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Angelique, two different book publishers offered me very similar terms in a red flag contract and I turned them down. Guess what? Other authors accepted those predatory terms and got their books released under those unreasonable "perpetual" conditions. Did THEY read the contract? Or were they that desperate?
And the predatory practices will continue to infest the publishing world just because enough writers will close their eyes to it and sign. That's it in a nutshell. :-(
First, the sad news. A wonderful editor Carl Bettis shuttered his delightful twice a year horror lit mag and podcast, tiny frights (as of Dec. 2024).
Now . . . horrendous news! Red flags aplenty at Cult Magazine.
This message was written by my colleague Pixie Bruner (cut and pasted): Just wanted to give everyone a heads up on the latest lit mag to buy our souls if we don’t read fine print with publication rights -- caveat scriptor.
Read this and noped away!
Cult Magazine
Sounds edgy and cool, Spec-friendly even, kept reading to find the small print ---
“By providing any content on cultmag.net you hereby agree to grant cultmag.net and its editors and affiliates an irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, fully-paid, royalty-free, unconditional, transferable, non-exclusive license, with the unlimited right to grant sublicenses, under any of your copyrights and licensable copyright moral rights in any works included on cultmag.net to reproduce, make derivative works of (and register such derivative works), distribute, publicly perform, publicly display, transmit, and otherwise use such works in any manner and in any medium and you hereby agree to irrevocably waive all moral rights in any content provided on cultmag.net."
Appalling, Becky! This red flag should alarm every author out there - - - except it does not. EX: I have rejected TWO predatory book contracts with the same language (from two USA-based indie presses). However, several authors have accepted these predatory "perpetual" contract terms and signed with them. Yes, indeed ...... ????????
Re: MFA profs "pumping out" authors who write in the present tense, Poets & Writers reports that there are over 200 MFA programs in the US alone, so I think generalizations about said programs needs to stop. The majority of MFAs also don't occur in Brooklyn, and there's no uniform "Brooklyn" literary aesthetic, so I wouldn't mind seeing that claim stop too. Sally Rooney is often cited as fitting said "Brooklyn MFA" aesthetic—she's Irish and has no MFA. I'm not saying the essay's not interesting, and I'm not saying it's not necessary work to call out MFA programs' shortcomings, but my take on all the present tense in fiction of late is the Netflixification of the modern brain. But also, I just read Garth Greenwell's Small Rain and Morgan Talty's Fire Exit...both critically acclaimed works by authors with MFAs, both in ye olde tense o' the past.
Thanks for sharing our post!
Always love reading these updates. Thanks for all you do!
Thanks for all you do, Becky, to keep us informed about the literary world. At least one here I need to check out.
Thanks for the shout out Becky! Sadly, I also found out that Hexagon and Impossible Worlds are shutting down.
What!?! This is why you read the contract!
Angelique, two different book publishers offered me very similar terms in a red flag contract and I turned them down. Guess what? Other authors accepted those predatory terms and got their books released under those unreasonable "perpetual" conditions. Did THEY read the contract? Or were they that desperate?
Maybe both…
And the predatory practices will continue to infest the publishing world just because enough writers will close their eyes to it and sign. That's it in a nutshell. :-(
First, the sad news. A wonderful editor Carl Bettis shuttered his delightful twice a year horror lit mag and podcast, tiny frights (as of Dec. 2024).
Now . . . horrendous news! Red flags aplenty at Cult Magazine.
This message was written by my colleague Pixie Bruner (cut and pasted): Just wanted to give everyone a heads up on the latest lit mag to buy our souls if we don’t read fine print with publication rights -- caveat scriptor.
Read this and noped away!
Cult Magazine
Sounds edgy and cool, Spec-friendly even, kept reading to find the small print ---
“By providing any content on cultmag.net you hereby agree to grant cultmag.net and its editors and affiliates an irrevocable, perpetual, worldwide, fully-paid, royalty-free, unconditional, transferable, non-exclusive license, with the unlimited right to grant sublicenses, under any of your copyrights and licensable copyright moral rights in any works included on cultmag.net to reproduce, make derivative works of (and register such derivative works), distribute, publicly perform, publicly display, transmit, and otherwise use such works in any manner and in any medium and you hereby agree to irrevocably waive all moral rights in any content provided on cultmag.net."
Yikes!
"...you hereby agree to irrevocably waive all moral rights in any content provided on cultmag.net."
???
Appalling, Becky! This red flag should alarm every author out there - - - except it does not. EX: I have rejected TWO predatory book contracts with the same language (from two USA-based indie presses). However, several authors have accepted these predatory "perpetual" contract terms and signed with them. Yes, indeed ...... ????????
Re: MFA profs "pumping out" authors who write in the present tense, Poets & Writers reports that there are over 200 MFA programs in the US alone, so I think generalizations about said programs needs to stop. The majority of MFAs also don't occur in Brooklyn, and there's no uniform "Brooklyn" literary aesthetic, so I wouldn't mind seeing that claim stop too. Sally Rooney is often cited as fitting said "Brooklyn MFA" aesthetic—she's Irish and has no MFA. I'm not saying the essay's not interesting, and I'm not saying it's not necessary work to call out MFA programs' shortcomings, but my take on all the present tense in fiction of late is the Netflixification of the modern brain. But also, I just read Garth Greenwell's Small Rain and Morgan Talty's Fire Exit...both critically acclaimed works by authors with MFAs, both in ye olde tense o' the past.