Filed under: Letters of Opinion, Misc
Dear Editor:
I read today on your author, Victoria Laurie’s, website that you have been in discussions with her about a voice mail message that you have received from a blogger called NovelReads about a statement Ms. Laurie made on her website. I felt that Ms. Laurie’s accusations of this reader being a “psycho” and a “cyber stalker” should not go unchallenged. The timeline of events occurs as follows:
1. In July Ms. Laurie takes exception to a review left at Amazon by a reviewer with the handle Butterscotch.
2. In July Ms. Laurie blogs about this reviewer and says these things in a blog post has since been deleted by can be read here via Google Cache). The blog post, in case you do not care to read it, includes the following comments:
And you should never pick a fight with an author….well….because, honey, we know how to get even. ;)
and
And so, come September…my little “fan” and some of her close friends and family will likely read about a character with a very similar name, (i.e. nearly identical but not enough to get me sued) depicted in one of the most comical and fabulously scandalous scenes within Death Perception. And trust me…this isn’t a scene which in any way flatters that character. :) (Also trust me….you’ll know it when you read it!)
…In other words, if in a year you should pick up a copy of Doom With A View and read about a certain transvestite prostitute with a piss poor attitude and a bad case of V.D., who just happens to go by the name of an ice cream topping….well, you and I and about 60,000 of our closest friends and family will know exactly where that inspiration came from. ;)
and
my editor thinks this concept of mine is hilarious and she’s going to suggest the idea to her other authors who are fed up with being targets for the mentally deranged.
3. I blog about this and Novelreads (and many other readers) i disturbed by Ms. Laurie’s conduct as well as the idea that an editor of a major publishing house approves of this type of action and that the editor is going to suggest to other authors to do the same.
4. Novelreads then leaves a voicemail message expressing her disappointment.
5. Ms. Laurie then gets a call from her editor (which I presume to be you) expressing concern over Ms. Laurie’s safety and suggesting that she contact a lawyer. Apparently she does so.
6. Tuesday, Novelreads receives a letter via email from a lawyer purporting to represent Ms. Laurie asserting that Novelreads is violating Ms. Laurie’s copyright rights to her blog posts and that Novelreads is inappropriately interfering with a contractual relationship with yourself.
7. Ms. Laurie has blogged again with the following:
ANYhoo, to catch you all up, last week I got a very upsetting phone call from my editor who was really creeped out. She said that some crazy woman had called the voice mail of another editor in her department. The caller clearly thought that editor was my editor and had demanded to be called back saying she was “deeply disturbed” (mental diagnosis or state of mind?) about a blog that I’d written and she demanded a comment from my editor.
She also said the woman didn’t leave her name, but left a blog address, http://novelreads.blogspot.com/ and told me to go look at it and probably look into retaining an attorney. Now, the blog that she posted didn’t bother me much, she seems to be a woman who just wants to be noticed - and isn’t getting much attention, (and I know from previous posts that she “dreams of being a writer someday,” hmmm, envious much?)
I can’t imagine that you asserted a reader was psychotic or a cyberstalker and I also thought that you should be in command of all the facts before making up your mind about NovelReads who was merely expressing her thoughts as a reader and blogger about an author’s actions which appear out of the bounds of decency to many.
No response is necessary.
Best regards,
Jane Litte
http://dearauthor.com
Wow, Jane, you’re the best!
[Clapping my hands]! Jane, please keep us posted on the editor’s response (if you do receive a response).
Jane, I am so impressed with your clear and concise matter of the situation. Please keep us updated on the situation.
Meant to add, thank you for articulating what so many of us would like to express. I, too, would be interested in knowing how the situation plays out.
And the blog is now down! Laurie’s blog has been taken offline. Nice job Jane! Looks like the Penguin didn’t find this so funny after all.
It’s very interesting to note that Ms Laurie’s blog has apparently been reduced to entries from 2006 which are reducing as we speak…Well done for standing up for a reviewer’s right to have opinions. The likes of Ms Laurie don’t appear to appreciate that everyone is entitled to an opinion and to not be lambasted in public because their view is not one that the author likes. Unfortunately all writers (whether published as a book or on a website) are not going to appeal to everyone…that’s what makes us such an interesting species, we are all different.
It never fails to amaze me in how many ways an author can destroy their own careers.
This is like a train wreck, its hard to look away.
