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Posts Tagged ‘Author Issues’

Highland Press Warnings

By Jane • Apr 7th, 2008 • Category: Misc, Publishing News

Highland Press authors have complained about lack of communication with its publisher, with all communication being diverted to a secret co-publisher, DeborahAnne MacGillvray. Ms. MacGillivray is an author published by Highland Press (among other presses including Dorchester and Kensington) and also serves as a cover artist for Highland Press.
Among other things, Highland Press is [...]



Plagiarism Is a Community Issue

By Jane • Jan 8th, 2008 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

“Plagiarism is the academic and literary equivalent of robbery, taking somebody else’s property. If you copy somebody’s test answers, take an essay from a magazine and pass it off as your own, lift a well-phrased sentence or two and include them without crediting the author or using quotation marks, or even pass off [...]



RomanceLand Presents The Long Goodbye Starring Ms. Adele Ashworth

By Jane • Nov 27th, 2007 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Dear Ms. Ashworth:
Thank you for the prank you pulled on AAR this past holiday weekend which just last year was a place you vowed never to read again or post at again. At first, I was all worried that you were serious when you went after a reader complaining about your books being wallpaper [...]



Patricia Cornwell Asks if You Are a Real Fan

By Jane • Nov 22nd, 2007 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Happy Thanksgiving Dear Author Readers. I came across a special tribute by one Patricia Cornwell to all her fans and had to share it.
I saw on David J. Montgomery’s website a message from Patricia Cornwell making a call to her fans to contact everyone they know and strong arm them into leaving her positive [...]



Romance Isn’t for Everyone and It Doesn’t Have to Be

By Jane • Sep 20th, 2007 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

There was a recent post at “Fangs, Fur & Fantasy”, a blog for urban fantasy writers, from a self labeled romance cynic, author Maggie Stiefvater. Ms. Stiefvater is, by her own definition, a urban fantasy writer whose first book is due out in Fall 2008. She attempts to open a dialogue about romances [...]



Brenna Lyons Hangs Up Her Bankruptcy Law Shingle

By Jane • Sep 13th, 2007 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Brenna Lyons is way unhappy with me (Jane for those who don’t read the “stamped by” or for the bloggers (read me) who chose the incorrect author when posting guest columns)) and according to her supposedly are the Triskelion authors to whom I am doing a great disservice. Her first complaint with me was [...]



Author Attempts Oprah Book Club Hoax

By Jane • Aug 17th, 2007 • Category: Publishing News

Bill Schneider is the author of three self published books. Like many self published, debut and midlist authors, Schneider is toiling in obscurity. So he did what any possibly neurotic, desperate, and not terribly ethical author would do and began telling people that his book, Crossed Paths, a gay love story set in 1976, [...]



Why Romantic Times Reviews Are Not Credible

By Jane • May 1st, 2007 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Karen Scott, blogger from the UK, wrote a review of Ben’s Wildflower, a recent release from Ellora’s Cave. I wrote a review as well. Neither of us liked it. It was plotless porn. Today, a person purporting to be Kathryn Falk, the CEO of Romantic Times, posted a comment on Karen S’ [...]



Letter to Anonymous Author Who Thinks Her Stuff Is the Bomb

By Jane • Feb 23rd, 2007 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Dear Ms. Anonymous Author:
I read your letter over at the Anonymous Publishing Vent Club which, I have to confess, has been terribly boring of late. I had high hopes for it when it started, but the first 4 posts have been quite dull. Your letter was just the right thing to start out the [...]



Holly Lisle Hates Chains (and after reading her rant, Chains may hate her)

By Jane • Dec 5th, 2006 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Okay, so you know I’ve tried to stick with my one rant a week theorem because no one wants to hear rants everyday or even every other day or, generally, more than once a week. But the more that I ponder the December 1, 2006, blog post by Holly Lisle, the more I am [...]



Barbara Delinksy Disavows Romance Writing Past

By Jane • Dec 4th, 2006 • Category: Publishing News

In an interview with the Globe, Barbara Delinsky disavows her romance writing past, refusing to discuss it with the interviewer. Nice. Am adding her to the list of Authors Behaving Badly. Come on, Delinsky, you built your career on romance readers. At least acknowledge that they exist. Via HelenKay Dimon’s blog.



Should Authors Shut Up and Write?

By Jane • Nov 6th, 2006 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Much ado was raised by Miss Snark and her commenters about Anne Stuart’s statements to All About Romance. Ms. Stuart confessed that she felt “disillusioned about the lack of support” by Harlequin and that she felt the publisher is more about “slots and numbers, not about passion for what they’re putting out there.”
I recall [...]



Authors Behaving Badly, Episode #4: Rosina Lippi/Sara Donati

By Jane • Aug 25th, 2006 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Someone needs some attention. Let’s, as Sybil would say, give her some. You see, Rosina Lippi, in an attempt to keep things on the downlow, posts on her blog an explanation of an online kerfluffle that happened at the Gabaldon yahoo group. Thanks to my reader tip, I moseyed over to see what the drama [...]



This Is Not Chick Lit

By Jane • Aug 23rd, 2006 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Dear Ms. Merrick,
My newsletter from PaperbackDigital.com came and one of the featured books is your anthology titled “It’s Not Chick Lit.” I know that this topic has been debated to death. I am simply late to the party. My excuse is that I am running this blogging experiment about a book that [...]



Authors Behaving Badly Episode #3: Jan Butler

By Jane • Aug 5th, 2006 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

Hey, a special Saturday edition of Authors Behaving Badly. We did our level best to simply ignore the rantings of a small minority, but with the recent post by Ms. Butler, we had to send our letter of commiseration. For those who aren’t in the know, Jan Butler is a member of RWA and [...]



Authors Behaving Badly: #2, RWA Literacy Episode

By Jane • Jul 24th, 2006 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

I have only been to one Literacy Signing. I lugged a suitcase full of books from my house to the signing much to the chagrin of Ned who was forced to carry it everywhere (at least when there was no porter in sight). I was excited about finally getting to meet some of [...]



What Goes on on the Internet, Stays on the Internet?

By Jane • Jul 8th, 2006 • Category: Misc

Sorry authors, this ain’t Las Vegas. If you’ve picked up the most recent edition of RT’s magazine, there is a little piece about authors behaving badly on the internet. Told in broad, but descriptive terms, the article poses three examples:

A Bestselling Author asking for bank statements of an ebook publisher
A “fanged” author referring [...]



The $1.00 Bin

By Jane • May 15th, 2006 • Category: Misc

Dear Ms. MaryJanice Davidson:
So I was at the Half Price Bookstore yesterday and was browsing through the $1.00 bin. There was a romance book there proclaiming to be by New York Times Bestselling Author so and so (see I can’t even remember her name today). I looked at the copyright date: 1980s. [...]



Authorzilla, Episode 5019 of Authors Behaving Badly

By Jane • May 12th, 2006 • Category: Letters of Opinion, Misc

There aren’t many people happy with the Ashworth novel, Duke of Scandal. I didn’t much like Duke of Sin so I wasn’t shelling out $8.00 for Duke of Scandal particularly after I read Ashworth’s own description of it:
As his feelings for her grow, he's confounded by her honesty, her naiveté coupled with a glamour [...]