As you have probably guessed, I get a number of books for review (not all of which make it into the blog) and now that Amazon has added this feature, I've added this as an option for submitting a review copy. Congratulations to Dawn McCullough-White, who, as the first author to submit a review copy this way, gets her book, Cameo the Assassin ($0.99), featured in this post! I haven't had a chance to even crack them open (she sent both in the series; Cameo and the Highwayman is $2.99), but have seen at least one glowing review of the second in the series.
So, from the recipient side, here's how it works. First, you get an email from Amazon, at the address to which the gift was sent:
There's not a lot to it - click on the button to get your book. This takes you to Amazon, where you'll need to log in (if you are not, already). You can be logged into any account; in my case, my default account uses a completely different address than the one to which the gift was sent (which answers one of my previous questions). At Amazon, you'll once again see the giver's name and the message that they typed in when they sent the gift. Since I know you could just take the amount as a gift certificate, I hunted around the page to find that option, without success. So, I clicked on the "How does this work" link and this is the page that resulted:
The option is there to get a credit (or even return the money to the giver, according to the original announcement), but you have to contact Customer Service by email or phone (at least, for now) to do so. Which is exactly what you would have to do if that hardback showed up on your doorstep in the smiling brown box. This extra step should cut down on the number of gift books that are declined.
All in all, I spent a lot more time writing this post and capturing the images than it took to get the book on my Kindle. The total process from receipt of the email to reading on the Kindle is under a minute - two clicks and then checking the home page of the Kindle to find the book already waiting.
My biggest question? How many extra books do you think Amazon will sell today, just from people trying out this feature? For those that have sent a gift, what options would you like (timed delivery, perhaps?). What about those who have received a gift book? What do you think of the process?
