Can people PLEASE just stop the sock-puppetry (and plagerism) already!

The book world is always surprisingly full of scandal and recently there seems to be even more than usual. You remember the "Jordin Williams" plagerism/sock-puppetry scandal from last month? Some people are thinking that "Jordin" may have returned.

Firstly there are three other things that have come to light this month. An author was discovered to have created several fake reviewer aliases that befriended lots of other reviewers to attempt to convince them to buy the book. Huge lengths were taken to make the reviewer seem legitimate and powerful but the amazing Steph @ Cuddlebuggery along with some other people, discovered what was going on. You can read the whole story here - How To Trick Bloggers Into Reading Your Book

Today Dear Author exposed a scam of ghostwritten books being "repackaged" and sold under different names. The person behind this is using multiple pen names, fake publishers, and several sock-puppet review accounts. The worst part of this is the fake reviews and mass down votes of real reviews on amazon the rest of it is some bizarre one man publisher type thing. To read the whole story go here - http://dearauthor.com/news/wednesday-news-ghostwritten-stories-solicited-and-repackaged-as-individual-authors-australian-recommendations-for-lowering-media-costs/

Author Jessica Beckwith was discovered to have been plagiarising from authors on fiction press. You would expect the writers who had been plagiarised to have been upset, and they were. So upset in fact that they verbally attacked a blogger who had a promotional post up for the author even though said blogger (who has a great blog that does not support plagiarism in the slightest) had no idea the book she was promoting had been plagiarised. You can read the bloggers take on everything here (it was written in the original post so you can see all the abusive comments) -  http://www.memyshelfandi.com/2013/06/my-indie-monday.html

Now possibly the worst - though only speculation at this point - is that the person behind Jordin Williams and all other associated names may be back. Here is a great summary of all the original drama. Very recently quite a few NA reviewers (not me) received a review request that sounded shockingly familiar. This request was apparently worded almost identically to the one that people received for Cherry Popper by K.A. Andrews, one of the books by "Jordin Williams" that never got around to being released. The plotline of this new book also sounds identical to that of Cherry Popper (although admittedly there are a few NA books with similar themes). I have also heard that the request was also worded very similar for the one sent for Amazingly Broken by Jordin Williams. Also making people suspicious is the fact that two beta-readers have appeared completely out of nowhere and joined goodreads within the past few days to review this book. This looks very similar to the sock-puppet reviewer tactic employed with all the original books though these could be real people.

It does like the person behind Jordin Williams/K.A Andrews decided to give releasing one of the books another try under a new title and author name. I REALLY hope that this isn't the case and that this is a completely innocent author.

All this sock-puppetry is getting to the point where I don't know who I can trust anymore. I don't want the blogging world to turn into a place where we distrust new reviewers because they might be sock-puppets and worry about promoting authors in case they turn out to be plagiarists and we get dragged down with them. I want to trust everyone and I will try to but to be honest, it is hard to tell who is real anymore.

Authors need to feel safe in sharing their work without fearing it will be plagiarized or posted onto an illegal book downloading site. Reviewers need to not fear being attacked for unknowingly promoting a plagiarist. Plagiarism and sock puppetry will probably never go away so we will have to be vigilant yet also not too quick to place blame (hence why I did not name the maybe/maybe not "return of Jordin Williams" book).

If you have not already guessed, I do not condone plagiarism in any way, shape or form. Hopefully everyone in the community will continue to support one another and plagiarist can be stopped as soon as they are discovered.

Say no to plagiarism!

Co-blogging vs. Going It Alone

***Edit - From all the comments and discussions I have decided not to get a co-blogger just yet but instead a new guest reviewer who has the potential to become a co-blogger if things go well. If you are interested you can find more information here - Who Wants To Be My New Guest Blogger? ***

So as you all know I run this blog by myself. I have a guest reviewer called Hannah who posts a review every few weeks or months but other than that this blog is entirely me. Going it alone does have its benefits, mainly total freedom and control over the blog but it gets exhausting. Sometimes there is just no time to write posts, and other times blogging leaves me with no time to read. I have managed to keep the blog running at its best so far but I worry that the standard may start to decrease especially as I have two more years of University left and each year comes with more work.

