Part of a series: Cassie Edwards 1: The First Post | Cassie Edwards 2: Savage Longings | Cassie Edwards Part 3: Running Fox | Cassie Edwards Part 4: Savage Moon | Cassie Edwards Part 5: Savage Beloved | Follow-up: Penguin (Part 1?) | Official Statement from Signet | AP Article Contains Response from Edwards | RWA Responds to Allegations | A centralized document for the Cassie Edwards situation
An Associated Press article has a response from author Cassie Edwards to the allegations that “she lifted work from texts:”
[Edwards] acknowledged that she sometimes “takes” her material “from reference books,” but added that she didn’t know she was supposed to credit her sources.
“When you write historical romances, you’re not asked to do that,” Cassie Edwards told The Associated Press, speaking earlier this week from her home in Mattoon, Ill.
Edwards then asked her husband to get on the phone. He told the AP that his wife simply gets “ideas” from reference books.
“She doesn’t lift passages,” Charles Edwards said, adding that “you would have to draw your own conclusions” on how closely his wife’s work resembles other sources.
The article also quotes plagiarism software detection developer John M. Barrie as saying that she “had indeed lifted material,” and Sherry Lewis, president of the RWA, is also quoted: “It’s not clear-cut to me,” she said. “You can see similarities in the passages, but I’m not qualified to make that assertion.”
I’m just wondering what kind of precedent this kind of investigation will provoke. Will romance authors – or for that matter, any author – have to quote all the sources they’ve used for their stories? I can imagine the list at the end of the book… And if they have none, will this author be considered lazy or mediocre because supposedly they have done no research into world building, plot or characterization?
“When you write 100 books, or even ONE, then we’ll talk. Then we’ll pick apart your book, word for word”
Not 100, more like 20. For my historical romances I do a lot of research. I have never, ever quoted without attribution, in either fiction or non fiction.
Not because I’m afraid of prosecution but because it isn’t right.
Oh yes, and I do a fair bit of research for my paranormals, too, but I’ve never quoted chunks of “Dracula” and claimed it as mine, either.
Ok, so I discovered I have a CE book and couldn’t resist. Because of limited time, I only found 3 blatant examples, the most egregious being from the epilogue. Sorry if this is tl;dr!
Night Wolf by Edwards (2003):
“That first winter as Night Wolf’s wife, she had learned that winter and blizzards were as much a part of the Indian’s life as were the pleasant days of summer. … They often gathered around fires, drinking broth made from buffalo marrow as stories were told and warriors reminisced.
As the men talked, the women would repair their husbands’ leather shirts, finish some intricate quillwork on a dress or moccasins, or teach a girl child a variety of beadwork stitches. When the people ran short of firewood, the young braves would collect buffalo chips. The chips often burned too quickly unless their mothers had a bit of fat to suspend above the fire to slowly drip onto the dung, making it last longer and create better heat. Marissa was surprised that on the coldest mornings, Night Wolf would strip to his breechclout and go outside to rub snow on his body.
Trim, fit, and hardened by a life in the outdoors, Night Wolf had adjusted long ago to the cold and could easily withstand the rigors of the trail.” (p. 328)
Which came from….:
Big Bear: The End of Freedom, by Hugh Aylmer Dempsey (1984):
“Inside his lodge, Big Bear relaxed and waited. Winter and blizzards were as much a part of his life as the pleasant days of summer. At times like this, a man could visit with his friends, tell stories and reminisce about the glories of hunting and war. A woman could finish some intricate quillwork on a pair of moccasins, repair her husband’s leather shirt or teach a girl child a variety of beadwork stitches. When they were running short of firewood, the younger girls ventured from the lodge to collect buffalo chips. These burned quickly, too quickly, but if their mother had a bit of fat, she could suspend it above the fire so that it slowly dripped on the dung, making it last longer and creating a better heat. …Even on the coldest mornings, some of the men insisted on stripping to their breechcloths and going outside to rub snow over their bodies. Trim, fit and hardened by a life in the outdoors, they adjusted to the cold so that they could more easily withstand the rigours of the trail.” (p. 49)
I’d be rather insulted to find out the Pres of RWA doesn’t read Smart Bitches. She needs to update her bookmarks methinks.
