Bookshops giving away a free little book, the first chapter of sequel to a wildly successful children's books which is going to sell by the bucketload anyway, and I can't help but feel that giving away such things for lesser-known authors would actually be smarter, kinder thing for publishers to do
The book publishing process is broken beyond repair and those involved in making it that way have no clue how petty and arrogant they are. Just read a literary agent’s criterion. A bunch of words nobody outside of lit agents have a clue about what they mean. Arrogance at its finest.
I get their thinking behind doing this - to maximise their profits on a guaranteed bestseller but it grates when so many great books are left to sink or swim depending on random luck.