News Ticker

Self-Published Erotica is Being Singled Out For Sweeping Deletions From Major eBookstores

Amazon,5001841627_fed12fba03[1] Barnes & Noble, and WH Smith are taking a radical response to last week's "news" that they sell boundary-pushing adult content in their ebookstores. They are now deleting not just the questionable erotica but are also removing any ebooks that might even hint at violating cultural norms.

This story began when The Kernel discovered last week that, much to their dismay, Amazon was selling legal adult content:

The books are sold as Kindle Editions, the name Amazon gives to books that can be cheaply and quickly downloaded to its portable Kindle device. Available titles include Don’t Daddy (Forced Virgin Seduction) and Daddy’s Invisible Condom (Dumb Daughter Novelette).

As with “barely legal” pornographic films, which seek to satisfy base urges associated with illegal and immoral acts while circumventing laws against depictions of underage sex, many of the titles listed on Amazon protest loudly that rape victims are “over 18”.

Similarly, the “daddy” rapists in many incest stories are revealed in the small print to be “not blood related”. But few reading the titles of these books will be fooled about the supposed erotic intent of the volumes.

Again, this content is legal.

I had planned to simply ignore this as a non-news story, but the major ebookstores were more concerned about legal self-published erotica than I would have expected. The Daily Mail, On The Media, BBC News, and a couple dozen authors on KBoards are all reporting that content is being deleted right and left.

The ebookstores are sweeping a wide broom in the process, with WH Smith even going so far as to shut down their website. They have replaced it with a holder page that explains that:

Last week we were made aware that a number of unacceptable titles were appearing on our website through the Kobo website that has an automated feed to ours. This is an industry wide issue impacting retailers that sell self published eBooks due to the explosion of self publishing, which in the main is good as it gives new authors the opportunity to get their content published. However we are disgusted by these particular titles, find this unacceptable and we in no way whatsoever condone them.

Their statement ends with the conclusion that the website will be operational again "once all self published eBooks have been removed and we are totally sure that there are no offending titles available." When that will be, they did not say.

Update: It appears that WH Smith wasn't exaggerating when they said that all self-published ebooks were going to go; there are numerous reports that Kobo is removing most if not all of the self-pub titles in their UK ebookstore. Click here for more details.

WH Smith is not alone in their overreaction. Barnes & Noble was only peripherally mentioned in this story, but they too have started removing content and released an official statement:

When there are violations to the content policy that are brought to our attention, either through our internal process or from a customer or external source, we have a rapid response team in place to appropriately categorize or remove the content in accordance with our policy.

Amazon has not officially commented on the story, but I do have numerous confirmations from KBoards (I can't figure out how to link to specific posts, sorry) that Amazon as well as Barnes & Noble have been removing whole swathes of self-published erotica from the Nook Store and Kindle Store. And they are not just deleting the more questionable titles; B&N and Amazon appear to be performing keyword searches in the erotica section and removing everything they find.

Many authors have reported that their titles had been pulled from the Kindle Store with little explanation beyond the statement that the titles in question violated Amazon's policies on "Description, Cover Image". Many don't have a clue what that is supposed to mean, including the author who forwarded one of the emails to me.

For example, one self-published title that was swept up in the crowd was Babysitting the Baumgartners. This ebook was unquestionably erotica, but based on the listing on Goodreads it is not in the least bit questionable (other than the word babysitter in the title). This title is not listed in either the Kindle Store or Nook Store any more.

And then there is Riding the Big One, a gay novel which was originally published years ago and subsequently re-released by the author in 2010. And suddenly Amazon decided they won't sell it anymore as an ebook, possibly because the description mentions the word teenager.

There is also The Nun's Lover, which appears to have been removed simply because the description mentions the word sister.

Curiously enough, B&N and Amazon have yet to remove The Bible, V.C. Andrews' Flowers In The Attic, Alyssa Nutting's Tampa, Judy Blume's Forever, or Lolita.  No, they're just removing self-published erotica. And that brings me to what I see as the more important story.

This story has already gotten a lot of press, but so far as I can tell everyone from the journalists to the ebookstore staff has made the same assumption that only the self-published titles are an issue. As you can see from that list of titles above, that is simply not true.

Unfortunately, I may have been the only one who noticed. And I might be the one only one who cares about the authors who have been harmed in this moral panic.

It is not easy to get a title restored to the Kindle Store after the staff removed it. Said title has to be approved by some faceless drone inside Amazon before it can be sold again, and thanks to the minimalist explanations provided by Amazon it's going to be exceptionally difficult for authors to comply.

And that means that this overreaction on the part of Amazon, B&N, and WH Smith is affecting the livelihoods of more than a few authors, none of whom have done anything worse than write and sell what readers want to buy. The overblown response to a couple of news stories is actually causing more damage than the content being vilified.

