Hugh Howey

Bestselling author of Wool and other books. Currently sailing around the world.

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This can’t be right…

I remember back in October of last year jumping up and down when the first Wool, which was a short story, cracked a top 100 list. It appeared at #99 in Anthologies, which was what Amazon picked for me when I clearly tagged it as a “Short Story.” (Amazon still does this. Don’t ask me why).

I figured it would soon disappear from said list, so I took a screen shot. So began my obsession with taking screen shots, ever convinced that each milestone would be the last. I was like the daredevil pilots of yore who wanted to log the max reading on their altimeters for bragging rights and rounds of beer later. Always expecting an engine to stutter, for gravity to notice that something was amiss and aim to correct it.

I’ve been obnoxious with these captures on FB. I’ve been slightly obnoxious here on my website.

Get this nonsense: I just cracked my first top 100 list for a PHYSICAL BOOK. Yeah. What the hell and tarnation and all that? I also noticed something a little freaky. When you go through the general top seller lists, it includes physical AND Kindle versions. The Kindle list excludes the physical books. Which means the overall list for Science Fiction > Adventure has the Wool Omnibus TWICE. Once at #7 for the e-book and again at #99 for the physical.

Of course, I assume that the cosmos has noticed this intrusion and has since corrected itself, but no matter. I, ever the wasteful one with my time and energy, captured the altimeter before the spring broke.

(This blog entry is a slightly modified KB post from today, because my blog was sad and lonely)

7 replies to “This can’t be right…”

After seeing the sheer amount of books on Amazon, I am equally impressed to see you at #2,525 in books! It’s a testament to your story telling and the inspiring connection you make with your readers.

I’m confused. Is it #99 based on its treebook sales only, or is it ranked based on its combined sales of ebooks + treebooks? Of course, major achievement either way!

Also, curious: how many treebook sales does it take to crack the top 100?

#99 among all books, print and e-book, but solely based on tree-book sales. Could that be any more confusing? Maybe it helps to visualize that the tree-book and the e-book of the same book are BOTH on this list at the same time.

It takes fewer sales than I would have thought to crack this list. Granted, it’s a sub-category of a sub-category and not the top 100 overall. I’ve sold 145 copies of the physical book as of yesterday. So, that’s what it takes. Not a whopping amount (but it feels like a lot to me!)

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Average of 5 stars with 650 ratings. Frankly, that’s what I (and many others) look at. I am oblivious to the overall ranking.

Once I finish a book that I like, I immediately “see what others have read” and sort by ratings. Further filtering by the number of reviews, I then begin reading the plot lines.

-Dave

David: I know you’re right. It’s only we nutty authors who even care about these other metrics. When I shop for books, I go the same route you’re talking about. :)

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