When the Kindle first came out, one of the great selling points was that even first-release “big name” titles were only $9.99 (you know, the ones you’d probably be paying upwards of $20 for in print), and many were appreciably less. On top of that, Amazon generally had a nice discount – usually 20%.

In the last several weeks, as I mentioned in an earlier post, there have been a lot of changes, particularly for independent publishers and authors.

But the latest change that I noticed (and I don’t claim to be the most observant person in the world!) were the prices listed in an ad that Amazon sent around (Amazon Kindle: Best Books of 2009…So Far). Folks, the times – they are a-changin’.

For example, of the eight novels they listed in the fiction category in the flyer, three were $9.99, while the others ranged from $11.99 to $14.82. The interesting thing is how they’re listing all the prices once you go to the catalog page: the actual sale prices are touted as being major discounts – 40% to at least 60% – off of both the print price and digital list price (which for the titles I spot-checked, were the same).

In the non-fiction category, the flyer listed another eight books: one was $9.99, the others ranged from $11.99 to $17.88 – the sale price.

Taking a look at the Kindle Store home page, Amazon tells us that “New York Times^® Best Sellers and New Releases are $9.99, unless marked otherwise.” All the books they list as of today are $9.99, “discounted” from the digital/print list price of $22.99 to $27.99.

Previously, the digital list price was usually the publisher’s MSRP (which typically topped out at $9.99), and Amazon discounted from that down to, say $7.99; and they generally didn’t list the print price (and when it was, it was – as you would probably expect – significantly higher than the digital list or actual sale prices).

Now, the $9.99 – or quite a bit higher – is the discounted price.

So what does all this hocus-pocus mean? It tells me that Amazon feels they have a large enough Kindle user base that they can start pushing up the prices closer to what you’d typically pay for print books. I’m not going to sit here and complain that this is “evil Amazon” at work. Let’s be honest: as a general rule, the books are still cheaper than what you’d pay for print copies. But, on the other hand, you’re going to have to start paying quite a bit more than we’ve become accustomed to.

The bright side is that, if you don’t want to pay premium prices, there are still tons of books to read, both in and out of the Kindle Store. My personal recommendation – and yes, this is a bit of a sales pitch (just glance to the left)! – is that you give some of the small press and independent publishers a try. Most of their books are a lot less expensive (despite the current discount and pricing bugaboos), and some of them are every bit as good (and, I daresay, in some cases better) than what the major publishers are putting out.

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