Buzz Worthy News 16th July 2012

16 July, 2012 Buzz Worthy News 23 comments

Buzz Worthy News

This week in Buzz Worthy News: Terry Goodkind has been on the warpath naming and shaming a pirate, Neil Gaiman signs a five book deal with HarperCollins and will be penning a prequel to the much beloved Sandman, a Twilight fan was killed at Comic Con, Anne Rice talks Erotica and, as always, there are scandalous scandals.

Buzz Worthy News is Cuddlebuggery’s weekly Monday post featuring the hottest book world news and blogging community’s scandals.  For Young Adult releases and fantastic cover reveals, check out our weekly Friday post, Hot New Titles.

 Book World News

Image from WTZ-zone

Piracy?  Not on Terry Goodkind’s Watch

The past two weeks have been eventful for Goodkind.  Under some scrutiny, Goodkind decided to self-publish his new novel The First Confessor in a special ebook format. The book was heavily pirated and thus Goodkind took steps on his Facebook page to publicly shame one of the culprits – posting his photo and details.    He also, apparently, released the following statement:

“So Josh, how about it — no respect for a hard-working author and fellow racing enthusiast? Not even for someone that is emphatically trying to reach out to people that might consider pirating our hard work? Can’t be bothered to read and consider our note on piracy in the front of the book?”

“How ironic you claim to be a fan of books that uphold truth and honour above all else. We hope the price of fame is worth the cost of your infamy.”

The pirates Twitter and webpages have been deleted, it would seem while people are still debating over whether Goodkind’s actions were validated or just vindictive.

SOURCE

Everyone Can Relax – More Gaiman is Imminent

Sandman, one of the more popular Graphic Novels of the last thirty years will see a sequel provided that the Guardian isn’t lying in order to see the crushed faces of millions to fuel their paper copiers.  The decision to continue the story of Morpheus, Dream, as a miniseries prequel was announced at Comic Con this week.

The prequel will be illustrated by JH Williams.

Unfortunately, there are forces at work keeping fans at a distance from the Sandman Prequel.  HarperCollins has conspired with Gaiman to keep him busy writing five illustrated children’s books about a  Panda, Chu, with a very big sneeze.

Aw!  Cute!  Of course we forgive you, HarperCollins.

SOURCE SOURCE

The Department of Justice Needs More Time, People!

After more than 800 letters of commentary were received on the ebook pricing settlement.

The Department was supposed to post all letters received by the 25th June.

Bob Kohn, CEO of Royalty Share, wrote to Judge Cote to complain that the DOJ’s failure to post and respond to the letters violates Federal Antitrust rules.

However, the letters should be posted by the 20th July.

SOURCE

Comic Con Ends in Tragedy for a Twilight Fan

A fifty-three year old New Yorker, Gisela Gagliardi, was killed at Comic Con this year while waiting out for a Twilight panel.

Gagliardi had been waiting out in line early to ensure a spot for the Twilight panel when she fell out of line and was hit by a car driven by a 67 year old man.

Some are suggesting that the event organizers could be held responsible for the death though it appears that they were taking steps to control the crowd.

SOURCE

Women Have a Right To Think Naughty Thoughts, Says Anne Rice.  Womankind Says Thanks, Says Kat

Inspired by the massive sales of Fifty Shades of Grey, Anne Rice has come out to say that women have just as much right to sexy, naughty-no-no times as men!

The article focuses on Anne Rice’s previous erotic novels such as her Sleeping Beauty retellings which are being republished by Penguin.

“As a feminist, I’m very much supportive of equal rights for women in all walks of life. And that includes for me the right of every woman to write out her sexual fantasies and to read books filled with sexual fantasies that she enjoys,” says Rice.

But in a day and age where you can get monster porn, cowboy porn, historical porn, fantasy porn, lactation porn, foot porn…

There’s a lot of erotica out there, but it’s great that things are changing and I can enjoy my ankle-slapping erotica without any shame.

SOURCE

Scandalous Scandals

Kill My ARCgate

Elizabeth Fama, author of Monstrous Beauty, wrote a blogpost, Kill My ARC, that caused some controversy this week.

The post focused on how Fama was angered at how some bloggers dispose of unwanted ARCs.

