Author Beware

My friend Nick Kaufmann just did a blog post (or LiveJournal post, which is like a blog wannabe, right?) about some shady shit happening in the publishing world. Here's some of the post:

I was recently contacted by the former book review editor of the Rocky Mountain News about working for the new review website she started, where I would review self-published horror, science fiction, and fantasy novels. It sounded like something that could be a bit of an endurance test--how long would I be able to stand each poorly written military science fiction adventure about the best pilot in the fleet who's also a hit with the ladies before contemplating my own death?--but I'd done similar work before as genre judge of the Writers Digest Self-Published Book Contest, and the promised $100-per-book payment was more than a little tempting.

Then I started to wonder how they could afford to pay me $100 a book, seeing as how even Publishers Weekly with its thousands of subscribers can't pay that. Fearing the worst, I checked their website and, sure enough, they charge authors for reviews. A lot. Here's the reply I sent back. Maybe I should have waited until I cooled down a bit, but I was aghast.

Dear [redacted],

Thank you for thinking of me, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to pass on your offer. I cannot get behind, nor associate myself with, any review source that charges authors for reviews. According to your website, you charge a belief-defying $395-$495 per book, as well as a $19.95 handling charge for books sent to you as a PDF instead of hardcopy. Frankly, I find this appalling. Not only does it automatically draw the truthfulness and impartiality of the review into question, it is, in my opinion, just another way of fleecing authors who have already been wildly fleeced by vanity presses.

Again, I thank you for thinking of me, but not only would I not want to be a part of a pay-to-play service like this, it is exactly the kind of thing I have been consistently warning other writers against for years now.

Sincerely, Nick Kaufmann

Kudos to Nick for having strong principles. Some reviewers might feel inclined to take the fast money. Then again, I do have to wonder where the rest of the $395-$495 goes if the reviewer (who is doing pretty much the bulk of the work, no?) only gets $100 per review. Oh, and let us not forget about the $19.95 handling charge for PDF!

But this outfit is professional, right? Well, they certainly think so:

Professional reviews are a critical cog in the book business. While not infallible, they offer informed, reasoned assessments that put the book into the greater context of literature. They are not replaceable with this sort of sophomoric review. They do, however, provide a nice complement and reality check to crowd sourced reviews.

At BlueInk Review, we use professional reviewers who know their genres and offer opinions that are more than thinly supported snap judgments. I am proud of our roster and would never use reviewers who weren’t committed to reading the entire book.

If you're an author looking to get your book reviewed, there are, like, a gazillion websites and blogs dedicated to reviewing books. Seriously, The Dishonored Dead has been reviewed four times on blogs, The Serial Killer's Wife two times so far. I didn't pay a cent, just contacted those website asking if they would be interested in seeing my book. In fact, a few other places even requested to see the books after they were mentioned elsewhere. So just contact them. The worst they can say is no.

Actually, I take that back.

The worst they can say is, "How much is it worth to you?"

Being Social

I have to be honest: I'm getting a little sick of social networking. I could handle Twitter and Facebook just fine (well, I mostly ignore Facebook), but now Google+? As I probably mentioned before, social networking can be a double-edged sword for writers. Sure, you can connect with other writers and readers, but it's a massive time-waste that could be better spent, well, writing. If you don't tweet or make a Facebook or Google+ update every day, do you cease to exist to the others wired into the social network? If you let a week pass with no updates, do people just assume you're dead and move on? Does anyone even care?

Personally, out of all the social networks out there now, I like Twitter the best. I don't have to worry about friend requests or event invites or people asking me to like their self-made fan page. I don't have to sift through an ever growing stream of so-and-so is friends with so many new people or so-and-so just scored so many points in such-and-such a game or so-and-so is now in a relationship or so-and-so is now out of a relationship. Because, quite honestly, I don't give a crap about any of that.