Umm unless I have completely lost it this morning(in Alaska, still AM here) I just went to her website, clicked on Blog..says it’s not there. Now I was there about an hour ago reading some of the sooo insane, (voicing everyone elses reaction) need to do a thorazine shuffle comments she had on there..decided to go back and see if any other comments were up..JC totally agree with youon the train wreck, don’t want too but just can’t look away! So have I completely lost it or is it really not there?? Did she finally get a clue??
–Well I got my answer, apparently I am not the only one that noticed it was down:)
This is again another case of someone being pathetic. And if VL is a so-called psychic, wouldn’t she this whole drama coming?
And I love when the shit hits the fan, posts on these author’s blogs who are causing the drama just happen to go MIA or have them erased. At least have the balls to stand by your words and don’t take the coward’s way out by getting rid of them.
Again pathetic and sad. :(
WOW! Jane! The second standing ovation you’ve gotten from me today and I’m very stingy with those.
You’ve not only stood for novelreads, but all of us who either write, blog, opine or any other thing (like posting comments!) on the internet where really, one should just read it and, if they don’t like what they’ve read, move on.
Whatever happened to an author simply saying “Thank you for the time you spent reading my ________” you fill in the blank. They did take the time, one would hope read a legitimate copy and posted what they did or did not like.
Whether it’s about the book or yes, in some cases, the author personally, it’s ONE review!! A sorry way to end a career, publicly going after one review out of how many total readers, who probably liked what you wrote but will no longer read you because you can’t accept a bad review as an adult.
The latest on VL’s website, Contact link:
Due to my increased work schedule, I am no longer responding to emails.
If you would like to comment on my blog, or write a testimonial please visit those pages tabbed above. If you need to contact me regarding an urgent matter about your scheduled appointment - please call my office @ 512-358-0620 between the hours of 8:30 a.m. & 5:30 p.m. CST Tuesday - thru Friday. (If you need to change the phone number on your appointment and there are less than 48 hours before your scheduled time - please contact me via the phone number above.)
Otherwise - you may contact my webmaster - who schedules my appointments at - jaawebmaster@gmail.com (please note - these emails should discuss appointments only - any personal message will NOT be forwarded on to me.)
If you represent a book review website or periodical and would like to obtain an ARC, please send an email to mail@victorialaurie.com listing your contact information and my publicist will get back to you shortly.
LOVE the letter! Please share if you get a response. I too noticed that the blog seemed to be disappearing all day and is now gone completely. I can’t help but giggle.
Jane, hope I am able to repost here the info available on her site…would assume it to be not reprehensive to do so but if you feel otherwise, please delete it.
Oh well done, Jane! Please keep us informed. TPA
I think it would be okay to repost portions for commentary but maybe not the entirety of it.
You’re my hero Jane. I can’t imagine any editor condoning such behavior from one of her writers. Most of the editors I know would boot writer with this attitude out the door faster than a kick up the backside.
I’ll be curious as to the editor’s response. Please do keep us posted on this.
I heart you, Jane.
Jane, do whatever you wish…my window of edit time is past.
I really do hope we hear from the editor. Because honestly? The poor girl probably had no idea her author was spreading this crazy and claiming she was in on it, and to suddenly get voicemail messages regarding it might very well have made her nervous. (I’m not saying it was wrong to call her, not at all; just that it might have confused her or made her wonder what was happening.) So I’d love to hear that she now knows what actually happened.
Very well done, Jane, very well done.
Thank you, Jane. Just thank you.
Due to my increased work schedule…ha! rotflmaoooooooooo.
One minute she’s threatening people with lawyers, the next she’s slinking away in shame. I hope that means lesson learned–unless it’s just a case of Vicki’s mommy taking her toys away and making her go stand in Time Out for a while.
Also hope that anyone considering paying Vicki 100 dollars for a “psychic” reading will stop dead in their tracks, realize how incredibly stupid that would be, and instead donate the money to one of those charities Vicki so highly recommends.
Brava, Jane!
Please keep us updated.
I betcha that the Penguin attorneys did not find this funny at all. Not at all.
In future, folks? If anyone wants to alert someone at a publishing house about an Author Behaving Badly in a way that might be injurious to someone, go right to the attorneys, not to the editor. The attorneys really, really don’t want to be involved in any libel suits that stem from some vindictive author writing about the nefarious habits of Ms. Thinlee Disguised-Enemy.
