Please read the shipping info below. It’s important.
It is an author’s right to sleep in on the day of the release. If we’ve done our job well, the readers might have stayed up, but we can safely get our rest.
Except I woke up at 5:30 am to the sounds of a dog puking and couldn’t go back to sleep. I sat up in bed, looked at Nykie upchucking something on the wood-look tile floor, and told her, “You do you.” And then I lay back down, picked up my phone, and checked to make sure Magic Claims was up and running on Amazon. It was. And the first review said, “It’s fantastic!”
So I lay in bed for awhile and smiled at the ceiling. Thank you for my little moment of happiness.
Now onto more pressing things. The release party zoom is tomorrow, Mod R has the details here. There will be a surprise if I can pull my head out of the drowsy cloud. If you miss tomorrow, there will be a spoiler zoom free-for-all on Saturday. At least one of the sessions will be recorded and uploaded to Youtube.
Now on to the store. The store will open tomorrow morning, barring some weird last minute glitches.
Shipping Info
Ah, merchandise. You go to a concert, you get excited, you buy a $35 T-shirt, it ages 20 years in 12 months, and you finally toss it and relegate it to the “bad inside T-shirt” collection, but at the time of the purchase, it is $35 worth of awesome.
By now, everyone knows how Amazon works. Most people that use it frequently end up springing for the Prime membership and they enjoy free shipping. You buy a lamp, a toothbrush, and a case for your phone, and it all comes free in a single box.
Our store doesn’t work like that.
Large retailers like Amazon have subsidized shipping. We don’t. Our store functions more like Etsy. Although it’s a single storefront, every type of item is produced by a different vendor on demand. Each vendor charges shipping per item. The shipping is not grouped.
For example, our US mug vendor charges the following rates on shipping to US:
First mug: $8.59. Each additional mug: $6.
This is me ordering mugs:
I am paying taxes because playing with Texas state’s money is like playing with their emotions. they do not like it.
If I add a second mug:
$8.59+$6 = $14.59.
$8.59+$6+$6 = $20.59.
The same vendor also makes stickers. Their sticker shipping is $4.29 for the first item and $.09 for each additional sticker.
You would think they would put the stickers and the mug in the same box, or just toss the sticker in with the mug, but the system isn’t set up for that. They are charging $8.59 for the mug and $4.29 for the stickers, for the total of $12.88.
When we originally opened the store, we had a flat shipping rate because we thought we would sell a few T-shirts and a couple of mugs. We had to cancel it within 48 hours, because the typical cart looked like this:
Every new type of item – T-shirts, Sweatshirts, Mugs, Stickers, etc., – is has its own shipping charge attached. We can’t get around that. I think the shipping is outrageous, but there is no way to reduce it. We could hide it and offer you “free” shipping, but then the mugs would cost $25. We have to make a profit, because we license art for the images, we pay to maintain the storefront, and we invested a lot of time into making these designs and items.
The only way to limit the shipping charges is to limit your purchases to a single type of item, like two T-shirts vs a T-shirt and a sweatshirt.
I love it,and it is always exsquisite, can we have more kate Lennart please?more story of Kate and family please..pretty please
Looooved the new book. How we’ve missed Kate and Curran! Thaaaaank you. Soooo excited for the next part.
loved the book so much! it was awesome!
also I saw the magic claims reference and LOVED IT! 😂
**Magic Clams**!! Spell check strikes again!
Happy Book Birthday! Loved it and that you humored the BDH with the addition of magic clams! Looking forward to tomorrow’s session! 😊
We understand! Shipping is mostly expensive everywhere other than Amazon prime. I try not to think about how much it costs me to get my favorite flavored coffee. But it is a must have so…..
Looking forward to seeing the new merch. Thanks for doing this! My BDH mousepad still makes me laugh. I’m so happy I bought it.
My Amazon UK paperback preorder still says estimated delivery 5 July 😭
Preorder still says 5 July, but they’ve got a new page for the book which says tomorrow. sigh! reorder placed and preorder cancelled.
Squee, book tomorrow! (insert happy dance here)
Even with the ridiculous shipping I still want stuff & things. Seeing these small reminders of the worlds you built that make me so happy, it makes me smile 😁. Thank you.
OK – being very p*tient here. Magic Claims dropped to my Kindle library yesterday but… it was also my mother’s 100th birthday… further family stuff and village celebrations for her over the next two days….
