A brief glimpse into publishing’s dark side
I love writing. Publishing… not so much sometimes. There are a few things that go on in the field of so-called marketing and promotion that make my skin crawl. Nasty, shameful things, pursued by a handful of people, but sometimes with great success. Commercial success anyway, because they’re the kind of nonsense people primarily obsessed with creative success wouldn’t contemplate for one second.
If you want to know what I’m talking about take a look at some posts by a couple of brave and talented writers Jeremy Duns and Steve Mosby. They stem from the astonishing admission by the writer Stephen Leather at Harrogate that he used sock puppet accounts — fake identities — to promote, to great financial rewards, his work.
Stephen Leather has his own account of that event on his blog here. Though for some odd reason that seemingly-reasonable post (which makes some sound points about publishing) fails to include any mention of sock puppets. Why? Perhaps because there’s a much larger story to be told.
Steve revealed the sock puppet nonsense (to those of us who weren’t at Harrogate) in a very measured blog post here. Jeremy then set about some serious and dedicated sleuthing. Most of the results you will find on Twitter and I heartily recommend you follow both these chaps, @jeremyduns and @stevemosby. A measure of Jeremy’s discoveries can be seen in a second post by Steve here.
But only a fraction because there’s so much out there it frankly beggars belief. You have to wonder how Stephen Leather finds the time to do this stuff. To adopt different identities and roam the wilds of Amazon (where he seems to be well known and in some quarters deeply loathed). To pursue both his own promotion and the denigration of anyone who dares to criticise his work. Who, for example, would really think it worthwhile setting up a fake Twitter account in the name of one of his critics? And then track down another critic complaining elsewhere about an electric kettle on Amazon and get on his case there?
Yes, you did read that right. And here it is…
If you want to know a bit about the dark side of modern publishing I’d advise spending a little time perusing some of the facts Jeremy and Steve have turned up. But do please remember this: Stephen Leather is not alone. You can find other examples cited by Jeremy too, including one fairly well-known author who used a sock puppet to slag off the work of a rival (which is about as low as anyone in this business can stoop, at least as far as I can imagine).
Leather coughed up to his behaviour at Harrogate, supposedly after a bit of prompting from the organiser. Few others would be so frank. One of the down sides of the internet is that it is frequently open to abuse, usually anonymously or under the guise of a false identity. And if something can be abused pretty soon some dodgy Del Boy will come along and abuse it.
They will doubtless argue, as Stephen Leather does, that ‘marketing is marketing’. This isn’t. It’s a blatant attempt to rig book sales through fraudulent behaviour, posting five star reviews of your own books under a fake identity, damning the work of others or encouraging strangers who’ve never read your book to vote for it in one of those awards idiotic enough to use the web, not independent judges, to decide on ‘winners’. Stephen Leather has coughed to only the first and I don’t accuse him of the others. But they do happen, perhaps rather more often than any of us knows.
If someone in the financial world tried such stunts they’d end up in jail. In publishing they can wind up on festival platforms looking very pleased with themselves indeed.
Amazingly some people seem frightened to come forward and condemn these practices. I have no idea why. What — or who — is there to fear? Stephen Leather has threatened Jeremy Duns with libel. But given that pretty much everything Jeremy has uncovered comes, in one way or another, from something Leather himself has either said or posted it’s hard to see that as anything more than bluster.
But really Stephen Leather is a symptom of this malady, not the disease itself. There’s a stink in some quarters of publishing and I do think it’s time those of us, the vast majority of writers, who hate it distance ourselves from this rotten pong.
Here is my position.
- I have never used sock puppets and never will.
- It’s nice if you want to review my books on Amazon, and even nicer if you do so favourably. But that’s your choice entirely; I won’t beg you to do it.
- I will never allow my name to go forward for any so-called prize which is ‘awarded’ on the basis of nothing more than web votes. On the one occasion I was rash enough to allow this I went out of my way simply to publicise the fact that awards list was up there and leave it to readers to decide the rest. Maybe that’s naive. I well remember getting a round robin message on Facebook from another author on the shortlist pleading for a vote (whether I’d read the book or not).