 

For these reasons I have considered getting a co-blogger. I know several people who share their blog with another person and they all seem to love it. Some of the biggest and best blogs are ran by two or more people (eg. Cuddlebuggery and The Young Adult sisterhood) and I would love to make my blog better than it is now. On the surface co-blogging sounds perfect: someone to help with big blog decisions, share ideas with and make the blog bigger and better.

 

However, I worry about the downsides of co-blogging. Like everything in the world there will be downsides, otherwise no one would blog alone! First of all there would be the fact that I wouldn't be able to do anything on my blog without taking them into consideration, and they might disagree with things I really want to do. I also worry about losing my blog's identity. Everything I write has a similar style (simply because it is written by the same person) and if I bring someone else in with a different style then you guys, my followers, may like it less. My biggest concern would have to be possibly falling out with my co-blogger. What if everything just didn't work out (possibly ruining the blog in the process) and after a huge argument I decide I can't work with them anymore. That would be an awkward situation as though the blog is mine they would have partially made it theirs and a bad co-blogger break up would be much worse for the blog than me never getting a co-blogger in the first place.

 

Before I started my blog I was interested in becoming a co-blogger at a pre-existing blog. The only reason I didn't is because I couldn't find anyone looking for a co-blogger that I thought I would fit in well with (until the day after I started my blog that is). I could see only benefits: blog already designed and ready for me to start posting, already has a reputation so I wouldn't have weeks/months of blogging to no one (luckily I managed to skip this anyway) and if it didn't work out then I wouldn't have lost anything, just gained experience of how a blog works. It is different now as I created this blog from scratch myself and I feel like I will be giving a stranger joint custody of my "baby".

 

What I would like to know is if you run a blog with another person then what are the good and bad elements (feel free to anonymously comment)? If you blog alone, why have you chosen to not have a co-blogger? Also I would love to hear from someone who did co-blog but stopped for whatever reason (again feel free to comment anonymously).

 

Would you be interested in seeing someone else reviewing and posting here at Bookish Treasures? If I choose to take on a co-blogger what should I be looking for? Is their anything in specific I don't do / I am not that you would love a new co-blogger to be? Funnier reviews, more serious reviews, videos?

 

This blog is made for YOU to read so therefore I care about what you think :)

Review by Hannah - Half Lives

Synopsis

Present day: Icie is a typical high school teenager - until disaster strikes and her parents send her to find shelter inside a mountain near Las Vegas.

The future: Beckett lives on The Mountain - a sacred place devoted to the Great I AM. He must soon become the leader of his people. But Beckett is forced to break one of the sacred laws, and when the Great I AM does not strike him down, Beckett finds himself starting to question his beliefs.

As Beckett investigates The Mountain's history, Icie's story is revealed - along with the terrifying truth of what lies at the heart of The Mountain.

 

Review

Like the title, the story is one of two halves. One narrative is from Icie’s perspective, as she, Tate, Marissa and Chaske meet in today’s time and try to find refuge from the terrorist biological warfare unleashed on America. The second narrative is by Beckett and Harper, who exist sometime in the post apocalyptic future. I found the first change of narrative a little jarring as I was really getting into Icie’s story, and it took me a little while to get used to the strange society that Beckett and Harper lived in, with their language, religion and politics revolving around popular teen culture, sayings and slang.

Throughout the story I remained much more invested in Icie’s story, perhaps because I knew the context for why she was hiding in a mountain bunker, whereas I had little clue as to where Beckett’s ragtag bunch had come from. It may also be because Icie’s narrative was in first person, where the future narrative was in third. Either way I enjoyed reading about Icie and was hooked on finding out what would happen to her group. However I was a little intrigued to figure out how Icie’s and Beckett’s stories linked together, and the more I read the more the two stories came together and started to make sense as a whole.