I would have loved to be a fly on the wall when her editor read that and when this person realized what she did was, well, stoopid, that’s all I have to say.
I’m reading comments here and there about how it’s career suicide, no future in publishing, etc. Really? It seems it hasn’t affected DAM’s future one iota. What about one certain vicious author and her equally vicious minions (starts with f and ends with bat)- seems they still have a publishing future. Same with authors who plagiarize i.e. CE and JD.
Meanwhile, it’s great to see a bully being backed down.
Nice letter, Jane. Just what Blogland needed, another Grade A twat, with little or no brain cell activity going on.
I wonder if her editor told her to shut her blog down?
Che, honey, you’re dead on. In publishing it’s all about the numbers. And unless VL’s next book TANKS, she’s very unlikely to be cut loose by her publisher.
Doubtful, since the blog started disappearing before the email was sent.
VL is one who looks to her peers for approval, as anyone who read her previous post about Butterscotch can see. The comments to her current post were entirely derogatory in nature, prompting VL to first delete the comments, then disable commenting. When people started going back and commenting on past posts, she deleted all of them.
Che, I’m pretty sure The Batshit Crazy One didn’t really have a publishing career to begin with. I know of at least one publisher who wouldn’t touch her with yours now, but that might be because her one and only booked sucked arseholes to begin with, thus maybe not such a sacrifice for publishers to ignore her.
Thank you Jane—both for writing the letter to Laurie’s editor and for sharing it.
I just wonder at the pathology that makes her say all this batshit-crazy stuff one moment, then annihilate her entire blog the next. You know, writing is a public performance, blog writing even more so, and guess what, not everyone likes you. If you can’t handle that, you really should find another line of work.
What really was appalling about her last blog post was the fact she put real people’s email addresses in it. I don’t do that even when I’m making fun of SPAM– and, in fact, SPAM’s the only e-mail I’ll quote publicly w/o permission.
Although I would be very surprised is Laurie’s editor a) knows what’s going on with Laurie’s blog, b) actually encouraged Laurie’s “revenge”, and c) will publicly respond to this issue, I also would be surprised if something didn’t happen behind the scenes. Because Laurie has, at least twice now, implicated her editor directly as supporter/encourager/adviser of Laurie’s actions — actions which some might construe as defamatory. And while it amazes me that Laurie would potentially imperil her editor like that, it would amaze me more if her editor didn’t find that particularly objectionable.
Bravo! I am in awe Jane!! *bows*
Now, the blog that she posted didn’t bother me much, she seems to be a woman who just wants to be noticed - and isn’t getting much attention, (and I know from previous posts that she “dreams of being a writer someday,” hmmm, envious much?)
What a patronizing snot…. Its not like Ms.Laurie writes frickin “War and Peace”….
I seriously doubt her editor did, but I wouldn’t be surprised if her agent said a word or two.
See, I don’t know. This is arguably a case of ‘author behaving badly’, but I kind of think DA and NR exacerbated the affair for no other reason than to spark drama. I know, my opinion won’t be received kindly, but that’s kind of what it looks like from this outsider’s perspective.
I mean, VL already acted poorly. With Google, anyone could have read the ravings. DA didn’t need to post a bunch of letters over it. In fact, just linking to the Google cache would have been enough for readers to make their own judgements. But by adding subjective commentary, it becomes less pointing out poor behavior and more ‘everybody come chime in and talk badly about X’.
It’s this kind of stuff that makes lots of readers who aren’t vocal feel sort of bad about romancelandia, so to speak. Jane could have sent the note in private and probably effected the same results without having responders here allowing others to chime in with the ‘bat shit crazy’ comments. It doesn’t exactly make all the responders seem completely sane to be tossing in their personally directed negative two cents left and right.
Like another commenter suggested, the editor may have been truly unnerved by an angry, and likely belligerent, voice mail left on a co-workers phone and probably followed whatever protocols she thought right at the time.
As for the cease and desist letter, it was over the top, but chances are if it went to court on copyright infringement, it’d be fifty-fifty as to how the thing would go down. Free use only covers so far, and it would probably be difficult to suggest some kind of social commentary in relation to the large sections quoted from the original angry ravings. Parody would probably be a bit difficult to prove as well. Moreover, if pushed that far, VL probably has the money to take it to court, but if I were NR, I wouldn’t want to be emptying my piggy bank to hire an attorney.