Julie Elizabeth Leto for RWA president. She knows how to articulate without inserting her thigh into her mouth. Kudos
God, people, it’s only 9:30 am and I’m already a bit tipsy on old, bad, left over New Years alcohol at the number of times I’ve read accusations of “witch hunt”, “why don’t you get lives?” and “let me know if YOU’VE written a book, miss!” (and I sneaked one in for the “you’re becomin’ plain ol’ common letter bitches” because, well, it was too perfect to pass up).
Let me tell you, I was tempted to just empty the whole thing a couple posts back when the predictable “You can say nice things as often as you like because it makes babies and angels smile, but if it’s going to be *negative* just say it once or you’re killing a child in Iraq and geez you’ve mentioned Cassie Edwards outside of reviews in about 0.8% of your total posts talk about an OBSESSION and yes, publishing is a business but for romance it’s also a tea party and/or sorority, can’t we all just hold hands and sing kumbaya, even though no other set of writers acts like this even if they’re name becomes a by word for bad—anyone notice Dan Brown whining like a little baby lately when he gets thrown out as a sign of dumbed down fiction in America?—and don’t we all want to be taken seriously?” turned up, sure as sunrise.
But, technically, I’m supposed to be working on my thesis.
I don’t think it’s fruitful to try to psychoanalyse Edwards from that AP article a la “she’s as weak as her heroines” and so forth. I can’t really buy, though, that she thought it was fine to lift sentences wholesale from books and not think an acknowledgement was in order. She used words that weren’t her own. Lots of them. Setting aside attribution and what not, how the heck did she think transcribed excerpts of nature articles would make for good dialogue? Huh.
I’m guessing it won’t be so much of a big deal for other authors if they’re not giving the old Microsoft word clip board a heavy work out.
As for the issue of historical accuracy there have been previous discussions about its supposed impact on the reader and it’s arguable to say that it’s not a deal breaker for many people unless the inaccuracy is egregious. If any is really concerned, as also mentioned before, Susan Johnson does a fun bit of endnotes. I’ve read other authors (off the top of my head Lisa Kleypas) who in acknowledgements or afterwords mention some of their sources and/or to explain changes to actual historical events they made for the sake of the story.
Recapping my posted definitions from an earlier comment:
According to the following, hyperlinked, sources, Plagiarism is:
deliberate
copying of language used,
copying of ideas,
copying of original, non-common knowledge material
and/or
paraphrasing another person’s spoken or written words.
All of the above actions are plagiarism without proper citation and documentation of sources.
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plagiarism
2. http://www.wpacouncil.org/node/9
3. http://www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/handouts/plagiarism.html
4. http://www.ncusd203.org/central/html/where/plagiarism_stoppers.html
Following up to that, I think that the situation has come down to a high probability that she did not infringe on copyright, which is actionable,
and
a high probability that she did commit plagiarism, which is not legally actionable, unless you approach it from the fraud perspective.
Ethically? That’s a completely different matter.
With a work published in 1984, Karla?
Dear me.
I’m glad the AP picked up this story, and I’m pleased that they didn’t adopt a “snickery” tone the way some media outlets do when talking about romance novels.
Also, to those who believe John M. Barrie slandered CE by stating that she lifted passages:
1. I’d go with libel, not slander, since it’s a printed comment.
2. In order for it to be slander OR libel, it has to be untrue. I assume the man with the plagiarism software can prove that the statement is true.
3. I believe CE would be considered a public figure, which means you’d have to prove that Barrie had actual malice when he said it. That is, the he knew the information was untrue but said it anyway. I doubt that’s the case.
I’m not a lawyer, but I’m a professor who teaches media law, so take that for what it’s worth.
I’m not sure why you attributed the quote to AP. Why not just say there is a quote from Cassie Edwards and make it look like your quote? What? Whats wrong with that? Oh sure, its not YOUR work, your effort that figured it out, but after all its what CEWD.
(Cassie Edwards would do).
Glad to see the head of a large writing organization supports authors just snagging their passages from elsewhere. I guess anyone can write a book now, all you have to do is steal the right combination of paragraphs.
