Bitchin' Blog Posts

A Conversation with Kathryn Falk

by SB Sarah | May 03, 2007 | Thursday at 8:30 pm | 56 Comments

I received an email today from the aol address that was given to me by a Romantic Times receptionist as the best way to reach Kathryn Falk. The email had a subject line: “cell phone for kathryn falk is 111-555-1212.”

There was no text to the email, so I did what any normal person would do. I called the number. Ok, first I talked to Candy, and THEN I called the number. When Ms. Falk returned my message, I spoke with her about the recent message attributed to her by several varying sources.

I asked her if she posted the long comment on Scott’s site, or if it was someone posing as her:

It was both. I’m so not into that, and someone hacks into my computer from here. Some of the words were definitely from my lectures, but I don’t ever do blogs. I’m not in the industry. I know people are upset but I don’t go on the blogs. That’s not something I’m involved in.

 

She went on to discuss some of her other projects involving wheelchair accessible cabins, veteran support, soldier support, and work with other charities.

 

When I asked why someone would pose as her, she said,

Carol said it sounded like me, and it probably is me, but I’m retired…. Carol says it my words about positivity and positive energy, but not the rest.

There’s nothing I can do about it, but I’m not set up to go online. That’s not my focus. Someone took my words but that isn’t me.

But it’s not important. People shouldn’t get off on controversy or nastiness, when it’s more important to be positive to attract good things…. When you fill your bowl of abundance with love, you receive love.

Falk went on at length about some of her projects involving soldiers and local support, and about her farm in Texas. When I asked her why someone at Romantic Times would say publicly online that the message had come from her, and if that bothered her, she said:

It was my voice, and my stuff that was said. I’d say it. I’m sure that what I said was pretty positive. I usually am.

 

It seemed to me that Falk was seeking to distance herself from the comments attributed to her on Scott’s site as she tried equally to make it clear how distant she is from the romance industry. She writes one letter a month for Romantic Times, she said, and has very little involvement beyond that.

Most of her comments dealt with the power of positive thinking and the advantageous effects of contributing positive energy, and at no time did she say, “Yes, I wrote those words.”

She said it sounded like her, it was something she would say, and that she was sure that it was more of the positive New Age message that she sought to communicate at all times.

So was it Kathryn Falk? Enquiring minds still are not sure.

 

Filed: Interviews & Smart Responses, News

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  1. kate r said on 05.03.07 at 08:41 PM • [comment link]

    my guess it was the following mix:
    a whole boatload of cocktails, some women talking and talking, a handy laptop.

    The next day, a hangover and fuzzy memories.

    voila!

  2. Sarah Frantz said on 05.03.07 at 08:42 PM • [comment link]

    Um, talk about personality disorders.  “It probably is me”?!?!  “It was my voice”?!?!  She might never have said that it definitely WAS her, but she never categorically denied that it was NOT her, either.  She sure doesn’t seem upset that someone hacked her account or that Ms. Stacy was claiming it was her.

  3. Rinda said on 05.03.07 at 08:42 PM • [comment link]

    Uh…

  4. Elaine said on 05.03.07 at 09:02 PM • [comment link]

    Stranger and stranger.

  5. shuzluva said on 05.03.07 at 09:03 PM • [comment link]

    I have been watching events unfold simply agog. All I can say now is:

    Wha?

  6. Walt said on 05.03.07 at 09:05 PM • [comment link]

    Maybe she has a clone that does her correspondence while she rests on her ethereal platform floating above us all…

  7. Caryle said on 05.03.07 at 09:08 PM • [comment link]

    I’m so confused…

  8. jmc said on 05.03.07 at 09:09 PM • [comment link]

    It was both (her and not her)?
    It was probably her?
    The words are definitely from her lectures?  (And someone stole them and posted under her name?)
    She’s not part of the industry?  (Er, then why have her bio online at RT?)

    I’m having flashback’s to the AG’s testimony—I don’t recall.  I don’t remember having that recollection.  Because it was safer for him to be seen as a moron than it was to tell the truth.  Same here?

    If she’s not set up to go online, how did someone hack her computer and post from it?

    Just wondering.

  9. Mel-O-Drama said on 05.03.07 at 09:09 PM • [comment link]

    huh?

  10. Madeline said on 05.03.07 at 09:12 PM • [comment link]

    Signs point to “I had a flunky write it for me. So it was kind of me. But I don’t want to admit it.”

  11. Catherine J. said on 05.03.07 at 09:16 PM • [comment link]

    So she can’t say whether it was her or not? Hmmmm.

    My money’s either on “wrote it and doesn’t want to admit it” or “ordered a flunky to write it.”

