Alicia:Omg, Felicity, it’s not on you at all! She had us all fooled!
Yuna:Yeah.
Come on, Haven, ticktock, I think. Look at this, they’re already talking about her like she’s not even here. She really needs to come up with something good to salvage her name. But then, as I think that, Haven’s name disappears from the members list. One second it was there, the next second, it’s gone.
Lisa:I think she just ragequit the Slack group
Jenna:Good riddance! We don’t need fake people like her in here. Publishing is stressful enough as it is
Felicity:Yeah. God, I really didn’t know what she was like. I can’t believe it. I feel awful. I’m sorry, Fern
Fern:Oh my gosh please don’t blame yourself! This has nothing to do with you! She had us all fooled
Jenna:Well, I’m glad she’s no longer here. It only takes one rotten egg to make the whole place stink. This group will be much healthier without someone like Haven in it
And just like that, I have defeated Haven Lee. At long last. I release my breath in an incredulous huff as more and more messages pop up, agreeing with Jenna that it was for the best. A couple of people even said that they’d gotten bad vibes from Haven all along. I narrow my eyes at them, wondering how real that is or if they’re just jumping on the bandwagon now. I guess it’s impossible to tell what’s what.
When the messages start petering off and branching into other topics, I switch over to Twitter. I have a good feeling about this. Twitter is where publishing really takes its gloves off, and I wasn’t wrong. Already, my fellow debuts are subtweeting the entire thing.
@FelicityLynn:You think you know someone and then next thing you know they turn out to be a pathological liar who’s been gaslighting everyone in your debut group for ages. #LiveAndLearn
Twelve likes and two comments, both of them going,Omg what happened?
@JennaWritesBooks:The thing about debut groups is, at the end of the day, it’s just a bunch of strangersthrown together bc we happen to have the same debut year. #SnakeInTheGrass
Seventeen likes and three comments, again asking what happened.
There are more subtweets from the other debuts, but what’s even more delicious is that I’m also seeing tweets from people who aren’t in our debut group.
@ChaiLovesTea:Waiting for someone to fill me in on what’s going on with the 2020 debut group. #PublishingTwitter #PublishingDrama
@AaronPark:Every year, it never fails to happen. Every debut group will have its own drama. And this year’s drama according to the grapevine is aDamn Good One. One might even go so far as to say it’sDelicious. #BookTwit #Publishing
I guess someone from the group has told @AaronPark what happened. I scroll through more subtweets that allude to the drama, then I finally find it. The one brave soul who’s willing to pull back the curtains.
@JulesCesarRatesBooks:Ok, I guess no one’s willing to say it, but screw it, I’m done protecting your problematic favs. The author everyone is subtweeting is Haven Lee. If the name sounds familiar to you, it’s cuz she’s got a massive book deal and her book is being shoved down our throats everywhere we turn. Here ya go. #Publishing
Along with the tweet, @JulesCesarRatesBooks has posted Haven’s book cover. Her post already has over a hundred likes and seventeencomments. I drink in the comments, reveling in the collective hate toward Haven.
@Chosaiseo:OMG I got an ARC for this book and it was on my TBR list but I won’t be reading it now!!
@Helelelelen:I read an interview with this author once and I knew there was something off about her!
@CaileeChastnet:Wait, can anyone tell me what she did?? I really wanted to read her book but if she’s done something rly bad then obv I’m not going to support it ...
@Supercutie103:@CaileeChastnet Her debut group put together the most adorable gift for her and she threw it out.
@CaileeChastnet:@Supercutie103What?? Why would she do that? Omg that is so mean, especially when they put in the effort to do something so sweet! I won’t lie, I’m kind of a loner so hearing stories like these make my blood boil. I would love to have friends who cared abt me!!
I hear you, @CaileeChastnet. I would love to have friends who cared about me enough to send me a care package too. But it’s okay, I remind myself, because now I have friends who would go to battle for me. I wonder if I’ll ever get used to that, to accepting that I’m no longer on my own. Well, I definitely won’t get used to the fact that it’s now Haven who’s on her own for a while yet. I check on her Twitter profile and find that she’s locked it. A thrill shivers through me. Would that bebecause she was getting so much hate? I go to her Instagram, and this one she hasn’t locked yet.
Sure enough, when I open her most recent post, one where she’s made mussels cooked in a garlic white wine sauce for her parents, along with homemade baguettes, the most recent comments are along the lines ofHaven, do you throw out all of the food you make too, or just the ones that other people make for you?To more direct ones likeYou’re such a hypocrite, you grew your content based on food but you waste food, that’s so messed up.
I can’t believe it. Have I really defeated Haven Lee? I don’t see how she could possibly come back from this. Twitter will do its thing and spread the news to the rest of the publishing community. Then a small voice whispers: I wonder if Haven’s book is going to get canceled over this.
It’s a delicious thought to have, and I entertain it for a while. Sometimes when a book is deemed problematic, whether because of the content or the author’s behavior, publishers have been known to postpone it. This is the most common outcome. Publishers will put out a statement saying they have listened to the protests over the book and are learning and will make the edits needed to make the book more palatable. But sometimes, the book, or its author, is so problematic that there is no saving face, and the only recourse for the publisher is to cancel it altogether. I don’t know the logistics that go on behind the scenes when this happens: whether the author must give back the advance payments that have been made to them or if they get to keep the money that’s been paid out but forfeit all other payments. Whether the publisher might even go so far as to sue the author for damages to their reputation, or whether the publisher is simply happy to cut their losses and call it quits.
For a while, I let myself revel in the daydream of Haven losing her book deal and being made to return money she’s been paid. Publishing payments are usually doled out in thirds, or quarters if it’s a major deal, which Haven’s is. So assuming her book deal was for a million dollars,then she would’ve been paid two hundred fifty grand upon signing of the contract, and another two fifty when she’s made the edits required and her editor formally accepts the manuscript. Now that we’re mere months away from publication, Haven would’ve received at least two payments. I wonder if she’s panicking right now, knowing she might need to pay $500,000 back to her publisher. It’s not as easy as simply returning the money to them; when they make these payments, she would’ve had to take a third of it out for taxes, and 15 percent would’ve gone directly to her literary agent. Which means if Haven’s publisher demands the payments to be returned to them, Haven will be in real trouble, unless she happens to have two hundred extra grand lying around. I suppose given her financial background, I can’t dismiss the possibility of this, but it’s unlikely.
