How NOT To Be A Douche Bag Author 101

Welcome to a new, belated edition of HNTBADBA 101! Usually it's biweekly and posted on Wednesday. It is now Friday (I think). It's a couple days late because I've had the week from hell, however I knew I couldn't wait until next Wednesday because then Julie Butcher (@jimsissy for Twitter peeps and you had BETTER be following her!) would be sad and not entertained. And I live to entertain people with publishing rants.

Warning: this column will regularly feature lots of profanity. So Sensitive Speshul Snowflakes can go elsewhere.

Today's edition is about...slush author douche bags.

My duties as senior editor are split primarily between coordinating edits and working in acquisitions.

Acquisitions is the department that reviews all submitted manuscripts, rejects most of them, and then accepts one or two. Although I see a LOT of author douchebaggery among contracted authors, the vast majority occurs with the ones who haven't had their books accepted yet.

Here's pretty typical douche bag behavior I tend to see...

Manuscript goes for review. Thumbs up from the initial read editors. I send out a notice that it's going for a full read with an editor.

I get back a note saying the book has already been accepted elsewhere.

Okay...what...the...fuck? Look, we accept sim-subs. Our website states that we send a notice about every manuscript. Sometimes they get caught in spam filters, so maybe you didn't get it.

But TIME and MONEY are being spent evaluating YOUR book. And you didn't have the common decency to let other publishers know when it had been accepted elsewhere?

Guess what: Skyla the Bitch Editor has a mental auto-reject list. If you waste my time being a douche bag, you go on it. Out of the thousands of authors I deal with, I remember names for two different reasons. One: You were polite, an amazing writer, and/or you acted like a professional and let me know if the book was taken elsewhere. Two: You stalk/harass me or only tell me AFTER I've sent some kind of notice to you that the book is contracted with another house.

The douchebaggery doesn't end there, however.

Sometimes, the author decides that our house would be better than the one he or she accepted. I know a few douche bags who tried to get me to offer them a contract so they could then cancel the one they have with the other publisher.

Okay, here's the thing, potential douche bags: first, I can't consider a manuscript when the rights aren't available. It's legally and morally wrong, and YES I do have some ethics. Second, that is such a fucking douche bag thing to do.

Yeah, sometimes you're with a publisher and you suspect Something Is Wrong. You have to be careful in small press and epublishing. Sometimes, something IS wrong. Other times, you and the staff just don't jive. Honestly, I've worked with quite a few people where we didn't mesh and it was clear that we shouldn't work together. And I'm always upfront about this.

But when you're under contract, that's legally binding. You should NOT be offering it to another publisher. And even if it's the most brilliant manuscript in the world...do you REALLY think we'd want to work with an author who is so wholly filled with douche-i-ness that he or she would try something like that? What if said author did it to US?

And then sometimes, we get another email from the author letting us know the work is available again. In case we want it.

Well...guess what? We don't. Because YOU are a fucking douche bag who didn't inform us immediately when you signed a contract. And I don't care how many times you want to send it to me: I'm not going to take it. And if you think editors don't ever talk about these stories or share the names of various douche bags, you're pretty naive.

So you know what we do now? If a book makes it past the first cut to an initial read, the editor googles. Checks out the author and the book. And if it's still in print, or scheduled to be in print somewhere, I don't even bother with a rejection letter.

And then there are clueless douche bags, and this is my favourite kind of response to my letters... I say, "sorry, we're not accepting your book". They say, "that's fine--I just sold it to PublishAmerica and it'll be in bookstores in two months".

Okay then, douche. Good luck with that.

I see many other douche bags in slush (the insane guy who stalked me was one, the kid who asked his friends to harass me into take his book was another), so I'll maybe blog about them another day. But for now, if you're an aspiring author, please remember that if you want a career in publishing, it's best not to waste people's time. And to not do anything like BREACH YOUR CONTRACT.

Some people don't realize this.

They are douche bags.

Don't be one.

Brand New Disclaimer! The opinions expressed herein are those of the person who wrote them and in no way represent any company anywhere on the planet. If you don't like it, and can't take this kind of humour, kindly walk away and don't be a fucktard.

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