The concept for the story was really interesting, and crossed (pre and) post-apocalyptic drama with a dystopian feel. The scary thing for me was that the terrorist scenario that Icie was faced which was easily imaginable and utterly terrifying. When the general public started to realise that something serious had happened, with planes grounding to a halt and phones not working, fear and panic started to set in. People reacted irrationally and violently, everyone struggling and fighting to reach loved ones. The fear felt so real, jumping straight off the pages. Seeing the first effects of the biological warfare was also a little gross and added to the gripping tension.

I found it fascinating watching how the group changed from outside/before the bunker and when they were locked up indefinitely inside it. Cool, calm Marissa became scarily obsessive and slightly maniac after a few weeks underground, where as Icie worried about whether her parents would ever meet her at the mountain. I found Tate less annoying and came to like him. And interestingly Chaske remained very collected despite the huge potential for claustrophobia, paranoia and panic. I would certainly be freaking out if I was locked in a mountain bunker without knowing when I could leave. These changes in personality and behaviour were written really well, so that they were realistic to the character and situation and added emotional ups and downs and drama to the plot.

In terms of the end of the story, I did expect something more. There were shocking and emotional twists in the story that I hadn’t quite expected, but for some reason I wanted something bigger to happen at the end. Regardless of this I enjoyed the story, which was thought provoking, definitely different and gripping. If you’re looking for something unusual to read in the dystopian or post-apocalyptic genres then give Half Lives a go.

Isn't Hannah's review great?

Try it for yourself: Goodreads | Amazon | Amazon UK

New Adult Readathon Wrap-up - Huge Giveaway!

This week I have been co-hosting the New Adult readathon with Faye @ A Daydreamers Thoughts. Unfortunately it is now over :( I am thankful to everyone who participated and even more to Faye who did most of the work in organising this readathon and deserves to have you all go and FOLLOW HER BLOG :P

 

My Achievements

 

So my main goal was to read seven books and I sort of succeeded. I read 6 1/2 NA books (though two were very short) and I also read two other books that could be categorised as NA (though I probably wouldn't call them that).

Elsker, State of Emergency, No Reverse, The Bone Season, Madison, Gavin, Working It

I would recommend ALL of these books :)

 

Let us know how well you did! Did you succeed in your goals?

 

 

 

Twitter Chat

 

Saturdays twitter chat was great and hopefully gave lots of people things to think about and books to read. Here are the main things most people agreed on.

 

1) NA does not need sex. In fact if we wanted to read graphic sex we would pick up an erotica rather than an NA. Feel free to include graphic sex if it suits the characters but we would equally love emotion based scenes.

 

2) A book being labelled as NA does not mean it is NA. It has pretty much been agreed that NA is not just YA with sex. So if you are an author of a YA book with sex please don't call it NA (unless the sex is WAY inappropriate for under 18's).

 

3) If you are an author don't be afraid to be different! We would love to see a LGBT NA. We also want more dystopian and other non-contemporary novels.

 

4) Boys in NA are sexy because they are becoming MEN.

 

5) Strong themes of become adults and being independant are what truly makes a book NA instead of another category.

 

You can check out all of the tweets here.

 

Giveaway

 

I promised a huge giveaway at the end of the readathon and here it is! With 41 ebooks, 3 print copies and swag up for grabs I think you'll agree that I wasn't exaggerating when I said their was a lot of prizes. The giveaway is open to everyone but extra entries are available to participants of the readathon.

