Who pre-orders books anyway?

Almost all my reading is done on a Kindle and I enjoy occasionally window-shopping in the store for anything that might grab my attention. Since I don’t follow any authors religiously–even my favourite ones–I was pleasantly surprised to see Lightbringer by Pierce Brown being advertised with a release date. If I pre-ordered it now, I would have it first thing on the 25th of July.

But then I thought, “Why would anyone pre-order a digital copy of a book?” At least when you pre-order video games, you usually get some extras for your commitment but books? Come on. It’s not like they’ll ever run out of digital copies anyway.

After checking my order history it turns out I’ve already pre-ordered two books in the past–Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir and Dark Age by Pierce Brown.

Looking back, the main reason was to show support and appreciation for the authors since I enjoy their work. It probably makes no difference to them either way but it does make the wait a bit more enjoyable or exciting because I know I’ll be able to get my hands on it as soon as possible.

Like a mini Christmas that you mark on your calendar. And so I marked the 25th on my calendar and added another pre-order to my list.