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In entering the literary community, these are things you should know about...

None of this information is intended to start an attack on anyone, it is just shared so everyone in the community is informed.

Comment your thoughts.

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1.] PROBLEMATIC

[Francina Simone]

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[Wolfshot Publishing]

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[mynameismarines]

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2.] CENSORSHIP

[Francina Simone]

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3.] Blood Heir by AMÉLIE WEN ZHAO

January 2019

Various reviewers with advanced reader copies (ARKs) accuse Blood Heir of having racist elements and plagiarism. Author then decides to pull book before it's launch later that year. Seems the release that was just pushed back from June to November, and an editor took a second look at the manuscript. Overall the reception of the debut seems ok..

[Sarah Z]

[FrancinaSimone]

[The Book Brats]

A Goodreads review:

Link to an article on SLATE: https://slate.com/culture/2019/01/blood-heir-ya-book-twitter-controversy.html

Link to a New York Times article:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/29/books/amelie-wen-zhao-blood-heir.html

Link to wiki page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_Heir

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4.] PUBLISHING SCAMS

[iWriterly]

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5.] BOOK REVIEWS

[Alexa Donne]

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6.] #ArksAreFree (KRISTIN MARTIN)

May 2019

Indie author and authortuber Kristin Martin is called out for selling her ARKS for $150 and for having expensive courses.... even though she has no real credentials.

(Refer to the ARK chapter..... coming soon)

[Haley Bascom]

[pistachiopaperbacks]

[Camille Myrik]

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7.] SARAH DESSEN

November 2019

[Daniel Greene]

[The Novel Lush]

Article: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/11/15/sarah-dessen-south-dakota-college-student-ya-novel-backlash-twitter/

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8.] DOES TWITTER SELL BOOKS?

December 2019

[Alexa Donne]

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8.] LUCIA FRANCO

December 2019

This is currently happening on Twitter. Apparently, there is upset, because Lucia Franco's book/series was classified as Romance. Many in the Romance genre believe it should not be classified as so, because Franco's book/series is about a 15/16 year old gymnast who has an affair with her 32 year old coach. A coach who feeds her birth control pills aka "candy".

- For many countries, 18 is the age of consent, thus a 16 year old cannot consent. So that makes this is story romanticized statutory rape.

- To be considered Romance by the Romance Writers of America (RWA) a story must have romance as central to the plot and must have a happy ending (HEA).

Really good response article: http://jennytrout.com/?p=12833

- The defenders cite free speech and compare this series to the world famous Lolita written by Vladimir Nabokov (1955). Which is written from the perspective of a middle aged man obsessed with a 12 year old girl. This is a horrible defense, by people who most likely never read Lolita.

Link to a Lolita plot overview: https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/lolita/summary/

Here is a link to an article talking about the inspiration of Lolita: https://medium.com/@editors_91459/the-real-story-that-inspired-lolita-is-somehow-more-disturbing-than-the-book-d14167cd157a

And added element to all of this are the doxxing of Scarlett Parish and the removal of Franco's books from Amazon.

- Parish has been outspoken in her distaste for Franco's series and has now had to report the doxxing to the authorities.

- Fans of Franco and some neutral parties have said that the removal of Franco's books is akin to censorship.

- that said, some don't see the hypocrisy of their actions when reporting, threatening, doxxing, and down voting (leaving one stars and bad reviews) opponents of Franco, aka censorship.

- The biggest contention opponents have is the framing of this series as Romance and categorizing it as Romance. Many stating that, even though they dislike her content, Franco has the right to publish what she wishes to write, but that the categorization is wrong.

- Many feel that having such a series, or such books, in the Romance category taints the genre and the authors in the genre. They don't wanna be associated with such a book.

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9.] AUTHORTUBE

October 2018

Two authortubers uploaded similar videos at around the same time, talking about their issues with some of the things going on in the authortube community.... and many took it as a coordinated attack, others took it as a moment to discuss these issues.

[Shaelinwrites]

[Jenna Streety]

[Alexa Donne]

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11.] JK ROWLING

December 2019

JK Rowling sides with transphobe Maya Forstarter who recently lost a court case in which she was suing her former employer for firing her for her open bigotry.

https://www.nbcnews.com/think/opinion/j-k-rowling-s-maya-forstater-tweets-support-hostile-work-ncna1105201

[Council of Geeks]

[The Errant Nerd]

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13.] RWA

December 2019

The Romance Writers of America suspends novelist and former board member Courtney Milan from their group, because she publicly (twitter) called certain books racist. It seems the writers of those books turned around and reported Milan to the ethics committee for breaking rules. Various members have quit of threatened to quick and have sided with Milan.

Link to article: https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/romance-writers-america-suspends-novelist-142953480.html

[The Bookish Vineyard]

Link to this video: https://youtu.be/BQDmemaGHRg

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Latest update on the RWA scandal: it seems a special ethics subcommittee was made just to handle the Courtney Milan complaint.

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Here's a link to Guardian an interesting podcast on racism, sexism, and discrimination: https://www.theguardian.com/news/audio/2019/nov/01/fifty-shades-of-white-the-long-fight-against-racism-in-romance-novels-podcast

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14.] #COCKYGATE (FALEENA HOPKINS)

Indie author Faleena Hopkins tried to trademark the work COCKY....

It seems that the trademark office (USA) let the trademark request go through without any real consideration and the Faleena went around messaging anyone on Amazon with the word COCKY in it telling them that they had to either remove the name off their books or be sued.

Subsequently, lawsuits were made, the trademark office was bombarded with emails, and the case went before a judge. The trademark was cancelled. But.... this hasn't stopped, but has actually inspired, others to try and trademark basic words.

Here are some of the various videos made about this scandal that took place in May 2018.

Faleena did post response videos, but almost immediately took them down. Occasionally you'll find snippets of the long and ranty nonsense.

[Sasha White]

[Self-publishing with Dale]

[Lawful Masses a with Leonard French]

[Bianca Sommerland]

[Badly Drawn Theater]

Links to blog posts by Jenny Trout on this topic:

http://jennytrout.com/?p=12071

http://jennytrout.com/?p=12080

http://jennytrout.com/?p=12103

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15.) RACISM ON BOOKTUBE (intentional/unintentional)

2019

Combination of events: young girl goes on rant, Michelle Obama YouTube interview, on the movie set of The Hate U Give, and over compensating.

Big question is highlighted in many videos.... "is booktube racist?"

[The Novel Lush]

[Bookslikewoah]

[The Reading Outlaw]

[The Artisan Geek]

[my nameismarine]

[Francina Simone]

[The Book Archer]

Link to article she mentions:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/black-booktube-diversity-books-publishing-youtube_l_5d14f9e8e4b03d6116384e92

Videos mentioned:

[YouTube Originals]

[polandbananasBOOKS]

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This info is shared not to provoke an attack on anyone,
but for all those in the community to be informed.

[Yes, we are biased, so use this info
to do some more research.
Everyone is welcome to have an opinion,
So let us know in the comments.]

No, we didn't mention issues with WP
(which there are tons of)
since we don't wanna be deleted.

Let us know if there is an issue
you think we should mention.