  12. jmc said on 05.03.07 at 09:16 PM • [comment link]

    Flashbacks, not flashback’s.

  13. Carrie Lofty said on 05.03.07 at 09:22 PM • [comment link]

    I call bullshit.

    See, when I read the phrase “hacks into my computer,” I start imagining Denzel Washington or somesuch trying to clear his name in an international drugs/nukes/hostages/secretbabies thriller—not a poor, maligned, aw shucks professional. A little too cloak and dagger.

  14. Alessia Brio said on 05.03.07 at 09:31 PM • [comment link]

    My kids lie better than that.

  15. Jonquil said on 05.03.07 at 09:33 PM • [comment link]

    “Carol said it sounded like me, and it probably is me, but I’m retired…. “

    Whoa.  Our Lady of the non sequitur.

    I’m with everybody else; this could be the literal truth if she’d told somebody else to type it for her.

  16. Najida said on 05.03.07 at 09:42 PM • [comment link]

    My evil twin did it!
    (Did that go out in the 80’s with Jane Seymour movies?)

  17. Amy E said on 05.03.07 at 09:42 PM • [comment link]

    It probably is her… frantically trying to distance herself from her own words on the advice of a desperately-needed PR person.  My money’s on ‘backtracking at Warp 9, Cap’n!’

  18. Candy said on 05.03.07 at 09:48 PM • [comment link]

    It was both? How hilarious is that? What, was her purple polka-dotted magic gnome from outer space, Hieronymous, posting on her behalf? Or is she All About Eve to Tony Catanzaro’s Baby Jane? This non-answer is so slippery that it’s an answer in and of itself.

  19. Teddy Pig said on 05.03.07 at 10:09 PM • [comment link]

    I vote for Candy’s response as the best explanation of these twisted events EVA!

    BONUS POINTS Candy! For the cinematic allusion making obscure reference to the RT Hyatt Homophobes-R-US mess they still have not explained without fucking up and pissing people off even more.

  20. spinsterwitch said on 05.03.07 at 10:11 PM • [comment link]

    It was obviously her because any sane person’s response to “there are words attributed to you on a website that aren’t yours” is OMG! let me clarify immediately and try to understand why someone is impersonating me.

  21. Phyllis said on 05.03.07 at 10:13 PM • [comment link]

    I’m just guessing that she has no idea how deep the sh** is, in which she is standing. She probably said/wrote some of that, but it’s out of context.

    I doubt she’s the one who said that Dear Author is causing suicides. Just her own professional suicide!

  22. dl said on 05.03.07 at 10:33 PM • [comment link]

    Another looser…does she know Tony?

    I vote for cocktails, laptop, & hangover (followed by soberness, regret, & humiliation). 

    Candy’s right about the slippery non-answer being an answer in an of itself.  She has forfeited any shred of respect or sympathy I might have felt.

  23. Darlene Marshall said on 05.03.07 at 10:45 PM • [comment link]

    I like spinsterwitch’s theory.

  24. Lia said on 05.03.07 at 10:58 PM • [comment link]

    “...someone hacks into my computer from here…”

    “I’m not set up to go online…”

    ai yi yi…

    Somebody send this to Jon Stewart.  It’s too good not to share.  D’you think she’d do a guest spot on the Colbert Report?

  25. azteclady said on 05.03.07 at 11:06 PM • [comment link]

    Huh?

    The stupid, it be contagious.

  26. Teddy Pig said on 05.03.07 at 11:27 PM • [comment link]

    Hmmm, blaming Hackers…

    1995! Angelina Jolie and Jonny Lee Miller.

    Corrupt corporate execs seek to blame hackers to cover up their crime.

    Did I win?

  27. MamaNice said on 05.03.07 at 11:31 PM • [comment link]

    dl: I’m sorry - but I have to do this, it’s killing me: it’s “LOSER.”

    As to Falk…is she running for office anytime soon?

    My word? “you42” Now, Ms. Falk, which you would that be?

  28. Flo said on 05.03.07 at 11:50 PM • [comment link]

    This woman should enter into politics.  She’d be perfect for ANY administration…

  29. Charlene said on 05.03.07 at 11:59 PM • [comment link]

    Sounds like a deadly combination of mimosas and laptops to me.

    (Spamblock: clearly18. I’m not sure it’s clear with respect to Kathryn Falk.)

  30. DS said on 05.04.07 at 12:02 AM • [comment link]

    Re: Looser

    I’m not dl but I think she and I might have hung out in some of the same general areas. 

    Looser is a reference to a loser who spells loser looser.

    Just saying.

