OH, AMAZON

Seriously?

Over the weekend, thousands of books have lost their sales rank – the number that Amazon uses to show how well one title sells compared with another – as the company apparently seeks to make its bestseller lists more family friendly.

But thousands of users have voiced concern after the seemingly random application of the new rules not only affected a number of high-profile authors, including Annie Proulx, EM Forster and Jeanette Winterson, but also led to thousands of gay and lesbian titles being stripped of their sales rank, regardless of their sexual content.

This family friendly approach has also impacted romance and erotica authors.

So. To anyone out there still thinking of buying from Amazon - why?! There are alternatives.

Some other things:

Smart Bitches googlebomb Amazon.

Of course, DA and the Smart Bitches are amongst those leading the charge against this, the latest in a string of Amazon-related scandals (and are, thrillingly, linked to in this Guardian article).

PHEW!

Gab deadline just about met. Okay, almost met.

I need to go somewhere dark and quiet and lie down now.

Why is it so hard to talk about romance as a genre? Sometimes I think it's too big and unwieldy a topic to grapple with. Which is why I so greatly appreciate posts that do. Such as -

The Subgenre Slide

Is Happy For Now Happy Enough?

What is Romance Really All About?

The Romance Insider, the Reader, the Fan, and the Academic Researcher

Generation Gap

French Dressing, from which:

The real conflict in genre fiction, I believe, is the endless argument between the helpless part of us that wants – that has -- to go there once more, and the wisecracking intellectual part of us that can’t quite believe we’ve been suckered, again and forever seduced by the worn old props and operetta costumes.

Cute ferret for Tumperkin's benefit.