We Still Report. You Can Read it and Stuff.

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


I went back to my review of Savage Moon, and looked at the following passage, which I joked was “CSI:Shoshone”:

“See the dried material on the very tips of the sharpened stone arrowhead?” Soaring Hawk said, pointing toward it. “The points of these arrowheads have been dipped into a mixture of pulverized ants and the spleen of an animal that has been allowed to decay in the direct rays of the sun,” Soaring Hawk said grimly. “This rotten mixture combined with rattlesnake venom is the deadliest of weapons.”

Saleratus & Sagebrush: People and Places on the Road West By Robert Lee Munkres uses an identical passage and cites its source as The Shoshonis: Sentinels of the Rockies, by Virginia Cole Trenholm and Maurine Carley, published by the University of Oklahoma Press in 1964.

Both books reference a work by John G. Bourke, which I haven’t identified or located.

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  1. azteclady says:

    I wonder what on earth the number of fans (or books published, or $$$$$$$ made) an author has to do with facts?

    Sarah Frantz: I’ve been wondering about Ms Crusie’s question as well—but I chose to think she meant that Ms Edwards books are often referenced here at the SB’s as shinning examples of the worst of the genre. *shrug*

  2. STP says:

    I bet the Cruise comment is from a troll.

  3. Robin says:

    I bet the Cruise comment is from a troll.

    Why would anyone want to take their own life into their hands by impersonating a well-known author with a comment like that and then providing a link back to the author’s own website?

  4. rubbercement says:

    I’m not wanting to argue with you, Robin, but I’m not sure how the troll would get caught, much less take its life it its hands. It’s easy enough to copy and paste someone’s url and e-mail address. Who would be the wiser? What could Jenny do about it? And didn’t someone troll Tony the Chest (of Caddy trunk fame) here once?

    Maybe I’m just an optimist—I have a hard time seeing Cruise condoning this.

    I can’t remember who rooted out the Tony troll last time, but perhaps her talents would be of use here now?

  5. I assumed the Crusie comment was meant as a joke.  Ms. Edwards has often been mentioned here, and I believe she has here only special book rating.  It could almost seem like a “crusade” and so worthy of a little poking fun.

    Anyway, I will have to second third etc all the commentary against plagiarism.  Nothing really funny about it although the rabid fangirl reaction is funny from afar.  Kudos to Sara and Candy for being stand up gals and taking on the fangirl hordes. (Or should I say stand up bitches?)

  6. Castiron says:

    Speaking with my employee-of-publisher hat on, I definitely appreciate the SBs bringing this to people’s attention; it’s material for an interesting discussion.

    And speaking as an SB fan, now I want a new contest: choose one of Edwards passage/scholarly book passage pairs and write your own version, using the scholarly info but your own words.

    (area11?  Is that where they store the books from outer space?)

  7. Sara (a different one than the Edwards defender) says:

    If Louise Allen, author of the much-pummeled Virgin Slave, Barbarian King, has been feeling picked on, I bet she’s not anymore. I’d say the focus has shifted, and rightly so.

    This isn’t a new sentiment, but I’m horrified at this (alleged) sloppy and blatant plagiarism. Shame on both the author and her editors/publishers. As if the romance genre needed another excuse for people to get sniffy and superior about it.

  8. Kate says:

    This is a tad off-topic, but more desultory googling shows that Edwards has also apparently copied.. herself:

    From Savage Obsession, 2006:
    “It was the most attractive lodge in the village, a long narrow structure of handsomely fashioned bark.  The ends were beautifully rounded and the roof gracefully arched.  The snow-white birchbark sides were decorated with striking totemic designs in brilliant but harmonious colors.”

    From Savage Torment, 2007:
    “This lodge, the Chippewas’ council house, was a long, narrow structure, handsomely fashioned of bark and appearing to be sixty feet or more in length and about twenty feet wide.  The ends were beautifully rounded and the roof gracefully arched.  The snow-white birchbark sides were decorated with striking totemic designs in brilliant but harmonious colors.  Slow spirals of smoke rose from four smoke-holes and an Indian stood guard on each side of its front door.”

    …WTF?  Either she was looking at the same source-book for both of these passages (in which case it’s sadly not on Googlebooks), or she was cribbing from her earlier works.  Or she has a remarkably formulaic memory.  Aargh.

  9. Kerry says:

    Castiron, that is a brilliant idea.