  31. Kat said on 05.04.07 at 01:09 AM • [comment link]

    Maybe the two booksellers mentioned in the letter/comment can confirm or deny…

    (Word verification: who36. Who, indeed?)

  32. Colleen said on 05.04.07 at 01:09 AM • [comment link]

    I am very tempted to send the following email to RT:

    To whom it may concern:

    A friend of mine receives your magazine which I have been contemplating subscribing to for some time now.  Several days ago someone claiming to be your CEO posted a rather disturbing reply to a review on “Dear Author.com.”  The reply was so disturbing that many people doubted it was truly Ms. Falk.  When she was contacted by Sarah from “Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Romances.com” her explanation was that someone was able to “hack” into her computer and took words she used in previous documents to create the reply. 

    If your company’s computer security is so lacking that someone can get into your CEO’s computer, how can you possibly guarantee my personal information is at all safe?  I will not be subscribing to your magazine until your company can publicly declare the security of it’s computers.  In addition, while I had been planning to attend your convention in 2008, once again I am not comfortable in submitting the kind of personal information that would be so easily accessible to this supposed hacker. 

    I advised those that I know who subscribe to your magazine and/or have attended one of your conferences in recent years pull a copy of their credit report and add fraud alerts to it.  I am astounded that in this day and age a company of your size does not have better computer security.  Your CEO’s seemingly nonchalant attitude that someone can get into her computer and impersonate her using documents on said computer is astounding and cause for great concern. 

    Until this matter is resolved I will not be a consumer of your products and will encourage others to act in kind. 

    (keep in mind I don’t buy for a SECOND that someone can hack into her computer)

  33. Teddy Pig said on 05.04.07 at 01:14 AM • [comment link]

    It was Karen’s review that set her off I think Dear Author did the first review but the old bat posted on Karen’s blog.

  34. Suisan said on 05.04.07 at 01:17 AM • [comment link]

    I’m with Alessia Brio. My kids lie better than that. They would NEVER say:

    I don’t know how all my clothes got on the floor. Someone who was pretending to be me broke into the house, opened up the drawers in only my room, and sprinkled the clothes all over the floor and I don’t know why. Uh huh.

    If someone used my name on a piece I didn’t write or on a essay length comment I’d be furious. I’d have retractions posted all over the place. I’d hire security at the office. I’d get a PR girl on it right away.

    She wrote it, but she’s confused as to why anyone would disagree with all her “positive” and “helpful” comments, so she’s trying to diminish the whole thing. To quote the author of the comment in question, “to nip it in the bud”, so to speak.

    Ugh.

  35. Jennifer McKenzie said on 05.04.07 at 01:40 AM • [comment link]

    Whew.  This is soooooo weird.  I’m not sure I understand any of it. 
    Does anybody know what’s REALLY going on?  *shakes head*
    In the words of a writer on Romance Divas “Ah edrama”.  Gotta love it.

  36. Kalen Hughes said on 05.04.07 at 01:41 AM • [comment link]

    I’m just gonna clutch my crystal and stumble towards the kitchen for a big, stiff whisky.

  37. isabella snow said on 05.04.07 at 01:46 AM • [comment link]

    I’ve read and read and read this on blog after blog and still can’t manage to get my knickers in a twist, whether she said it or not.

  38. EGS said on 05.04.07 at 02:00 AM • [comment link]

    She did it yet she didn’t do it.  Huh?

  39. Beth said on 05.04.07 at 02:15 AM • [comment link]

    I can’t render judgment on whether she wrote it or not, because I get stuck at the part where someone emails their PERSONAL CELL PHONE NUMBER to a stranger, presumably in order to address a very specific issue - and then really clearly doesn’t have anything to say. It seems like if it’s an effort to back-pedal, then you’d have clear statement worked out before sending off your digits. And if it’s an effort to deny it was you, then you’d… ya know, actually deny it was you.

    I mean, you don’t say “Call me so I can explain!” unless you’ve actually prepared an explanation. And yet she told you to call. Her cell phone.

    I can’t get past it: what’s her MOTIVAYYYYY-shun??? It will keep me awake, trying to figure it out. Well, until I just decide that fuck it, she’s been doing too much E.  A logical conclusion, I think.

  40. kate r said on 05.04.07 at 02:54 AM • [comment link]

    yeah, that’s what I said, Beth. Kinda. Drugs.

  41. Caro said on 05.04.07 at 03:01 AM • [comment link]

    I am agog.

    Proably a good thing I can’t get to most of the blogs I read at work; it would have been hard to look awy from the trainwreck.

    I don’t know what’s weirder—the post or the conversation.

  42. izme said on 05.04.07 at 03:26 AM • [comment link]

    FWIW, the Scott/Falk business is now on Galleycat.