Learn The Cassie Edwards Style – Writing becomes a form of collage.
I’ve only read one CE book all the way through. I was 12, I think. The whole noble savage genre seemed insulting from the start, so I never read another one, but whatever. To each her own.
However, is a list of sources, even 1 or 2 books in an acknowledgments so frackin’ hard? But I guess Signet wanted to reserve that 1 page for a letter from CE that basically says, “I have a book out every 6 months! So go buy!”
And now I know why she can churn them out so bloody fast. I’ve always wondered! Thanks, Bitches, for answering THAT question!
Nikki,
OCD software can scan in a CE novel and then you could submit it to turnitin. I remember someone doing this to a few LKH novels and it was…illuminating.
I’m *pretty* sure slander/libel laws vary between the U.S. and the U.K., so whoever said you can be sued even if it’s true may be from the U.K. But I welcome corrections from Brits if I’m wrong. In the U.S., I’m 98% sure nobody can stop you from saying “so-and-so is a lying doodyhead!” if you have actual proof of their lies and doodyhead-dom.
Anyway, on to the topic at hand: I’ve written eight books, of which two are in print and a third is on the way. That third? Happens to be historical. I read a crap-ton of research material for that one, and no, there are no citations in the book itself. I did not, however, quote any of my research directly, with or without cosmetic paraphrasing. (I save that kind of thing for the research papers, which I also write; in those cases, citation city.) What I am going to do? Throw a bibliography up on my website before the book comes out, so anybody who wants to know where I got my facts can find out.
There are two possible levels of usage here: usage of ideas, and usage of the way the ideas are expressed. I frankly don’t think the former should be footnoted, much less paranthetically cited, in fiction, because that breaks the illusion of the story. If the idea is central and/or unusual, though, then give credit where credit is due; put something at the front or back of the book saying, “hey, this cool person’s work is where I got it from.” The usage of the way the ideas are expressed . . . folks, there’s this thing called “style.” Nonfiction style and fiction style? Usually not the same. Dropping in quotes from nature articles is a bad idea from a craft point of view, whether you cite it or not. Save that kind of thing for the epigraphs, the little stand-alone quotes you use to start off a chapter or section or book.
And whatever you do, don’t try to pretend you didn’t notice you were copying whole paragraphs, or that its public domain nature means you’re being any less disrespectful of your sources.
Randi, did they post that online? I would so love to see what LKH turned up.
The concept of plagiarism (and the attendant knowledge that it is WRONG to do it) has been around far longer than Ms Edwards has been on the planet.
Going by the evidence quoted in this blog, she didn’t start lifting entire sentences and paragraphs (i.e., plagiarizing, for the slow out there), just last year, as a poor old, fragile, lady. (And, for the record, my mother, who’s older than CE by a full two years, would kick my ass where I to think of her as fragile just because of her age—let alone use old age to defend wrongdoings.)
Going by the evidence, she’s been doing this for years. Perhaps her entire career.
When someone says, “but she’s an old lady, don’t be mean to her!” to defend CE’s wrongdoing, I read, “if you steal consistently for decades before you are discovered, you won’t have to face the music.”
When someone says, “you are not a writer, you are not successful, you are just bitter” to defend anyone’s wrongdoing, I read, “you are envious of this person getting away with unethical/criminal behaviour, and only wish you had been *smart* enough to do it yourself, neener!” (which speaks volumes more to me about the naysayer than about the whistleblower, personally).
Whether the people finding the evidence have lives or not; whether they are successful*** or not; whether they are envious or bitter or whatever the hell they may be: if the evidence is there, available for anyone else to check, then all those things do not matter. The whistleblower is not the unethical person here.
Trying to turn this into a “how dare you, bitter bitches, accuse successful CE—even if there’s evidence, nacht” is contemptible.
In my not-at-all humble opinion.
Which, gee, I don’t have to have any credentials neither to have nor to share publicly.
*** “successful” by the naysayer’s definition.
Boy, it’s news to me that something can be slander (or even libel) EVEN IF IT’S TRUE! *gasp* Thank God we don’t have any of that awful free speech around her. Yikes.
