Yeah, it's stupid. The last Internet order I made (not from amazon btw) turned out to be a disaster as well. I actually make a point being at home on the delivery date, so they don't have to deliver next door or come back for a 2nd try. The nice thing about these orders is that I can actually look up the status of the delivery on the website of the delivery service. Where my package is, when it's going to arrive etc. Anyway, on the first try I waited the entire morning and while I was at home, it never came. It later said on the website that I was not at home. The second try was even worse. They dropped it off at a house further down they street and never even bothered to write me a note where it was delivered. You can imagine my anger when it said on their site that the package had been delivered.

I understand you blame Amazon for poor packaging, at least they could've used proper material. In my view however, UPS is really the one to blame here. How they justify a delivery by dropping it at the front door like that (or without notice is beyond me). It's wrong I know, but you could just as easily have claimed to Amazon that your books were never delivered. Because there was a good change that might have happened.

In my case I did get my stuff. I kept my cool and figured that instead of writing the store I bought the goods from I first check with some of the neighbors and scored on the second try. One thing is sure though, there are two things I'm going to do different from now on when I order stuff.
1) I check for delivery service.
2) If possible I set the delivery address to my work, or to a place where I can pick it up myself.