Any experience with Amazon, on the publishing end?

[OneGrassRoot]

I'm working with two books, published with a small outfit in the UK. One has been listed for pre-order for about one month (scheduled for release in April), the other just opened for pre-order today (June 2010). I was a little concerned about them being listed so far ahead of publication, but since the publisher is supposedly pushing them in trade magazines, listing at Amazon was part of that process.

Oddly, when the novel listed today, it HAD a ranking rather quickly (that in and of itself was odd to me), and then it jumped in a matter of hours from 4 million to 62k. lol. I think part of that is because there is a non-fiction title by the same author, and that ranking went from 3 million to 175k by the end of the day.

I know the ranking thing is one of the main secrets of The Universe. I do know a handful of books were ordered, but it's wild that it would affect the ranking that much, but there are so many variables involved in that process.

Anyway, the main thing I'm trying to find now is how to get a report of pre-orders. Does anyone know if we SHOULD be able to get a report of pre-sales? It would be very helpful for marketing purposes, but I'm hitting a brick wall in trying to obtain this information, from Amazon, the distributor and the publisher.

Thanks in advance. :)