On that last point I’d simply say this. If you want to know how an awards system should be run take a look at the way ITW handles its annual Thrillerfest prizes. I was on the board of ITW for five years. The system, set up by James Rollins at the very beginning, was scrupulous in its integrity. No one outside Jim and his judges knew who’d been nominated. No one outside those involved knew the eventual winners until they were announced. And all board members of ITW were barred from being considered for any prize whatsoever (which is why the very honourable Joseph Finder immediately withdrew his recent nomination after joining the ITW board, choosing the hard volunteer work of running this important organisation over the chance of a big prize).
Britain’s got a lot to learn from America when it comes to honesty and generosity in publishing, but that’s another story.
I don’t have any lofty ideas about my own position. I’m a commercial author, not someone jockeying for a Booker nomination. I do this for a living and I like sales as much as anyone. But I won’t cheat to get them and I will not knowingly share a platform with those who do.
Writing of all kinds tends to come down to an attempt to find some truths through the use of your individual imagination. I can’t begin to think how that’s possible if your work is wreathed in layer upon layer of dismal, self-serving lies.
37 Responses to “A brief glimpse into publishing’s dark side”
Thanks for this explanation, David.I stumbled across the story on Twitter this afternoon, and have spent several hours reading Tweets and blog posts. And it's scary. To think that honest reviews could lead to threats and stalking, is frightening. Another practice I've witnessed is the 'befriending' that goes on amongst self-published authors. Nothing wrong with new authors supporting themselves, helping each other, but what tends to happen is that the 'friends' vote up each other's works, recommend them, provide friendly positive 5-star reviews, and similar. Once again, this can be viewed as semi-fraudulent.Self-publishing – giving authors a bad name?
Don't think this is to do with self-publishing at all. It's about manipulating the various web resources out there to your own advantage. That's open to all authors, self published or not. To me it's simply a question of integrity. We all know what's right and what's wrong in all of this. Does a fast buck justify dishonesty?I'm sure most writers, wherever they are in the business, think not.
Hi David, I'm the reviewer that Leather keeps tracking down. He is indeed a nasty piece of work and has stalked me across many reviews. He has previously insinuated I was gay, had a go at AIDS sufferers, people with Alzheimers and generally threatens people who don't give his drivel a 5 star review. Keep up the good work!Mark McKew
I'm not defending Stephen Leather's marketing practices. I've long since come to the point where I've set that aside. I disagree with how a lot of authors conduct themselves, but frankly, it's far easier for me to ignore an 'anonymous' sock puppet online than it was for me to ignore the costume-clad authors who kept boxing me in at B'con the one year to tell me about their book. However, I disagree with you about the ITW awards. It's not a perfect system by far. I was a judge once, and I didn't receive a number of books I was supposed to. From my division of judging, I don't believe my scores were even applied. There's a bigger story than that, but it's water under the bridge for me, although I've heard similar views expressed by others who judged for them. I'm not specifically coming on to take a shot at the ITW; what I am saying is that no system is perfect, and if you set one up as perfect, you open the door to an onslaught of information that has no benefit in public discourse. This entire situation from that Harrogate panel has blossomed into exactly what I thought it might – a fracturing within the writing community. You've just essentially spit in my face with this post, whether you realize it or not, and sadly undermined the achievements of so many authors by doing so. Since what I do in the community was born out of a place of passion for books and reading and trying to find honest ways to build the platform of books I loved, and that has extended to all my husband does as well through our sites and awards, you've effectively suggested all of that is dishonest. It's a good thing we don't do what we do for you, or we'd pull the plug on Spinetingler, which would be a tremendous hurt to a number of great authors who've benefited from the site and the recognition they receive from our awards, not to mention the authors who've said after reviews on the site, they've seen their sales rise. Considering we don't sell reviews and write what we believe when motivated to, and never for barter for promotion elsewhere, I'm not sure how that's managed to see us lumped in as dishonest, untrustworthy or borderline criminal, but in your shots at SL, you've tarred us as well.
