Heacock Hill Literary Agency

-- and the cop writer she turned down with pages of gobbledygook to me about being "proper" JUST got picked out of 2200 other writers for Police Writer of the Year. For HONESTY. Jack's out at 4 publishers now. Best reply: "We will take this seriously."

Click to expand...

Okay, let's look at this.

As Hapi points out, there is no such award as "Police Writer of the Year."

There is, however, a place called police-writers.com which has a Book of the Year award, and the The Police-Writers.com Book of the Year 2009 was written by someone named Jack.

The 2200 writers mentioned in Tom's letter ... well, that's close to one of the numbers listed on the Police-Writers page. "As of May 20, 2009, this site lists 1060 state and local law enforcement officials from 448 state and local law enforcement agencies who have written 2334 books."

2200 writers, 2334 books, well. Maybe. Maybe the number went up from the last time Tom looked at the site, assuming it's the right place. (Police-writers.com seems to have a relaxed view on exactly what a book is -- they apparently include websites, blogs, and magazine articles as books). But if we're looking for strict accuracy (and assuming that this is the book that's intended) it's been chosen from among the works of 1,060 writers, not 2,200.

So, what else do we know about this book?

First, that it does indeed have an ISBN: ISBN-10: 0981792871, ISBN-13: 978-0981792873.

Second, that it is actively for sale from the author's website: http://vegasjacklv.com/ and being advertised by him: http://authortree.com/vegasjacklv/Book Detail/839

And third, that the word "honesty" doesn't appear anywhere on police-writers.com writeup for this work.

But maybe Tom's talking about a different book.

James D. Macdonald said:

But maybe Tom's talking about a different book.

Click to expand...

Um, no. This is what Tom was attempting to push my way.

Maybe it's a dandy book. I wouldn't know.

Published by Centennial Handyman. All the searches I did came up with, well, handymen. It appears to be self-published, then.

The 2334 appears to be a cumulative number, but I presume to be book of the year, it has to be published this year, or maybe just submitted to the site this year. So it's not at all clear how many books it competed with, but it does appear to have been recognized as the best book out of a fairly large group.

So maybe this will turn out to be one of those rare self-published books that gets picked up by a commercial publisher. Point is though, that it hasn't been sold yet, and the author--not his agent--has done a lot to get the book out there and recognized.

The book was published in 2008, so "Book of the Year 2009" isn't unreasonable. I expect that their Book of the Year 2010 will be one published this year.

Here is the application for the 2009 Book of the Year award. So, from among those 1,060 writers listed on the site, from among the ones whose works came out in 2008, this award is chosen from among those who sent in three copies of their books.

Be that as it may, one thing that we keep saying in the self-publishing group threads, as a disadvantage, is that the first publication rights are gone and the work will have to be sold as a reprint.

The book is that good, and it's self-published? It's that good, and Tom Dark is not only submitting it to small presses, but hasn't yet gotten one to take it?

If it truly has won a major award, this is the perfect moment for the author to fire Tom Dark and get a real agent.

Again, I wasn't going to come back here but...

I am getting more harassing email from my former literary agent. He evidently is taking his firing rather personally. I have asked him a few times now to stop emailing me and bothering me but he won't let me go. He asked me to post his latest letter here in full. You can imagine it is full of profanity and outlandish accusations. He also hurls a few insults at the moderators and guests on this board. But since he did not send letters out about my book, I don't feel the need to act as his literary agent, so to speak, on here. Publish your own work Tom.

What I have posted is a letter that I wrote to the Santa Fe police department:



Dear Santa Fe Police Department:
I have asked Tom Dark,( who resides at delete delete Santa Fe NM) to stop harassing me and he still writes me these vulgar, confrontational letters. He is a literary agent for Heacock Literary agency and became quite enraged when I had to fire him for a series of odd behavior. Well that behavior has turned from odd to stalking and harassing.

I would like the police there in Santa Fe, NM to ask him to leave me and my family alone. I have a wife and two small children and we do not need this brand of craziness in our lives.

Thank you

Sincerely,

James Clark

As a general caveat, be wary of any ostensible professional agent, or editor, or publisher who missuses terms of art, and abuses English. It's the equivalent of a warning klaxon.

Yes, beware and warning should have went off in my head

Quote: "As a general caveat, be wary of any ostensible professional agent, or editor, or publisher who missuses terms of art, and abuses English. It's the equivalent of a warning klaxon."

Yes, beware and warning should have went off in my head when Tom wrote me a few months back(as he did with with his other disciples...ah I mean writers) to come fight his battle on here.

He has called them all together again he says(writes actually in his last tirade to my email account) to monitor the actions on this board. This message is to my fellow brethren(yes the twelve of you, do you think it is just an odd coincidence that Tom wants twelve of you?) who are being pulled this way and that by the puppet master. You are being put to sleep by a carny hypnotist.

I'm snapping my fingers now(o.k. you didn't see that but I did snap them). Now that you are awake, ask yourselves what I did not when I came here to defend him...what does being here watching Tom watch me have to do with the sale of your book?

As a new writer (and new to this forum), searching for my dream agent, I gotta tell you....

This has to be the saddest thread I have ever read. I'm glad this isn't the first thing I read in this forum, or I might have said "Whoa Nelly!" and gone searching for another forum (and I think this place and the people who "live" here are great).

Pathetic.