Friday is me and Kate day. Darkened room, soothing tea and Kate and Curran. No interruptions on penalty of extreme rippercushions.
Massively avoiding spoilers as much as possible for two more days.
Enjoyed Magic Claim so very much! Got a day off today, spend the whole day in bed reading, drinking tea and eating cakes for sustenance! Perfect day! Thank you!!!
Happy Book Birthday, it’s awesome!
I just finished it and it was simply put, excellent. Cant wait for the next book.
I loved the scenes with Conlan.
Loved loved the book. Looking forward to the next one.
eagerly waiting for the store to open!
I tried to get Magic Claims early by setting the clock on my kindle forward 4 hours, but it didn’t work.
Your stories are our joy to read and reread and to share with new readers.
Thank you.
Kelly, I pre-ordered the Claims paperback from Amazon, and it won’t arrive until the 16th.
I’m gonna have to use a freight forwarder unless the AU store will ship to Asia. But I will get my hands on a BDH mug and shirt even if I have to pay $$$ for shipping!
I love you guys and the store. However, where is the mug with “Here Kitty Kitty” with the writing on the back? They all appear to have blanks backs. Or am I missing something?
Thank you
That was the old mug. Do you want one? If you do, let me know and I will revive the listing for you by tomorrow.
Yes PLEASE. I got the Ripper Cushions mug last time and did not see this one. Thank you SO MUCH. Also, the book is AMAZING!!!!!
Have a great day,
On my second read today. Checking to see if I’m reading the same thing I was reading at midnight on the 12th. I have made many embarrassing blunders when a quiz is published.
The quizzes are full of boobie traps! They’re not a reflection on anything but my eeeeeevilll 😈
All – Like mugs, but prefer glass mugs, why? Simple, most mugs today come from China, the glazing process used sometimes it not complete, and lead gets into the ceramic base material, and leaches out because the glazing is not good. I just don’t take a chance. Young and old are very easily hurt from lead poisoning. So, if you can find a vendor making glass mugs, I’m all in on that. Glass is fired at 2500 degrees F, so anything in the glass is cooked out, etching the glass is perfect. I have several glass mugs from Disneyworld, and other places, even once upon a time from Krispy Kreme, then they went to ceramic from china, and I don’t buy them.
Now, the book was released on the 13th, Amazon, shipped it on Sunday the 12th, but I will not receive it till the 17th, 4 days after release. Ilona et-al, please get on amazon’s shipping folks and get them better organized so we get our books on release date. Yes, I live in the country sort of, but this book has been on preorder for over 3 months and was in Wishlist for longer than that once you told us it was coming. Amazon has been worse this year for shipping stuff to me, at least 5 orders just lost, this has been because they turn the shipping over to the USPS, and they have terrible work ethic in some of the larger post offices. All mail to us, goes through Atlanta, which I believe is the worst PO in the country. Setup something please so we can buy direct from you, and UPS or FEDEX is the carrier, more expensive, but every order using those vendors gets to me, not one has been lost. The 1500-dollar flight chair from Germany, received, the 3400-dollar computer, received. The book, however, may never get here, and may have been opened and read and yes, that happens to me a lot when using USPS.
I loved Magic Claims and can’t wait for whatever else House Andrews writes. Thank you so much for all you do! A proud member of the BDH.
I would really love to have a 15oz mug like the one at the top of the 6-14 post. The one that has “here kitty kitty” on the front and “what kind of woman greets the beast lord with here kitty kitty” on the back. Did not see that in the merchandise store. Did I miss it or is it not available? Thanks
Hi Bess,
I don’t know what country you’re writing from, so I cannot advise you on which merch is available 🙂 . Please follow the instructions in the blog post, and use the contact form on the merch store site to give feedback about an existing design on a different item. Thank you 🙂
Thank you for the shopping instructions.
I stuck to clothing myself with T-shirts (purple! woot! THANK YOU!)(also black, but that’s a given), so the shipping costs in the EU store felt super reasonable. (I have experience buying cones of yarn within the EU, and watching that shipping rate hike as I add to my cart. Cones of yarn are heavy, yo.) The T-shirt prices felt super reasonable, so I kind of loaded my cart a bit—like I would in a bricks & mortar store if I came across awesomeness at a reasonable price.
Best case, I’ll have awesome wear-in-public tees. Just fine case, I’ll have awesome wear-at-home tees. I’m in need of both. (Worst case, I’ll have wait to wear the T-shirts while I shrink myself to fit. Still not sorry.)