I don’t see how a criticism of bad web review practice, and particularly the dedicated lying of SL, has done you down?
– as an outsider to this “writing community” I am having trouble placing you in the attacked group in the above blog piece at all.
I see no mention of Spinetingler for example…
which makes me ask, – is this a confession to being involved in sloppy self reviewing practices?
How do “shots at” (I would say ‘exposes of’) someone who smears other writers from behind a fake persona, and threatens and inhibits the social media life of those who expose such abominable behaviour, apply to you?
Or are you a fan/friend of Leather and his fellow professional liars and thus the criticism applies to you as well? you say you “set that aside” – not sure if that means you are associated but innocent? If you say it does, I can only assume that you are reading something differently than I find possible, and must be projecting yourself into a position of guilt alongside Mr Leather…
Perhaps I'm being dense here but how does what I've written 'spit in your face'? It doesn't mention you or Spinetingler. I don't know you or Spinetingler or 'what you do'. Genuinely baffled here…I'm sure the ITW awards system isn't perfect. No awards system is by the way. But it's a lot better than a system based on 'anyone can vote if they can go online'.
Actually, we have met, at the same B'con as the costume-clad authors. I believe it was the Saturday night… one of the parties. Perhaps St. Martin's. I was in Killer Year once upon a time. Essentially a marketing venture I'd rethink now if I had the benefit of experience past debut, but that's another story.
Okay, a few thoughts: 1) I think using sock puppets is something that's going to bite us all in the ass, especially if some writers keep bragging about doing it. The Amazon ratings system has a dubious enough reputation as it is ( I'm looking at YOU, Harriet Klausner).2) I don't see anything wrong or dishonest with awards based on reader votes (like Spinetingler's) rather than the "panel of judges" method (and I say this as someone who's been an awards judge). It's a different way of doing it, and you can give awards based on that method whatever weight you like. As we say in the law biz, "that goes to the evidence's weight, not it's admissibility." But calling it "dishonest" seems unnecessarily harsh. 3) what tends to happen is that the 'friends' vote up each other's works, recommend them, provide friendly positive 5-star reviews, and similar. Once again, this can be viewed as semi-fraudulent.Self-publishing – giving authors a bad name?This happens in traditional publishing, too. A lot. I've seen it, especially when an author friend is being unfairly attacked. I eventually decided that jumping in does more harm than good, but if a friend has written a book I like, I don't have any problem giving it a good review. And I am somewhat more likely to read a friend's books. It's the way of the world.
All awards systems are flawed but as I said earlier it seems to me that one which allows people to vote whether they've read the book or not is inherently open to abuse. As I also said I'm not aware of Spinetingler so maybe it works differently there. If so… fine. But the simplest way is to have a panel of judges – who will fall out anyway.Awards inherently suck and always do until you win one. Don't remember any event at Bouchercon with costume-clad authors I'm afraid. I certainly never wore one.
I think authors should be more like me and simply not even be nominated for awards let alone win them. This obviously removes this problem at a stroke. I do however (and more seriously) sell more than enough books to earn a comfortable living which ultimately, is what it's all about.
Spinetingler Magazine has been around since 2005 and our awards have been around for almost as long. We also rely on online votes to determine the winners. Last year we received over 20k votes. Past nominees and winners have included: John Rector, Tom Franklin, Benjamin Whitmer, Emily St. John Mandel, Roger Smith, David Corbett, Charlie Stella, Dave Zeltserman, Ray Banks, Megan Abbott, Duane Swierczynski, Laura Lippman, Dennis Lehane, Don Winslow, Charlie Huston, and many others. If you intend to offer commentary with scalpel like precision you have have to be careful not to grab the shotgun instead. In going after Stephen Leather in this post you also go after awards that rely on online votes:1) "damning the work of others or encouraging strangers who’ve never read your book to vote for it in one of those awards idiotic enough to use the web, not independent judges, to decide on ‘winners’."2) "I will never allow my name to go forward for any so-called prize which is ‘awarded’ on the basis of nothing more than web votes. On the one occasion I was rash enough to allow this I went out of my way simply to publicise the fact that awards list was up there and leave it to readers to decide the rest. Maybe that’s naive. I well remember getting a round robin message on Facebook from another author on the shortlist pleading for a vote (whether I’d read the book or not)."Which applies to the Spinetingler Awards. If you intend to criticize A and your words also apply to B, C, and D you are also criticizing them as well, regardless of intention.