Twitter is so much easier. I can follow who I want to follow. I can update when I want to update. I don't have to worry about getting notifications when someone "likes" my tweet or comments (though, yes, I guess @mentions are comments, no?).

There are different ways to use Twitter and Facebook and other social media websites. A lot of writers use it to promote their work. I'd be lying if I said I didn't use Facebook and Twitter to promote my stuff, but I don't do it constantly. When there's news to report (a new story or novel published), I'll mention it once or twice and that's pretty much it. My novels? They continue to sell pretty well every day, and guess what -- I'm not mentioning them on Twitter constantly, just as I'm not posting about them on message boards. I don't really understand the rationalization of writers mentioning their books and stories again and again on Twitter and Facebook and Google+ if their friends or followers don't really increase by much. If your friends or followers aren't interested in buying or reading your stuff the first time, they probably won't be interested in buying or reading your stuff the second or third or fourth or fifth time. In fact, they'll probably just get annoyed and unfollow (or block or unfriend) you.

If that happens, does it mean they don't like you anymore? Who knows. I've unfollowed people in the past on Twitter, and it was never because I didn't like them. It was just because I found myself not really paying attention anymore to their tweets. Or they retweeted like a madperson. Or they didn't tweet at all.

In fact, a long time ago, I unfollowed someone because I found myself not really paying attention to this person's tweets. I didn't not like this person anymore, but the next day I woke up to find a new blog post from this person making a big deal because I stopped unfollowing them. I mean, I have to assume this person meant me, otherwise it would have been way too coincidental to be anyone else. But anyway, this writer took it extremely personal that I would unfollow them. In their mind, I no longer liked them or considered them a friend. As you can imagine, I was embarrassed -- not for myself, of course, but for this writer making a big deal out of nothing.

At least, in my mind it was nothing, while to this writer it was clearly something.

But is that what social interaction is? Do we become virtual friends with everyone we encounter?

I know some writers play the Follow Me Game. They follow you and expect you to follow them back, and if you don't within a day or two, they stop following you. Why? Because I guess they think the more followers they have, the more successful of a writer it makes them. (Also, there are apparently programs you can log into that will automatically follow people and unfollow them after a day or two if the person does not follow you back. And of course there are people who just follow everybody they can because they want to.) I mean, not too long ago I saw a writer bragging how he had over 10,000 followers on Twitter. And it was true: he did have over 10,000 followers on Twitter. Of course, he was following about the same number too, which, if you think about it, sort of minuses the other one out.

Success is not judged by the number of Twitter followers you have or the number of friends on Facebook (or "likes" to your self-made Facebook fan page). At least, I don't think success is judged like that, but to each his own.

But again, I do like Twitter. Am I using it right? Is there a proper way to use these social media platforms?

A few months back, I tweeted some news on the Hint Fiction Twitter account. Someone responding, saying something to the effect of there you are, haven't seen you much, and I responded with something like, well if people talked more about Hint Fiction, I would post more. I was just trying to be friendly, nothing more than that, I was just trying to be "social," but this innocuous tweet was taken way out of context as an invitation to get a lecture on how I was doing the Hint Fiction Twitter account all wrong. How I needed to follow more people, how I needed to become interactive, how I needed blah blah blah.

My response was a simple thanks, but really the account is for updating any and all news about Hint Fiction, and left it at that.

Every person is different. Every person uses Twitter and Facebook and Google+ differently. Some of it can be too much. Some of it can be too little. Can any of it ever be just the right amount of socialness?

Some Diesel Spam

Remember back in February when I talked about getting a rather spam-ish email from the owner of Diesel eBooks? Well, he emailed me again tonight:

Robert,

I’m Scott Redford, owner of Diesel eBooks.  You have  a nice website and we hope you will use it to announce where your ebooks can be found. Please take a moment and paste the below “My latest Diesel eBook” link to your website.  Your readers will be grateful (so will we), for when ”clicked”, it will take you to your most recent book at our web store. Please see for yourself by clicking on the below link or pasting the URL in your browser:

http://www.diesel-ebooks.com/index.php?page=item&id=SW00000026239

Paste this code on your website to show the above link to your readers:

<a href=”http://www.diesel-ebooks.com/index.php?page=item&id=SW00000026239” alt=”Diesel eBook Store”>My latest Diesel eBook</a>

You can also send your readers to a tailored listing of your eBooks at our store using the below code.

