Time to Write

This is why (some) publishers deserve to go out of business

In 2012, authors sued the largest publisher of romance novels, Harlequin. Here's a summary of the situation, as described at www.harlegquinlawsuit.com:

THE LEGAL ISSUES

"A class action lawsuit was filed today against Harlequin Enterprises, Ltd., the world’s leading publisher of romance fiction, as well as Harlequin Books S.A., a Swiss corporation, and Harlequin Enterprises B.V., a Dutch corporation, on behalf of authors who entered into contracts with the company.

This lawsuit results from Defendant Harlequin Enterprises Limited, the world’s leading publisher of romance fiction, depriving Plaintiffs and the other authors in the class, of e-book royalties due to them under publishing agreements entered into between 1990 and 2004.

Harlequin required the authors to enter into those agreements with a Swiss entity that it created for tax purposes, and that it dominates and controls. However, Harlequin, before and after the signing of these agreements, performed all the publishing functions related to the agreements, including exercising, selling, licensing, or sublicensing the e-book rights granted by the authors. Instead of paying the authors a royalty of 50% of its net receipts as required by the agreements, an intercompany license was created by Harlequin with its Swiss entity resulting in authors receiving 3% to 4% of the e-books’ cover price as their 50% share instead of 50% of Harlequin Enterprises’ receipts.

Instead of paying the authors a royalty of 50% of its net receipts as required by the agreements, an intercompany license was created by Harlequin with its Swiss entity resulting in authors receiving 3% to 4% of the e-books’ cover price as their 50% share instead of 50% of Harlequin Enterprises’ receipts.

What this means to the authors can be illustrated by an e-book with a hypothetical cover price of $8.00. The “net receipts” made by Harlequin Enterprises Limited from the exercise, sale or license of e-book rights would be at least $4.00, of which authors would be entitled to $2.00 based on their 50% royalty. Computing the “net receipts” based on the “license” between Harlequin’s Swiss entity and Harlequin Enterprises, Plaintiffs’ 50% royalty amounts to only 24 to 32 cents."

In April, 2013, the court dismissed the claim (it gets too technical to get into here, but basically the court found that Harlequin had covered their behind adequately in the wording of their contracts with the authors). The plaintiffs filed an appeal.

The plaintiffs filed an appeal.

In September, 2013, the Romance Writers of America and the Authors Guild filed a 'friend of the court' brief in support of the plaintiffs.

In May, 2014, the Second Court of Appeals reversed the dismissal of one claim and sent the case to the district court for further proceedings.

THE BIGGER ISSUE: TRUST

Undoubtedly the case will continue to grind through the court system. In the end, it may be that Harlequin prevails on strictly legal grounds. To my mind, however, the bigger issue is one of trust. Authors and publishers are supposed to be on the same side, not figuring out legal loopholes that permit them to screw each other. I don't know the state of the finances of Harlequin. Maybe they, like many other publishers, are suffering financially. The best response cannot have been to poison the well that is the source of their income.

Authors and publishers are supposed to be on the same side, not figuring out legal loopholes that permit them to screw each other. I don't know the state of the finances of Harlequin. Maybe they, like many other publishers, are suffering financially. The best response cannot be to poison the well that is the source of their income.

Regardless of the result of the lawsuit, are authors going to want to work with Harlequin? Or will this drive more of them to self-publish and cut Harlequin out of the equation totally? 

Yes, publishing faces huge challenges now. I don't know whether working together more closely with authors will save traditional publishing (whether or not it deserves to be saved in its current form is another question) but surely turning on authors won't. 

 

How to have a best-selling novel...without writing a word

I get some interesting blurbs in my email but this is a new one: an offer (not to me specifically, I'm just on their mailing list, via Publisher's Weekly) to "co-author a book with a New York Times best-selling author." Guess what? we can do this without even writing a word:

• You Don't Need To Have A Manuscript Yet - Work with Wahida's Team to select one of her existing manuscripts in the fiction romance niche.

The best-selling author making this offer is Wahida Clark. I'd never heard of her but her books include Every Thug Needs a Lady, Payback With Ya Life, and Payback is a Mutha. According to her site she has been crowned the queen of street literature. She served nine and a half years in prison and now runs a publishing company. 

THE MISSING "CONGLOMERATE" BEHIND HER COMPANY

On Wahida Clark's web site, www.wclarkpublishing.com, it says "W. Clark Publishing is a subsidiary of Green and Company LLC, a publishing conglomerate and literary agency."

Strange, then, that a Google search for this conglomerate turns up only one item:  a Better Business Bureau note that the company was located in Ogden, Utah, but that it is no longer in business.

The web site listed for it by the BBB is www.green-company.com.

That url is now for sale.

Isn't is strange that Ms. Clark doesn't mention the disappearance of her parent company? Then again, her site seems not to have been updated since 2012.