And that, frankly, is ridiculous.

Further Reading

  • Amazon removes abuse-themed e-books from store (BBC News)
  • Why Amazon Should Keep Publishing Rape and Incest Porn (On The Media)
  • Warning: KDP banning old and new erotica titles en masse from self-publishers (KBoards)
  • WHSmith removing all self-published titles; Offline Statement (Kboards)
  • How Amazon cashes in on Kindle filth – Jeremy Wilson (The Kernel)
  • WHSmith's vile trade in online rape porn: Bookseller apologises after sales of sick ebooks are revealed (Mail Online)

 image by victoriapeckham

About Nate Hoffelder (10929 Articles)
Nate Hoffelder is the founder and editor of The Digital Reader: "I've been into reading ebooks since forever, but I only got my first ereader in July 2007. Everything quickly spiraled out of control from there. Before I started this blog in January 2010 I covered ebooks, ebook readers, and digital publishing for about 2 years as a part of MobileRead Forums. It's a great community, and being a member is a joy. But I thought I could make something out of how I covered the news for MobileRead, so I started this blog."

90 Comments on Self-Published Erotica is Being Singled Out For Sweeping Deletions From Major eBookstores

  1. Sounds like “questionable literature” is just a pretext. After all, banning “questionable” expression is called censorship, and that’s illegal. More likely, this is an attack on self-publishing itself. “Once all self published eBooks have been removed”, indeed.

    Publishers are panicking, that’s what happens. And they’re lashing at those who no longer need them.

  2. Kobo just pulled all our titles. They show as published but none are actually available in the store. Ironically, the one title we published through Smashwords which was then republished by Kobo is our only title now listed.

    We’ve tweeted and emailed Writing Life for an explanation.

    With respect to Amazon, we’re very surprised by their overreaction. We know that nearly a third of our titles are not offered in the India Amazon store due to censorship, and we expected that if the UK went forward with blatant censorship then titles would be removed from the UK store only. We’re watching how this develops very closely because our investment in the erotica segment of the market is a considerable portion of our work.

    My sympathies to all the authors and publishers effected already. Perhaps this just points back to the problem of monopoly market holders and the need to establish an open marketing platform for literature of all types with a business commitment to fair trade rather than selective content.

  3. Esmeralda Greene // 14 October, 2013 at 6:40 am //

    Thank you for being on the side of truth and rationality on this, Nate.

  4. No vacuum on the market.

    If it can make money it will make money.
    So prepare for rise of some self-pub platforms.
    Pandora’s box can’t be closed 😉

  5. Austin Mitchell // 14 October, 2013 at 8:56 am //

    The WH Smith UK website is now a holding page: http://www.whsmith.co.uk/

  6. The UK is such a puritan country, I’m surprised they haven’t made sex illegal yet.

    I mean, at what point did they come to a big fork in the road where reality took a left but they hung a sharp right?

    If you can’t tell the difference between real child abuse and something that’s described in a work of fiction then you’re no different than the people who actually abuse children.

  7. I’m sure the big publishing houses are loving the message- Self Published Literature= Paedophilia, Pornography and Raunch. They couldn’t have come up with a more marginalizing message if they tried. Of course maybe they did.

  8. The pearl-clutching in that Guardian article is insane.

  9. Since 1999 Amazon has sold my gay erotica when it was first published by Prowler. In all these years I’ve not been aware of any complaints. Amazon have done very nicely out of them I would think. The books I now publish with KDP are the very same books, with mostly the same covers, and often the same blurb. Can someone at Amazon explain why ‘teenager’ is now an offensive word and they must be withdrawn. Shame they are not paperback then you could have had a public burning.

  10. So much for crime thrillers and the like. I guess Hannibal Lecter wont have a presence there or any other story where a rapist, pedophile etc is the villian and the act has to at least be mentioned. I guess that a tell all book about surviving incestuous rape named somethign like “Daddy only said he loved me” will be banned since it has the word Daddy even though its a book that would help many suffering to feel the bravery needed to come forward at last. If you don’t like something don’t freakin buy it (I don’t), BTW it’s a book, it’s not real!

  11. Kobo has even pulled my book of fairy tales, Dragons and Dreams. I understand that Kobo has pulled all books offered through Draft to Digital, no matter what the topic.

  12. All six of my self published stories have been removed from the Kobo website. One of them was a short ghost story about a middle aged shop keeper so it’s not just erotic titles that are being removed. I am very disappointed at this knee jerk reaction.

  13. You’re not the only one.

  14. Headless chickens springs to mind. Amazon sent me another mail and still failed to say what was wrong with my book. Do they know, I wonder.

  15. I completely agree. This is a great opportunity for someone to make a boatload of money. A single site, selling to a specific market, selling multiple formats DRM free would be a cash cow.