<a href=”http://www.diesel-ebooks.com/author/Swartwood,%20Robert/results/10-Default/1.html“ alt=”Diesel eBook Store”>See me at Diesel eBook Store</a>

Also, don’t forget to click the “like” button underneath your cover on your diesel book page. Get your friends and fans to click as well. More clicks equals more exposure for you.  It takes just a second and this will automatically put your title on Facebook for everybody to see. Never know – you may go viral.

Our authors tell us that linking to their titles increases their sales so please take a few moments to past the code and start promoting.  If you need help  just let me know.

If you would like a small Diesel logo graphic for your link you can find one here: http://affiliates.diesel-ebooks.com/datafiles/uploaded/promo/1/still_image_small_1_Diesel-eBook-Logo-No-background_124.png

Give me a quick email back on your decision if you can… and keep up the good work.

Scott

Diesel eBook Store 1202 Peachtree Blvd Richmond VA 23226 804-201-4162

Word for word what was sent to me a few months back. And if you remember the exchange I had with Scott, he got sorta testy. So I thought I'd try to test the waters again:

Hi Scott,

Is there some way I can unsubscribe from these automated emails?

Thanks,

Robert

His response, seven minutes later:

Not automated. I'm the real deal, Robert.

Yes, of course you are, I thought, and sent this:

You may very well be the real deal, Scott, but you sent me the same email back in February, which was odd because at the time none of my ebooks were even available in your store. In fact, what's even odder is that some of them now are, which is strange as I never authorized Smashwords to distribute them to your store. So obviously Smashwords went and distributed them anyway without my permission. One ebook, in fact, I had unpublished over a year ago but still it seemed to go through.

Anyway, you also sent me an email in April which was meant, I suppose, for Raymond Nye, so he probably never did receive your initial response.

Best,

Robert

And, just like last time I called him out on his spammy email, he never responded. (And yes, in April he did send me an email intended for Mr. Nye, and I was tempted to reply with something stupid but just ignored the email completely.)

I still don't know what to think about the Diesel eBookstore. It's not a bad looking store compared to some. Definitely more appealing than Smashwords itself, but it basically does the same thing. It's an unnecessary middleman. If you have a Kindle, you buy your ebooks through Amazon. If you have a Nook, you buy through Barnes & Noble. If you have a Kobo reader, you buy through the Kobo store. If you have a Sony reader ...

You get the point.

But Diesel? There is no Diesel ereader. It's just a website that sells different formats of ebooks (and I can't even imagine their prices are that competitive) and is, according to their website header, world famous. Also, from their "about" page:

Finally, you may be surprised to hear that we don’t view eBooks as our core business. Yes, we sell them by the boatload. That’s the product. Our real business, however, is to provide a fun, positive, engaging customer experience. That’s what we strive for. That’s what we hopefully deliver.

So how do they intend to survive against the major corporations like Amazon and Barnes & Noble? Superb customer service, apparently. So superb, in fact, that its owner spams authors with automated emails and then claims that they're not automated.

Uh-huh, sure.

Keep up the good work.

UPDATE: At 9:32 a.m. Scott Redford replied with this simple note: "okay, sorry about the duplicate emails." That's at least something, but still, it doesn't give me that warm and fuzzy feeling in my belly.