Gab, I’d say that the reason the pub companies don’t check for plagiarism (aside from saving money) is that professionals are supposed to have learned those lessons already. We (presumably) all finished high school, and though there wasn’t as much focus on it in my day because we didn’t have the temptation of the internet, we all learned about plagiarism in English class. And then there was college, where you can be kicked out.
More importantly, we all sign contracts stating that we are the “sole author of the work”.
In other words, our publishers don’t check to make sure we aren’t cheating, just as other employers don’t look for cheating employees unless there’s sudden evidence. As adults, it’s assumed we know right from wrong. (Not implying that you don’t, btw.)
Teddy Pig,
This was on the Amazon threads. I can’t remember for which book-maybe Danse Macabre….
You could just post a quick question about anyone OCD-ing one of her books on any of the threads (I suggest one of the snarkier ones). I’m sure you’ll get a quick response.
Teddy Pig,
I should probably be more specific..
I don’t think anyone submitted a LKH book into turnitin. They OCD-ed it and just ran the Word spelling/grammar tool. The results were what I called “illuminating”. I do not know if anyone actually posted the results.
I’m watching with glee, but not because a romance author is going down. I’ve never read this woman’s books, and I don’t give a flying rat’s ass about her. What I love seeing is the Bitches’ effort and how far and wide this is spreading from its purportedly humble blogosphere origins.
As for the trolls: c’mon, shut up. I’m one of the people, I think, that assorted commenters worry will look at this and go “oh man, romance writers sure are dumb,” or “anybody could do this job,” etc. And I think I might possibly have viewed the CE affair that way—if it weren’t for this site. I may still never want to read a romance, but because of the Bitches I at least can understand and appreciate the depth of the genre and the wide range of good and bad that makes it up. And surely if romance readers were all vapid dim bulbs, they wouldn’t expect quality and integrity from their writers, now would they?
However, as somebody commented a few posts ago, I really would react with glee if this happened to LKH.
Christ, people—the Word grammar-checker has the linguistic intelligence of a retarded chimpanzee.
LKH may have her share of clunkers, but I wouldn’t take Word’s evaluation as indicative of anything. Not when it tried to tell me “am”—as in, “What am I supposed to do?”—usually doesn’t modify a verb directly, and I should try adding “-ly.”
Yeah poor grammar is far different than a cut and paste job. Plus Word is not a great tool for that anyway.
re: OCR software and turnitin
Randi,
Trust me, I’ve seriously considered it.
Another concerned/curious individual and I are running a “test” sample through turnitin first using verified and unverified passages to see if it (A)picks up on things I’ve already found source materials for and (B)identifies sources for the unverified passages I feel are highly suspicious.
Depending on what the outcome is, I may go the OCR route as long as it won’t break any laws. You know, like those pesky copyright laws.
I love that she put her husband on the phone. “Honey, could you come explain to these nice folks that I didn’t do anything wrong?”
I think all the discussion of footnotes and bibliographies blurs the real issue.
I don’t think what Edwards has done can be fixed with an Author’s Note. An Author’s Note is the place to say things like: “I based the buffalo hunt in chapter four on this book. For further information on the Lakota, see these books.â€
From the evidence, Edwards did not consult reference books; she opened them up and transcribed passages from them directly. Phrases, sentences, whole paragraphs. On a regular basis. (No, I suspect it was not copy-and-paste.)
I strongly suspect that she thinks this is meticulous research. She’s probably trying to figure out what all the fuss is about. Does that make what she did all right? No, of course not. I would like to think that she could lose her publishing contract and a large portion of her fan base over this matter, but I don’t think that will happen.
And as far as all the ‘well, it’s all public domain, so it’s legal’ excuses? It looks to me like some of it isn’t public domain. So both plagiarism and copyright violation.
I don’t even want to go into my feelings on what she has done for the reputation of romance readers and writers. I was ranting on the matter this morning and my daughter said, “So she’s offended your honor.†Yeah, sort of.
Off to compose a letter to Signet/Penguin expressing my great dismay over their response and my hope that they will investigate further and treat this as the serious matter that it is.
