Oh, so much happened today to amuse me. Just oodles of fun reading thanks to the Intarwebs and their love affair with drama. Or more accurately wank.
It’s not even worth the energy to type it all out because in the end, I do believe, this comment ends it all [emphasis mine]:
I’m an editor at one of the better-known publishing houses in North America, and the office was abuzz with this situation as an example of a deal-breaker when looking to sign on new authors. Ms. Malone’s excessively immature reaction to what was actually some very gentle criticism guarantees that she has no future in print other than with vanity presses. Believe me, we do use [G]oogle.
I just wanted to let you know; feel free to include this tidbit in your blog. :)
I’d also like to give a shout out to Goodreads, who not only responded to me personally about the attacks posted on their website and sent to me in a private message, but they subsequently removed her as a Goodreads author. A no-tolerance policy for personal attacks is exactly why I am so proud to be a librarian on the site.
Lastly, I want to extend a very warm thank you to Kat Richardson and Sam Hilliard for being awesome enough to let me vent about this to them on Twitter. You guys are full of win and that has nothing to do with how amazing your books are. (The books are just an added perk.) And to everyone else who was so supportive and kind about this, I sincerely appreciate it and dearly thank you as well.
I heart you all so much. :-)
Good for you! I’ve been following this debacle for the last few days and it’s been satisfying to watch R. Malone’s rudeness and idiocy backfire on her :-)
Thanks, Rose!
You know, the sad thing is she really did bring it upon herself. I would have left her PM private had she not immediately gone to the review and attacked me in a comment there — and on my profile. And even after I went public, had she just apologized or acknowledged the juvenile behavior I would have more than gladly taken the post down. Instead she reported me to my webhost and then continued to dig herself deeper while I sat back and just watched the chaos. Best of all, she had the gall to accuse me of attacking her.
After watching all of this unfold, it does dawn on me: That’s the kind of crazy I wouldn’t want my money going to. She instigates it all, then still wants to assume role of victim. Ugh…
I believe Leverage‘s Elliot Spencer sums it up well: “Twenty pounds of crazy in a five pound bag.”
Y’know, I admit I worried for a bit that the thorough trouncing she got for the childish wank might make her seriously suicidal, or something. I’m somewhat relieved, in a weird way, to see she’s as delusional as ever, and still creating sock puppets to swear at you.
Whatever fills up her day, I guess.
I guess it just never crossed my mind that someone could be that buried in denial.
See, and I just didn’t bother to analyze it that deep. But that may have been because I was too flabbergasted at the things I was called. I am very easily distracted that way.
Well, yes. I’d probably feel the same way, if it were me being called the c-word. Having that in my inbox would make me so furious I wouldn’t be able to form words, I suspect.
Pretty accurate description of how I felt. Yes.
So … Just to sum up …
You had an agenda. Apparently, you are dying to be published as a romance novelist, and will stop at absolutely nothing in pursuit of this goal.
To fulfill your agenda, you sought out an obscure aspiring author who had penned the world’s most amazing vampire soul-devouring-bites-are-symbolic-of-love-not-rape-because-literal-rape-is-also-symbolic-of-love story ever to be published by SO TOTALLY NOT A VANITY PRESS. You lulled her into trusting you enough to give you an e-copy of her book. Oh, you dastardly woman.
Carefully, so skillfully, you created a masterful “review” of the book that made it seem at first glance as though it was a fantastic book that you loved, despite saying that it sucked more than words could express. You further obfuscated the true negative nature of the review by giving it the coveted Two Star Rating, which any executive chef would kill for. Nobody could be expected to detect the true measure of your hateful words dressed up for all the world as an author’s treasured gift, resting on a red velvet pillow.
Oh, how she must have danced with joy at the two star review. How she must have jumped and sang with the delight of forgotten youth at the words, “… I can’t entirely dislike this book.” Only then did you reveal the plot you’d so carefully laid out: You took away a star!
Such a vile thing! In the history of all written media, never had anyone so afflicted another human being as to downwardly revise a recorded opinion after additional diligence and pondering been considered. C-word indeed, Cyndy. C-word indeed!
But so crudely had you sprung your ill-considered trap! She cleverly reversed the tables by stalking you everywhere and announcing to the world ahead of the wild-fire gossip of your one-star betrayal that she was as unstable as the Tilt-a-Whirl. She wrote about what a “scathing” and “terse” missive she’d sent you — how sassy she was to call you such misogynistic four and five letter words. She would limit the damage you could do to her by beating you to the punch.
