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MUSIC AND ENTERTAINMENT 2: Connect With Authors

Amazon.com, the world’s first online bookstore, is looking to shake up how we buy books once again. In November 2005, the website launched Amazon Connect, a program which enables shoppers to see authors’ thoughts about their own work and, in some cases, email the author directly.

Participating authors write messages--known as blogs--which are posted on their book’s web page. They also have a personal profile which gives additional information about the author, such as their birthday or their favorite things. For example, author Meg Wolitzer confesses that she likes to play scrabble every day.

Most authors only get the chance to address their readers when a new book comes out, but Amazon Connect allows writers to update their blog whenever they like. In an interview with the New York Times, Wolitzer said, "Anything that can get fiction on people’s radar is good."

Amazon hopes that this program will encourage readers to be loyal to particular writers and buy more of their books.

But the program also gives writers an opportunity to respond directly to the readers’ reviews which are posted on the Amazon website. In a blog updated on December 27, 2005, Pete Hautman, last years’ winner of the National Book Award for young people’s literature, revealed his surprise at the reaction to his book "Twisted." While reader reviews commented on the tragic nature of the book, Hautman says that he thought it was the "Funniest thing I ever wrote." Blogs like this may prompt readers to look at a writer’s work in a different light.

It seems that measures intended to boost sales, like Amazon Connect, are changing the way we read as well as the way we buy books.

--Written by Kate Day

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