 

Prizes

Ebook of A Summer To Remember by Elle Chardou

Ebook of When You Loved Me by Terra Lorin

Ebook of A Taylor-Made Life by Kary Rader

Ebook of Queen of Jastain by Kary Rader

Any ebook by Magan Vernon

Ebook (kindle only) of Take Me Now by Faith Sullivan

Ebook of Aurora Sky Vampire Hunter vol 1 and 2 by Nikki Jefford and a Do Not Disturb: Bood Sucking in Progress door hanger

Ebook of Destiny Gift by Juliana Haygert

Ebook of Breaking the Reins by Juliana Haygert

One Print copy and 10 ebooks of Dark Child by Adina West

One print copy and 5 ebooks of Lick by Kylie Scott

3 Ebooks of Stripped by Brooklyn Skye

3 ebooks of The Awakening by Yunnuen Gonzalez

Ebook of The Last Strand by Van Krishna

3 Ebooks of Stripped by Brenda Rothert

3 Ebooks of Now and Then by Brenda Rothert

Ebook of The Sirens Tale by Anne Carlisle

Ebook Streamline by Jennifer Lane

One Print copy and One Ebook of Shine by Amy Freeman

Swag from Amy Freeman

The giveaway is open internationally and ends on August 12th. Winners will be e-mailed and then have 72 hours to respond before another winner will be chosen.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Stacking the Shelves / Showcase Sunday #24

Showcase Sunday is hosted by Vicky @Books, Biscuits, and Tea and Stacking the Shelves is hosted by Tynga's Reviews and they both give bloggers the opportunity to share the books they have received in the past week.

This week I downloaded lots of freebies from amazon and I bought myself a few ebooks also. As usual if you click on the book cover you will be taken to its Amazon page.

Review

I can't wait to read this upcoming NA release by debut author Ever McCormick. Also a huge thank you to Emma from Bloomsbury for sending me a paperback of All Our Yesterdays after I had it as my waiting on Wednesday this week :)

   

 

Netgalley / Edelweiss

 

As you probably know I loved Losing It by Cora Carmack and this is a novella featuring the two main characters so I can't wait to read it.

 

Bought

The first two are short novella spin offs of a series I love called Hidden Gem by India Lee the first book of which is FREE on amazon. Shadowed is the eighth book in a series I follow and Wanderlust sounded interesting and was on sale so I decided to buy it for when I want to read something a little different.

Freebies

These all looked awesome and were FREE so I couldn't resist downloading them. Some of these are still free and the ones that aren't are reasonably cheap.

 

 

 Borrowed

 

Thank you to Kayleigh from K-Books for lending me her copy of The 100 which I have been dying to read.

 

 

Gifts

 

A huge thank you to Hannah from In The Best Worlds for sending me a £15 gift card for helping support Garrick in the NA Crush Tourney. My help basically consisted of nagging my boyfriend for a few days until he let me record him saying some quotes from Losing It in his British accent (I live in the UK if you didn't know this already). If you want to see what was used in the end you can visit Hannah's blog here - http://www.inthebestworlds.com/2013/07/vote-for-garrick.html

 

So what do you think? Are there any books you have read or plan to read? Feel free to link to your Stacking the Shelves or equivalent post in the comments.

New Adult Readathon Challenge - Book Spine Poetry (with giveaway and a free book)

*If you aren't participating in the NA Readathon a) you should - it isn't too late b) there is a free book for everyone at the bottom of this post :) *

 

Welcome to day 5 of the New Adult readathon! Hopefully you are all having lots of fun and have read lots of amazing books. Today I am hosting a challenge with a giveaway and don't forget that tomorrow (Saturday) is our twitter chat at 7pm GMT using the hashtag #NARead .

 

The challenge I am hosting is Book Spine Poetry, simple in theory, a bit trickier in practice. The idea is to create a poem using the book titles on the spine of books. Here is my attempt (I know it's pretty terrible but it gives you an idea of how it works).

 

 

It reads -

 

If you find me rogue across the universe, unravelling

Wake the hunt dark inside, everlost, everlasting

 

Now I am AWFUL at poetry, so hopefully you can all come up with something much better. You can do this with the physical books you own or just titles from books on your ereader / on your goodreads to read shelf. Please share your Book Spine Poem in the comments either directly or by linking elsewhere. Don't worry if it is short and simple, just have fun and remember you can win things. Any one who makes an attempt can enter to win.