Your evil mind games didn’t end there, though, did they? You miraculously placated her with the unfathomable: you have certain challenges in life like many other people on Earth. How did you know? What gave you the insight to understand her psychology so well as to prey on her only weakness of being so certain of her superiority to lesser beings that anybody different from her is inferior and must be pitied. You took advantage of that most noble and beautiful attribute of human arrogance.
Even as she bestowed upon you her gift of pity, however, you stabbed her again with the knife of Self Esteem. How could you?
Finally, in her hour of darkest general ignorance, you struck with your final weapon: The entire fury of Teh Internets, which was apparently bequeathed to you when God died, if I’m reading things correctly (and I obviously am).
And now … NOW, Cyndy Otty, your agenda is bare. Nobody has any choice but to publish your as-of-forever non-existent romance novel.
Er. WTF? I’m missing something. It sounds better when she tells it. It must be the part about the sock puppets.
trufax, histry bin rerittin. as uv nao dis how it happind. 4 rlz!
Now THIS book, I’d read.
Yay, I’m so so so so glad this was resolved favorably!
Well, to be fair, as far as I was concerned it was over when Goodreads emailed me that they had dealt with the matter on their end. This is just icing.
Wow Cyndy, what’s your agenda? Can I join your let’s bash author’s work agenda club?
I’ve been asking the same question for three days now and I still don’t know what my alleged agenda is. I’ll just go with JollyCynic’s version of events. ;-)
I’ll just bookmark this for the next time I turn down a self-pubbed fiction book for review and the author wants to what I have against self-pub.
No, no. Let’s set the record straight here: She’s published through PublishAmerica, which is not at all the same as self-publishing. It’s basically a vanity press.
Almost all self-pub books I get offered are from vanity presses. Accepted one that was self-published by starting up a real publishing company. Never again. Vanity press is a subset of self-publishing.
Indeed it is, but let’s not feed the myth that they are one and the same. True self-pubs actually have standards.
You lost me. Self-pub means you pay to print your book yourself. Vanity press means you foolishly relinquish your rights to the company that you paid to print your book.
Google is our friend. In short, putting your money upfront to publish your work when you strive for quality is not the same as paying for hacks to do exactly the opposite of that.
The acceptable quality level is set by the person footing the bill. In the case of self-publishing, that person is the author who may or may not have enough knowledge, self-awareness, or skills to get a high quality production process including cover design, editing, layout, and formatting. There is no inherent guarantee that the quality will be better than a vanity press, only that the author has more control over the production process.
I realize I mistyped, what I’d meant to say is that a true self-pub has actual standards. And certainly I’m not aware of a vanity press that could boast that.
Quality itself can be lacking in even the big name houses. I have a book published last year that not only has typos in it, but has an entire section where the POV is randomly third person instead of the first person it should be in.
I keep an eye on the PublishAmerica discussion board to see their attempts to get writers to pay them, so I’ve read some of R. Malone’s posts there. As far as sales go, printing a book through PA is the kiss of death, and she also mentioned that she’d fallen for one of PA’s special offers – buying 15 books so that PA would donate another 15 to Wal-Mart.
Wal-Mart refused to stock those books, which were never seen again. Neither was the post about it on PA’s discussion board, since that was promptly deleted by their moderator, and I haven’t seen R. Malone back there either. Tough on all sides if you’re trying to sell a PA-printed book, and you only make it worse by alienating reviewers and potential customers. Some writers have to learn that the hard way.
Whatever the equivalent of being speechless is for writing, that would be what your comment has rendered me. Just…no words. None.
I have to say, when I read about this incident on another community, and being a writer myself, it shocked me how someone could be so rude and condescending on what was really light constructive criticism on a work. I’ve never read the book in discussion though – and respectfully said, I don’t plan to do so.
Suffice to say, I think she put herself in a predicament that just made it worse for her with respect to how she responded to her readers (I won’t get into the discussion with PA, because that’s it’s own can of worms), and even went to the level of personal attacks. I’m glad that it worked out for those who reported and responded to it.
I’ve been reviewing books for over ten years now and it’s the first time I’ve ever had a reaction like that. I’m still rather shocked and appalled at all of it, but mostly I’m bewildered that she continues to play up the angle that she is victim in this. I almost could understand it if I’d been less critical and more snarky with my comments, but even still her behavior was entirely uncalled for and immature.