  10. Miri says:

    To the “Cruise” comment (I doubt it was her but if it was)
    As a collage girl who was, back in the day, a rabid fan of everything Cassie Edwards (dudes I was 22!) and spent full price on EVERY book she wrote from 1989-1992. I’ve since grown out of that phase of romance readership, but look back with a pleasant sigh on all those longass bus rides to school.
    After today it does feel like Cassie Edwards ran over my dog!
    There is NO way i’m mad at SmartBitches for uncovering this info, why should CE get a “oh there there” for screwing up because she’s a matricarch writer? Tough!
    If someone were to plagiarize Ms. Edwards and pass it off as their own work without giving due credit, you bet your ass the SmartBitches would raise hell and put a block under it.

  11. Katie W. says:

    I third Castiron’s brilliant idea.

    And here’s hoping that the Crusie comment was a joke and/or troll because I love me some Jenny Crusie.

  12. Lani says:

    I wasn’t gonna hop in on this because all day, it’s been giving me that sick feeling I get when I pass a car crash on the road. But Jenny Crusie is a good friend of mine, and she’s no troll; she had a point and she made it. And I have to say, I’m with her.

    NOW PUT DOWN THE PITCHFORKS. Yeesh. There’s no more dangerous place to exhibit an unpopular opinion than on an internet forum. Just do me a favor and hear me out before you light your torches. Once I’m done, have at it.

    There is no defending Cassie Edwards here. This is disgusting and infuriating for all the reasons Sarah pointed out, and everyone who is horrified by the willful theft of honest work is absolutely in the right. But I’ll tell you, the gleeful bashing of Cassie Edwards – not in the investigation, but in multiple reviews and posts here prior to today – got old for me a while back. If you don’t like her books, don’t read them. There’s so much good romance out there. Why read someone whose books you hate? It never made sense to me, but I never said anything, because hey – it’s Sarah and Candy’s site. Y’all do as you please.

    So, while there’s no excuse for what Cassie Edwards appears to have done, I think it would be naive to say this investigation came out of a vacuum. It happened because the Cassie Edwards obsession tripped over something (other than lousy writing) to justify it.

    All Jenny did was point this out; I’d ask that no one lump her in with the people who lack the courage to speak up respectfully in public and put their name on it.

    Sarah, Candy, you guys know I love and respect you, and anyone sending you nasty e-mails on the side needs a serious smackdown. I’m just making a point, and standing up for my friend. I know you’d do the same.

  13. liz says:

    Lani, I get where you’re coming from – but are you saying that because Candy & Sarah already thought CE was craptastical it somehow affects what she may or may not have done in her book? It is what it is – how it gets a light shined on it shouldn’t affect whatever it turns out to be.

    Secondly, I really really take issue with the prevailing theme in romance that it’s not ok to bash a bad writer.  Everything on this site is done with glee, not just the trashing of CE’s quality.

    It doesn’t need justifying.

  14. --E says:

    And the thing of it is, the folks who don’t think there’s anything wrong with plagiarism are sortakindahalf correct.

    That Ms. Edwards did research is fabulous. That she went and found studies and descriptions of things she herself could not directly experience is what a writer is supposed to do, if the writer is trying to bring elements of realism to their work.

    Unfortunately, a writer is also supposed to incorporate that information smoothly. It should flow naturally as part of the narrative or dialogue, and should never, never, never sound like a mini-lecture expounding on some irrelevant detail.

    And that’s the real tragedy. If Ms. Edwards had internalized the information she studied, and then allowed it to incorporate naturally into the story when appropriate, it would have been all her own words, and it would have been a hell of a lot less stilted. It might even have improved the prose sufficiently that the Smart Bitches wouldn’t have had to create a new level badness in their grading system.

  15. Chrissy says:

    What I DON’T understand is how weasels, including the one who ripped off Nora, can continue to be published quite regularly and with great success without suffering any long term damages.

    I’ll admit it—I’m a mean, hateful bitch.  I not only won’t ever buy Jane—errr THAT WENCH’S—books again, I think her career should have been freaking OVER.

    There are other careers.  For any artist to rip off another—nope, that should be your exit ticket from the club.  It’s a sacred goddamned trust.

    It happened to me years ago and not only did the culprit lash out at me over it when she was FORCED to admit wrongdoing by lawyers (after being given several chances to bow out quietly), she attacked me with slander for years from an overseas website the host refused to remove.  Then again, she was a nutcase who couldn’t return to her own country because she had too many outstanding warrants… one for falsely accusing somebody of child molestation after HE outed her for fraud.