I guess I’m all for authors behaving badly, but when some kind of group pile on starts, it stops looking like author behaving badly and turns into romancelandia behaving badly. Again, I know, not a popular point of view.
Yep. And I bet BOTH are telling her to keep off the Internet for the time being.
I’m also going to bet that this is boosting her sales, despite her piss-poor behavior and despite the hole she dug herself into. I haven’t checked her Amazon ratings or anything, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d perked up a little. If so, it’s a sad commentary on what drives people to buy books.
Theo said:
I couldn’t have said it better. Thank you, Jane, for eloquently sticking up for everyone in blogland.
Shirley,
I understand where you’re coming from with your pov and respect it. But I can’t help thinking that this is a case of ‘All it takes for a bully to win is for the good woman/man to do nothing’
They each have a right to their say…and VL chose to take this public, front and center. You take your lumps, is all I’m saying.
Shirley: It doesn’t matter if your view is popular or not - it is still your opinion and you have the right to it.
I understand what you are saying and I disagree. I get what you are saying about this maybe being done behind closed doors, however, the point of a blog, usually, is conversation and opinions. VL chose a very public forum to make some pretty nasty remarks. On top of that you have yet another author who actually threatens a reviewer or reader or who ever it may be and that is going to bring out a ton of discussion and yes, sometimes, name calling. I don’t think it makes DA or NR look bad - they opened a forum and justifiably so it didn’t turn out so well for VL.
I don’t think that “Romancelandia” is behaving badly - I think they are acting accordingly.
Shirley, you bring up some very interesting points. Thanks for airing them :-). You remind us that it doesn’t pay to stoop to the level of the person who began this whole situation in the first place.
Certainly, it doesn’t look great to an outsider looking in. Then again, it didn’t feel so great to that blogger to get a “cease and desist” letter from an author’s lawyer. I think everyone on this forum (and others) is frustrated that someone is being bullied and is rushing to this person’s defense. But you’re right — attacking the attacker just can create a backlash if it goes on for too long.
Having said that, I’m suspicious of that “legal” e-mail to the blogger. What attorney in their right mind uses the Internet to send a cease and desist order? Doesn’t there have to be an actual defendant for that? As in, an actual defendant’s name, which no one really knows as the blogger uses an alias?
My understanding is that legal judgments, et al, needs to come via hard copy, through the U.S. postal service (or its counterpart in other countries).
Any legal experts out there to comment?
Shirley, I’m going to (politely) disagree with you. I feel that some of these authors behaving badly, such as LV, are actually harassing and attempting to intimidate readers. I’m not sure much can put a worse stain on romancelandia than that. I’m on the readers’ side, as I’m sure DA is.
As for DA using this incident to merely spark drama, it seems to me that this blog and others were created to talk books and report on the industry in general.
I’m not trying to be rude or argumentive, but - like I said before - I disagree.
Well done, Jane.
Shirley,
I respect and understand your opinion, but will have to disagree on some points(and no worries about not being a popular comment, that’s what is great about this website). I would have never known about VL and her actions if not for DA as I do not read other blogs and I seriously doubt this would have made it on CNN. With the knowledge that has been posted on VL(both from the links supplied and quotes) I can make an informed decision on whether I would like to spend my hard earned money on an author such as her. IMHO DA has done a favor for “romancelandia” by pointing out this bad behavior. What I love about DA is that fact that I can read a review and post whether I agree or disagree with the reviewer’s point of view without fear of retribution from the author, the reviewer, or fangirls. It’s a mixed community of authors and readers that I believe work well together.
Ignorance is bliss when it comes to food calories but not when it comes to spending my hard earned money:)
I don’t know if I would’ve called the editor. Sending an email or snail mail letter is more my thing. A phone call is more immediate, and depending on the recipient, it can be seen as aggressive, even if there were no such intentions on the part of the caller. Some people just get panicky about phone calls, and there’s often no way of predicting who’s going to freak out.
I’m not saying ChariDee did anything wrong, mind you. It’s just not the route I would have chosen, if I had felt inclined to contact Victoria Laurie’s publisher about her conduct.
In the years I’ve worked in Corporate America, I’ve seen consumer complaints make big changes in corporate behavior on more than one occasion, and I am a firm believer that the right letter, worded just so, landing on the right desk on the right day, can make a HUGE difference. I saw one of my former employers abruptly pull a multi-million-dollar ad campaign based on just ONE letter that hit all the right notes, sounded sane, and was worded respectfully. When the letter got to the president, he pulled the ad campaign that very day.