1. I don’t want my ARC to go to a small used bookstore in your neighborhood. 

2. I don’t want my ARC to go to a struggling public library for anything but collection development purposes.

And here’s the kicker that may make me seem like a horrible beast:

3. I don’t want a deserving teenager—even one who is underprivileged, owns no other books, and who devotedly helped with his library’s collection development—to be given my ARC as a gift.

The post caused some controversy on Twitter and generated discussion between bloggers over the legitimacy of Fama comments.

“THIS BOOK MAY NOT BE USED FOR ANY OTHER PURPOSE OR TRANSFERRED TO ANY THIRD PARTY!Which happens to be the sort of admonishment we’ve all seen printed directly on ARCs, leading me to ask, What part of those statements isn’t clear?”
Fama later edits her post to include the following:
“Edit for clarity: I’ve removed a line in this post that was inadvertently offensive to bloggers regarding the transferring of ARCs to third parties. It seemed to imply that I believed sharing ARCs among reviewers before the pub date was wrong. In fact, I believe the point of ARCs is to be circulated for review and buzz, before the release date, and as long as the publisher hasn’t expressly asked the reviewer not to circulate it.”

Image courtesy of Meljean Brook

Stop The Goodread’s Bullies Wankathon

We here at Cuddlebuggery acknowledge that, in pretty much every online community, there’s going to be a certain amount of wank.  It’s a natural part of online interactions.  For a lot of people wank is fun, wank is great.  Everyone enjoys a good wank.

And with rampant wankery in mind, we present to you Stop The Goodread’s Bullies website.

The site, profiling Kat Kennedy, Lucy, The Holy Terror and Ridley was set up anonymously by four personalities, aimed to harass and humiliate Goodreaders that the site’s owner considers bullies.

Personal details such as their names, cities, families, workplaces/situations etc were posted as well as allegations about their sex lives, drinking and childrearing (my children are reared!  What more can you ask?) were also commented on in the posts and comments as well as various threats made against the reviewers. And whilst the site managed to get many of those details wrong, it got enough right to cause an outrage in the community.

I responded here in order to set some facts straight.

Banners for several bullying organizations were displayed on the site without the permission of the organizations. At least one of those organizations sought legal advice and others publicly distanced themselves.

 

 

 

 

The anti-bullying banners were soon removed from the site

The person behind the STGRB was interviewed by Kenya and Alicia on their blog.

The inclusion of a recommended reading list of authors added to the site without their permission was also a point of drama.  Did the authors on the site support it?  Were they affiliated.  Whilst some probably were, others such as Rachel Vincent were not:

I don’t know why my books are included in the sidebar of that site.

I was not notified of their inclusion by the site’s owners. If my CP hadn’t told me, I still wouldn’t know.

I do not know who the owners are.

I was not asked to join the site.

I am not affiliated with the site in any way.

And I do not support any site that would in any way threaten someone’s private home life, especially the safety or privacy of their children. That is a line I will never cross.

The list of recommended authors has since been removed.

The whole controversy created a lot of posts, too many to go into details so we’ll just list them here:

Stacia Kane’s Avenging WTFuckery

Meljean Brook’s Stockphoto of the Day Angry Grandma

Gossamer Obsession’s In All Seriousness

Smart Bitches’ A Few Words of Reviews and Reviewing Bullshit

Foz Meadow’s Bullying and Goodreads And Stop The GR Bullies: Consequences (which details a hilarious incident in which an author abuses me on twitter)

Jennifer Armintrout’s Mother Fucking GAAAAAAAAH! And Let’s Get Some Things Straight Here Okay

Parajunkee’s BB101 The Shit Stops Here

Thankfully the drama is mostly over now and people are getting back to their regularly scheduled reading, blogging and writing.   Although, if anyone is struggling to do that, Gossamer Obsession blog has also posted an excellent and informative article on Responding to Negative Reviews Dos and Don’ts.

 

23 Responses to “Buzz Worthy News 16th July 2012”

  1. Lexxie

    Kat, how dare you continue with the scandalous scandals? All kidding aside, I think it’s good that there is a way to keep up with what’s happening, both good and bad.

    It’s very sad what happened to the Twilight fan at SDCC, but I really don’t see why it should be the organizers fault.

