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Purchasesweird "delay" with my order of Material Girls by Kathleen stock on Amazon
I recently had a weird delay with my copy of Material Girls by Kathleen Stock. Something tells me it's intentional. I got an e-mail asking if I still wanted the book. If I didn't confirm they were going to cancel it.
I placed the order at the end of October. Now they're telling me that I can't expect it until well into the new year. This seems unusual for this company.
I know that Amazon is the devil but part of me wanted to order this book through them to show support for feminist writers, to make sure they are still available on their website. Ultimately I know all corporations only care about money, and part of me wants to encourage the big companies to keep real feminist books in stock, before they are all chased off. I also want to help Kathleen Stock's sales.
Anybody else had this experience with them?
Many supply chains are disrupted because of covid-19, so there are many shortages. In the last couple of months many presses have been dealing with paper shortages. It might be that there is a new print needed of the book (because the first print sold out) but all the processes keep getting delayed because of the shortage of materials needed.
And yet, I only had this situation when I ordered Helen Joyce's book. No other book order was treated the same, and I did buy some new popular books around the same time.
This happened to me with my order of legos. They keep having to restock it. It's Christmas, stuff is selling out. This book is pretty popular too.
Honestly, I think it might just be a supply chain issue specific to the UK. I ordered a book with a UK publisher on Amazon that has nothing to do with the gender debate, and it got pushed back and back until either they canceled it or I did. FYI I'm ordering on the US site to deliver to a US address.
I had the same issue with irreversible damage a year ago, they kept delaying it, claiming it wasnt available. Thats when i decided to just buy it as ebook, which at first didn't work either. Couldn't get my money back. Bought it again and that's when I could finally read it.
I heard that the book had sold out and needed another print run. 🥳.
As a previous poster mentioned, I prefer Blackwells. They scored much higher on the ethical consumer index than Amazon, Helen Joyce spoke highly of them and how they accommodated her signed copies of Trans.
Yes! Can't find that earlier thread from ehich I found out that many of us gad this issue.
My order of Helen Joyce's Trans was delayed by at least a month and I also got a bizarre email urging me to reply quickly or the order would get cancelled.
I tried to order Trans and the weirdest thing happened! I ordered it second hand online and it said it was shipped and everything. Got the second book I ordered but not that one. When I reached out to the company they said it was out of stock. But they said they’d shipped it to me! Tin foil hat moment is that someone threw it out before it got shipped or something.
Wow. That's crazy.
I appreciate everyone in this thread urging that we think about supply chain issues so as not to get conspiratorial. But... I'm seriously weirded out by the email communication around the book.
I'd bought from Amazon for years (haven't we all?) and even when there issues, they never threatened me with cancellation unless I reply immediately.
It sounded almost like a phishing email
This really isn't right.
I did have this happen years ago with an obscure book I'd ordered on the habits of wild rabbits. I placed the order before the book came out, at that date they emailed me to say it still wasn't available and it would now be another date, then repeated when that date came along etc. Eventally they just cancelled my order. I think in my case they had just not ordered enough copies of this rabbit book and then couldn't get more when they got more orders (probably it had a very short print run as it was quite an obscure book).
Just presenting this story for what it's worth, it may be that Amazon isn't intentionally holding these books back but just doesn't have the stock
They're on audible, you get access instantly. Finished Trans recently and soon to be moving on to Material Girls.
I had a similar problem when I ordered I Hate Men by Pauline Harmange, and it ended up being some error on their part related to pre-orders and their warehouse stocking system. They ended up having to cancel and reorder it for me, and then adjust the price since the price had increased since my original order.
Perhaps they've oversold beyond their intended stock, and aren't able to get enough copies stocked again? Not to defend Amazon, but given that the Kindle version is still readily available, I am skeptical about it being intentional.
Same here--I ordered it in September, and now they tell me they don't know when it will be available, so they cancelled my order! This is the message I got from Amazon:
Due to a lack of availability, we will not be able to obtain the following item from your order. We've canceled the item and apologize for the inconvenience. If you see a charge for the canceled item, we will refund you within 1-2 business days. If you are still interested in purchasing this item, it may be available from other sellers. Please visit the detail page for this item below.
I had that with a rare book but no problem yet with any gender critical stuff.
Not with this book, but I ordered a different book and it took a couple of months for them to actually send it. It was a second-hand book on Morgentaler (a pioneering abortionist in Canada). It was listed as available but then for some reason it wasn't. I did eventually get it, though. It was weird that it was listed as available but it wasn't. I'm glad they had it listed, though.
That sounds more like a problem with a third-party seller though, since Amazon doesn't sell used books directly.
I've never heard this happening with any other kind of book on Amazon. Is there someone up in corporate arguing this book shouldn't be sold? Are they on some kind of naughty list?
There was only 8-9 years ago a situation where Amazon suddenly labelled ALL gay/lesbian (T+, though there was less of it then) literature as erotica — we’re talking anything from Rubyfruit Jungle to Tales of the City — anything with a gay or lesbian or bisexual theme in fiction was marked as pornography and put on a “naughty” list that Amazon then had to backtrack and apologize for.
So yeah, they’ve been homophobic and misogynist before, only now they’re cloaking it as trans-rights activism.
Nothing to add except I’ve had it preordered for months and am experiencing the same weirdness with the email confirmation and such. Wow.
I looked for it at Bookshop.org, where I buy most of my non-work dead-tree books, and it is marked as 'temporarily out of stock.' But I was able to buy the Kindle Edition immediately (thank you for reminding me to do this!).
I no longer use Bookshop and wouldn't be surprised if they were censoring it.
When they didn't have Shrier's Irreversible Damage in stock (they had a listing for it but no image of the cover), I emailed them and asked whether they were censoring it.
The first response I got said, "No matter what our personal beliefs are, we aren't censoring this particular title for any reason. I will reach out to my colleagues to see if we can get it on to our site."
A month later I checked in and got this: "After discussing the title with my colleagues, and reviewing our company values, we chose to remove it from our site permanently. I apologize for the inconvenience at this time."
Soo yeah I'm back to using Amazon or brick and mortar stores.
I didn't realize Bookshop was so woke. Thanks for the heads-up. Will take my business elsewhere...
I had the EXACT same thing happen with both Material Girls and Helen Joyce's book when I ordered from Amazon. A kind Ovariter here told me about Blackwells in the UK, and they ship to the US for free. I ordered from them and canceled my order with Amazon. I had my book from the UK here in a week, after months of Amazon jerking me around!
https://blackwells.co.uk/bookshop/search/?keyword=kathleen+stock
Happened to me with Helen Joyce’s book, too. It kinda feels like either it’s in huge demand or internal employees are fucking with things.
I had a huge delay with Helen Joyce’s book too.