    A thief is a thief and an artist who steals is NOT an artist.  She’s a wannabe who betrayed all artists.

    Go work at the discount club, where you can purchase your plagiarism with the cover ripped off on aisle 4.

    Publishers who put this crap on shelves over and over again should be forced to repay the cost of the book to anyone suckered into buying it… plus shipping and handling… and pain and suffering.

  16. Lani says:

    Secondly, I really really take issue with the prevailing theme in romance that it’s not ok to bash a bad writer.  Everything on this site is done with glee, not just the trashing of CE’s quality.

    Hey, Liz! See, this is why I try not to post here. I get trapped here for days, just for the fun of intelligent discussion. It’s great when I have time, but now I’m under deadline. Agh!

    Now, I’m not saying that you shouldn’t give bad reviews to bad books. I’m saying that once you’ve reviewed an author and decided she’s badbadBAD, you’ve made your point for God and country. Cassie Edwards has become shorthand here for “crap writer” and whenever her name has come up, it’s been open house to pick her carcass clean. That’s way beyond just giving her a bad review.

    The main reason I posted was that people were starting to think that Jenny Crusie defends plagiarism, and that’s not the case AT ALL. I just wanted to make sure that was clear.

    And—E… there are people here who think there’s nothing wrong with plagiarism? Really? They’re not kindasortaright. Taking someone else’s work and passing it off as your own is terrible. Research good. Plagiarism bad. Are people arguing that plagiarism in this case is okay? I must’ve missed that.

    Deadline. Going. Really mean it. 😉

  17. But this didn’t start because the Bitches were hunting for more ways to rag on Cassie Edwards. It started because SB Candy gave her friend and Edwards book, and the friend noticed some stylistic issues and decided to use Google to research them.

    It could just as easly have happened if SB Candy loved Edwards and gave her friend the book as an example of great romance.

  18. liz says:

    Well, I may view that differently because CE was code for crap writer on the BBS servers way back in the start of her career. For real, people would say “Cassie Edwards bad?” So I think tying that trend to this site is giving undue acclaim.

    I think we disagree. You seem to feel once you establish ‘bad’ you should leave it alone, and I think this site is all about beating dead horses into costly shoes. Nor do I see that as wrong. But I’ve been hearing CE bashed since about book three. I am old and all.

    Good luck on the deadline.

  19. Jane says:

    the fact that the first and only comment by Crusie was remarking essentially how mean the SBs were and not on the contents of the charge or the issue of plagiarism says volumes.

  20. Robin says:

    I didn’t automatically think Crusie was condoning the plagiarism, but IMO her comment did deflect “blame” back to the SBs and in its brevity bypass completely the plagiarism issue, leaving only the whistleblower effect.  And that bothered me for the reasons I stated.  Now if the real issue is “gleeful bashing,” or being a minority voice on a popular blog, I have expressed enough opinions on both those topics on Crusie’s blog and elsewhere that I probably don’t have to repeat them all here.  But because of that, actually, I’m in no better place with Crusie’s comment.

  21. jb says:

    Coming out of the woodwork to say—agree with liz on this, because if a writer continuously churns out work that is deemed holycraptasticbad, we’re allowed to continuously bash it as such. Now, flogging one single dead horse over and over may get tiresome, but Edwards has earned her reputation through countless bad novels.

    Is the romance community more sensitive to bashing because its authors are generally more accessible to its readership than in other genres? I dunno, but maybe that’s a question for another day.

    Published novel = fair game, y’all. Multiple published novels = greater instances for bashing.

  22. Meriam says:

    I think it’s great. Candy and her pal Kate, the Woodward and Bernstein of investigative romance blogging. This story’s got everything – a light hearted exchange between friends uncovers a sinister secret at the heart of the romance industry. Will Candy and Kate escape the fangirls’ wrath?

    Sorry. To be serious for a moment, I think this is a pretty straightforward case of getting caught red handed and facing the music. There is an element of glee, because it’s Cassie Edwards, but I think Sarah and Candy have been pretty restrained about the whole thing. Plus, this is a news story of legitimate interest to readers of romance. It should be out there. Edward’s readers, both present and future (God help you), should know.

    To be honest, I thought Crusie was making a lighthearted comment because Candy is notorious for her Cassie Edward’s hate. I don’t think she defends plagiarism. I do think there appears to be an unspoken code of some sort that writers adhere to; no bashing other authors: close ranks at any sign of attack. Maybe there is even a knee-jerk defense mechanism for when things like this happen? Writers sticking together.

