There is a person whose name I have never mentioned on this site (and never will). She had what Michelle Bachman referred to as the enormous chutzpah to take partial credit for writing Blood Diva. Legally, I can’t stop her. We have an agreement, and she has let me post a few times on her blog (which I understand is
read only by her hundreds of cats), so for that at least I should be grateful.
What makes it even worse is that she acts as though I don’t even exist — literally. And I mean that literally literally not the newfangled definition in which the lexicographers gave up and said words will henceforth mean whatever you wish them to. She dismisses me as a “pen name”, a device, a play on words that some readers will “get” — which is just typical of her.
Honestly, if there are parts of Blood Diva that annoyed the shit out of you –
pretentious little references to literary works, operas, movies etc — all of THAT probably came from her warped mind. Me? I was trying to keep it simple. and just tell the story of a woman trying to live up to the legend of her created by men.
And now, now dear readers, this person has gone beyond beyond. (You see what she does to me? The thought of her makes me repeat words!) Now she has gone on her website BEGGING readers to review “her” books on Amazon, and of course she includes Blood Diva in this most undignified exercise in annoyance.
It seems she has a developed a new obsession — and she has many of those. In fact, I have it on good authority that she might be suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder, or maybe Asperger’s, and certainly attention deficit disorder, agoraphobia, anxiety, depression, narcissism and possibly dissociative identity disorder — but what do I know of these? I am but a writer. She’s the one with the degree in social work.
So her new “thing” is this belief that there is hope of her gaining a “readership” — as if one wrote for any other reason than the love of
it — and that there is a “magic formula” for gaining the devotion of this wider audience that involves getting at least 50 reviews on Amazon. So she is now asking readers of her blog, who perhaps found a useful post on scoring cheap opera tickets, or dealing with a geriatric dog who pees itself, or using packing paper to create economical flooring, to reward her by buying a book and then reviewing it on Amazon.
It’s not as though I haven’t mentioned the importance of Amazon reviews on this very blog or promised not to misbehave or send my minions after a less than stellar write up. It’s not like I haven’t already been offering FREE copies to readers who commit to reviewing! But I see no reason to lose one’s dignity, to plead like a panhandler, to compare oneself to a waiter hovering around a table for a tip — not that there’s anything wrong with that (I’m a 20% gal myself).
I wish I had some way of controlling her antics, but alas I do not! So let me simply state here, that while of course I am relying on you dear reader to spread the word about Blood Diva, you are under no obligation to do anything that makes you uncomfortable, and you may feel free to ignore the entreaty of this most desperate and disturbed individual.