  16. This affects so many authors who were trying to eke out a meager living during hard economic times. The fact that sex sells, and has done so since the dawn of time, and that thousands of authors were able to live comfortably because of catering to the genre doesn’t seem to matter at all. For the last two years a lot of authors have mentioned the option of putting a content filter into place to solve the problem of exposing underage readers to questionable content, but it would seem these companies would rather cut off a huge leg of income rather than working with authors and readers.

  17. My latest release (the only one published through D2D) was removed from Kobo as of this morning. And it’s definitely not erotica.

  18. Most of our traditionally published books have disappeared from Kobo. And they included everything from middle grade books to contemporary erotic romance.

    I do see Fifty Shades of Grey still up…is that questionable material?

    Right before the holidays wasn’t the best time for them to do this. Or at least to have began checking books and titles instead of wiping everything out.

  19. My brothers company was hit by this and I work for him. We are starting our own bookstore at Cryptobooks dot com Right now its erotica because that’s what we sell, but we plan on putting up titles for other things as well at some point. We’re doing this partially to give us another outlet to sell our books but also because we think it’s ridiculous that you can’t sell things that are perfectly legal because certain companies said so. It’s upsetting because we didn’t break any rules they just suddenly changed the rules. I understand them being upset that children could see it, but they can still get to many mainstream books from large publishers that are damn near as explicit as ours. It shouldn’t affect our finances just because they can’t be bothered to partition their sites.

  20. Why are they attacking self-published authors when they allow you to self-publish on Amazon.com? That just doesn’t make sense and as for erotica being banned, that’s just stupid, it’s fictional writing meant for adults, to keep it out of kids’ hands, simply don’t let them use your e-reader and instead get them their own with parental controls on it.

  21. Soon_to_be_famous // 14 October, 2013 at 5:09 pm //

    I remember the flowers in the attic series in middle school. It was really popular with my classmates. I don’t remember the book that well. I thought it was in the ” horror, murder mystery category” that was the last I ever read in this category or of the series. I swear. I decided in middle school I did not want my mind to dwell in this area ever. I am now 38 and still haven’t changed my mind, though now as a writer I find the murder mystery horror authors discussions quite fascinating but personally cannot read anything in this genre! From my memory of middle school I don’t know if really understood ” flowers in the attic” was erotica. I just thought it was ****** sick and didn’t like it.

  22. Soon_to_be_famous // 14 October, 2013 at 5:20 pm //

    I am all for free speech within limits. I feel more for these authors pocket books than anything else. I sympathize with them extremely as I am an aspiring non-fiction author with some controversial topics and a memoirs who believes that you live and die by touching on the darkest parts of life and family. For some authors this is their only source of income. They should have a union or something. This is just an unacceptable act. It’s making clear how at mercy we are to these big publishing giants. They are now controlling the art world of literature and uhm who gave them the license to do that?

  23. Celeste M. Bath // 14 October, 2013 at 5:45 pm //

    Kobo has pulled ALL of my titles. This is going to cost me hundreds of dollars a month that in this economy I really need.
    But I still see a lot of other porn books there, with a lot more blatant content. How come those are okay and mine are not? They bribing somebody or something?

  24. When does writing about raping children and animals become an acceptable form of entertainment deserving protection? Just trying to understand the rationale in defending certain types of books. And no, I’m not a prude, I love erotica between consenting adults of any kind, about pretty much anything. But the attempts to justify some of the materials that started this firestorm are bewildering. No one is suggesting that the vast majority of erotica be removed. But when books about raping minors (no matter how it’s set up, plotwise, to appear legal) or abusing animals are the subject, can you really expect a major retailer to defend your right to make a buck? By the way, they are businesses, they don’t owe you a living, they have the right to sell or not sell your product, and if you don’t like, go set up your own bookstore. It’s not censorship.

  25. A Puritan country with legal “sex workers” and “rent boys”? You must be joking.

  26. I write romance and erotica. Every one of my titles was removed from Kobo. Amazon pulled several and I removed the rest of my erotic titles through KDP in order to prevent them from eventually blocking even my romance novels.

    I have never written rape or abuse or incest or bestiality. I do have a collection of BDSM erotica (pretty light BDSM) and the consenting adults are over 18. However the characters are 18 and virgins. Is it garbage? From a literary standpoint (and I have an MA in English), yes. However, are we now banning the Marquis de Sade? Anais Nin? EL James? Fifty Shades of Grey is not winning the Pulitzer. Yet people read it. As an author, marketability is a factor, especially for someone only a year into this publishing gig.

    One of my titles was blocked for the word babysitter. Another for daddy. The title? “Daddy’s Little Girl Gets Naughty.” The plot? An 18 year old girl decides to have sex (vanilla sex) with her father’s business partner. The blurb is clear. No fine print. The title isn’t referring to daddy but the idea that the good girl misbehaves.