O, Egyptian Goddess, I've seen far sadder threads. This one has happy endings. Jack's book wins a major award. Elvikingo realizes that Tom Dark's ba --

(Emendation: Elvikingo realizes that Tom Dark's bad news, and looks for a different agent. ... And how an unfinished message got sent when my computer crashed is a mystery to me.)

elvikingo:
I am getting more harassing email from my former literary agent. He evidently is taking his firing rather personally. I have asked him a few times now to stop emailing me and bothering me but he won't let me go.

Click to expand...

elvikingo, the best way to stop this twit from contacting you is to just block his email address. If he then tries to find other ways to harrass you, you can take it to the police if you have to, but in the meantime, ignore him. He's clearly a self-centred little twerp and the best way to hurt him is to show that you're not paying him or his pathetic, rambling emails any attention.

MM

Yes it was a good ending.

DEAR MODS,

It is now time to delete the ENTIRE content of account for "NOKIAUSER1" once and for all.
Please and thank you ahead of time. AND it was a pleasure to be here and observe the world of publishing and to help out where I could, even in a small way.

I've learned a lot on how the industry works being here. If I ever write a book, I'll have some idea of what to expect in this world. It's good to learn things. And the minute you think you DON'T NEED TO LEARN any more, is the day you may as well roll over and call it quits for keeps.

God Bless everyone in here and may HE, whoever He is or what etc.., RAIN DOWN great luck and blessings from the high source...(whatever energy and/or spirituality that may be ).

Love and Peace

Wait, are you saying that everyone who posted here is one of Tom's twelve "called" monitors?

Interesting...

Explanation of the twelve

Quote: "Wait, are you saying that everyone who posted here is one of Tom's twelve "called" monitors?"

This is a snip it of Tom's letter that he wrote me yesterday:

"You can post any replies seperately, although the truth will show that all you need to reply with is an apology. I'm copying this to observers, so that you can no longer hide the illness you've shown with this rash of lies --"

The observers that he is talking about are the 12 writers that he is a "literary agent" for. He chose 12 writers(because he has a Jesus complex and he thinks he is their master) that he is supposedly working for. But as I said before he spends his time fighting battles like this one on this board and with editors and clients like me who question how he does things, instead of creating positive relationships with people in order to sell their books.

Any way my last post was not for the people that are already here but for the twelve that Tom wrote to come to his side yesterday much like he wrote me to defend him a few months ago when this thread first started. They probably got a letter like this one that he wrote me when I was in his legion:

Say... could you do me a little favor? There’s a website called Absolute Writers.com, in the “watercooler” thread, where I’ve been getting some SERIOUS badmouthing. I know who these creeps are. Catt stumbled across it today. One of the badmouthing is by a quite dishonest editor who’ll likely be going out of business, and the other are two genuine cocksuckers I’ve known for 30 years. They’re jealous because I cut them off – and because of what I’ve had to say about “channeling.” So they’re trying to get even. One of my guys, Lance Frank, found it but hadn’t mentioned it. He answered it.

Thanks for sticking up for me. Everybody would. I'd like these buzzyflies off my back.

Here’s what I wrote Lance:

deleted...

elvikingo said:

Any way my last post was not for the people that are already here but for the twelve that Tom wrote to come to his side yesterday much like he wrote me to defend him a few months ago when this thread first started. They probably got a letter like this one that he wrote me when I was in his legion:

Say... could you do me a little favor? There’s a website called Absolute Writers.com, in the “watercooler” thread, where I’ve been getting some SERIOUS badmouthing. I know who these creeps are. Catt stumbled across it today. One of the badmouthing is by a quite dishonest editor who’ll likely be going out of business, and the other are two genuine cocksuckers I’ve known for 30 years.

Click to expand...

Okay. I've changed my mind. (I originally posted a comment saying I believed this exchange should be deleted: too much information.) Now, I think the letters from this agent should be posted in as many places as possible so that writers, setting out on their query journeys, will understand what many bloggers have said repeatedly: You're better off with no agent at all than signing with an agent who is wrong for you and your career, not to mention your sanity.

I know there are scammers galore out there. And there are agents who are nasty and rude and incompetent and stupid. But I had no idea there were agents like this. Shiver. What an eye-opener.

Repunzel said:

But I had no idea there were agents like this. Shiver. What an eye-opener.

Click to expand...

Amen.

If anyone is Catt LeBaigue's friend, as in "knows her personally," would you please call her on the phone and tell her what's going on?

If anyone has a copy of that correspondence complete with the hidden headers, please share a copy with me at P&E. You can forward it to me at [email protected] . Your identity will remain confidential and I won't repost the correspondence, but I do want a copy as documentation.

Question for Tom Dark

Have you sold any books to any legitimate, reputable commercial publishers as an agent? If so, would you please post the title, author, ISBN, and commercial publisher's business name in this topic?

Thank you.

Card-carrying creep comes clean!

As one of the "creeps" Peter Danison (DBA Tom Dark) has known (that is, ranted at) for 30 years, may I respectfully point out that I had to ask HIM to stop e-mailing ME abusive, self-important, opinionated screeds.
I received an e-mail apology from the Association of Literary Agents apologizing for TD's unwanted, unprofessional correspondence with me.
Anybody who holds triple-decade grudges needs a shot of Botox to relax away his sneer.
Or just plain grow up!

edited out, as I see Mac is already in the building.