Page stuffing and bonus books in Kindle Unlimited: Awesome or super annoying?

Look, we’ve made it clear that we’re not big fans of Kindle Unlimited. It’s great in theory, but the system is broken—so broken that it’s unclear at this point if it can even be fixed. And one symptom of the broken system that keeps popping up over and over again is the “stuffed” book.

What’s a stuffed book? Glad you asked.

Since authors in Kindle Unlimited get paid by the total number of pages people read of their books, it behooves them to make their books as long as possible. And the way some authors choose to make their books as long as possible is to pack them with as much “bonus content” as humanly possible. They often even add additional, full-length books to their back matter in order to encourage more page reads, so that readers are effectively getting multiple books in one volume. (SIDE NOTE: Amazon has recently tried to crack down on page stuffing scammers, but they’ve got their work cut out for them, and I imagine it’ll take a long time before the problem is completely resolved.)

On the surface, this seems like a great deal for readers. I mean, who DOESN’T want multiple books in one volume? Well...we don’t. And here’s why:​

1. When we buy books, there are many factors that guide the buying decision, but the biggest factor is the blurb. Unless it’s an author we already know and love, chances are we aren’t willing to read just anything they write. We want to read the story outlined in the blurb. So when the book we bought ends at, say, 25% of the Kindle file and we notice the rest of the file is filled with stuff we didn’t even want or expect, we feel a little deceived. I can’t say that we’ve EVER read the “free bonus books” that authors have stuffed into the books we’ve bought. (And notice I said “bought”. We don’t subscribe to Kindle Unlimited anymore for many reasons.) All that free content is wasted on us, and being deceived doesn’t ever really feel good.
2. I’m sure there are plenty of authors who aren’t trying to scam the Kindle Unlimited system by providing free bonus content. Many of them are probably just honestly trying to entice readers to check out their other work. But knowing that page stuffing is a legit thing makes the inclusion of bonus books feel smarmy and desperate. And smarmy and desperate isn’t a look ANYONE can effectively pull off.
3. We love a good deal as much as the next guy, but here at Romance Rehab we don’t feel like anyone should get more than one book for the price of one. Authors work hard on their art, and often pay out of pocket for cover design, formatting, and editing services. They deserve to be paid fair market value for their work—and multiple books for 99 cents isn’t fair market value. If we continue to devalue authors’ work in this manner, our fear is that our favorite authors will quit writing because they can’t make a decent living at it. And the thought of our favorite authors giving up writing…well, that’s the kind of thing that TERRIFIES us. Like, wake-up-in-the-middle-of-the-night-screaming TERROR. (*shudders*) We want all our favorite authors to be paid well for their time and efforts, and Kindle Unlimited ALREADY doesn’t pay them fairly. Giving away multiple books just cheats them even more.
4. Page stuffing encourages a sense of entitlement among readers. If it keeps happening, readers will come to expect to be able to get multiple books for the price of one. Entitlement is one thing that really chaps our ass here at Romance Rehab. (As does people who block grocery aisles while reading food labels for excessively long periods of time. It’s yogurt, people. Just pick one and move the hell on. But I digress…)        

So that’s where WE stand on page stuffing. But what about YOU?

---