No. The price is identical whether you use a link here or go to the retailer directly. The commission comes out of the retailer's margin, not out of your pocket.
Disclosure
Affiliate Disclosure
How this site makes money, what that changes, and the parts it deliberately does not.
Updated September 2026 · By Sawyer V.
The short version
If you buy a book through a link on this site, we earn a small commission from the retailer. It costs you nothing extra — the price is the same as going there directly — and it is the only way this site makes money.
What that does and does not change
| It changes | It does not change |
|---|---|
| That we can afford to keep the site current | Which books appear on a list |
| That buy links exist on commercial pages | The order those books are in |
| That we can spend time verifying catalog data | What we say about a book |
| Nothing about the price you pay | Whether we tell you to borrow it instead |
The last row is the one that matters most. Several pages on this site recommend a public library over any purchase — audiobooks for beginners, books for someone who wants to start reading and is Kindle Unlimited worth it all do. We earn nothing from those recommendations and they are the right advice for those readers, so they stay.
Who we link to
Amazon, essentially everywhere. That is not a judgment about Amazon; it is a statement about which affiliate programs this site has actually joined, and we will not pretend to a relationship we do not have.
- Amazon — an active affiliate relationship. Every buy control on the site links there, and those links earn us a commission.
- Bookshop.org and Libro.fm — independent bookseller alternatives we mention where relevant. We have no affiliate relationship with either and earn nothing from those links.
- Libraries — recommended in several places, free, and worth nothing to us commercially.
If that list changes we will change this page. What will not happen is a link presented as a recommendation when the real reason it is there is a commission rate.
How the links work, technically
Buy links on this site point at an internal address beginning with `/go/` before redirecting to the retailer. Two reasons, neither of them sinister.
First, it means a destination can be changed in one place rather than edited across a hundred pages — which matters when a book goes out of print or a program changes. Second, it lets us see which recommendations people actually use, which tells us what is worth updating.
It adds one instant redirect and takes you to exactly the retailer named on the button. Every affiliate link is also marked with the `sponsored` attribute in the page's code, which is what search engines ask for and what an honest site does anyway.
Why there are no prices here
You will not find a price anywhere on this site, which is unusual for a site that earns commission. There is no live price feed behind these pages, and a price typed into a page in September is wrong by November — so every buy control reads "Check price on Amazon" and links the current listing.
A wrong price is worse than no price. It sends someone to a checkout expecting a number that is not there, and it is the most common way a site of this kind misleads people without meaning to.
Questions
Anything unclear about how this works, ask: info@marginandmuse.com, or use the contact form. This page is meant to answer the question completely rather than technically, and if it does not, we would like to know.
Questions people ask
Does it cost me more to buy through your links?
Do you only recommend books you earn from?
No. Several pages here recommend borrowing from your public library, which earns us nothing, and we say so on those pages precisely because it would be easy not to.
Does a higher commission get a book a better position?
No. Where two books fit equally we do not check which pays more, and no publisher or program can buy a position on any list.
Why do your links go through a /go address first?
So a destination can be updated in one place rather than across a hundred pages, and so we can see which links are used. It adds one instant redirect and takes you to the same retailer.
What do you do with the money?
It pays for the site: hosting, data, and the time to keep the pages current. There is no other revenue — no advertising, no sponsorship, no paid placement.
Read next
- Editorial Policy
What we will and will not publish, and how corrections work.
- How We Pick
The published, reproducible method behind every list here.
- About Margin & Muse
Who writes this site, what it does, and what it does not claim.
- Privacy Policy
What we collect and why.
- Contact
Corrections, questions and suggestions.