I do so love to see some quality stupid slapping :)
I know some people have protested this all being out in the open and perhaps turning a small dispute between 2 people into a much larger thing - and I can see the point of that, there is always an element of drama because we all likes to see a good drama don’t we? (I know I do! The antics of authors and publishers are better than any soap opera!) But I think this needed to be larger and more public than just hidden away - this author intimidated, threatened and bullied someone in a way that is damaging to reviews and quality reviews in general and was frankly intolerable - and without the avenue of a public rallying cry like DA then she would probably have got away with it. I have a special hatred for faux legal threats as well - this needs to be named and shamed to every corner of the industry to try and stop such horrendous tactics in the future.
Cyberbullying and internet group think are interesting phenomena from both sides of whatever fence has been erected. Why it happens…how people respond to it…how it reflects on us as a society…how it factors in to the brave new world of internet marketing and publishing…etc. So sometimes the issue isn’t as small as “that author behaved badly”; the impulse to share and discuss isn’t simply to punish that author as it is to negotiate this new territory.
Do you think so? It comes across to me as just the opposite. When an author like Laurie publicly posts messages seething with bile, over-the-top arrogance, threats, and just mind-blowing vindictiveness, it actually reassures me to see readers and other authors and bloggers like Jane turn around and blow that nonsense to very public smithereens.
Laurie isn’t just behaving badly. She’s behaving reprehensibly, on the level of DAM (although, granted, threatening to name a person after trashy characters in a book does not rise to the repulsiveness of stalking someone’s family). But you’ve only to read Laurie’s posts and blogs to understand what a thoroughly unpleasant person she is, and how much she seems to enjoy being that nasty toward people who would dare slight her or say anything negative about her work.
That kind of behavior deserves a harsh spotlight shone upon it, revealed in all its ugliness. I am glad to hear about her, because I don’t want to put a penny into the pocket of someone like Laurie, who takes such obvious relish in slamming down her readers. If a few readers or writers offer her up a good dose of her own medicine, maybe she can learn something from it–but, after reading her posts, I sincerely doubt it.
As a reader, I look at these posts and Dear Author’s responses and think, “Good to see this community looks out for those who are being treated badly and chastises those who are horribly in the wrong.”
Jane did the right thing. You don’t sweep garbage like this under the rug. That will just make authors like Laurie feel snug and safe in continuing to be vicious across the interwebs. I would much rather see authors like Laurie feel worried and anxious that they may have done themselves a whole lot of damage that will take a good long while to overcome. Then maybe they and other such authors will think twice before doing it again.
So…I’m not talented enough to figure out how to look up the cached link. Can someone post the link for the most recent post that’s being linked to at the top about the voicemail?
Shirley, to give you the POV of someone who is pretty much outside the orbit of romancelandia. Victoria is really the only one who looks bad in this. I may be a bit of a hard-ass on things like this, but I generally feel that if someone acts a fool in a public forum, you get to call them out publicly. And, in fact, NovelReads was incredibly circumspect in the initial post– as in asking, “does anyone else feel uneasy about this?”
I agree, Jody and MD. That the romance community is finally having this discussion is a good thing, IMO. As I was saying on a different DA thread yesterday, the DAM and VL scandals of this year are NOT the first time reviewer bashing/stalking has come up in Romancelandia, but this year we are seeing much more widespread concern about how badly some authors respond to criticism. Stalking and cyber-bullying are never acceptable. Unfortunately, there have been previous incidents where some in the romance community gave these behaviors a pass or even encouraged them.
I guess it could fairly be said that there’s been a pile-on against DAM and VL, but sometimes the best way to deal with bullies like them is to call them out as publicly as possible. That’s what I think is happening here.
I see it as going even beyond that. IMO, Laurie’s initial post, her admonition to readers that if they misbehave they will be humiliated publicly through a vicious characterization in a future work, was intended to intimidate critical readers into silence. It was not just garden variety ABB, but a definite threat (and self-consciously so, as I read the post). And when bloggers picked up on what she had to gleefully written, Laurie gets a lawyer friend to write a threatening letter to an individual blogger — is there any doubt that the intent was to silence that blogger, to give her fear of exercising the same rights to public speech Laurie capitalized on in her blog posts? Forcing silence is the whole point of Laurie’s words and actions, IMO, and cooperating can look a lot like capitulation.
