You know how much I love Lori Prokop and her laughable array of get-rich-quick schemes. Well, my brother Tod has found Lori’s dastardly male counterpart in Nick Daws, another self-proclaimed
"bestselling author" of books you never heard of and can’t find in any bookstore. Daws’ "Quick Cash Writing Course" is the funniest author scam since Lori’s "Book Millionaire" debacle. But, as Tod writes:
There’s nothing funny about the desperation writers feel — spend even
a few hours in a workshop and you’ll see it in Technicolor — and as a
professor part of what I preach is that this isn’t easy. There’s no
back door. The only way to succeed is by doing, by handling rejection,
by improving. If you’re looking for Quick Cash, maybe make up a course
like the "bestselling" Nick Daws has, because desperate, foolish
writers will pay you for your precious secrets.
Your brother is right about the desperation writers in my classes have seemed to feel–more so in recent years, it seems. No one wants to hear that the usual overnight success takes a good ten years. Newer writers have been raised in an instant gratification society that makes hanging in there for the long haul sound ridiculous when they can get rich quick, “publish” with a POD printer, self-publish, or post their raw writing on a website. No artists except writers seem to expect to learn Chopsticks one day and then turn around and play Carnegie Hall. 😎
http://www.Writers-First-Aid.blogspot.com
I can see when someone don’t like something, and even talking bad about it is okay. But, when the line is crossed, and one is called a scammer, that’s the same as calling someone a crook. Scammer is a term that has brought many into court.
Nick Daws is a fine upstanding man who has much respect in the UK and Europe. The publishing industry is more writer friendly there than here in the States. I don’t think calling someone a scammer sets well with the folks on the other side of the pond.
If you can’t prove it, you should’nt say it.
Domenic,
Certainly. Obviously we want bona fides. Perhaps we can be told:
In what ways is Nick Daws a “bestselling author” in the usual sense of the term (like major-selling books in bookshops, not the easily-achieved brief peak in Amazon sales)?
What movies are based on his wonderful three-line pitches? What novels written by him in under 28 days are in print? What consumer competitions has he won a fortune from?
If he knows all these secrets, presumably he’s used them many times and can tell us when and where?