A GUARANTEED FIVE-FIGURE CHECK?

The email (emphasis mine) says, 

"What if there was a way to guarantee that your book would sell thousands of copies putting your name in the spotlight and earning you a five figure check? Would You Take It? If the answer is YES! Then now you have an opportunity right now to do it! www.nytbestsellerpartner.com"

The lowest five figure amount is $10,000. Let's assume for a moment that they mean the word "guarantee" in the statement above. The royalty split is 50/50, so the book would have to earn $20,000 in royalties. 

But wait--if we don't even need to write a word, why should they be looking for partners at all? Why not publish the book themselves and keep 100% of the royalties? Probably because they want us to put up money in advance to cover their services: creating a cover, formatting the book for digital, etc.

HOW MUCH WILL IT COST US TO MAKE $10,000...OR WILL WE?

I wonder whether it might cost us more than the guaranteed profit to "co-author" with Ms Clark, assuming that the contract does guarantee that return (which would be unusual--nobody can predict how many copies a book will sell, unless they plan to buy the copies themselves).  

Ms. Clark is not ready to tell us about fees until we follow these procedures: 

#1: Sign Up Using The Add To Cart Button And Make Your Good Faith Payment. ($99)
#2: You will Receive your Login and Password - Login 
#3: Read Through The Confidentiality Agreement - You will need to Accept The Terms and Conditions
#4: Fill in your Contact information page
#5: Schedule a meeting time with Wahida and her Team.
#6: Hang On and Enjoy The Ride!

The question is, will we be taking a ride...or taken for a ride?

 SALES STRATEGIES 101

The $99 Good Faith payment is fully refundable, but it means that before you find out how much money they want to charge you, you will already have taken an active step toward working with them (see Robert Cialdini's excellent book, Influence, to read about how getting people to take a small tangible first step increases the liklihood that you will agree to much bigger steps later).

You also will have signed a confidentiality agreement (which, I'm guessing, will say you promise not to reveal the terms and conditions of their offer).

Finally, you'll be talking to Wahinda herself:

• Your $99 Payment is a good faith payment and you will be interviewed by Wahida - if we can work together then awesome if not your payment is immediately refunded.

Salespeople know that it's easier to make a sale when you've got somebody on the phone and I bet Wahida has a good salesperson or two on her Team. I wouldn't be too surprised if you get called by a Team member rather than Wahida--she sounds like a busy lady.

THE BOTTOM LINE

I'm not suggesting that this offer is a scam; there's not enough information in the pitch to evaluate that. However, any "co-authoring" opportunity that doesn't require you to do any writing needs to be looked at very closely. 

I'm checking with Victoria Strauss, the "Writer Beware" expert in con tricks that target authors, to find out whether she's heard of this particular offer and give her opinion.

I'm also going to email Publisher's Weekly to ask whether they looked into the details of this offer before allowing their marketing mailing list to be used for it.

Stay tuned!

 

Scams to beware

Recently I wrote about the Green Shore Publishing scam, where they're using actors from Fiverr to provide fake testimonials on the Green Shore site, and a mail drop as their headquarters, and the books they say have been published don't seem to exist. That company has been referred to the authorities (although so far nothing has changed on their website).

Some writers also fall for "work from home" schemes, hoping to make enough to support their writing. The latest scam along these lines says that Facebook is hiring people to work from home. The very useful site hoax-slayer.com reveals:

"The message is a scam. Facebook has not launched such a program and has no connection to the scheme. The link in the message takes you to a fake Facebook Page that tries to trick you into paying four dollars for a dodgy 'Facebook Millionaire' kit. Fine print on the signup form indicates that your credit card will be charged $94 per month for continued access. Do not be tempted to participate in this bogus program."

Any time you are tempted to sign up for a work from home or other supposed money-making venture, it's a good idea to take the time to go online and check out what others have said about it. I've written before how I feel prety to a "publicist", won against him in small claims court--and was unable to collect. As they say, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure!

5 warning signs if you're looking for a publisher

Considering publishing with America Star Books? Know the facts.

PublishAmerica has gained an unenviable reputation in the realm of digital vanity publishers. Google their name and you'll come across an impressively long list of complaints.

What do you do when a product or service becomes notorious?

Improve the service?

Naah, there's a much easer way: change the name!

That's what PublishAmerica has done this month. They are now known as America Star Books. Anybody going to the old PublishAmerica site is now forwarded to the new America Star Books site.