    I don’t really mind but the principle bugs me. Because meanwhile dinosaur rape is still selling. The bestseller lists are flooded with rape and abdication novels. A fair and consistent plan would have been a smarter business move.

    Meanwhile my suggestion to supporters of indie writers is to spend your money on sites that don’t react like children. Apple, Smashwords, and Sony appear to have remained calm. But keep buying indies, to show that your money can be spent elsewhere. Because the authors are losing out here and it’s a bad sign for the industry.

  27. That was supposed to say abduction. Abdication erotica is a niche that likely doesn’t exist. 😉

  28. No, I’m pretty sure that niche does exist. After all, King Edward VIII provided a real-life model for the niche. 😉

1 2 3

46 Trackbacks & Pingbacks

  1. This is Not The First Time That Amazon Has Removed Adult Content Without Warning or Good Reason - The Digital Reader
  2. Self-Published Erotica is Being Singled Out For Sweeping Deletions From Major eBookstores « Steelwhisper
  3. Sure, put porn in its place - but don’t let all erotica suffer - Nichi Hodgson
  4. An Update, and A Sad State | Adventures of a Word Wytch
  5. Kobo Now Removing All(?) Self-Published From UK Their eBookstore - The Digital Reader
  6. Censorship in Publishing: Are We Okay With This? | Karpov Kinrade
  7. The Kobo UK splashzone (dude, where’s my ebook?) ← The sound and nerdery of Rachael Acks
  8. Caught in the Crosswinds – The Amazon, WS Smith and Kobo Hurricane | Author Kim Cresswell
  9. The howls of protest rise again | madgeniusclub
  10. The Times Are Interesting For Erotica -
  11. Amazon Swings its Mighty Censorship Baton Once More | Brandie Buckwine
  12. Digital Products | daily digital deals
  13. The Home of E.L. James Brings Us – THE PORN PROHIBITION « Quacking Alone
  14. Is Censorship Contagious? | Literary Ames
  15. Divide and Conquer | BASIA ROSE
  16. Kobo's Purge of Self-Pub eBooks has Spread to New Zealand, Australia - The Digital Reader
  17. What You Can Do About Amazon’s Book-Banning | One Handed Writers
  18. Panic Censorship by Amazon, Kobo and other ebookstores | Stillpoint/Eros
  19. Stillpoint/Eros post on Amazon and Kobo censorship | K.D West
  20. #Censorship Sucks. Here's a #Free Book! - A Sexual Being
  21. Sure Glad I Didn’t… | Sober Shoshi
  22. The Recent Ebooks Pornocalypse – ErosBlog: The Sex Blog
  23. Online Booksellers Are Increasingly Afraid of Selling Smut | Joe Garde
  24. Genre Bias | Tricia Drammeh
  25. The Recent Ebooks Pornocalypse - Lust My Body
  26. E-Book Censorship – Necessary or a Slippery Slope? | writermummy
  27. Climbing on a Soap Box | Amaranthine by Joleene Naylor
  28. Amazon, New Books, and Updates
  29. With Incest and Rape, eBooks Court Censors - Kinky
  30. Kobo Kid's Store Now Live, Offers Safety at the Expense of Growth - The Digital Reader
  31. Missy Jubilee's sex blog
  32. Rebecca T Dickson « Book burning’s digital counterpart. It’s happening right now.
  33. You put your right foot in, you take your right foot out… « Anderson Gray
  34. Censuur begint altijd aan de randjes | L i n d a D u i t s
  35. Did Amazon Just Ban Suggestive eBook Covers from the Kindle Store? - The Digital Reader
  36. Putting All Your Eggs In One Basket | eBooks by Forrest Young
  37. Kobo Loses NZ Partner Whitcoulls, Restores Self-Published eBooks to UK Partner WH Smith - The Digital Reader
  38. Bonfire of the self-publishers | Vox Popoli
  39. The Great Erotica Ebook Purge - RaynfallRaynfall
  40. What Indie Book Publishing and Indie Game Development Have In Common, Part 3 | Musings and Marvels
  41. Il grande scandalo degli ebook zozzi - Ayzad : Ayzad
  42. The great scandal of dirty ebooks - Ayzad : Ayzad
  43. Google, Tumblr Remind Us That If You Don’t Own The Platform, You Don’t Control It Either ⋆ Ink, Bits, & Pixels
  44. Smashwords Pulls Catalog From Profanity-Filtering Reading App Following Author Outcry ⋆ Ink, Bits, & Pixels
  45. Linda Harvey’s Book Pulled From Amazon | Joe.My.God.
  46. Is it Time to Start Protecting Kids From Adult Content in the Kindle Store? | Ink, Bits, & Pixels

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published.

*