Plagiarism

I know about it and have been following the story. I've posted a few times on Dear Author.

What Ms. Edwards has done is wrong, in my opinion. I have no desire to "throw her under a train" as someone accused recently. I don't know her, so I don't hate her or anything like that.

But as a writer, plagiarism is one of the things that I absolutely do not stand for.

If you look at the evidence, it's been clearly shown that Ms. Edwards lifted several passages from other writer's work, without changing the word order or structure. This was discovered by a reader who noticed a change in tone, from narrative to factual, not someone on the blog.

But it doesn't really matter who discovered it. Copying another writer's work word for word, without attribution, is plagiarism, plain and simple, and plagiarism is wrong. Period. You don't have to agree with the Smart Bitches style, but the fact that Ms. Edwards has been caught doing this, in more than one book, is indisputable.

There will always be two sides to an issue like this...where is the line drawn when it comes down to describing historical facts and plagiarism?  Readers will always have an opinion when it comes to favorite authors

Greay areas .... yes .... I agree ......and yes, authors should be held accountable, esp. as the paraphrasing (and sometimes word for word copying) was so blatant as in this case .....

we were taught in school to use reference materials and then put the content in our own words ..... sometimes that is incredibly hard to do ... thus the rule of attributing to source .......

take popular music ...... how many songs are out there that sound sooooo similar? ..... they have the same refrain (words are different, tempo may be faster/slower but the melody is basically the same) ..... who polices that? 

so do we need a Literary Police?  .... I'm not a writer so I haven't a clue what the process is ..... is the publisher supposed to ensure that there are no duplicates in phrasing to other published works?   ....

I use cliches and quote verse where I don't know the source, just in my daily speech ...where does that fit? ... thus, more grey areas

from the examples shown in the articles, Ms. Edwards does indeed have some explaining and apologizing to do .... what sort of penalty is there for this sort of thing?

I think that the majority of people are not asking for Ms. Edwards to be brought down, Certainly, speaking only for myself, I'd like to see her held accountable. I would like to see an acknowledgement from the author that she's done something inappropriate and a sincere apology to those she's stolen from.

Her publisher is now investigating the matter, which is crucial. I would like to see some sort of acknowledgement of the sources she's used on her books.

I think those are reasonable expectations.

I'm in the middle of the road until Cassie, or her publishers come out with an annoncement.  Or if and when she is charged with a crime.

How can you write any romance book without picking up something or someone did or done as Chelle as said.  It's a grey area that has been around a while, and with the intenet getting bigger every day, it's just coming into the light.  Stop and think about there are only so many ways to describe something, like a group of people or making love.  And with historicals it's only harder.

Can you image reading a romance book with footnotes?   I do not read for the historical or accuracy of a book.  I read for fun and entertainment. I'm going to run to internet to google everything I read nor am I going to use an romance book as a source.  Yes, there are authors who give acknowledement at the beginning and/or author's notes at the end of a book.  

I say let the publisher's do their job of investigating the charge and let them handle it.  And I'm not one to judge. What Cassie did or did not do is between her, her publishers and God. I do not read very many historicals and Cassie Edwards is not one of the few I do read. And I have no desire to start reading her with or without the controversy.

Gotta to go, kids, the husband and the dog are fighting again.  Yep it's going to be one of those days.

 jdpicraux

Yes, of course if you do research, there are only so many ways you can put the information you've discovered into the text. However, as a writer, you ought to be able to *at least* do so in your own words.

Again, Ms. Edwards copied many passages word for word. This does not mean paraphrasing. This does not mean that she read something and then rewrote it in her own words. She copied passages exactly as they were written in the source material.

I'm sorry, but that's not unintentional and it's not acceptable. Nor, to me, is it a grey area. Copying word for word without attribution is plagiarism. That's black and white.

Candy, who made the initial post about this over at SBTB, has apologized for the fact that her tone may have been off. The point is, she apologized. And from that point forward, the women who post the news have been nothing but professional, IMO.

Some of the commenters have crossed the line into unpleasant and unprofessional, on both sides of the argument, but the people doing the actual reporting have done their best to stay out of that.

There are many people saying that it should have been handled privately. I completely disagree. As evidenced by the initial response from Signet, they would not have done any investigation at all, had there not been ongoing information coming out and public response. It was only after people wrote letters to the CEO that they revised the initial support they gave Ms. Edwards and announced that they would look into the charges.

This is not a whisper behind your hand sort of issue, IMO. It needs to be in the public eye precisely so it can't be shrugged off and excused.