Unfortunately abuse is rampant, but JD is right, it's not only the self-published who play the game. Both indie authors and the traditionally published solicit reviews, nominations for awards, and contest votes, and frankly, they don't care whether you've read their book or not. But is online voting any more skewed than the nomination/voting process for awards like the Agatha or the Anthony, where winners are selected by conference attendees who may or may not have read the books? This smacks more of popularity contest than a reflection of quality, yet these awards are considered a feather in a writer's cap. (You like me, you really like me!)
I do however (and more seriously) sell more than enough books to earn a comfortable living which ultimately, is what it's all about.I'm with you on this one, Dougie. To me, there are two questions to ask any author: (1) Are people reading and enjoying the stories you tell, in whatever format? (2) Are you making enough money at it to suit you? If the answer to both of those questions is "yes," then the only thing you need to say is "good for you!"
All awards systems are flaky and yes the 'vote for me at a convention' one is in that category too. I'm afraid the only fair and reliable one is an independent set of judges who choose on their criteria alone. Which can be dubious too but at least the popularity contest quotient is diminished and when you get down to it people should at least have read the books concerned.I'm not going to prolong this Sandra because it's frankly tedious and your original assertion that I 'spat in your face' really didn't merit a response at all. I will not take part in awards based on web votes for the reasons I've outlined. I think I have the right to make that choice, as you have the right to run your awards the way you see fit. Any awards system that doesn't ensure the people voting have actually read the damned book seems pretty flawed to me. But others may feel differently.
David, let me ask: when you were an ITW judge, did every judge receive every book published in the genre in a given year, then read it all the way through? Or was it permissible for a judge to go, "I've read x pages in this book, and I can tell it's not a contender"? I'm afraid the only fair and reliable one is an independent set of judges who choose on their criteria alone.I guess to be truly pure, you'd have to find judges with no friends in the business.
Sandra – while I appreciate why you're annoyed, I also think David has a point that web-voting-based awards are vulnerable to tactics like logrolling, among other possible criticisms. They just are, aren't they? Which isn't to say other methods are necessarily preferable. With awards, I'd say we all require a little cognitive dissonance regardless of how they're decided: there is, after all, no such thng as a "best" book of the year. It's one reason I look to shortlists rather than winners. But some systems are easier to game than others. In general, I favour a juried system, as far as it goes.Even more generally, I'm bemused by this idea that the debate around Leather's admitted and revealed activities has torn a rift in the crime community. You don't have to move on from it, or become weary of it. It's the main issue. This isn't directed at you, as I don't know what you've said elsewhere, but I wish some of the people arguing the toss with David and Jeremy would spend some of their time arguing with Leather instead – or at least as well. I genuinely can't imagine why someone would look at this whole issue and decide "Here is where I will concentrate my attention".
I was on the board which meant I was, quite rightly, ringfenced from the whole process. As a board member none of my books could be eligible. Nor would I have any contact whatsoever with anyone in the judging process. That's as fair and independent as any judging process can be it seems to me.It won't stop people using friendships to up their books. But it does put brakes on the process, and since ITW was using judges in different countries some of the cliquishness was surely squeezed out of the system. I don't pretend it was perfect but at least an effort was made to keep out any attempts at fixing things. How that can be done in a process where, as I say again, people can vote even if they haven't read the book is beyond me. And I have witnessed some of the rather sleazy efforts to drum up votes in those situations. Not pretty.Am slightly baffled how this has become the major source of contention in the post above. It never mentioned Spinetingler. I never even knew about Spinetingler until today and web award voting systems aren't the primary discussion here. Wouldn't we be better employed turning the spotlight on the practices bringing this profession into disrepute in the first place?
