Riot Read Monthly Book Club Subscription Review #RRD02

I cancelled my sub after the first book because of the lack of value. However, I just went on Amazon and picked up this book for myself. So basically I can “pretend” to be part of the sub for ~$10 less. 🙂 I like their selections and I’m always looking for new titles and authors.

I love the BookRiot Quarterly box and I also subscribe to Powell’s Indiespensible. Those two subs are very different (I see Powell’s as being more high-brow “literary” works to build my library and BookRiot as more fun “popular” works) but I’ve got a wide range of literary interests so both work for me.

I agree with everyone’s comments. I love my Book Riot Quarterly box so I was really disappointed when I found out that Riot Read was US based only. I do however think that the additional content should be exclusive to club members. Perhaps they could have an option when you pay say a $5 monthly subscription to access the content as an international subscriber and then access could be included as part of the US Subscribers price. Then only people paying towards to curation of the club can access the content.

I was disappointed by the value of the first box after receiving it and learning that the “premium content” wasn’t exclusive to subscribers. Book Riot hadn’t explicitly stated that, but they implied it when they launched the box when they touted the value of the content. The gist of it was: “$30.00 is what you’d pay to get a hardcover shipped from an indie, and plus, we have all this great online content.”

I expressed my disappointment on Twitter, and I had a brief chat with one of BR’s founders. He said that the online content is available to anyone because they didn’t want to exclude folks outside the US, since Riot Read only ships to US. OK, I get that, but why would I, as a subscriber, want to pay more than anyone else in the world and any US non-subscriber to buy a book and access online content? Especially since Landline was announced as the first RR pick before it even had been shipped out.

I don’t understand the business model. If they can make a profit from this, more power to them.

Finally, I will echo everyone praising Indiespensable. I LOVE that sub.

Wow, totally signing up for Indiespensable(from Powells). I live in Portland and had no idea this existed. I just looked at past deliveries and they included items from some of my favorite chocolate shops. The next delivery looks great.

Tiphanie is a good friend of my bf’s (we’re both writers) so this is so exciting to see her book featured by Book Riot! I had thought about subbing to this myself (though I’ve gone for their regular Quarterly instead), but I wish they would do something a little more special the way Indiespensable does. Still, I love that they’re recommending a new book each month. Wish there was a way to make the extras a bit more valuable. But I’m thrilled to see Tiphanie’s book featured! I just picked up the book myself, so I’m excited to read it!

$30 a month for one book seems awfully steep unless it’s a book in a series or by a favorite author that I’ve been highly anticipating. I can use my local library to order books online for free and just walk in and pick them up (I take my kids to the library for story/song time weekly) or buy them half price via amazon. The value on this one just seems so low considering that there isn’t any special exclusive content available only to the subscribers.

Try the Powell’s book club 6 wk delivery club. It is awesome!