In my high school, the Honor Code was more important than anything else. If you were caught for any serious offense, a person got probation on the first offense...except cheating. The punishment for cheating was immediate expulsion. It wasn't just the teachers but the students truly valued the honor code. When a girl in my class was expelled, the yearbook people included her picture with a quote about giving credit where creit was due. My mom was the same way.... make a mistake was one thing but lying about it was much more serious. Lies are one thing that can turn a friendship sour more than anything else. I am not talking about being kind instead of just opening your mouth to tell a friend every unkind thing in the name of honesty...there is a place for compassion and sometimes these friends who just have to tell you you are this or that "for your own good" are just controlling with no sense of compassion...

IN terms of writing..I think modern writers need to get a grip on the whole notion of orginality. Copying word for word, yes that is plagarism. But modern writers and readers seem so obsessed with this concept of orginality that I think they lose a whole side of beauty. In the Middle Ages, many authors retold the same stories... genius was more about how a writer could take something familiar and make it new. It's been that way for centuries before and after the Middle Ages too. Part of a way an author showed genius and flair was being aware of others and citing them somehow.

The whole issue of plagarism in the Da Vinci Code was so silly to me. I have read the scholarly works the author used. SO what? It is an entirely different thing. One is a scholarly work, another a work of fiction. I think it is cool that a fiction author leaned on something else and rewworked it and added things and took out others and made it a work of fiction. 2 completely different things. A scholar should have known better because his research relied on others too. As far as I am concerned, that whole thing was purely a matter of greed.

Yes, writing is a business and intellectuals and artists and those that support it like publishers deserve money. But writing is also an art. Readers read, building up a storehouse of knowledge from previous reads...it's fun to see references to others. Personally, when I see people get so obsessive about this idea of originality when it is a front for pure greed, it turns me off big time. I am probably more likely to turn off from those that are overly protective in a greedy way. Sometimes I read reviews that trash an author for having something similar to another and I want to scream...duh, get a grip, that is what books do!

I won't comment on the particular case you mentioned since I have not read this author. If it is plagarism, then she should be punished. A cynical side of me says there are a lot of websites getting a lot of publicity for themselves over this too. It is important to stop plagarism and it should be punished period...but it also makes me sick the way the news is like a feeding frenzy.  When I see the picture in the year book, I feel good that she was expelled and that our honor code was not just in name only...and yet there is a part of me that wonders if the inclusion in the yearbook with that quote was also like that news frenzy, a malicious side of kids showing in a kind of sick feeding frenzy.

"Signet has conducted an extensive review of all its Cassie Edwards novels and due to irreconcilable editorial differences, Ms. Edwards and Signet have mutually agreed to part ways," the publisher said in a statement Friday.

"Cassie Edwards novels will no longer be published with Signet Books. All rights to Ms. Edwards' previously published Signet books have reverted to the author."

to read the full press / arcticle .... click here

I'm glad that one of her publishers is stepping up and doing the right thing .... but that is only one of them

have you been paying attention to the Deborah Anne MacGillivray situation over at Amazon?  ... here's the deal as posted over on  Dear Author    .... now there's something that pretty scarey

PS ... I like the "new" you!  

argh!

you'll need a few hours to get through all the comments over at Dear Arthur .... what a huge can of worms that is!

I'm astonished that Amazon hasn't done anything to fix this ..... they need to fix their review system and deal with DAM and etal ........ I was aware of the reviewer's situation back in the fall but hadn't really followed to see what was happening ... and what has been happening is diddly from Amazon and tons from the attacking party ....

I'm surprised the media hasn't touched on this yet ... what's wrong with that picture? .... shouldn't this have been mentioned somewhere by the big media giants?

now about the hair! ....... what a nice compliment from your dh that he loves your "blond"  :)   ...... but sometimes a gal needs a bit of a change ... I like the spicer colour on you .... it gives you some sparkle!

the whole thing is it's not just her ... she has a whole posse who post 5 star reviews for certain authors and then if there's a 3 star or less review they vote them down or report them to Amazon as inappropriate  .... on Amazon if you have postive feedback votes on your reviews it raises your ranking as a reviewer, and DAM is in the top 100 rank of reviewers .... I guess this is a sort of status thing ... Amazon really needs to do something to stop that sort of abuse of their system ... how can any one believe in the reviews if this is allowed to continue?

I definitely needed sparkle in my life!!! ;) But I went back and had her highlight it with blond and red.

The highlights sound lovely! ... I like to get highlights in the Spring .. they just give a nice lift and a new look for summer  ... so comb you hair already and post a pic!  LOL

the backlash to folks who also just truly enjoyed her books was unfortunate.  More than one reviewer suffered who had no part in any alleged posse.

I typed and retyped a post multiple times trying to say exactly what you just said.  Thank you.