StoryBundle is a new e-book self-publishing outfit that’s taking an intriguing approach. Each bundle of five books is pay-what-you-like, from $1 on up. If you pay over a certain amount–either a fixed number or the average of how much people have paid so far–you get two additional books (in the case of the first bundle, they’re sequels to two of the other books). You also get to decide how much of your purchase price goes to the authors and how much to StoryBundle. This is a pretty neat end run around both pricing structures and royalty/markup arrangements. The sliders default to a $10 payment split 70–30 between author and seller, which works out to $1 per book if the boost threshold is $10 or less. You can also choose to donate 10% of your purchase to a charity of their choice.

All the bundled e-books will be DRM-free. After the bundle expires, the books will be available from the individual authors, presumably via the e-book store(s) of their choice and going by those stores’ policies on DRM.

The books are all described as “indie”, which seems to mean “self-published” rather than “published by independent presses”; the first bundle is SF, and the only name I recognized in there was Joseph Nassise. A quick glance at the author bios suggests the rest are debuts. I assume StoryBundle is acting as publisher in some capacity, but it’s hard to tell how far it goes. They select books from a slush pile (their site says they’re open for submissions) but don’t seem to offer editing or cover design–maybe they only want books that have already been self-pubbed elsewhere. Regardless, $1 for five books sounds like a pretty good deal, at least if the excerpts on the site appeal to you.

What do you think of this setup? Will it become the Woot.com of e-books? Or is it asking too much of readers? I’m pretty wired into the industry and I struggled to decide where to put that percentage slider. I don’t think most readers have a sense of what’s a “fair” or “reasonable” split between author and publisher/seller, and I wonder whether people who purchase those bundles will generally leave the slider at 70–30 or adjust it. An interesting experiment, to say the least.

Edward Champion has posted an amazing list of indie bookstores near the stores that Borders is going to be closing, including estimates of how far each one is from the closed store. Here are the listings for NYC:

Borders Bookstore #566
100 Broadway, New York, NY 10005
Alternatives:
The Mysterious Bookshop, 58 Warren St., New York, NY 10007 (0.7 miles)
McNally Jackson, 52 Prince St., New York, NY 10012 (1.5 miles)

Borders Bookstore #228
576 Second Avenue, New York, NY 10016
Alternatives:
Revolution Books, 146 West 26th St., New York, NY 10001 (0.7 miles)
Idlewild Books, 12 West 19th St., New York, NY 10011 (0.8 miles)
Books of Wonder, 18 West 18th St., New York, NY 10011 (0.9 miles)

Borders Bookstore #200
461 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10022
Alternatives:
Center for Fiction Books, 17 East 47th St., New York, NY 10017 (0.7 miles)
Rizzoli Books, 31 West 57th St., New York, NY 10019 (1.0 miles)

If your local Borders is shutting its doors, this is your chance to change your buying habits just a little and support independent bookstores instead. Remember that any bookstore can order just about any book for you–I recently requested a title from McNally Jackson via Twitter direct messages!–and won’t charge you for shipping. And smaller staff are more likely to get to know your reading preferences and make suggestions for new books you’ll enjoy. In my experience, the days of grumpy, reclusive bookshop clerks are long gone. If it’s been a while since you visited your local indie, give them a try before retreating to the safe, sterile world of online book ordering.