What this site does with what it knows about you

The short version

If you join the newsletter, I keep your email address so I can send you the newsletter. It is not sold, traded, rented, or given to anybody for any reason. I also count visits, so I can tell whether anybody is reading; that counting is described below and is not connected to your email address. There are no ads on this site. The counting does feed Google’s advertising system, which means I could one day show you an ad for these books somewhere else, and the section below says exactly how that works and how to stop it.

What gets collected

Your email address, and only if you type it into the signup form and tick the box. Along with it I keep the fact that you consented and roughly when, because that is what makes the list legitimate and keeps the mail out of spam folders.

Ordinary server records. Like every website, this one is served by a host that logs requests. I do not attempt to identify you from those logs.

Which pages get read. This site uses Google Analytics. It stores a cookie in your browser so a second visit can be told from a first one, and it records which pages you opened, how you arrived, what kind of device you are on, and roughly where in the world you are — country, and sometimes city. Google processes that on my behalf and holds it.

It is connected to Google’s advertising side. If you are signed in to a Google account with Ads Personalization turned on, Google may match this visit to that account. That is what lets me see rough age, gender and interest groupings, recognize the same reader on a phone and a laptop, and — if I ever advertise these books — show an ad to people who have been here before. All of it reaches me as groups and counts. None of it arrives with a name attached.

What it still does not do: it does not know who you are, and it is not joined up with your newsletter subscription. Those are two separate records and I do not connect them.

If you are in the EU, the UK or Switzerland, none of that happens. No analytics cookie is set and no visit is recorded. That is why this site has no cookie banner — there is nothing to ask you to agree to. It costs me the ability to count European readers, which I would rather pay than interrupt every arrival with a consent box.

I do not collect names, addresses or payment details. If you buy a book, you buy it from a retailer, and what that retailer collects is governed by the retailer’s own privacy policy, not by this one.

Who else sees it

The list is stored with the email service that sends the newsletter, because it has to be stored somewhere for the mail to go out. Nobody else has access to it, and it is never shared with another author, a promotion swap, or a list broker.

The list is one-way. Other subscribers cannot see you, cannot see the list, and cannot post to it.

Getting out

Every email has an unsubscribe link at the bottom. It works immediately and it keeps working. You do not have to explain yourself, and you will not get a message asking you to reconsider.

If the link ever fails, write to the postal address below and I will take you off by hand.

Opting out of the page counting is separate and does not require me. Any content blocker stops it, and Google publishes a browser add-on that switches it off across every site that uses Analytics.

Opting out of the advertising part is a single switch in your own Google account, at My Ad Center. Turning off Ads Personalization there stops this site, and every other site, from matching a visit to your account. It is a better control than anything I could offer you, because it works everywhere rather than only here.

Nothing on this site is withheld from you for using any of these. There is no wall, no prompt, and no degraded version.

Children

These are adult romance novels. The site is not directed at children and the newsletter is not knowingly sent to anyone under 16.

Changes

If this changes, the date at the top of the page changes with it. I am not going to quietly broaden it.

Where to write

William Penwell
750 E. Hurd Rd.
Monroe, MI 48162
United States

The newsletter page says what the emails actually contain and how often they come.

This policy covers https://williampenwell.com and the newsletter sent from it.