Hopefully mine being so terrible will mean non of you will be too embarrassed to try. Also go and check out todays other challenge which is Reading Playlist over at Diana M Long.

 

To enter the giveaway you must have signed up your goals for the readathon in the linky at the bottom of this page. It is not to late to join and if you don't have a blog you can do a tweet, facebook status, goodreads shelf etc.
 

Giveaway

 

Enter in the rafflecopter below. The only requirement is to have signed up for the New Adult readathon but you can gain extra entries by following my blog.

The Prizes

Paperbacks of Broken Promises and Broken Dreams by Dawn Pendleton. This will be chosen from the entries in the rafflecopter. I also may do an extra prize for the best poem.

Oh and Broken Promises is FREE on Amazon so even if you don't win you can get this New Adult book for no cost :)

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Sign up for the NA Readathon (must to win) 

Cover Reveal and Giveaway - Two Roads

Today I am revealing the cover for the soon to be released NA romance Two Roads. The book sounds amazing and I think the cover looks lovely.

Two Roads by L.M.Augustine

Synopsis

 

The only person poetry-loving Cali Monroe hates more than herself is Logan Waters, the geeky kid who lives in the dorm building next to hers.

Ever since Cali's parents told her she would amount to nothing, she has felt entirely inadequate. Friendless and alone, she takes on the mean girl role in hopes it will make her feel better--and Logan serves as the perfect target. He infuriates her with his obnoxiously long lashes, his all too perfect dimpled smile, and his complete lack of personality outside of his intelligence. It doesn't hurt that he's part of the reason her brother is dead, either. So Cali hates him, and he returns the favor. Thus, their prank-filled, insult-driven rivalry is born, and torturing Logan quickly becomes the highlight of her life.

 

But when Cali's parents set them up on a blind date, she begins to realize Logan might not be as boring as she always thought. He shares her love of poetry, takes a sadistic pleasure in making fun of crepes, and he makes her blush when he calls her smile pretty.

 

And hey, maybe those long lashes of his aren't that obnoxious after all...

 

Two Roads releases on August 26th

 

Add it on Goodreads!

Follow the author: Facebook | Twitter

~Cover designed by E.M. Tippetts Book Designs~

Giveaway

Enter to win a ebook of Two Roads and a $10 Amazon gift card. For other giveaways check my giveaway page.
 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Waiting on Wednesday - All Our Yesterdays

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine and it allows readers to share the books that they are most looking forwards to reading.

This week the book I have chosen to feature is All Our Yesterdays by Cristin Terrill

Title: All Our Yesterdays

Author: Cristin Terrill

Series: Not sure - I have heard there may possibly be a sequel

Publisher: Bloomsbury (UK), Disney-Hyperion (US hardback)

Publication date: UK - 1st August, US hardback - 3rd September

Links: Goodreads | Amazon UK | Amazon




Synopsis

A brilliantly brain-warping thriller and a love story that leaps back and forth in time – All Our Yesterdays is an amazing first novel, perfect for fans of The Hunger Games.

Em is locked in a bare, cold cell with no comforts. Finn is in the cell next door. The Doctor is keeping them there until they tell him what he wants to know. Trouble is, what he wants to know hasn’t happened yet.

Em and Finn have a shared past, but no future unless they can find a way out. The present is torture – being kept apart, overhearing each other’s anguish as the Doctor relentlessly seeks answers. There’s no way back from here, to what they used to be, the world they used to know. Then Em finds a note in her cell which changes everything. It’s from her future self and contains some simple but very clear instructions. Em must travel back in time to avert a tragedy that’s about to unfold. Worse, she has to pursue and kill the boy she loves to change the future . . .

My Thoughts

This sounds amazing! Just read that awesome sounding synopsis. I have heard great things from lots of great bloggers about this book so I am really looking forward to reading it. I'm very glad that I won't have to wait much longer to read it.

Book Trailer

The amazing Casey @ Dark Readers has created a great book trailer that has me even more excited about reading the book.

