I just had to share this sorry tale with you.

I work - only for 2 more days yippee - for a local newspaper, and yesterday a woman phoned up to ask if we wanted to do a story on her as she has just had her first book 'published'.

Great, I thought, and asked her which agent she was with. 'Oh I haven't got an agent' she replied. So I asked her which publisher she was with. She mentioned one who I hadn't heard of, and I asked her where she found them. She then told me that she found them on the net, they were giving her a good deal and only charged her xxx amount of pounds to publish her book. The xxx amount was quite horrendous.

'So I said, oh, so you have taken the self publishing route. What genre do you write?'

'What's a genre?' she asked me. I explaind and she said 'oh the book is for anyone to read really. It's about a woman who marries a man but he's only after her money.'

I then asked if this publisher was in the Writers and Artists Yearbook.

'What's that?' she again asked me. I was now thinking 'oh my God, a very inexperienced writer here who has tried to self publish without even realising what she's doing.

I looked up her 'publisher on Preditors and Editors, and wasn't surprised to learn that it says 'not recommended', and that they lost a libel suit and now owe hundreds of thousands of pounds.

I then goggled her book, and could only find it on this very obscure booksite, and when I looked at the book blurb which she had written herself, it was bordering on illiterate, with spelling and grammar mistakes. She is trying to sell this book at £10.99.

Without wishing to be unkind, you could tell by her language and speech, that she wasn't the brightest button in the box, and isn't this just the sort of person these so called publishing houses love.

When will something be done about these self/vanity publishing groups, who prey on naive inexperienced people and make an absolute fortune out of them.

I really did come off the phone thinking, oh you poor girl!

If only she had been on WW, she would have got some very good help and advice and saved herself an awful lot of money.

Katerina

That is a horrifying story. Gives me shudders.

Good grief. Poor thing.

Ouch! Talk about fleecing lambs! It shows it really happens. And it's awful when you hear about it at that stage, and can't, out of kindness, say anything.

Emma

Emma, once I'd found out about the 'publishing' house from P&E I wanted to contact her and tell her, but it was too late anyway, she'd already parted with money etc.

I do wonder why she didn't get any advice from anyone first. To call yourself an author and not even know what a genre is shows how very naive she must be.

A colleague said that she almost deserves what she got anyway for being so dumb, which I thought was a bit harsh, but as I said, she is just the sort of person these scumbags like - someone naive that they can take advantage of.

Isn't there a governing body or something against these people?

Katerina

Yes, she’s a victim of the present culture which equates having a computer with the ability to write a novel. However, I tend to agree with your colleague, Katerina, this is naïve bordering on stupidity. She didn’t do the research, and now she’s paying the price.

Dee

It is tragic, and every bit as much of a con as the people who sell slimming pills and herbal remedies that don't work. I would have thought the Office of Fair Trading or some similar organisation ought to be able to take some action. Perhaps your newspaper could run the story from the point of view of "look how this company has ripped off this poor woman" ?

On the other hand I am ashamed to admit there is a wicked side to me that can't help enjoying the irony you point out, that the plot of her story involves unscrupulous men who are only after a woman for her money. Life imitating art etc.

It’s a sad, but flat-out fact of life that there is one born every minute, and there will always be someone unscrupulous enough to take advantage of the gullible and unwary. I wonder how many ‘victims’ fall prey to this kind of thing, quite a few I suspect.

On a similar vein, a friend of a friend recently lost her husband. To help her children get over their loss she bought a star (for a large sum of money) and named it after her husband. I’ve been asked to show the kids this star through my telescope, but I feel really uncomfortable knowing that they’ve been scammed, equally though, I don’t want to tell them they’ve just handed their money over to a con artist.

There should be a lore against this kind of thing.

Grinder

Grinder,

I find the whole business of this star naming thing utterley despisable.

I used to work in the funeral profession, and know how devastated people are at the loss of a loved one. To make money out of grieving people, is, in my opinion, utterly contemptable.

That's one of the reasons I gave up the profession - we used to buy coffins for £34 each and sell them to grieving relatives for £355. Now I know it was a business, who had to make a profit, but not that much of a mark up. There were a few unscrupulous things that I didn't agree with.

Dee, I have come round to thinking, that if she was so thick that she didn't even know the basics of writing such as what 'genre' is, and her book blurb is terrible, then yes, she deserves all she gets. AND to try to sell it in paperback form for £10.99, what planet is she on?

Katerina

PS, Can I name the title of the book, so you can goggle it if you wish and read the synopsis, or could I get into trouble?

Bit dodgy to name it on this thread, as it could lead her back to see these comments.

I'd love to have a look at it, though. Could you WWmail me?

Dee

I have to say i feel very sorry for her. yes, she has been incredibly stupid, but i can remember the thrill i felt on finishing my first novel, i thought i'd done the hard part and felt a real sense of achievement, yippee, i'm a novelist. Ah hem, them i joined WW (don't know if you remember my first upload you critted Dee, it was about 8,000words of backstory), which brought me down to earth.

This girl's probably had relatives tellig her how wonderful her book is and, unfortunatley she's learnt the hard and expensive way that it's probably not.

Someone ought to report these people to Watchdog.

Casey

At least you had the good sense to join WW, Casey

This girl's probably had relatives telling her how wonderful her book is

That’s the trouble isn’t it. It’s like all those poor deluded hopefuls on X-Factor with their mothers telling them what fabulous singers they are. Human nature, I suppose, but it doesn’t do them any favours.

The big problem is that these vanity publishers aren’t doing anything illegal. It’s frustrating and it makes me angry that people are being deluded, but the bottom line is that many people are gullible and ignorant of the way these systems work.

And I can't help but think that it’s stuff like this that forms 98% of the slush piles that are making it so difficult for genius writers like wot we are to get on.

Dee

I have come round to thinking, that if she was so thick that she didn't even know the basics of writing such as what 'genre' is, and her book blurb is terrible, then yes, she deserves all she gets. AND to try to sell it in paperback form for £10.99, what planet is she on?

I can't agree. If people are really as thick as all that, then these publishers are just taking advantage of them and it's not on, really. The situation may well be of her own stupid making - but that's not really the same as her "deserving" it, any more than when daft pensioners are pressured into parting with their life savings for a set of solar panels that don't work.

And I can't help but think that it’s stuff like this that forms 98% of the slush piles that are making it so difficult for genius writers like wot we are to get on.

Now that made me laugh :-)

And I also wonder about the notion that vanity publishing firms are not doing anything illegal. There may be some demonstrably misleading and inaccurate claims made about the amount of money a writer would make by publishing with BigFatCon Ltd. which could be challenged in court ? (But I'm not a lawyer so that's just wishful thinking I guess!)

Geez Louise. Though I'd have to agree to a wicked tinge of appreciation at the irony of this tale...