  23. Brandi says:

    I wonder what on earth the number of fans (or books published, or $$$$$$$ made) an author has to do with facts?

    Sweet fuck all. Just look at Ann Coulter.

  24. Jenny Crusie says:

    Hi. I’m Crusie.

    I apologize for being unclear.  This is what happens when you go for snark instead of direct communication.

    I am against plagiarism.  If Ms. Edwards has plagiarized as it certainly seems she has, then she should pay the price.

    I think that the SBs should savagely review any novel they find wanting, including Ms. Edwards’.

    I think that this site is one of the smartest sites on romance on the net.

    I also think this site has made Cassie Edwards a scapegoat and a whipping boy, taking gleeful delight in pointing out how bad she is over and over and over again to the point where it’s close to harassment.  The woman is a bad writer, we get it, we get it, so why did Candy give her friend one of Edwards’ books when she knows what outstandingly good books there are out there?  Because it’s Cassie Edwards, and she’s so much fun to kick.  The only thing I do not like about this site is the way Edwards is treated. 

    So when I saw another “Cassie Edwards, ohmygod” post, the fact that it was about plagiarism is not what annoyed me first, it was that it was another shot at Cassie Edwards, discovered because people were reading her to make fun of her again.  She plagiarized, I hope she goes down for it.  But she doesn’t deserve the constant humiliation this site heaps on her, nobody does.

    I realize this will enrage SB fans.  I realize this will make some people think even less of me than they already do and that opinion was pretty darn low to begin with.  I’m good with that.  Have a nice day.

  25. liz says:

    Brandi – I’m willing to have your child.

    Jenny C – I don’t really have an opinion about you. I’m not really an SB fan. So I suppose I bring you back to the point I made to Lani, being that the things you object to in CE’s treatment here are Not New and have been the case for decades. Sci Fi has it’s own whipping boys. A large body of dreadful work gets you turned into shorthand.

    If CE doesn’t like being shorthand, she could work at being, I dunno, better? Working in different genres under other names? Or accepting, as the rest of us do, that not everyone will love us and cashing the paychecks.

  26. littlemissspy says:

    you gals are frickin’ amazing. Keep these wonderful exposes up!

    my word: under
    Ha! Cassie prolly wishes she were a bit more undercover right about now 🙂

  27. Marta Acosta says:

    Anyone who writes a book called SAVAGE WINDS (hold your nose!) already knows she’s stinkin up the joint.

    Snark on, bitches!

  28. Kimberly Anne says:

    I can certainly see your point, Ms. Crusie.  We do give Cassie Edwards A LOT of crap. But think less of you because you think it’s not cool and have the cajones to say so?  Nah.  I think more of you for voicing an unpopular opinion and doing so with style and class.  And I know I’m not the only one.

    We may be bitches, but I hope we can be fair bitches.

  29. I’m pretty uncomfortable with bashing, but I find myself sort of agreeing with the poster who pointed out that Ms. Edwards comes out with book after book after book of the same quality. It wasn’t one book the Bitches disliked and trotted out everytime someone wanted to giggle.

    OTOH, I do feel sorry for Louise Allen who must have thought she’d fallen down the rabbit hole when she woke up one morning to find hundreds of bloggers doing in-depth analysis and critique of her ONE book. (A slight exaggeration?) Yikes! Nothing wrong with it, but a shock for her, I’m sure!

  30. Candy says:

    I interpreted the Crusie comment as a joke—let’s face it, we do smack Cassie Edwards novels around a whole lot.

    And while I’m every bit as horrified at the whole mess as Sarah is, I’d be lying if I didn’t acknowledge that there’s quite a bit of horrified amusement at a) how utterly blatant the usage of unattributed material is, b) how long it’s been going on, and c) AN ARTICLE ON FERRETS, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD.

    Ferrets.

    But the more I think about how she’s published over 100 novels, and God knows how many dozens, probably hundreds, of sources have been mined as extensively without so much as a footnote or nod of acknowledgement, the less amused I am.

    But Lani Diane Rich said something that I would like to address:

    But I’ll tell you, the gleeful bashing of Cassie Edwards – not in the investigation, but in multiple reviews and posts here prior to today – got old for me a while back. If you don’t like her books, don’t read them. There’s so much good romance out there. Why read someone whose books you hate?