Wouldn't we be better employed turning the spotlight on the practices bringing this profession into disrepute in the first place?I think the reason the contest thing's getting more discussion is because no one's willing to argue in favor of sock puppetry.
I also wonder if 20K votes wouldn't tend to even out any logrolling…I don't know anyone with that many friends. But my last word on the subject of web-based voting in contests is a paraphrase of Willie Nelson: "it ain't wrong, it's just different." Peace.
Wouldn't we be better employed turning the spotlight on the practices bringing this profession into disrepute in the first place?I think the reason the contest thing's getting more discussion is because no one's willing to argue in favor of sock puppetry.
I also wonder if 20K votes wouldn't tend to even out any logrolling…I don't know anyone with that many friends. But my last word on the subject of web-based voting in contests is a paraphrase of Willie Nelson: "it ain't wrong, it's just different." Peace.
Thanks JD. I actually spoke at a literary conference this weekend and the theme of my talk was writing to earn. Whilst the audience of budding authors loved it, the looks on the faces of the majority of 'published' authors at the very idea of anyone actually being motivated to study their market and use that research to target their writing as a means of earning money was one of abject horror!Yet these are the very people who are having to subsidise the meagre income they derive from their own writing by teaching creative writing classes and doing the festival circuit spouting the same tired rubbish. I know what I'd rather be doing and if I were a budding author, I know what I'd rather listen to.
JD – I would think 20k votes would be enough, yes! And I agree that nobody's likely to step up and defend sockpuppetry.But that's the thing, isn't it? I would say Jeremy Duns has put his head above the parapet, named names, and been threatened with libel. I've blogged on it. David has, here. Others have joined in too. If nobody thinks this behaviour is acceptable, why is so much of the dialogue I've seen being wasted nitpicking about how things have been said? Certainly, some of the people criticising Jeremy – I wish they'd spend a fraction of that energy openly criticising the behaviour he's uncovered instead. And yet for some reason they don't. It becomes peripheral and then perpetuates because we let it.
If nobody thinks this behaviour is acceptable, why is so much of the dialogue I've seen being wasted nitpicking about how things have been said? I've had whole pages wasted on this kind of thing whenever I've posted on Amazon.com as opposed to Amazon.co.uk. It really is quite amazing and incredibly petty. I suspect however, that it is simply a tactic used either to unsettle the 'target' by trying to put them on the back foot or as a response to points raised which they actually agree with but don't want to admit to. This seemingly being very much against their own 'code' of conduct.I once raised this very question with them but when I suggested that they should actually use their time to create as opposed to undermine or even destroy other people's efforts, their response was simply 'why? We're readers, not writers.'How can you argue with that kind of mentality?
It wasn't an event with costumes. They just wore them and hung around the halls between panels.I've certainly heard from other authors that have been on other judging panels that there's no way they can read the volume of books they receive, which means not all books are necessarily read. I could say in my own case that there was no way to prove if I read the books either. I'd say there is no perfect system whatsoever. That does not change the fact that when a person makes morality statements against behavior which is suggested to be dishonest or possibly illegal, and then states they'll never do certain things, which they list, there's an inference that those things are suspect. Steve, how we say things matters. I know you know this.