While I am not the biggest fan of variations on the batshitcrazy accusations, I am much less a fan of authors who believe that readers should not be entitled to respond critically to their work, and who are willing to threaten and otherwise intimidate readers in order to shut them up. IMO that is a problem beyond simply saying something stupid or doing something controversial or any other public expression or act that generates blog discussion.
I don’t find these things entertaining in the way of a reality tv show, say, because to me there are real stakes here. I understand that some people find these incidents to be entertaining — and even cheerlead for entertainment’s sake alone — but I find them frustrating, tiring, and depressing most of the time, especially when there are still questions floating around as to whether it’s right to speak up (I’m thinking of the objections to the public discussions about Cassie Edwards here, for example).
So please tell us how we can get Amazon to do anything about Highland Press. A lot of us have tried and failed.
Peter Durward Harris said:
If their actions are in violation of Amazon’s TOS, that might be one angle.
Robin said:
I don’t find them entertaining, either. But I do think the discussions are necessary to have.
There are several problems with that. Chief among them are that Amazon is freakin’ huge. They are the 600 pound gorilla and they’re rapidly gaining weight. I was not exactly happy to see that they’d acquired Abebooks recently.
That streams into the next problem…actually reaching someone who cares and/or knows their ass from their elbow. You can’t even find such people in Customer Service over at Amazon. And one part does not know what the other parts are doing…when I was in Vine, I saw a lot of reports of people contacting Amazon’s Customer Service about Vine problems, only to receive the response “Vine? What’s that?”
It really reminds me of an old Rocky Horror line “Jesus Christ what a b*tch,quick Magenta hit the switch!”
Well done Jane. I do hope you get a reply from the editor.
Exactly, Robin.
Well, there you go, Shirley. You have an opinion with which I could not possibly disagree any more. You express it quite eloquently. I read it, and then I think “H’m. Shirley and I disagree.”
I do not decide “NOW I’M GOING TO GET SHIRLEY BACK BY WRITING A {insert negative characteristic} CHARACTER NAMED SHIRLEY IN MY NEXT BOOK” because I am not vindictive and inappropriate. I just notice the disagreement and move on.
I think there are a lot of people out there who need a “Goofus and Gallant” for grownups.
GALLANT receives a negative review. She looks at it briefly, evaluates its validity or lack of same, then moves on.
GOOFUS receives a negative review. She takes it incredibly personally and vows revenge. In a public blog posting. Written in extremely unprofessional language. Then she gets a lawyer friend to make an empty (and also unprofessional) threat.
In the absence of “Highlights for Grownups” I think that blogs like Dear Author perform a very useful public service. Letting people like Ms. Laurie labor under the delusion that this kind of behavior is even remotely appropriate is not actually doing them a favor.
The second an author publicly attacks and harasses a reader, it stops being between two people and becomes a concern for ALL readers. And when said author tries to intimidate a blogger with faux legalese, it becomes a concern for all bloggers.
Since the author brought her editor into the conversation and caused the editor’s professional integrity to be questioned, I don’t believe Jane did anything wrong by posting this letter.
I’ve learned long ago that there are some people who will take your private emails and publicly distort what you say. No private email would have had any impact on Laurie.
Further, the cease and desist and takedown letter was sent with the intent to harass and intimidate a blogger into taking action. As someone upthread suggested (Ms. Kearsley?), bullies go after people who are perceived to be alone. ChariDee is not alone and neither are other bloggers and that is a message that needs to be made publicly.
I appreciate everyone’s view point and I’m glad to see that I didn’t somehow get vilified for having a differing opinion. :D It makes me feel better that just because I don’t agree, I won’t somehow get slapped all over for being outside the majority box here. Still, even though some of the cordial, articulate responses help me to see the ‘other side’, so to speak, more clearly, my perspective hasn’t changed.
It would be different if VL’s actions resembled the Cassie Edwards situation, where something truly wrong (and illegal) may have happened (and did in my opinion). That story absolutely should have been brought to the forefront and investigated. I firmly believe actions like those taken by DA and others in outing the truth should be in the public view. If only because doing so shows the ‘world’ so to speak that romance writers aren’t going to allow sloppiness, or illegality, in their genre any more than other group of writers would.