    Because loud, repeated attention for bad work is every bit necessary for balanced discourse as loud, repeated attention for good work. For every time I’ve hated on a Cassie Edwards novel, I mention books I love by people like Jennifer Crusie, Loretta Chase, Patricia Gaffney, Laura Kinsale or Sharon and Tom Curtis, or talk about issues I feel ambivalent about and want to hash over. I’d even venture to say I do this a whole lot more than I poke fun at the Cassie Edwards novels.

    So, while there’s no excuse for what Cassie Edwards appears to have done, I think it would be naive to say this investigation came out of a vacuum. It happened because the Cassie Edwards obsession tripped over something (other than lousy writing) to justify it.

    Look, if Kate had found the same thing in Lord of Scoundrels, I would’ve wept, gnashed my teeth, and felt betrayed—and done the same thing. (In fact, it’d be much more fair to say I have a Loretta Chase obsession than a Cassie Edwards obsession. I’ve given by far more people Loretta Chase novels than Cassie Edwards, and I’ve never, to the best of my memory, ever counted down the days to a new Cassie Edwards release, or dropped a few hundred bucks to buy a package of autographed copies.) Cassie Edwards books aren’t an obsession here so much as they are a callback.

    If we want to be totally honest, I only gave Kate a copy of Shadow Bear because a) I’m on Penguin’s mailing list and happened to have a stray copy of a Cassie Edwards novel they’d mailed me kicking around (I pretty much give away ALL the Cassie Edwards to the library without bothering to review ‘em) and b) because it was part of a Quick-n-Dirty Sampler of Romancelandia.

    If you want to call me out and say that my cracks about how you need a SAN check after reading a Cassie Edwards book are less than the embodiment of sweetness and light, I’d totally agree. It wasn’t a particularly nice joke—but then I’m not especially nice, and I get downright MEAN when a book is bad enough to piss me off. But to imply that we’re doing this partly because we’re somehow the Committee to Bring Cassie Edwards DOWN? Psh. Perhaps even piffle.

  31. Candy says:

    I also think this site has made Cassie Edwards a scapegoat and a whipping boy, taking gleeful delight in pointing out how bad she is over and over and over again to the point where it’s close to harassment.  The woman is a bad writer, we get it, we get it, so why did Candy give her friend one of Edwards’ books when she knows what outstandingly good books there are out there?

    Why did I hand a poor, unsuspecting friend a Cassie Edwards novel? I said so in my original post. Because I wanted to give Kate a genre sampler of sorts: an example of the best, an example of the worst, and an example of the most popular. I tend to tailor my romance recommendations to my friends’ personalities; I recently posted about a friend of mine who needed smart, funny escapes from some fairly awful stress, and I only gave her romances that were, in my opinion, excellent reads. Kate, on the other hand, has an appreciation of the awful every bit as finely-honed as mine, and I wanted to give her a more accurate survey of the territory.

    I do see what you mean about how we pick on Cassie Edwards novels, and I get how it’d get to be a drag to read after a while. But as somebody pointed out up above, it’s not like we’re picking on one book over and over. There are over a hundred. We’re not scapegoating her; how in the hell are we doing this, actually? Her books are a sort of a collective whipping boy, sure, but I don’t think we’ve ever pinned anything on an Edwards book that didn’t deserve it and then some.

  32. JulieB says:

    Candy wrote:
    “Because loud, repeated attention for bad work is every bit necessary for balanced discourse as loud, repeated attention for good work.”

    Yes. But for the same person, ad nauseum?

  33. azteclady says:

    On the Cassie Edwards = shorthand for craptastic thing, and how it should stop already.

    Unless I’m completely off my rocker (always a possibility), I’ve gathered that the SBs at large also use shorthands for great writing (Laura Kinsale comes to mind). Should they stop doing that as well?

  34. Candy says:

    Also, in case it wasn’t clear: I appreciate the observations by Lani and Jenny about our hate-hate relationship with Cassie Edwards novels. I don’t agree with certain aspects of their opinion, and there are other aspects I can agree with, but I appreciate knowing what people honestly think about us and letting us know in reasoned and reasonable terms.

    Or, y’know, be really, really funny. I’ll forgive a lot if it makes me laugh.

  35. Candy says:

    Yes. But for the same person, ad nauseum?