If we're more emotionally invested in the subject, maybe we're more willing to overlook the nuances, or the collateral damage doesn't matter as much. The reality is that we'll never all agree on marketing strategies. I'm not personally aware of Stephen Leather ever doing anything to annoy or affect me, while I can think of several other authors who've irritated me considerably with their pushiness and practices. And we all know there's a bit of a cultural divide here. Now, I'm a person who's been labeled as negative on a number of occasions, and argumentative, and seen as having something critical to say about next to everything. Maybe sometimes, that shoe fits. But Spinetingler is something that was about positives. It was about recognition for great books, about being able to champion what I love and do that from a natural venue, and it helped writers and authors. Spinetingler Magazine is an MWA approved publication. Screw whoever doesn't like us – it's damn hard to meet MWA guidelines, and we do. We've worked hard, digging into our own pockets and giving of our own time for years, and the more 'known' as an author I've become, the less of a presence on the site, so that there is no conflict of interest for me.And for those who apparently don't know Spinetingler or what it does, they can come along, read a post like this, take the inference that certain things must be suspect and shady, then see that we have an award that has open online voting, and question our credibility. Hell yes, that matters to me, and I didn't start that. I've got people on Facebook saying they read this post and wondered about us. That's not acceptable to me.It isn't us who made this topic be about something other than intended, but certainly because of all the people who benefit from Spinetingler, and who value what we do, I'm going to defend Spinetingler. If people want to gang up and attack Stephen Leather, then do it. Leave us out of it, but in the midst of all this the divide has grown, and it isn't just about sock puppets and marketing. It's about the price of your e-book and traditional publishing and this is exactly where I could see it going a week ago, which concerns me. I don't have an argument with Leather. Here's the thing – there are people who have been traditionally published who've been absolute a$$e$ about self promotion and employed methods I don't particularly like, or approve of. I get to make the decisions for me. Beyond that, I'm not God. I'll give Stephen the credit of saying he admitted what he does to sell books. That's better, in my eyes, than the thousands of others who do it all in secret and wag fingers at others publicly. I mean, I don't agree with the practice, but there is no value in arguing against those people. Am I the only person who sees that a lot of "traditional" authors have been blasting some successful "non-traditional" authors and what it looks like is a combination of fear, bitterness and jealousy rolled into one? I don't even believe that's what it's about, but it really is how it looks at points. And there are those who are going to take it that way. I understand just how hard it is to market effectively, and to get your work into the right hands and build a readership. Do I wish there was a level playing field? Hell yes. But life isn't that way. That's never been true. Big books with big payouts and budgets get big promotion while little books that didn't cost much get ignored.Before I started our awards, I agonized over issues just like this. How do you make it fair? Being the type of thinker I am, I projected my way through a lot of scenarios and came to one conclusion: there is no perfect system. Our best protection against logrolling would be promoting the awards to the level that we get thousands of votes, and the bi-product would be even more promotion for all the authors who were nominated. It's what the other awards should be doing. But it's all moot. There are just a lot of good writers who're getting caught up in this, unfortunately. The price of my e-book alone may be enough to lump me in bad company, which is a load of rubbish.You want the shadiest thing I've experienced of late? I was offering copies of my book for review, and offered it to various Amazon reviewers, making it clear there was no obligation to write a review at all (never mind a positive one). One fellow wrote a very positive review. It was nice. I didn't realize he was an author, and was strictly self-published. Not until he responded by sending me copies of his books, and when I didn't review them within a few weeks, he removed the review of my book. Who knows what he really thought of it, but clearly, he thought it was a trade. I was after only honest reviews given voluntarily.So there's crappy behavior everywhere. If we were really to name all these people, this is all we'd do, and none of us would ever have time to read another book again, never mind write one. I won't make this my mission because it's a fight we can't win. It's like Coke and Pepsi – I hate Pepsi commercials. They're often so mean. But clearly, their marketing strategy works for them, and it motivates enough people to buy their product. I may never understand it, but that's okay. I'll just drink Coke. Honestly, what does anyone hope to accomplish with this? Stephen Leather to reform? Fewer online sock puppets? I'd say there's more chance of money under your pillow from the Tooth Fairy… and so I'll go back to doing what I do, and I am not investing energy in this war, because it's not possible to win. There's no gain here, only loss.
As soon as I got to the 'I don't have an argument with Leather' I was done thank you. Please do go back to what you're doing. Nothing to see here.