Stand Up And Fight

Remember awhile back I talked about community? Well, here's an example where a community comes in handy and where you, if you are one of that community, are much needed. You see, Dorchester decided to go all digital for the most part many months ago, which caused a great disturbance in the force. Some made out on the deal, getting all their rights back so they could do with their novels as they saw fit. Others were not so lucky and their rights are still in a kind of limbo -- specifically Leisure has them and are still using them but aren't really paying their authors anything. And then today many of their authors received this email:

Dear Authors,

As many of you know, in conjunction with building the trade line, we're working to release our backlist in e-book. We've heard from some of our readers over the last several months about titles and author backlist they'd like to see released and so, as we build the upcoming publist, we've decided to reach out to them in a more direct manner to really get a pulse on what they want.

A newsletter campaign is going out today asking people to name the top 20 titles they'd like to see in e-book format. To make it fun, we're running it as a contest (see copy below). We hope to get a great response! Feel free to spread the word via your own website and social networking outlets. If you have any questions, feel free to shoot me an email or give me a call.

Cheers,

Allison

Top 20 Titles that should be an E-book

Dorchester is building its upcoming pub list, and along with all the great new genre fiction filling the pipeline, we’ll be releasing the best of our backlist in e-book format. But we need your help!

Be part of the process and help us select which backlist titles will be released! Send us between 10 and 20 titles that you want to see in E-book and be entered to win $25 worth of e-books from the Dorchester Web site!

Perhaps your favorite series is missing a few titles. Or your favorite author’s early works were published before e-books were even a possibility. No matter the reason, if you’re looking for a Dorchester title in e-book format and it’s not yet available, let us know. We want to hear from you, the reader, and make our upcoming list of releases the best it can be!

E-mail your list to contests@dorchesterpub.com subject: Top 20 Titles that should be an E-book and you’ll automatically be entered to win!

Contest closes Wednesday, March 30, 2011. Winner will be announced Thursday, March 31, 2011.

http://dorchesterpub.com/site/top20ebookscontest.aspx

Allison Carroll
Editorial and Web Coordinator
Dorchester Publishing
http://dorchesterpub.com

Lovely, no?

What's happening here is while Leisure is on the cusp of being forced to give back the rights to many of its authors because those authors' books are about to go out of print, they're looking for reasons to keep those books in print and hence hold onto those rights. Anyway, here's what I just emailed them:

from: Robert Swartwood
to: contests@dorchesterpub.com
date: Wed, Mar 23, 2011 at 10:11 PM
subject: Zero Titles that should be an E-book

Howdy --

I think this is a GREAT idea! But do you know what would be an even BETTER idea? If you gave back the rights to all the authors who have been waiting patiently while you guys screw around! If you do that, I'll be a happy customer.

Sincerely,

Robert Swartwood

If you'd like to help out some writers who are getting royally screwed over, I encourage you to email Leisure and say the same thing I did. In fact, if you want to copy and paste my email, feel free. I'm offering full world rights -- print, e-book, audio, the whole shebang.

In Which I Join The Bandwagon

Last night Jason Jordan posted about what he felt were 5 overrated writers, and the Internet exploded. There is now another one of those silly outcries of how we are a community and we need to stick together and blah blah blah. You already know my thoughts on that. It just blows my mind that you can't speak your mind in this community, because if it's not completely constructive criticism (and even if it is), then you're suddenly a meanie. This makes me think most of these writers in the community are in writers' groups where everyone praises everyone else's work no matter how bad it is, and hence nobody learns or grows as individual writers because nobody has the balls to tell them what's wrong with their work. And so, with that in mind, I present you with my list of 5 overrated things:

• Thursday. You know, the fourth day of the week. It's so overrated.
• Coke Zero. I mean, come on, why not just stick with Diet Coke?
• Frosted Brown Sugar Cinnamon Pop-Tarts. Everyone love them but I don't care much for them, so I judge them overrated.
• True Blood. It's probably a great show, and I do want to see it, but I haven't seen it yet, so right now it's overrated.
• Puffs Facial Tissues. Seriously, it's Kleenex or nothing else.

And so you have it, my current list of 5 overrated things. Yes, I know, I'm a meanie. So suck it.