Don’t support authors who plagarize (original posted site exceeded bandwidth)

[Edited to correct username to DataAngel]

The person behind astrangeday.net uncovered a case of pretty blatant plagarism (which, as I’ll get to later this week, is pretty rare).  It ended up on the front page of Reddit and exceeded that website’s bandwidth.  (Google cache here, original link if you MUST)  I’m reposting (and adding to) because this is hosted by Google, and if their bandwidth is exceeded…. well.  We’ve got bigger problems.

Here’s the text of the original post (removed links that weren’t to Amazon):

Don’t support authors who plagiarize.

The best thing about living in the future is that you can find out about these things very easily and spread the word that much faster.

The story starts like this:

My mother (Mim) was on Amazon looking for something to read. She found a recently (self)published book that had several great reviews and one negative one. Mom likes to read self-published books. Sometimes there are real gems and the price is usually great. But poor editing is a big turnoff for her, so she read the lone negative review.

https://www.amazon.com/review/R24T3E294BVWY3/ref=cm_cr_pr_perm?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1499354894

Curious, I got the free sample of both books. The evidence is pretty conclusive.

[images redacted by me, see below]

He’s published the second book in the series. It’s… more of the same.

[images redacted by me, see below]

As a reader and as a writer I can’t put up with this. I did find out that the original author is on Goodreads and I’ve sent her a message. That’s not enough for me, though. I’ve had my short stories pirated. That hurt a little because it meant I wasn’t getting paid, but at least no one was making money off my work. This guy’s a thief. He’s stealing someone else’s work and earning money and reputation. Not cool. Not cool at all.

The images were also hosted on astrangeday.net, and I couldn’t snag them. But I’ll do you one better. Not only did I directly change the link to the review, I checked the books myself. Not only did I take pictures, but the images SHOULD link directly to Amazon, and if I’m lucky, the actual “look inside”.

https://www.amazon.com/Dead-Before-Morning-Evans/dp/0373261845/ref=tmm_pap_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1405863727&sr=1-1#reader_B004EYUHN8

https://www.amazon.com/Murder-First-OMalley-Mysteries-Volume/dp/1499354894/ref=cm_rdp_product#reader_1499354894

Unlike “DataAngel”, I do not think this is a case of someone writing under a pen name and later changing their mind.  I looked at Geraldine Evans’ author page and Karl Jones’ author page.  Since Geraldine is still an active author, and neither her page nor Karl’s mentions writing the same book under a different name, I’m going to go one step further and introduce @gerrieevans and @karljonesauthor on Twitter. 

Like I said at the top, the irony is that I have a scheduled post for later this week that basically says this doesn’t happen.  And that’s probably the most important takeaway here, as “DataAngel” pointed out at the beginning of their post.

Especially in the internet age, it’s too easy for this stuff to be found out.  And it’s too damn risky, especially not in the genre fiction world.  There’s too few of us at any kind of professional level for any one to get away with it for long.

#SFWAPro

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