Sandra – I hope (well, presume) you know how how much respect I have for you, Brian and Spinetingler, and how much I admire the work you've put in to support the crime writing community.But I genuinely don't get your point. It's not about self- versus traditional-publishing. It's not about ebooks versus paper books. It's about nasty, bullying behaviour – in this case on the part of a bestselling author who straddles all those divides. Can we not condemn that without adding a 'but…'? Why not? You don't have an argument with Leather right now, you say, and neither do I personally, but why wait until it directly affects you? He's provably a bully – and worse. Does he have to be bullying you specifically before you'd say something?It just seems mystifying to me that with X amount of time to comment on the issue, people are using that time to shoot at the messengers. No, it probably wouldn't achieve anything anyway, but for god's sake, it won't for sure if people behave like this. Stand up and call people out. What's your opinion on Leather's behaviour?
It just seems mystifying to me that with X amount of time to comment on the issue, people are using that time to shoot at the messengers.I think when it comes to the internet and especially the issue of trolling, shooting messengers has become akin to an Olympic sport.
An excellent and reasoned post which I agreed with and wanted to share right up until you said this:
Please don't malign an entire country based on the actions of the few, and please don't elevate another country which is as filled with dubious practices as it is exemplary. If only for your own sake, it risks alienating readers.Thanks for the rest of the post, though.
Maligning an entire country? Are you serious? That's almost as bonkers as 'spitting in my face'. I've long experience of publishing on both sides of the Atlantic. In America – as can be seen in places such as Thrillerfest in particular – established authors freely give up their time, at their own expense, to advise, nurture and promote writers coming into this profession. We don't do that to anything like the same extent in the UK, which is a shame but it's a fact, and hardly 'maligns an entire nation'. Sheesh…. I do wish people were posting this stuff on the sites of those who are bringing this profession into disrepute, not those of us who are trying to expose what's going on.
And here we have a problem. People move away from a topic, and into a nasty area where the thing of interest is not the message, but the messenger and how the message is presented. People have taken umbrage at a couple of David's phrases, and extrapolated that so that offence has been taken where no offence was intended.No, Mr. Leather hasn't directly affected me, either, but that doesn't mean I condone or overlook his behaviour. I've noticed for some time that his Facebook status updates are dangerously verging on the racist, although (for some reason), that seems to have calmed down. Could some of the backlash against him be starting to take effect?The internet is a great place, and 99% of the time, I believe it is a force for good, and has changed our lives. For that 1% of the time, however, it is a very nasty and spiteful place, and I've been embroiled in pointless 'discussions' to the point where I have had to move away from it. I don't do this now. Yes, I tend to look the other way, which bothers me. No comment is a tacit agreement. If you don't take on the wrongdoers, they breed and become more powerful.One thing bothers me about some of the comments here. Dougie said: "I do however (and more seriously) sell more than enough books to earn a comfortable living which ultimately, is what it's all about." I know that's important, but is it really what writing is all about? I fear that a lot of self-publishers (I know the discussion is not about self-publishing per se, but this is where the behaviour is worse IMO) have turned from authors into marketing machines. For me, the greatest kick is feedback that someone has read something I wrote. For others, I fear, the kick is making money. They see the Leather / Locke / Hocking superstars and think "I want some of that." And that's where the role of the author changes, and they get dragged into the "how can I make more sales of my book?"I decided some time ago to stop trying to prostitute myself and concentrate on what I should be doing, which is writing. If I become successful, great. If not, so be it.