New Adult Readathon!

Today is the day!

You may recall that last month I mention I would be hosting a New Adult readathon with Faye @ A Daydreamers thoughts. Well today is the first day and we would love for you to get involved. Whether you are already an NA fan or not, this will be so much fun. We have daily challenges that give you the opportunity to win ebooks, a twitter chat on Saturday at 7pm GMT and a HUGE giveaway at the end. Sign-ups will be open all week, so feel free to start participating whenever you want!

My Goals!

My aim is to read a total of 7 books but hopefully I will read even more. Here is a list of the books I will be choosing from. I am starting with Elsker but after that I am not sure what I should read and in what order. I have a mixture of all different genres on this list as I like variety whilst I read. Too many NA contemporary romances in one go and my head may explode :P I also want to visit all the blogs involved and do at least three of the challenges.

Elsker (The Elsker Saga) by ST Bende - Read 22/07
No Reverse by Marion Croslydon - Read 23/07
King Hall by Scarlett Dawn
The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon
Lick: Stage Dive 1 by Kylie Scott
The Space Between (The Book of Phoenix) by Kristie Cook
Faking It by Cora Carmack
The Only Exception by Magan Vernon
Ten Tiny Breaths by K.A. Tucker
Elite by Rachel Van Dyken
State of Emergency by Summer Lane - Read 23/07
Descension (The Mystic Series) by B.C. Burgess
Seduced by Innocence by Kimberly Kinrade
Shattered Promises by Jessica Sorensen

Feel free to suggest what books I should read first by leaving a comment!

My Progress

22/07 - Read all of Elsker, started State of Emergency (7%)
23/07 - Finished State of Emergency, read No Reverse, started a non NA book (sorry! But I am on target :P)
24/07 - Ok so I was really naughty today and finished reading the non NA book (well I suppose it could be called NA as the characters are 18 and 24 but it isn't really *cough* dark semi-erotic romance *cough*)
25/07 - Did minimal reading today, started The Bone Season (5%)
26/07 - Finished The Bone Season
27/07 - Read Gavin by India Lee and Madison by India Lee, read another non NA book, Started Working It by Kendall Ryan

Mini-Challenges

The mini-challenges are -

22nd July

Synopsis from Book Cover over at Jen Greyson
Bad Boy or Good Guy over at Krista's Dust Jacket

23rd July

 What Would You Do Differently over at Addicted to Books

24th July

 Twitter Character Bio over at Smoking Hot Book Blog

25th July

Picture Perfect over at Claire Reads
Describe NA Book over at Misadventures in Bookland

26th July

 Book Spine Poetry over at Bookish Treasures
Reading Playlist over at Diana M Long

27th July

Make Your Own Cover over at Big Book Little Book
Colourful Spine Pictures over at Wicked Wolves and Dreaming Dragons

 

28th July

 Alternate Endings over at All Night Book Affair
Rewrite the Synopsis over at A Daydreamer’s Thoughts

 

Twitter Chat

 

On Saturday at 7pm GMT we are having a twitter chat using the hashtag #NARead please join in as it will be a lot of fun.

Giveaway

On the last day of the readathon we are having a huge giveaway open to all participants. This will include ebooks, swag and even a few paperbacks. To make sure be eligible you will need to have done a sign up/goal post and linked it in the linky at the bottom of the page. We have so many donated books that we may even give prizes to people who participate the most in the readathon, read the most books etc.

 

What should you read?

 

I have had a lot of people asking me for recommendations. Feel free to leave a comment with the type of books / genres that you like and I will try to suggest a few NA books that you might like. Also check out my favourite books page, my post My Favourite NA Reads, and if you are a fan of non-contemporary novels, my post New Adult Books That Break From The Mold. Remember to leave a comment if you would like a personal recommendation!

Goal Posts

Use the below linky to sign up to your goal posts! If you do not have a blog you can link to a tweet, facebook status or goodreads status instead :D