Re: I'd like to toss this out here...
Winniemitzandme said:<blockquote><hr>Okay, when PA send one of their authors a release form but has the 'gag order' attached where the author is forbidden to show any part, copy of the release form to any publisher, which not only ties the authors hands from trying to get his/her book placed with a commercial publisher, but this author can't even try to get an agent to read his/her ms.
Now, my question is this. Cannot this be seen as Publish America doing a form of 'blackballing' this author? I think if it were pushed the Courts would be on the authors side and see that PA is using a form of blackballing the authors work.<hr></blockquote>The word is "reversion." And no, it's not blackballing.
I'll say what a lawyer can't: Those supposed "reversion" letters PublishAmerica sends are nothing of the sort. Let me add that in my opinion, they're acts of deliberate sabotage.
The entire point of a reversion letter is that you show it to other people: potential agents, the legal department at your new publishing house, the IRS, outfits looking to option movie rights, et cetera. A reversion letter that contains a non-disclosure agreement is a contradiction in terms. I'd call it a joke, if PublishAmerica's intent weren't so obviously malign.
Why do they do this? To repeat a point I made earlier, Meiners and Clopper and Prather are all failed writers. A proper reversion letter would make it possible for a legitimate publisher to buy a book from an author previously published by PA.
The problem is that no legit publisher has ever wanted to publish a book written by Meiners, or Clopper, or Prather. I believe they bitterly resent this, and would rather sabotage PA's departing authors than see them succeed where they themselves have failed.
No reputable publisher builds NDAs into their reversion letters. I don't even know of any disreputable publishers that do it, aside from PA. There's no point to it. If you let a book go, you let it go.