For $200, your book could get a national newspaper feature in USA TODAY. Email your manuscript to bestselling author Colleen Hoover and she’ll help you get it published.
If it sounds too good to be true, it’s because it is. Those are real-life examples of recent scams plaguing the publishing industry — targeting authors’ wallets and original works.
Scammers impersonate well-known authors. Others pose as book clubs and offer to get your book in front of hundreds of readers for a fee. Some tease a shortcut to a Hollywood adaptation deal. These days, the emails often open with flowery, highly specific praise about the book. Artificial intelligence has scraped the book’s copy and polished its own words to seem like a real, emotional appeal.
Hoover, the author of books with A-list Hollywood adaptations including “It Ends With Us” and “Verity,” warned fans about a scam in late March. An aspiring author had sent Hoover their manuscript, also copying a fraudulent email impersonating Hoover on the email chain. The author had been communicating with the impersonator for three months, thinking it was Hoover.
“But any minute now, that manuscript is probably going to be uploaded under a fake name and put out into the world for sale,” Hoover wrote on Facebook. “This author spent a year writing this book and now they’ve shared it with a scammer and there’s nothing I can do for them.”
AI Makes Publishing Scams More Frequent and Invasive
Victoria Strauss, an author based in Amherst, Massachusetts, cofounded watchdog group Writer Beware in 1998 to sound a similar alarm. But she said it’s “just gotten worse over the years.” Last year, a federal grand jury charged three people with scamming elderly authors out of almost $44 million by convincing them they’d turn their books into Hollywood hits for a fee.
“Right now, most scams are coming from overseas, and the previous ones pretty much exclusively targeted self-published writers,” Strauss says. “This new wave of AI scams is targeting everybody. I’ve only ever published traditionally, so I never got the scam solicitations until now.”
Hoover says she’s seen scams like this for all 15 years she’s been an author, though “the added element of AI” makes it hard to tell what is real. She used to pay a company to thwart and report impersonators, but said it’s gotten too out of control to keep up with.
“There’s one of me and thousands of them, and I’d be spending my entire career fighting it,” Hoover writes. “Awareness is key.”
Why ‘I Loved Your Book’ Could Really Be an AI Scam
Those “authentic-seeming details” praising a book are exactly what causes some writers to fall for these traps. “These scams have a pretty good grasp of writer psychology, which is what makes them so insidious,” Strauss says.
Kathryn C. Kelly, an author based in Rosenberg, Texas, was working to rebuild her readership after health struggles including cancer. At the start of this year, her inbox became flooded with “promotional” offers. One event in London offered to put her book in front of nearly 800 readers — for a contribution to their refreshment budget. They told Kelly to “contribute any amount that feels comfortable to you.” She sent around $50. It was all she could give after mounting medical bills.
Another “book club” wanted up to $200 for a customized “book trailer” to show participants. In both cases, the strangers she emailed with asked about her health struggles and offered sympathy. She stopped replying.
On April 20, she got an email impersonating USA TODAY Books. The notice came from [email protected], with an “Alex Morgan, Senior Editor, Book Features” offering a national newspaper feature for $200. USA TODAY would never charge money for a feature, and any authentic email would end in usatoday.com or usatodayco.com — not Gmail.
Scams Prey on Authors’ Hollywood Dreams
Nicole Loufas, a self-published author based in Vallejo, California, got an email from a producer claiming to work with Shonda Rhimes, the award-winning showrunner behind “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Scandal” and “Bridgerton.” The email said Rhimes was interested in adapting her book.
“You have that glimmer of hope,” Loufas says. “Maybe I’m the exception and not the rule.”
She called the supposed producer, who was operating under the name of a real Shondaland employee. They told Loufas she would have to write the screenplay herself — or pay them to hire someone. That’s when she ended the call.
How to Avoid Scams as an Author
Strauss says that “knowledge is a writer’s best tool and best defense.” Here are some best practices:
- Remain skeptical of any paid publishing or promotional service. Agents take a commission from book sales; they don’t charge upfront fees. Traditional publishers don’t charge for their services. If you’re asked to pay for exposure, stay vigilant.
- Double-check email addresses. Agents and publishers affiliated with a firm will typically have a company address, not a Gmail or other free email. Watch for slight misspellings.
- Beware cold emails from beloved authors. Check their website and social media. Does the email match the address listed there? Is there a publicist or agent you can confirm with? Are they asking for money?
Hoover says she would never offer services or connections to her agent in an email. “Authors don’t have time to reach out to other authors and readers and make friends in that way,” she writes. “The best place to meet authors authentically is through social media or at book signings, so you know they’re the real deal.”
Reported by Clare Mulroy, USA TODAY.
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