What is/was the problem with PublishAmerica? Here's an excerpt from Wikipedia:

PA pays advance fees of US$1–$1000^[1] to its authors, provides minimal editing and provides few of the services handled by trade publishing, such as retail distribution, marketing and media relations. Disgruntled authors told Publishers Weekly that PA did not pay royalties owed to them, sold books it no longer had any rights to sell, set unreasonably high list prices and lower-than-average discounts for authors to buy their own books and either neglected or failed to place books into bookstores.^[4]

In December 2005, PublishAmerica author Philip Dolan, who had spent between US$7,000 and $13,000 promoting his book^[15] only to find that no book stores were able to order copies of it, took PublishAmerica to arbitration for breach of contract. Dolan also alleged accounting irregularities; despite a clause in his contract allowing him to inspect PublishAmerica's accounts, his accountant was denied access, and Dolan received royalties for fewer copies of his book than he was able to account for having sold himself. He was awarded an unspecified amount in compensation for PublishAmerica's breach of contract, and his contract was rescinded.^[16]

Despite this, Wikipedia warns that the entry is written more like an advertisement than a neutral factual description!

Here's a "fact" on the America Star website: "FACT #1: Unique among all traditional book publishing companies, America Star Books has served 50,000 authors since 1999."

Well, that's not strictly true; PublishAmerica did that. If you go to the Store page of the America Star Books site and click on the various categories, like "Adventure" or "Horror" you find books published by PublishAmerica. If you click on "America Star" on the same page, you get...nothing. Apparently no books have yet been published under this new banner.

America Star Books seems to be targeting foreign authors, offering to translate and publish foreign-language books in English:

From South America, Europe, Asia, and Africa we now (sic) translating thousands of books by foreign authors, all scheduled to be released in 2014! Most popular languages that we're currently translating: Spanish, Portuguese, German, Dutch, Chinese.

Really? Thousands? Then isn't it strange that the six samples of translated text on the website are all in Dutch, the native language of the owner? 

Still, this sounds good: America Star Books is a traditional, royalty paying publisher. The author is never obligated or expected to pull their wallet to make any purchase whatsoever. All expenses involved with acquiring new titles, formatting, custom designing, and illustrating the final manuscript into a book, translating a foreign book into English, making books fully available to all bookstores at home and abroad, and informing news media upon the release of a new book, are underwritten by America Star Books solely. 

They say they pay royalties on an escalating scale that looks similar to that of mainstream publishers. 

One thing to look at is the retail prices they set. For instance, on the store page at their website is a book called Altered Perceptions: A Writer's Journey Thorugh Life With Attention Deficit Disorder, or A.D.D. it is a paperback 110 pages long in a 5.5" x 8.5 format. It sells for $19.95.

There's a novel called The Absurd Aventures of Tucker Doubt, paperback, 116 pages, again $19.95.

I think authors, especially unknown ones, would have trouble getting people to pay $20 for a slim paperback.

If you have any contact with foreign authors groups, it would be kind to let them know about the connection between America Star Books and PublishAmerica so they can make up their own minds with all the facts in mind.

Will this venture be any better than PublishAmerica? I'm sure it won't be long before authors who sign with America Star Books start posting their experiences on the web, for better or worse.

Until then, all I know is a saying that always struck me as very sensible: "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

 

Publishers to beware: Author Solutions Inc and Balboa Press (Hay House)

There was surprise in the publishing world when Penguin Group bought Author Solutions Inc. ASI had a long history of complaints of unfair dealing from writers--would Penguin put an end to that?

Apparently not, if the recent experience of a number of writers is anything to go by.

As usual, I'm indebted to the "Writer Beware" blog for additional information on this. They mention that there is a class action suit against ASI and Penguin for breach of contract and unjust enrichment, among other issues.

They also cite one author's nightmare experiences trying to get her illustrated book published by Balboa Press, the self-publishing division of Hay House, which outsources to Author Solutions Inc.

It was a children's book and she says the illustrations she got were dark and depressing. Among other things, an ancient woman was drawn as a bald old man. Keep in mind she paid $3400 for "intricate design."

When she complained the Balboa rep said, "the illustrator is sensitive, he's young, he draws like that."

Maybe taking into consideration this is a light children's book they could have given the assignment to an illustrator who is less sensitive and doesn't draw like that.

Also, the sales rep told her she'd be in contact with the illustrator directly; once she'd paid, the coordinator told her no, they have to be the intermediary, authors are not allowed direct contact with their illustrator.

The litany of things that were misrepresented or went wrong with this project is very long. You can read the author's first-hand account here.

Hay House itself as a good reputation as a publisher of books about healing, spirituality, and self-help, so it would be reasonable to assume that the values of Hay House and its founder, Louise Hay, would apply to any of its divisions or subsidiaries. Also that they would be transparent about their relationship with Author Solutions. However, you have to dig very deep on the Balboa site to discover that it is connected to Author Solutions. 

AND THE MORAL OF THE STORY IS...

If in doubt, always do a web search about any publisher, agent, manager, or other service provider you are considering. Go past the first page of search results. Usually the truth is out there if you take the time to look for it.

 

 

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