In this case, it isn’t as if VL said she was going to put a hit out on the reader. Was she trying to intimidate, humiliate, hurt the original critic with whom she disagreed? Absolutely. Was it bad behavior? You aren’t getting any argument from me on that. But as far as I can find, DA was not a part of the original back and forth. They chose to join in, which changes the whole feel of it for me.
And truth be told, authors have parodied critics, and hell other writers, in fiction from time immemorial. Recently, in fact, Michael Crichton was supposed to have parodied a critic of his in “Next”. Now, did he blog about it before hand? Um, no. Crichton has *way* more class. But he surely did get his jabs in, through a character in the novel.
I think anyone who critisizes someone, who makes their living with words, should inherently *know* that they take the chance of being made fun of later. It’s part of the gig, I guess. I mean, does it somehow make it worse that VL ’said’ for all and sundry that she was going to get back at this person? Is that what makes it so awful? Somehow, I don’t know that her being vocal makes her intent worse than those of an author who doesn’t bray to the world, you know what I mean?
So going to the extreme, in my opinion, of calling this particular author ‘on the carpet’ and in fact going to her editor over what is surely only poor conduct… It makes me feel a little, I don’t know, dirty, mean-spirited? I’m not conveying my emotion very well with words here, and I apologize. I’m not saying DA is dirty or mean spirited, but that the situations feels that way to me. That it’s being made into a big deal when it really should have warranted no more than a tsking and a roll of the eyes over another author with poor self-control.
ANother poster wrote”In the absence of “Highlights for Grownups” I think that blogs like Dear Author perform a very useful public service. Letting people like Ms. Laurie labor under the delusion that this kind of behavior is even remotely appropriate is not actually doing them a favor.”
That is a really good point. When I discipline my children, it’s not just because I’m mad at them, or think they are “bad.” It’s because I want them to learn good behavior–and part of that is learning what is NOT good behavior. People don’t always realize how public their behavior is online–they think they’re blogging to their BFFs, and that whatever they say is ok (or they really are bullies, cyber or otherwise and need to be confronted). I am always a big fan of the private, behind-the-scenes correction. But there is value in confronting someone publicly. For one thing, this serves as an education to others on how NOT to conduct themselves when faced with a bad review. It may encourage others who are currently behaving this way to stop. And it seems like Ms. Laurie has learned from it as well, if she’s taken down her blog for now. I hope so. It would be nice if she could move on and have a profitable, calmer, writing career. As for the humiliation aspect of it–well, sometimes that’s the most effective consequence. When I got in trouble in school, it didn’t hurt me to stand in the corner, or to stand against the wall during recess, or whatever. What hurt was knowing that everyone saw me being punished, and knew that I had done wrong, with the judgment that implies. It was a very effective deterrent the next time I was tempted to “talk to my neighbor.”
(edited to put in quotes, but failed miserably!)
Just speaking for myself and to use an analogy often evoked in ABB situations-
Do I find real live literal train wrecks (or any highway accidents) entertaining? No.
Horrifying and fascinating. Yes.
Schadenfreude because a bully is getting her comeuppance. Hell yes.
One has to wonder why VL thought she could intimidate a blogger (and previously an Amazon reviewer) like this and get away with it. The answer, I suspect, is that she and those of her ilk have done it before and gotten away with it.
The bullying has to stop and the only way to do it is to shine a light on it.
To Karen upthread- oh, I knew it was a stretch to refer to the viscous one’s “career.” Couldn’t tell from her website whether she wrote/published more books. Don’t give a shit. Her minions, however, seem to be still active.
And Kalen- yeah sometimes it’s frustrating that publishers put money first. Understandable. But doctors and lawyers can lose their licenses. Why can’t author’s? Not that they need a license to write, but you know what I mean.
Now see I don’t hold Crichton as classy at all, but I do think he’s lucky that Michael Crowley did not sue him for defamation, especially since Crichton was cocky enough to use a barely altered version of Crowley’s name (Mick Crowley). After that story emerged, I never picked up another Crichton book again. That an author who relies on the pretense of artistic freedom to create his work should threaten those who dare to criticize him with potential portrayal as a sexually dysfunctional child molester strikes me as hypocritical at best. It may not be criminal (although that doesn’t mean it isn’t legally actionable), but IMO it’s *small*. Rebut the criticism, object strenuously, call him out, write a satirical send up even, but that . . . something totally different, IMO. And still, perhaps, not as extreme as the entirety of the Laurie situation. I don’t subscribe to the maxim that authors should remain mute in the face of harsh criticism, but there’s a big difference between calling someone out for their criticism and exacting revenge, IMO.
