Warning From a Best-Selling Author

That has to be just coincidence, like the SK one. How could they quoting you? If it was more than a three book series, and you got rejected for the first one, the final book should have never seen the light of day, let alone be in the hands of an author a long way away...

 

I thought you'd already seen legitimate copyright infringement lawyers. This is what you said earlier - "I've only seen copyright infringement lawyers."

 

Sorry mate, but this is getting ridiculous. Not only is your entire story fishy and illogical, this last statement is downright preposterous. Why should any of us care to suggest lawyers for you? The ones that will see you for free, no less? What is it that you are really looking for here? Your statements and responses are quite bizarre.

 

After reading through all of the OP's responses, I think that it entirely coincidental the story is similar to his. Also I am guessing the series you refer to is about some games, that are for hungry people.

 

The first thing I thought when I heard about the book of hungry people was, "How has this only just come out?" I thought someone would of written something along those lines years ago. Wouldn't be surprised if thousands of people thought they had strong cases. I liked the pun. =)

 

Ahh you are right. I can never get away from those shiny people.

 

Can't be sparkly vampires. It wouldn't fit with the timeline the op suggests, and that publisher (Little Brown) didn't accept unagented submissions in 2000.

What we know is:

a) The book must not be a debut, since the author was already in the sable of authors at the publishing house (unless I read that post wrong by the op)
b) The book is YA, not hunger games.
c) Book is a series +3 book, and each book has sold +1, 000,000 copies.

WW - I actually think if your book WAS stolen, you should fight. But I think the odds of it being stolen are infinitesimally small, and you need to be so sure. No doubt. Because if you're wrong you will be bankrupt, and your writing career will be over. That's why people are being a bit blunt with you. Imagine everything we're saying, times it by 1000000 and that's what you'll be facing on the stand in court, the transcripts of which will be available to anyone who cares.

In the Stephen King case, the judge read both books and you should read what he said about the no-name authors book. . . it was, painful. You think reviews might not hurt a book, well, that one probably hurt since it basically called the book ridiculous, device riddled, nonsense that can not be compared to stephen King's book despite the obvious similarities. And there really were over 250 simmilarities and exact phrasings, and very similar plot with the main character having the same paranormal ability and same family life, and same . . . well, a lot of the same stuff.

If you tell us the series, we might be able to help you research. For example, I have read loads of interviews by JKR, Stephanie Myer, Susan Collins . . etc, and I can tell you a lot about their publishing backgrounds, including where their ideas came from and how they found publishers . . . etc.

We really are trying to help you.

 

You are so awesome, Selbbin. Then I would definitely talk to your cousin Greg.

word whisperer

 

In post #66 word whisperer says that this was the author's debut novel and that they had never published anything before in their life. (I too was confused on this a little).


word whisperer ---

You say that this private investigator discovered that your manuscript was "stolen" from the publishing house and given to this author. What exactly was the evidence for this? How do they know your manuscript was given to the author? How was the private investigator able to prove that?

 

Hi again, thirdwind. I only want to formally copyright every manuscript as proof that I really did write it. Also, the certificate they send you has the date on it. That also proves I wrote the novel when I did. I, too, keep everything. I have the hand-written original of the story. Also notes and pictures from magazines. I've kept them for sentimental reasons, but they would come in handy, like you said.

word whisperer

 

Hi, evelon. I have seen half a dozen copyright infringement lawyers. I only stopped because I was getting the same response AND the statute of limitation had run out.

word whisperer

 

Hello, dudlite. (Cute baby!) No, the series isn't about games for hungry people. I actually like Suzanne Collins.

word whisperer

 

Actually, if the first novel in the series was published between 2000 and 2008, it DOES fit the timeline...

word whisperer

 

Cicerotamar, the author wasn't established before this series. The first book was her debut. And her publisher isn't the one I sent my manuscript to. It was another well-known publisher. One of the editors there wrote that I could submit the entire ms after she read the first three chapters. Back in 2000, publishing companies were more open to direct submissions by the authors. They didn't insist on going through an agent.

word whisperer

 

Cicerotamar, I appreciate your concern. And I'm tired of fighting this. I'm considering removing as many similarities as possible and submitting my manuscript to agents. If they reject it because it's too similar to the other writer's series, then that's the end of my novel. I just don't want to be regarded as pathetic and unoriginal. Like I said in an earlier post, I immediately slam shut any novel that is similar to a popular series I have read. I think the writer is ridiculous, and I refuse to read anything by that person ever again. I don't want to be one of those writers. Especially when I wrote my novel first.

word whisperer

 

Hi, Paulkemp24. I will tell you what I know. But I want to make sure I'm not giving something away that could hurt my case if I ever did go to court (like if I publish my novel and SHE sues ME). If you all don't think it would matter, I'll let you know what the private investigator discovered.

word whisperer

 

word whisperer --

So let's assume that the publishing house employee did in fact give your manuscript to their writer friend. The writer then submitted their own manuscript to a different publishing house. Which means, the employee in question didn't really help their friend get published in any kind of direct way (it's not like they were the one deciding which manuscripts to buy; it wasn't even the same publishing house). The author didn't get published because of their employee friend. They got published because they did a good job of writing the manuscript.

Now I'm not saying this to be mean or attack you in any way but if you submitted a story to a publishing house and they rejected it and then another writer submitted their own manuscript about the same story and they were able to get published then what does that tell you about your writing versus theirs? Obviously they did a better job of writing the story than you did because they got published (and apparently sold a million copies and made a series out of it and whatever) and all you got was a rejection letter. If that happened to me, my first thought would be "Crap, that person did a better job of writing my own story than I did."

Again, not trying to slap you across the face here so please don't take it that way. I'm just saying that if it happened to me my emotions would be more of humbling and slightly humiliating than of anger or bitterness.

 

Gah, Word Whisperer,

PLEASE use one post to reply to everyone! Double posting is frowned upon and there's no reason you can't make one post with all your replies, thanks.

~ J. J.

 

1) then why are you asking someone to find you another?
2) why didn't you listen to what they told you? If you've seen legit. lawyers, which you said you had, and refuse to take their advice, what good do you think another 6 or 60 would do?
3) what is it you expect people to tell you. You have a negative answer for every suggestion made. Maybe it's time to give it all up.

 

I think Word Whisperer is getting off on all the guessing games, folks. I think we are being played.

 

I've been following this thread closely, though keeping my distance. word whisperer, why can't you just tell us who you suspect?

 

ditto that... there's no good reason for not mentioning the published books in question, or their author... and not doing so only causes us to doubt your entire story...

plus, in all these 5 pages of posts, you've still never said what it is you're warning other writers to avoid doing...

 

It was a jab at cicerotamar. That's about as close as I wanted to come to participating in this thread