More than 1,000 German-language writers have signed a petition protesting against the methods used by online retailer Amazon in its e-book price battle with Scandinavian publishing house Bonnier. Taking their cue from US writers involved in a similar protest over Amazons e-book dispute with Hachette, nearly 1,200 authors signed an open letter in which they accused Amazon of taking writers hostage in its pricing battle. In the past few months, Bonnier authors are being boycotted and their books no longer held in stock, said the letter, which was signed by, among others, Austrian Nobel literature prize laureate Elfriede Jelinek and the head of the German PEN writers association, Regula Venske. Amazon has no right to take hostage authors who are not directly involved in the conflict, it said.