Anything THIS Pirated HAS To Be Good!

Hello friends and fans!

Ten years ago, I latched on to the emerging self-publishing ‘print-on-demand’ trend on the internet and began to upload my series of sci-fi/fantasy novels onto Lulu.com. The platform was then a groundbreaking enterprise, offering design tools to authors and a free market place for their works. From there they were available for customers to order as either a hard-copy paperback print which was sent to them via mail-order, or to download them as e-books. Both forms would provide her with payment for her books.

Sadly, and perhaps predictably, some of the eBook versions of my stories have ended up being uploaded and shared on renegade sites, where they continue to be made available for free – and even for payment which does not go to the author.

Aside from the illegal aspect of the situation where piracy is taking money out of the pocket of a writer who is not yet by any means a big name in world literature – or at all wealthy – this causes older versions of my works to linger while better, newer versions have long since replaced them.

I signed with a traditional publisher in August 2014. J. Ellington Ashton Press (JEA) is what is referred to as a new-generation publisher, being a few years old, and snapping up all the hot up and coming international writing talent in the genres of sci-fi, fantasy, thriller, horror and splattergore and others. Since I signed with JEA in 2014, the publisher has included 2 of my short stories in the anthologies ‘Autumn Burning‘ and ‘Inanna Rising‘, and the first two titles in my Galaxii Series ‘Blachart‘ and ‘Demonspawn‘ have already been re-released under their ‘Hardwired’ label.

When I signed with JEA I’d just uploaded my 8th Galaxii Series novel to my Lulu shopfront. Knowing this would conflict with the titles being made available over time with JEA, I removed all of these from the site in keeping with the contract. In the meantime, I’d also performed several revisions to these books, everything from text edits to adding newer and more attractive covers. The two new re-releases through JEA have also had the added benefit of this treatment, with a two-stage editing and new cover design process additional to that. The result is a much better, more satisfying result.

In about 2010 – while feeling somewhat despondent about ever finding a publisher – I allowed several free e-book services to host a selection of specially re-formatted first edition titles as a promotional tool. This worked to a degree, providing me with a small cult following and several very good reviews. The problem came in 2014 when I began asking these free e-book sites to take down my works because of the publishing contract. The ones who had obtained direct permission to host my books – about four sites in total – complied without any problem, but when I dug deeper via web trawls and searches, I discovered quite a few more supplying some early versions of my books, who had not obtained my permission to do so!

Some of these pirate sites have simply uploaded the downloaded eBook format books specifically intended for Lulu.com, possibly bought and downloaded from Lulu in the first place by persons unknown, and then simply redistributed these illegally.

I’ve found up to 7 different sites supplying earlier versions of some of my works for free downloads, with at least 3 providing them as PAID downloads – with the monies collected not benefiting the author in any way, but going instead to the site owners! This is not only unethical but also illegal as well! Additionally, these sites are hosted in countries where legal action cannot succeed against the pirates, and there is no visible way to contact the site admins or their hosting services!

Aside from the financial setback to the author and ultimately also to any publisher, it is also a soul-destroying experience for any struggling author to see people praising their work on public forums – while passing around download links to obtain free copies of it!

I remain hopeful that the trend of piracy of literary works will draw to a close as more and more of my previously unreleased works become available via the correct channels.

The books being offered by JEA via Amazon and Barnes & Noble are after all unquestionably of far superior quality to the much older originals, and in the process I should receive a well-earned reward for my hard work in creating them.

Writers write because they love to write and create and tell stories – but they publish because they need to go on being able to do it! Face it, financial reward makes writing a viable activity!

Anything this pirated HAS to be good! Arrrr!

Anyone who risks getting caught copying and distributing pirated material surely isn’t going to take that risk for something that isn’t worthwhile, are they?