How do my money reach a book author?

Question

Let’s say I’m in a random small town in a random country, I go to the local book store and buy a book and pay, let’s say, by cash. This then counts as a sold copy of said book. How does my money from this random place, reach the author?

In: 3

Answer 1

The books have already been purchased from the publisher up-front so they can be put on shelves to sell to you. So if a store bought 100 books for resale and then never sold a single copy, the publisher can still claim they have “sold 100 copies”.