    OK, here are some numbers for those of you who are claiming that we rag endlessly on Cassie and just won’t shut up about her:

    Number of entries on this website: approximately 1750

    Number of entries in which we mention Cassie Edwards: 25

    Number of entries in which Cassie Edwards is the actual topic of conversation (reviews, this particular kerfuffle regarding unattributed usage, etc.): 8

    Number of entries in which Cassie Edwards is merely the author of a cover we’re snarking: 3

    Number of entries in which Cassie Edwards is mentioned in passing, usually as part of a Worst Book Ever reference: 14

    To contrast, here’s how often other authors’ names/books turn up:

    Loretta Chase: approximately 35

    Jennifer Crusie: 18

    Laura Kinsale: 17

    I haven’t bothered to search comments because our poor server’s overtaxed as it is, so take that into account—the numbers will jump up for just about every author, but then results will also be muddied by the fact that, say, Laura Kinsale has posted comments and the search results will pick that up.

    Does this put things into perspective for people?

  36. Shayne says:

    Actually, it really doesn’t matter how craptastic anybody on this site says Cassie Edward’s books are.

    Clearly the author has fans who like her books for whatever reason they do. I do find the opinions expressed about those who read Cassie Edwards to be off putting, but I don’t think any opinion expressed on the matter on this website influences Cassie Edwards one way or another.

    That said, the charge of plagiarism has to be accounted for. Irregardless of who Cassie Edwards is, and there is no reason to fault the ones who caught it. Except for the glee part. That’s just weird.

  37. Sara says:

    That said, the charge of plagiarism has to be accounted for. Irregardless of who Cassie Edwards is, and there is no reason to fault the ones who caught it. Except for the glee part. That’s just weird.

    First, it’s regardless, not irregardless. Second, when and where have Sarah and Candy expressed glee over this?

  38. azteclady says:

    Personally, I think some people are mistaking incredulity and shock for amusement.

  39. rebyj says:

    On topic..

    Regarding picking on Cassie Edwards I think there probably are several romance/fiction authors that if you researched deeply enough you’d run across similar passages that match up to their research resources. So I don’t take it as a Cassie Edwards witch hunt.

    Offhand, paranormal romances come to mind, many times my eyes glazed over as I flipped pages because of the endless “how to’s” that had to come from somewhere, because the writing style seemed to differ from the rest of the book.

    Lets face it, writing using a computer and having google books and other resources at their fingertips must make it very easy to “copy/ paste” when writing.

    I mean, in all honesty what would SBTB be without copy/paste? lol

    What are copyright laws in this situation? I remember some cases of religous book use,  a certain amount of content was viewed as fair use and over that was violating copyright? But that was years ago so my remembering might be flawed.

    ok a lil off topic

     

    It’s great to see you guys using books.google.com!I LOVE it. You can read a LOT of pages of a LOT of books.

    Some of Cassie Edward’s are available as “limited view” which means they cut out a page here and there.

    Savage Heart, Obsession,Innocence and Torment to mention a few.

    And Jennifer Crusie..there are about 8 of your’s available for limited view.

    And ooo lala at the amount of Ellora’s Cave books there! WITH the naughty bits even!!!

    It’s a great resource and entertainment web tool.

  40. GrowlyCub says:

    Ms. Crusie!

    I have a lot of your earlier books, so I most certainly did not fall in the category of not liking your books and you.  Nice attempt at a preemptive strike against your perceived detractors, though.

    I have to say that I’m rather taken aback by your attitude.

    I may have concurred if SB had repeatedly gone after any one author on the basis of 1 or 2 books, but the fact that CE has so many more books published than 1 or 2, and from what we all could see from just these short examples all of them rather low in quality (not even mentioning the plagiarism), leaves her open for repeated critical review.

    If there are repeated negative reviews all over review-land, there might be some truth to that perception that bad writing is repeatedly foisted upon the public.

    It has always baffled me that many readers and especially authors seem to think we as a sisterhood of women should not and ought not dare to criticize one of our ‘own’.  Bad writing in any form, by any author, should be ruthlessly exposed, so that only good writing is published.  After all, we all suffer from the perception that romance is trashy pr0n for mindless females who sit on their butts eating bon bons all day.

    I find it insulting that NO one, neither editor nor publisher thought it either necessary to check glaring style inconsistencies, or if they found them that they thought it unnecessary to correct the issue before unloading these ‘works’ onto the unsuspecting public aka other women in the ‘sisterhood’.

    I’m disappointed a romance author and academic would take this stance.

    GrowlyCub

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