Buzz Worthy News 23rd July 2012

Buzz Worthy News

In this week’s Buzz Worthy News: An author passes away, lawsuits are filed against Harlequin, more books are getting turned into movies, and some really great classics are having unnecessary sex shoved into them.  And, of course, as usual, there are the Scandalous Scandals.

Buzz Worthy News is Cuddlebuggery’s weekly Monday post providing you with all the best book world news and book blogging gossip.  For the latest Young Adult releases and Cover Reveals check out our weekly Friday Post, Hot New Titles.

 Book World News

Image by ~evilmuffins

Lawsuit filed against Harlequin

A collection of authors has filed a class action lawsuit against Harlequin, Harlequin Books S.A., and Harlequin Enterprises B.V. for royalties on ebooks.

According to the website Harlequin Lawsuit:

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.

Harlequin has replied with the following statement:

Harlequin announced today that they have been made aware of a class action lawsuit brought against them by three former authors.

The publisher wishes to make clear that this is the first it has heard of the proceedings and that a complaint has not yet been served.

“Our authors have been recompensed fairly and properly for their work, and we will be defending ourselves vigorously,” said Donna Hayes, Publisher and Chief Executive Officer of Harlequin.

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Self Publishing program Author Solutions bought by Pearsons

Author Solutions, a platform for writers to self publish their novels, is to be bought from Bertram by Pearsons for 116 million dollars.  And that’s a lot of tomatoes according to An Affair To Remember.

I have no idea why I just wrote that.  Moving on.

Pearsons is insisting that this is an upsize, not a downsize and thus the jobs at Author Solutions are safe.

The move has not been without criticism.  Particularly by Kate Pool Deputy General Secretary of the Society of Authors has this to say:

“What worries me is that authors will get misled by these deals thinking that a tie-up with Penguin means they are getting either a full publishing or self publishing service, when in fact they are getting neither of those,” she said. “It is very misleading for authors”. –source

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Ebooks are down and dirty with Adult publishing

A report from the Association of American Publishers and Book Industry Study Group have confirmed that ebook sales of Adult titles have sky rocketed to become the “Dominant Single Format”.

“Adult Fiction eBooks revenue for 2011 was $1.27 billion, growing by 117% from $585 million in 2010.  This translated to 203 million units, up 238% from 85 million in 2010.  Similar to the broader overall Trade sector, the combined print formats also represented the majority of publishers’ revenue in the Adult Fiction category, at $2.84 billion.”

My suspicion is that romance covers have a big part to play in this.  What would you rather people see you reading on the train in the morning – a Kindle?  Or this:

Explains everything.

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Acclaimed Children’s Author Passes

Margaret Mahy, one of New Zealand’s most acclaimed literary figures passed away today at the age of 76.

Margaret Mahy passed away this afternoon after a brief illness.

“She has written more than 120 books which have been translated into 15 languages. She has also won many of the world’s premier children’s book awards, including the Carnegie Medal and the prestigious Hans Christian Andersen Award.”

And no matter how you cut it, that is a helluva lot of prestige.

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Outlander Novels are getting adapted

Sony Pictures TV have snapped up the multimillion selling series rights, with Battlestar Galactica Exec Ron Moore adapting author  Diana Gabaldon’s original novels.

The books follow “British Army nurse Claire Randall as she is transported back in time from 1945 to 18th-century Scotland, embarking on an epic romance with Scots warrior Jamie.”

The adaptation is being pitched to cable networks this week, so a pilot could be seen in the not too distant future.

Our advice? Kilt Up! Outlander is coming to the screen!

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Gone Girl is getting Produced by Reese Witherspoon

Twentieth Century Fox have claimed the rights to Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl.

They’re reported to have paid a seven figure sum, that’s a lot of zero’s… for the rights. Flynn is said to be adapting the screenplay herself, on top of having two other film adaptations in the works. But for Gone Girl, Reese Witherspoon is set to take a seat behind her usual place. Behind the camera in a producers chair along with Bruna Papandrea and Leslie Dixon.

Lets hope that her producing skills are sharper than her acting ones…

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What the classics always needed – more sex!

A publisher of Erotic fiction, Total-E-bound is rereleasing several classic titles with graphic sex scenes.  We’re going to blame this one on Fifty Shades of Grey because at least one major publication has and attributing stuff to Fifty Shades of Grey has become the popular thing to do.

The list of titles that have been impregnated with gratuitous fornication are:

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte and Sierra Cartwright

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and Amy Armstrong

Sherlock Holmes: A Study in Scarlet by A.C. Doyle and Sarah Marsters

Northanger Abby by Jane Austen and Desiree Holt

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea by Jules Verne and Marie Sexton

“There is no doubting the fact that the classics remain an inspiration to writers, even today, with many complex and thought-provoking storylines. But if we are honest to ourselves, haven’t we heard the same reserved tale told time and time again?” says the publisher. “We’ll show you the scenes that you always wanted to see but were never allowed … The old fashioned pleasantries and timidity have all been stripped away, quite literally. You didn’t really think that these much loved characters only held hands and pecked cheeks did you?”

I don’t know, did we? I thought that was the point in many of Austen’s novels.

Quote: “My penis is hard, Jane. That is what kissing you does to me. My body is filled with desire.”

You can find the covers in this article on Oh No They Didn’t because I totally stole this article from them.

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Scandalous Scandals

Huffington Post Joins the Wankfest

Huffington Post found itself in hot water this week when it published an anonymous opinion piece by the creators of a website designed to target and bully book reviewers.  The Huffington Post, who did not fact check the op-ed, but originally approached the blog, posted an apology soon afterward. The apology was written by Andrew Losowsky and was not received well by all as is evidenced by Foz Meadow’s response that was also posted on the Huffington Post that day.

The Bullying blog responded by deleting the instances in which they posted personal data on targets and encouraged vigilantes to use it.  They then claimed that this data had never appeared on the blog and that the victims had fabricated it to gain sympathy.  Gossamer Obsessions blogged more fully on this development, providing proof of the personal information posted and screenshots for further information.

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Steampunk Listopia Drama

 Trouble in paradise once again. This time, however, it appears a GoodReads Librarian, Evelyn Kriete, deleted a significant amount of Steampunk books on a Steampunk Listopia list, and then proceeded to add her own with no explanation. This caused a blog post reaction from Karina Cooper. Later Evelyn does issue an explanation, where she claims another GoodReads Librarian removed 13 books and changed the name of the list. This incident ultimately led to Evelyn losing her librarian privileges because obviously Goodreads Librarians are not moderators.

Well that’s what we can decipher from what we can find.

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