As gift-giving season draws closer, publishers look to retailers to stock up for the holidays, but this season, one of the largest retailers, Amazon, decided to drastically cut book orders to publishers. The cuts are due to space issues in Amazon’s warehouses as they make room for “bigger-ticket items for Black Friday and Cyber Monday,” Publisher’s Weekly suggests. This choice to cut orders has a significant impact on publishers, resulting in lower sales during a season when publishers count on high buy-ins. Amazon’s decision is especially hurtful to indie publishers who rely heavily or completely on Amazon for sales. The decision “will affect publishers’ bottom lines for months to come,” Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA) states. Despite the fact that Amazon began as an online bookstore in 1994, its ever-increasing dominance and power creates a dependency that ultimately hurts the book industry. Amazon has no devotion or concern for the book industry, and its decision to cut book orders demonstrates just how important it is for book lovers to avoid Amazon for book purchases. The head of one company suggested moving more sales to retailers like Walmart and Barnes & Noble, but the best thing book buyers can do to support the industry is to make purchases from local independent bookstores. Purchasing from indie bookstores supports jobs, authors, and the local economy in a way that large retailers like Amazon simply cannot. Despite its convenience, Amazon is ultimately a harm to the book industry. This season, support your local community…

Pre-order. You might be surprised to learn that pre-ordering a book is critical to the launch of a book. Publishers may make decisions about how much marketing support to provide a new release based on the volume of pre-orders. Some even determine the size of a first print run using those numbers. If a book has strong pre-order sales, reviewers are more likely to review it, the media is more likely to hype it up, and retailers are more likely to carry it in stock and give it premium placement. If you know an author has a book coming out, please pre-order it. Write a review on Amazon and/or Goodreads. It doesn’t need to be very long or a deep literary analysis. The number of reviews a book receives affects the algorithms for getting found online. If you don’t like the book, don’t leave a review. As my mother used to say, “If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all.” Spread the word. Let your friends and family know how much you enjoyed a book. Share this on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, or wherever you do social media. Take a book-selfie. Post a picture of the book, your cat lying across the couch with a paw on the cover, you falling asleep on the couch with the book. Follow. Many authors have Facebook Pages you can like and follow. On Twitter, many authors have accounts and you can follow them and retweet to amplify their voices. Follow authors on…

Ann Marie Ackermann, author of Death of an Assassin: The True Story of the German Murderer Who Died Defending Robert E. Lee, will be at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, on April 9. She will give a book talk with the Tippecanoe Civil War Roundtable. This is her third trip from Germany to the U.S. to promote her book since it was released by Kent State University Press in September 2017. This September, the German edition will be released by Silberburg Verlag. Ann Marie Ackermann agreed to write a guest post on the method she used to adhere to copyright laws in the U.S., and for the new edition, in Germany. Welcome Ann Marie Ackermann. You can’t control where lightning will strike. Your best protection is a lightning rod, so that when it does strike, the shock will be deflected. Copyright law is no different. You can’t control whether someone sues you, but advance preparation can help keep liability from sticking. Physicians ask for informed consent agreements, family lawyers ask for prenuptial agreements, and insurance contracts restrict the type and amount of damages. Each example is nothing more than a liability lightening rod. As an author, you need a lightning rod too. If you plan to reproduce images or quote other authors, you need to secure written permission unless the material is in the public domain. Good records of your permissions will help you and your publisher in the long run. Not only will it speed up the book’s…