Scams want to eat your soul!

Writing scams. Did you know they exist? Did you know there are big, nasty, booger-nosed villains out there wanting to stroke your fragile writing ego just so they can milk you for all the money your worth while your stories never see the light of day? That’s right. Booger-nosed. Scared yet? You should be.

Uncertain how serious this is? Check out this news alert concerning a top scammer brought to justice- Martha Ivery, aka Kelly O’Donnell
(this woman sent death threats to the people who worked to expose her! C’mon!)

Never fear, however. While a new writing scam and scamming organization crops up every day, it seems, the forces of good are ever-vigilant in trying to help us writers from being suckered in to such mustache-twiddling schemes. Hours and days can be spent going over all the info available, and it will be to your advantage to spend the time to familiarize yourself with some of the more common resources and more popular scams out there today.

To start with: The primary resource of anti-scam info and news alerts that should be regularly checked is Writer Beware. Read through this site until your eyeballs scream for mercy. It’s worth it. It covers upfront agent fees, suspicious pay-to-publish companies, self-publishing scams, warning signs for contests you shouldn’t enter, and has a constantly updated news section alerting the writing public to companies and individuals who are coming under legal scrutiny for their misdeeds. It also has a wonderful section that lists the 20 Worst Agencies. Go. Here. Now. (but then come back and read the rest of this blog, of course)

Also, in my Writer Resources page, there is a site called Preditors and Editors. This is a comprehensive directory of agents and agencies out there, alerting you to those that dabble in duplicitous business methods so you don’t waste your time querying them. It is updated by people who have had personal experience with these agencies, and thusly they know of what they speak.

I’m going to likely keep coming back to this topic of writing scams, mainly because the idea outrages me, I hate seeing other people taken advantage of, and the best defense against this kind of thing is being educated about it. There are lots of links, blogs and resources yet to be shared, so spread the word.

I see that smile.