Tuesday, March 04, 2014

Amazon buried my novel: Those search algorithms are for sale


I have a major publisher and a buzzed-about debut. So why did a search for my novel lead to Sweet Valley High?

Amazon buried my novel: Those search algorithms are for sale
Jeff Bezos (Credit: AP/Reed Saxon/Pakhnyushcha via Shutterstock/Salon)

Before reading George Packer’s recent New Yorker article on Amazon and its relationship with the publishing industry, I hadn’t considered what forces might be responsible for making a book more or less visible on Amazon. I’d only wondered why my debut novel was being buried beneath a pile of books that were about as far from my literary ambitions as possible.

I first went looking for my book on Amazon months before its August 2014 release date, while I was still working on final edits. This is a self-absorbed thing to do, I know, but judging from all the posts I see on Facebook (Hey, you can pre-order my book on Amazon!), I know I’m not alone — and for good reason perhaps. Writing is a solitary act that demands you persevere through innumerable hardships and rejections; so when at last you see you have your own little corner of cyberspace, all those years of hard work and high seriousness feel a little bit more well-spent, and you’re one step closer to a realized dream.
Or at least, that’s the hope.

The first time I searched for my novel, nothing came back. A couple weeks later, same thing. But then, after my third or fourth attempt, success.

To a point.
I typed in the title — “SWEETNESS #9″ — thinking I’d only have to put in a few letters before the search engine would autocomplete it. Not so. Next, thinking the computer might need a little help, I added my name: STEPHAN EIRIK CLARK. Then I hit ENTER, and though my novel did come up, it was at the end of a very long list of books, all of them related. Maybe you’ve read one or two?
Sweet Valley High? Sweet Valley High? 

I felt ready to channel the words of the great unifier, Jonathan Franzen. “I’m writing in the high-art literary tradition!” I wanted to scream at my computer. “And you’re going to lump me in with “Sweet Valley High” and “Sweet Valley Confidential — The Sweet Life?”

Needless to say, I didn’t encourage people to look for the book online. I felt ready to take up the cause of Common Good Books in my hometown of St. Paul and rally to the defense of America’s great independent bookstores. They didn’t make space on their front tables for a novel months before its release date; but they also didn’t do the equivalent of having Gogol and DeLillo carpool with Laverne & Shirley.
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