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Very Weird Solicitation Alert: Monica Susan Main
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware®If you've been reading this blog for a while, you know I like the weird stuff. And this is definitely weird.Several writers have recently contacted me about a strange snail mail solicitation (there are also ...
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Scam Alert: TransMedia Agency /New Leaf Media / Author’s Outlet
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware®A quick warning about a new impersonation scam. I'm getting reports from writers who've received email solicitations from what appear to be real film companies. Here are a couple of examples:Note the id...
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Scam Alert: Silver Ink Literary Agency / Editors Press and Media / Global Review Press / Best Writers Publishing House
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware®Last week, the Authors Guild sent out this warning:Writer Beware has been getting complaints about Silver Ink Literary Agency for some time. It's included on our ...
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An Important Message for Writer Beware Email Subscribers
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware®As of mid-August, the service that handles Writer Beware email subscriptions and RSS feeds, Feedburner, is terminating its email service.Blogger, the platform I've been using for the blog, is very limited in...
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How Bad Contest Entry Rules Can be Mitigated: The Medium Writer’s Challenge
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware®That's right, boys and girls--it's another of my posts about hinky contest rules. If you're a regular reader of this blog, you'll know I publish a lot of these. That's not because I like repeating mysel...
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What Friends Don’t Do
I just lost a friend. I don’t know why. When I went to her the other day, after over a month of sudden and unexplained silence, to ask her what had gone wrong, she told me that nothing was wrong: things were exactly as they should be, with me out of her life. When I asked what I’d done, she wouldn’t say. She didn’t want to explain herself, she said. She said: “I’ve got a tendency to talk too much, so I won’t say anything.” It’s always been a troubled relationship. My friend—D—is funny, compassionate, generous to a fault. She’s a prolific writer, an inspiring teacher, and one of the most blindingly intelligent people I’ve ever known. But she is also one of the most difficult people I’ve ever known. She’s exhaustingly intense, easy to anger, quick to take offense, a holder of unyielding grudges. She’s incapable of apologizing or…
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2012: Year in Review
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware As we begin the new year (Writer Beware's fifteenth--good heavens!), here's a look back at some of Writer Beware's most notable posts and warnings from 2012. JANUARY The Delmont-Ross Writing Conte...
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Happy Holidays!
Writer Beware is taking time off for the holidays. Unless there's some especially major publishing news, look for us to be back after January 1. I'll still be answering emails. To contact me: beware [at] sfwa.org. We wish all our readers peace, ha...
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Guest Blog Post: International Writing Scams and How to Protect Yourself
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware Today's guest blog post, from journalist Mridu Khullar Relph, explores the world of writing schemes and scams from an international perspective--something that's increasingly an issue for Western writers ...
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The Albee Agency: Book Publicity Faked
Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware Over the past few days I've gotten a number of inquiries from authors wondering about the reputation of a PR firm called The Albee Agency. Albee bills itself as [A] new breed of book publicists- We offer...