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none PUBLISHERS AND PUBLISHING

Spooky Phishing Scam Targets Traditionally-Published Writers

9 COMMENTS

The New York Times has published the story of a strange international phishing scam: unknown actors targeting traditionally-published writers, posing as their agents or editors to obtain copies of their unpublished manuscripts.

Earlier this month, the book industry website Publishers Marketplace announced that Little, Brown would be publishing “Re-Entry,” a novel by James Hannaham about a transgender woman paroled from a men’s prison. The book would be edited by Ben George.

Two days later, Mr. Hannaham got an email from Mr. George, asking him to send the latest draft of his manuscript. The email came to an address on Mr. Hannaham’s website that he rarely uses, so he opened up his usual account, attached the document, typed in Mr. George’s email address and a little note, and hit send.

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none LITERARY AGENT SCAMS

Attack of the Fake Literary Agencies: West Literary Agency, Stellar Literary Press and Media

36 COMMENTS

Much of what I'm going to talk about in this post, I think most of my readers already know. But I'm getting so many questions about these two scam "agencies"--both of which seem to be super-active right now with solicitations--and providing so many warnings about them, that I think a broader warning is in order.

First, though--because it's relevant to what follows--some tips on evaluating a literary agency's website.

1. There should be a website. A pretty basic starting point.

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none IMPERSONATION SCAMS

Disssecting a Scam: The Literary Scout Impersonator

20 COMMENTS

I've written several posts about a fairly new phenomenon in the world of writing scams: scammers that falsely use the names of reputable publishing professionals, including literary agents and publishers, to lure writers into paying large amounts of money for worthless, substandard, and/or never-delivered services.

This time, I'm breaking down a very similar scam that, capitalizing on the pandemic-fueled popularity of Netflix and other streaming services (as well as the eternal writerly dream of having one's book translated into film), is appropriating the name of Clare Richardson, Senior Scout for film and TV at the New York office of Maria B. Campbell Associates, to hoodwink writers in an unusually complicated--and expensive--scheme.

Here's "Clare's" initial approach:

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none CONTRACTS

Bad Contract Alert: EMP Entertainment and A&D Entertainment

113 COMMENTS

Lately I've been hearing from writers who've been solicited by one or another of two companies offering to distribute their books to Webnovel, a Wattpad-like platform based in Asia: EMP Entertainment and A&D Entertainment. (Note: there are a number of companies with similar names focused on concert invites, event scheduling, and DJ services.) (UPDATE: See the bottom of this post for a roundup and evaluation of additional serialized fiction platforms and apps.)

EMP and A&D are both based in Singapore, and both are just 11 months old (which raises interesting questions about whether they're really different companies, though their contracts differ enough to suggest that they are). They present themselves as Webnovel partners--and, apparently, sometimes as Webnovel itself--authorized to offer non-exclusive contracts that allow authors to continue to publish on other platforms (such as Wattpad, where both companies are actively approaching writers) if they choose. (UPDATE: info I've seen since publishing this post suggests that Webnovel has contracted with these companies to recruit writers for its platform, allowing them to use their own contracts.)

I've seen numerous examples of each contract...and they are not author-friendly, to put it mildly. Nor are they truly non-exclusive.

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