    And I think that even in the case of piracy, posting someone’s private information out in the open to let it be open season for a witch-hunt is wrong. It would have been a lot better to simply press charges…

    • Kat Kennedy

      @Lexxie: The website claims that they got the idea from BWN. I wish they’d paid more attention to what I do. Then perhaps they’d do it correctly. Oh well. I’ll keep reporting just for the sake of news for the community.

  2. Nafiza

    So whoa, I just read through all the links and damn. Some people have too much time on their hands. I was especially disgusted by that Austen dude. His language made me so very very angry. Kat, you handled it with class. I’m glad to er…read you. And! I will look forward to your book.

  3. Christina (A Reader of Fictions)

    People just need to drink more and rant on disagreeing reviews less. Can we all support this plan?

    Wow. I hadn’t heard any of the bookish news. I would know NOTHING without you. I usually get wind of the scandals, but the other stuff I missed.

    You’re the coolest.

  4. Sarah (saz101)

    YOUR CHILDREN ARE REARED, YOU SAY? Well, what more could we ask for? ^__^
    Also, surely the fact that they can lay claim to the fact that their mum is a BAMF counts for SOMETHING, right?

    MOVING ALONG!

    NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL GAIMAN NEIL FUCKING GAIMAN!!!!

    • Kat Kennedy

      @Sarah (saz101): Hilariously, one of my children turned to me yesterday and said, “Mummy, I’m scared of the monsters.”

      Me: “Mummy is here, baby. Monsters are scared of Mummy.”

      Kid: “Yeah, monsters are scared of Mummy. Mummy fights monsters!”

      So there you go. I am the monster fighter.

  5. Kara @ Great Imaginations

    I agree with Christina up there. I could not live without this weekly post. Not just for the scandals section, but for the industry news as well. And I know this is another post you do, but I miss a lot of the cover reveals too. So the haters can kiss my you know what.

    I have nothing more to say about that site. You know how I feel about it and I don’t want to give them another second of my attention. But there were definitely some great blog posts out there about the fuckery. Your autobiography was my favorite. I also liked Gossamer Obsessions photo instructional on how to handle negative reviews.

    Have a great week, ladies! I hope this one is quieter than the last!

  6. AnimeJune

    Thanks for the linkie!

    You’re right that at this point, we just need to let it go with the GoodReads site. Quiet measures have already been taken, anyhow.

    As for Terry Goodkind – hmmm, I wouldn’t have gone so far as to post the kid’s address, but I am down with the shame. I have no respect or tolerance or sympathy for bookthieves whatsofucking ever.

    Keep up with the scandaly scandals!

    • Kat Kennedy

      @AnimeJune: Yeah, I don’t personally have much sympathy for pirates.

      And yeah, I’m just ignoring that other site.

  7. Expy

    I read the first book of Sandman…and it bored me. Too much introspection and angst for my liking.

    Anne Rice for smutty stories. Hear, hear!

    There’s a new drama llama coming around the corner: http://t.co/l0bddrCy When Book Blogger Charge Author for a Positive Review

  9. Bookish Brunette

    Ha!! I wrote a post about that stupid, ridiculous horrific site today too… Said my piece on their ignorance, and now I’m through.

    *sigh*

    xoxo

  10. Readers Have Rights

    […] bullying organisations displayed on its front page, as well as a list of authors it supported. Angry reaction and threats of legal action by the anti-bullying organisations forced the site to cease displaying the badges, and the list of authors has since been removed, to […]

  12. Kristine

    If you want to obtain a good deal from this paragraph then you
    haave to apply such strategies to your won weblog.

  15. dien dan mua ban xe biker

    Wonderful goods from you, man. I’ve take note your stuff prior to
    and you’re simply too wonderful. I actually like what you’ve
    bought right here, certainly like what you’re saying and the way
    in which in which you say it. You make it entertaining and you still
    care for to stay it wise. I can not wait to read far more
    from you. This is really a terrific web site.

  16. dien dan rao vat toan quoc

    What i don’t understood is in fact how you’re not actually much more neatly-appreciated than
    you may be now. You’re very intelligent. You already know thus significantly in terms of this subject, made me in my view believe
    it from a lot of varied angles. Its like women and men don’t
    seem to be interested except it is one thing to accomplish with Girl
    gaga! Your individual stuffs excellent. Always
    maintain it up!