For book lovers, Amazon has long been the go-to hub for shopping online, thanks to its unbeatable range of physical titles that can be purchased over the web. It has also risen to dominate the e-book world with its Kindle reader range, although the process of purchasing titles individually has remained consistent with the traditional retail experience.

However, the e-commerce giant announced this month that it is going to be launching the Kindle Unlimited service in the UK for the first time, with the idea being that users can pay £7.99 a month to receive access to hundreds of thousands of e-books and audio books, without having to pay for them one by one.

The 650,000 strong library of novels and factual publications includes everything from obscure works to the biggest selling fiction series, including the Hunger Games franchise, according to Wired.co.uk.

One of the biggest benefits for avid readers, aside from the price, is that Kindle Unlimited will also make it easier for them to discover new authors and works without having to pay a one-off charge. Readers are arguably more likely to take risks and dip into books they might have ignored in the past, which Amazon argues will be good for the publishing industry.

Netflix has shown that a subscription-based, on demand approach to film and TV content can be very successful, so Amazon is no doubt hoping to repeat the trick with Kindle Unlimited.

There has been some criticism of the way that Amazon operates its book selling business, with publishers and authors complaining about the monopoly it has over the market when it comes to safe shopping online. But perhaps the retailer can placate its naysayers if something like this new service is capable of providing publicity to overlooked writers.