Gerald, whilst I respect and understand your comments, I have to qualify them by saying that I never set out to be a writer and indeed, spend every day wondering how I get away with it.I am however and in every sense, a professional author. A status I’ve held for 16 years because I sell significant numbers of books and I sell them because I target write. By that I mean I write specifically and solely for the market I want to write for. Thanks to eBooks, I am now able to hit that market even harder and as a consequence of targeting, increasing numbers of people have been discovering my work including many who I would never for a moment have considered as potential readers. Many of these, admittedly, have come to me thanks to the fact that my first thriller is a free giveaway and has sat atop the Amazon sports chart for 9 consecutive months but that’s fine by me. Indeed, as a consequence of my success with eBooks I’ve actually forsaken the traditional route (and I had previously published with various houses including Headline, Virgin US and Blakes) to go down the SPA road simply because it’s both easier and faster.But I know both my limits and my ability as a writer and understand that I am not nor ever will be an award winning author. Indeed, I often describe myself as being not at the bottom of the literary ladder, but the rubber bungs on the feet. A sentiment which is endorsed by amongst other things, the fact that in 16 years I’ve received 2 invitations to literary events in the UK and have only ever attended one literary festival which was this weekend when I spoke at the disaster that was Kidwelly (although to be fair, I had a great time and from what I gather, had the biggest audience!)Many will read this and think that I am either a fool or a fraud but the fact is that I’m more than happy doing what I do in the way that I do it and more importantly, so are my many readers. I receive mails every day from people telling me things such as ‘yours is the first book I’ve read since I left school’ and ‘yours is the first book I’ve ever read cover to cover in one hit’ and for me, that’s all the affirmation I need because it means that whilst I might not be a ‘traditional’ author and my books might not be works of great literature, I’m giving pleasure to readers.Ultimately, that’s surely what it’s all about.(apologies for taking this even further off topic!)
If this wanders any further off topic I am closing it again!
I have a few untouched SL books in my home, sent to me by the publisher in the hope of a review. I have been considering what to do with them. In light of the recent revelations, I think I may well send them back to the publisher and ask that this author's books are no longer sent to me. It feels like my contribution to the protest.Excellent work by Jeremy Duns in the digging and my thanks to all who helped with the exposure.
What an interesting discussion. Getting back to your initial points, David, I think that the sock puppet approaches may be legal, but I consider them unethical. Anything that falsely pushes a product, whether it is a book or a tortilla warmer, is wrong. Legal does not mean right. We need to stop supporting such behaviors just because they are effective.
having read down the comments I can only say – that having gone through Jeremy Duns detailed expose of the practices of Leather and several others, that 99% of all “author anger” should be directly aimed at these sockpuppeteers – who are not some sideshow to be “set aside” – they are dangerous abusers of the public trust and equally dangerous as an infectious poison against other writers who have dared to raise their heads above the parapet…
The real issue is nothing to do with the various awards and such – which I as a non author member of the public have very little truck with, right up to and including the Booker…
It is…
malignant, possibly criminal, denigration and attacks on fellow authors by people caught skewing the system and lying in public about it…
Thank you Patrick. I think you hit the nail on the head.
I am not “in publishing” and know nothing of awards practices or many of the issues raised in the comments here. As a reader however, I feel the manipulation of reviews needs to be exposed and condemned. I have lived in South America for much of the last few years and, in lieu of word-by-mouth, reviews on amazon are often all I have to go on when I decide which English language book I will treat myself to next. Books (especially in English) are ridiculously expensive here and authors should treat their readers with more respect.
As a reader, not a writer, I’m grateful to everyone who has brought this into the light. I had to seek wiki’s help to discover what sock puppetry was and I am concerned and surprised that it seems to be so widespread. Will it make me more wary of online reviews? I think it probably will. I’m not so naive as to expect even genuine positive reviews to be a guarantee of enjoyment, but as I generally buy online I do take them into account.
But I can’t subscribe to the view that because people will become wary of reviews, we should pretend sock puppetry doesn’t exist. I genuinely feel that the more this sort of issue is brought into the light, the more likely it is that people will steer clear of doing it having seen the opprobrium that’s landed on Leather. Then we all benefit by getting more reviews that we can trust. So thanks to David (and Steve and Jeremy) for being brave enough to talk about this and bring it to our attention. Some writers seem to have a problem with what you’ve done. I can’t think any readers will.
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