Shirley — While I can understand and appreciate your opinion/ideas regarding what’s been going on, I have to say I agree with others here who state that bullies like this author need to be publicly called on the carpet. Who’s to say she hasn’t done this with some other blogger/reviewer before it got too public? She admits to having coerced Amazon, using their own system, to have negative reviews removed from her book listings there.
If she and others like her get away with it once, they’ll continue on and on until legitimate bloggers who have every much a right to post as Laurie does, fold because of pressure, fear and past occurrences?
And Che — I agree with you and though I see your point too, Kalen, that many publishers can be and are driven by that almighty dollar, it’s really the reader that spends that dollar and I can’t imagine she’ll keep all of her readers after this. She might see a spike in sales for a week. People will want to see what’s going on and if she’s worth it. But in the long run, I truly believe she’s shot herself in the foot.
But! That’s just me. If it had been handled quietly and with grace, it would never have come to a community outcry to protect those who give an honest but less than stellar review the right to continue reviewing without fear of reprisal.
Maybe it’s just my cynicism or my natural distrust of authority figures, but I don’t think authors who stoop to conquer, so to speak, are ever going to “learn” anything, nor do I think I have anything to teach in that regard. For me it comes down to the simple concept of “no”: No, I will not be quiet; No, I will not let you intimidate and threaten me (or whoever); No, I will not give up my right to be critical; No, this is not okay.
Blinking…man, some people. They kill me, really.
I know a lot of people are questioning whether or not there’s any point in emailing a publisher/editor about this sort of thing, wondering if agents/editors care, etc.
Yep, with publishers/agents, it’s going to be about the money.
For example… if Nora Roberts (not that it’s likely to happen, but hey… it’s Nora, best romance example I can think of-hope you don’t mind me using you a hypothetical example, NR!) decides to turn around and lambaste some readers for daring to have…gasp…an opinion, the publishers aren’t going to blink. Some of them personally would likely be surprised, as would many of us in blogland.
But it wouldn’t affect NR’s career or future deals with her publishers. She’s proven herself.
However, unproven Miz Susie Q Romance turns psycho in blogland, running off the deep end and mocking readers, telling them, oh don’t piss an author off…I am author, hear me roar….well, here’s what I think when I see that:
Wow. How fricking unprofessional can you get
And Susie Q immediately goes to my list of authors not to mess with. Way too many books to buy, not enough time/money to read them all, so this is a good a way as any to pare down my TBB list or even authors to consider list.
Likewise, I think that editors would also blink at a displayed lack of professionalism.
Professionalism does matter. An author that doesn’t behave professionally would likely be a hassle to work with, and not just in reader relations.
A lack of professionalism in one area could easily lead one to believe there is a lack elsewhere. Things like deadlines, timely editing, contract discussions, all these things where an author need to have her big-girl britches on and act like a normal, reasonable professional.
If an editor sees something that gives the idea the professionalism standards aren’t quite up to par…. well, editors have lots and lots of books to buy, too. But they aren’t buying for their TBR stack. They are buying to publish, and I bet they want to deal with writers that are going to behave professionally–because that makes their job easier.
And I know for a fact that several editors in the big houses do read blogs.
Not too far a leap for me to think that unprofessional behavior on the part of authors could definitely impact a career.
~had to do some editing….
Then I have to assume you’ve not been the victim of this kind of bullying because I can tell you - it is a huge deal. Threatening people with lawyers, outing their identity, bullying and controlling free speech - these are the kinds of things any decent person should make an enormous fuss about and I only regret that so few people have the cojones of Jane and Co. I make no apology for making a fuss about this, and rolling one’s eyes is a pretty pathetic response to this kind of shit.
I’ll save my compassion for the victim here, and Ms Laurie can go sit on a spike. I hope she’s as miserable as fuck right now. If that makes me a mean girl, too sodding bad.
Yeah to what’s been said. But I’d also like to add that I’ve chosen to post my opinion a few times today because I am an author whose books are publicly reviewed, and I want to do my part to emphasize that this woman isn’t representative o