Elizabeth Barrette (ysabetwordsmith) wrote,
Elizabeth Barrette
ysabetwordsmith
  • Mood: busy

More About Night Shade

Tags: economics, news, reading, writing
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  • 4 comments
ideealisme

ideealisme

July 8 2010, 22:46:51 UTC 10 years ago

I had a similar experience with a dodgy competition a few years back. It took a lot of letter writing (I asked my dad to write one for me because he's a solicitor) and persistence by me and several other writers before we got our money.
eseme

eseme

July 10 2010, 01:29:48 UTC 10 years ago

The SWFA has put them on probation for a year. The full post form the president is at http://www.sfwa.org/2010/07/a-note-to-sfwa-members-regarding-night-shade-books/
ysabetwordsmith

Hmm...

ysabetwordsmith

July 10 2010, 02:10:51 UTC 10 years ago

That's helpful. However, I notice that it doesn't say anything about Night Shade's punitive actions against authors who made valid complaints about it. I think publishers deserve to get smacked for abusing whistle-blowers, and that SFWA should at least criticize publishers for that behavior. (I can't imagine publishers actually stopping doing that.)
eseme

Re: Hmm...

eseme

July 10 2010, 16:11:37 UTC 10 years ago

Well, we have no idea what SFWA did in private, just what is in their public post (I'm not a member, so there may well be more going on).

It's actually a pretty decent punishment. People who publish SF/F typically want to join SFWA, and if going with Nightshade means that your first novel sale to them will not count as a a novel sale to SFWA, there are people who will look elsewhere. Which means fewer contracts for new books, and less revenue. If nothing else, this hits them in the bank account, where it really hurts.

Of course, there is speculation that the reason Nightshade was late with royalties is that they are in financial trouble, so fewer contracts would seriously hurt the business and possibly make them unable to pay their current writers. But I'd say that's what a lousy business deserves.