(Verification: took71. I think the number is much higher.)
Sigh.
Such a sad situation. Just a few observations from an avid reader with a lowly one pubbed historical and a few more in varying degrees of completion.
As I said in other threads, I was a CE reader long ago. Then I got bored with the books, found other authors. Perhaps this whole copy and paste style of writing is what turned me off after a while. Who’s to say? I can’t.
Now, as a pubbed author, I find this copy and paste style abhorrent. Taking entire passages from reference materials and just slapping a “he said”, “she said”, or “I read that”, makes my belly twist in knots.
I research lots. Sometimes to my detriment (which I’m sure other historical authors will agree can be a huge time trap).
But never ever ever have I been tempted to swipe passages from reference materials. Not even to make word count.
My notes are all handrwitten with items like, Wattle and daub: Blah blah blah material usually fashioned together by blah blah blah. (With the blah blah blahs not really there though, in case anyone is confused by that statement.)
Then I also have numerous weblinks. Sometimes three or more for the same item being researched. Often they contradict, so I make my best guestimate as to what I feel is pertinent.
Do I swipe sentences from those weblinks? NO NO NO. Later on, the information usually gets scribbled down on a notepad, just like the library material.
Then, sadly enough, I’m forced to interpret my horrid personal shorthand when I’m ready to create the scene the material will be used in.
Why do I say sadly enough?
Because, if the type of copy and paste writing that has been exposed becomes the norm, I’m wasting lots of time. I could surely write much faster if I didn’t go through this exercise, and again, I could bump my word count by slapping in whole paragraphs in seconds.
I just can’t do it though, no matter the outcome of this fiasco. I find this type of thing ethically unconscionable even if the courts and some pubs etc. find it totally acceptable practice.
Whether you like CE’s writing or not, you will find that some of us are very vocal on the issue of such practices. And whether you like US or not, we will defend our positions just as adamantly.
Nikki,
Keep us up to date on how you like TurnItIn.
I am requesting a quote for a single user copy myself. This could be fun to have for reviewing. Attribute the review to the correct authors and all.
Heh. Well, I know a lot of people that don’t like the Word grammar tool. It is limited. But I found it extremely useful in helping to pinpoint passages that could use help; like being less verbose, fleshing out statements, re-wording awkward sentences, etc. It, of course, does not replace a person reading the text and proving feedback, but it’s usually my first stop after writing something.
I don’t think I suggested (and if I did, my bad) that Word grammar was da bomb for the LKH experiment. I brought it up because of the OCD aspect; to let folks know that, if they wanted to, there IS a way of getting a CE book into word and then submitting it to turnitin, without actually having to copy it manually.
I still stand on my opinion that the results of the LKH experiment were illuminating. 😉
I mean, if the publishers won’t buy the proper tools then I will.
why must we be witchhunters/“bitches” for just wanting what is right?
OCD=OCR. *shakes head*
But I guess everyone knew what I meant, so I won’t be too embarasses I got that wrong. hahahaha.
Nikki,
I’d like to know how that experiment turns out. Keep us posted!
Must. . . not. . . go . . .count authors.
Seriously I’m having a very hard time keeping my finger away from the page up button to count the number of published authors in this comment thread alone.
You know, what a number of people keep seeming to miss is that there is a difference between copyright and plagiarism. You can plagiarize something without committing copyright infringement.
The e-mail addresses for David Shanks, CEO and Susan Peterson Kennedy, President of the Penguin Group can be found at Dear Author.
“similarities” *snort* yeah, a bit.
All of this is really making me wonder how her first few books were written; all the books reviewed here I think were published after 2000. She can’t have written all 100 since then. Maybe her earlier books (which I would assume were more scrutinized since she was less established) had less blatant plagarism, and then once she got older and more popular she just became lazier. Or maybe she wrote in the same way back then. Has anyone looked into this? I’ve never read any of her books and don’t intend to start now, but I don’t mind reading about the fruits of other people’s labor 😉
OT: wasn’t some of the stuff for LKH not grammar or syntax, but spelling things like “voila” as “viola” and “deity” as “diety” about fifty zillion times? Something like that.