken from me. Now, unfortunately, my books aren't available for Nook right now. Barnes and Nobles is still processing them after over a week. I've contacted them several times but no word back yet as I continue to wait. And I've been contacted several times by folks looking for Nook copies of the books. I'm very sorry about that but it seems that old saying about the few ruining it for the rest of us is true.
   If you find a pirating site or hear someone talking about it, please don't encourage it. Report it. The easy, carefree way of buying books won't last if this keeps up. If you've ever read a book that made you smile, or made you think or cry, then thank that author by purchasing those books the legal way. Seriously. $0.99 to you may not seem like alot but to me, my little percentage is all I get for my hard work.
  Thank you for all that have stood behind me during all this and I sincerely hope that if you're reading this, that you won't be a pirate.

                Best Wishes and Happy LEGAL Reading,
                                         Shelly Crane