Caveat Emptor Won’t do!

Have you ever tried to write a novel, or anything else for that matter? There’s an old adage that says everyone has at least one book in them. That may be so and many have tested the theory, but not many have proved its accuracy. Not through a lack of advice on the subject though. Type into your browser the words ‘Creative Writing’ and you will be astonished to see the number of hits…over fifty eight million! I thought for moment that I had misread the figure but I hadn’t. Writing short stories and other forms of creative writing have long been a hobby of mine and I have visited many of the major sites dealing with the subject. Those I have looked at cover the entire spectrum of the subject and detail the range of services on offer to the aspiring author.  I have concluded that Creative Writing is without a doubt, internationally big business and prospective authors are prime marketing targets. 

Advice on all aspects of the subject is only a couple of clicks away. Universities and other areas of higher education offer courses on creative writing; ‘published authors’ act as tutors for many privately run groups. Freelance editors offer to read and ‘constructively criticise’ manuscripts, others will advise on how best to present work to literary agents and publishers. Legal eagles offer advice on the ramifications of contracts. Books are published to guide the aspiring writer to those agents and publishers who are prepared to welcome unsolicited manuscripts. Almost every town has its own Creative or Writers’ Circle and many sponsor competitions and week-end study courses. Some of these services are free but others make a charge. The introduction of digital book publishing has opened up the possibility of self publishing and at the same time changed its image. Now it’s possible for authors to see their names in print without needing to invest vast amounts of money. E-publishing too has become respectable and there are many sites in magazine format inviting authors to use their websites to publish their work, all include a forum where members can exchange information and advice. 

At first sight all this seems a very good thing, few are familiar with the mechanics of the publishing industry and need to be informed. Information and knowledge are valuable commodities so it’s reasonable to expect those with experience, and the ability to open doors for new authors to charge for their services. Most of those offering to advise new authors do so with good intent, most of the courses are well constructed and do help to develop any latent talent the writer may have by improving knowledge of grammar and style. The websites that invite postings from unpublished authors serve a very useful purpose and every so often a major new name joins the ranks of authors ‘discovered’ by one of the major publishing houses. 

I belong to my local Creative Writers Circle, we meet once a month and publish annually an anthology of members work. We have as our patron a world famous author. Without fail we receive letters and publicity flyers every month from organisations seeking to attract entries to their competitions and writing courses. All claim to be well known and authoritative; most have modest entry fees. This latter point struck me as being the tip of an iceberg and changed how I view the whole subject of creative writing. No longer do I see it as hobby, suddenly it was clear to me that even before publication there existed a very important market place comprising a myriad of consumers and a vast array of those seeking to sell one form of service or another. It struck me forcibly that if what happens at our meetings replicate themselves in similar organisations all over the world the revenue to be gathered by the more successful service agencies must be astronomic and not all were in the market to help writers. 

Inevitably the market place has its villains. On a number of sites, advertisements appeared inviting would be authors to submit their work for appraisal and if in the opinions of the advertiser the work met with their approval they would act as agents and seek to get the work published. They had considerable experience in such activity and were confident that they would be able to place the work of those they  considered were to the required standard. It all sounded so attractive and many writers sent off their manuscripts, confident their work was good enough to pass muster. Alas all was not what it seemed. Few manuscripts were it seems up to standard but not to worry, fortunately the agency had contacts that could advise in how to improve the book and make it more attractive to a prospective publisher. There would be a fee of course but it was modest and worth pursuing. Given that the author signed up to take the matter further other charges began to emerge. Suddenly significant sums had changed hands and no publishing contract had been forthcoming. The unsuspecting author gradually realised that no contract was likely to be won and the money spent was lost. Further enquiries revealed that the agency had never successfully placed an author’s work with a publisher! 

It’s not a new flaw in an emerging market, it’s happened many times before, the overseas holiday market in it’s infancy, the second-hand car market, even washing machines, all had their down-sides, all recovered and became important areas of legitimate activity, but this area I suggest is very different. To buy a car or a washing machine that doesn’t work, or visit a holiday destination that was awful is one thing, but it’s transitory. To create a piece of written work no matter how good or bad is a very personal thing, it says something about who and what you are, it has an importance that is enduring. To have the confidence to show it to someone in the hope that it will be read and considered good enough to publish is a dream realised by very few. For someone to foster that dream knowing that it can never be is a cruel deception. Yet those who were exposed in this practice were never stopped from repeating their advertisements, and they still appear on some internet sites to this day. 

Pre-publication activity is and will remain an enormous market place that is so disparate that it can never be regulated by any one authority. The sites that host those who offer services to aspiring authors must therefore accept the responsibility for monitoring bogus operators and protect those whose only ambition is to become so well versed in their craft that their work will be published and receive the recognition it deserves. This is an area where ‘caveat emptor’ is quite simply, unacceptable.