  43. Lisabette said on 05.04.07 at 03:47 AM • [comment link]

    What the Falk?

  44. Amy E said on 05.04.07 at 04:22 AM • [comment link]

    Lisabette wins for best and most appropriate summation of this event!  *snerk*

  45. Emily Veinglory said on 05.04.07 at 04:32 AM • [comment link]

    I agree, the prize goes to Lisabette.

  46. DebH said on 05.04.07 at 04:38 AM • [comment link]

    <

    >

    And when you fill your bowl with other substances, well, you tend to get those substances right back, don’t you?

    It’s pretty clear that, if she didn’t write that screed, she would simply say, “No, I didn’t write that or post that and I’ll look into it.”  All the bizarre evasions and elliptical answers just make it look worse.

    I’m going to go with “wrote and posted under the influence - now trying to pretend it never happened.”

  47. SandyO said on 05.04.07 at 05:22 AM • [comment link]

    That full moon on the 2nd was obviously of cosmic proportions.

  48. Mama Nice said on 05.04.07 at 05:50 AM • [comment link]

    Dl, ds, etc: “Looser”
    Oh. I guess I may need an asshat myself - I had no idea it was an intentional error. It’s a personal glitch - I see that mistake and it makes me berserk. So many people make this error, and since I spent enough time as a tortured high school English teacher to earn tenure and then “run, run away!” a-la Monty Python, I can’t help it: “Looser” and misuse of “their” “there” and “they’re” make me break out in hives.

  49. Chicklet said on 05.04.07 at 05:58 AM • [comment link]

    God, next Falk will be saying that someone pretending to be her shoved a note into the tubes so it would go on the internets.

    Between the RT convention

    assholery

    folderol, Tony and Tina Catanzaro (or their imposter/s) proving themselves to be absolute nutbars, and the wank that took over my slash fandom last weekend, I’m assuming someone put some crazy in the nation’s water supply. *stocks up on vodka instead*

    Please note my spamblock is sense48. As in, “Nothing this week made any sense.”

  50. Kaite said on 05.04.07 at 03:43 PM • [comment link]

    OMGWTFBBQ? IF that woman wrote the badly…God, just plain badly written, ungrammatical and nonsensical drivel of a rant, AND she’s so incoherent in phone conversation, how has she managed to actually work in any positions that require you to put on panty hose and suit? Seriously. Has any of this nonsense made sense in any way to anyone, other than to be a bunch of nuvo-dippy-hippy crap (as opposed to savvy hippy wisdom) about beaming love into the Universe to get love back, and stop being mean because it makes my dolly cry?

    She sounds either completely stoned or borderline personality (or perhaps on a manic upswing) and off her meds.

    Are you really sure this is Kathryn Falk? For real, if this is her, there’s hope for anyone who can manage a full sentence without sounding stoned.

  51. Miri said on 05.04.07 at 04:54 PM • [comment link]

    As a card carrying hippie from the great state of Oregon. Ms. Falk’s positive “message” came across loud and clear.
    She’s obviously quite herbally altered and her keepers need to take away all forms of comunicatation devices.
    On a lighter note I’m glad that Britney Spears’ old mangager has found work again.

  52. fiveandfour said on 05.04.07 at 06:34 PM • [comment link]

    It was my voice, and my stuff that was said. I’d say it. I’m sure that what I said was pretty positive.

    Carol said it sounded like me, and it probably is me, but I’m retired….

    Well, hello there Sybil.  Or should I say Carol?  Did this whole thing occur while she was switched to some other personality? 

    What the Falk?

    Lisabette FTW.  Here’s another phrase I need on a t-shirt (preferably not accompanied by a picture of Peter, though that would be kinda’ funny - talk about your in-jokes).

  53. Rashenbo said on 05.04.07 at 07:58 PM • [comment link]

    This whole thing is just way too nutty. :)

  54. Cara said on 05.04.07 at 09:59 PM • [comment link]

    FWIW…a cell number in email subject line is b/c you were texted from a cell. My husband does it all the time…

    You could sell them T-Shirts with “What the Falk” on them at conventions. If I were ever to go, I’d wear it!

  55. TeddyPig said on 05.04.07 at 10:11 PM • [comment link]

    The Secret Explained
    by Kathryn Falk

    Chapter 1

    Marty my drug dealer and I were discussing successful business practices the other day…

  56. Amy E said on 05.09.07 at 09:07 AM • [comment link]

    <

    >

    And when you fill your bowl with other substances, well, you tend to get those substances right back, don’t you?

    So is this what happens when you fill your bowl with crazy?

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