How to make a point

[fpb]

The world is full of people who think they can see through the motives of others, and that those motives are always bad. JK Rowling is a favourite target: hugely rich, quite pretty, and never giving an inch on her private life, she is an obvious target for envy and spite. Of course, the revelation that a mildly successful and critically very well received detective novel – The Cuckoo's Calling – had been written by her under a pseudonym sent the crowd into overdrive. In certain circles, it became Gospel to claim that the whole affair was a marketing trick thought up by the greedy and talentless (wrong on both accounts!) Rowling.

So Rowling not only forced the people who'd given the secret away to make a large payment to a charity of her choice, she herself earmarked THE NEXT THREE YEAR'S PROFITS from The Cuckoo's Calling to that same charity. In practise, she is giving away all the money she would be making because the book was revealed as hers, and you may be sure it will be a tidy sum. The charity in question just think they died and went to heaven.

Come on, lads and ladies. I have no doubt that you will find a way to claim that this was all selfish propaganda and market manipulation. I am just waiting to hear how, but I am sure that nothing is beyond the creativity of your hatred.

Comments

[ravenclaw-eric.livejournal.com]

For the most part, as far as I know JK Rowling is a pretty good person.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I wasn't writing for you, mate. You're sane.

[filialucis]

Which charity is the lucky one?

It should indeed be a tidy sum. I couldn't warm to the writing in Harry Potter, but I have the paperback of Cuckoo's Calling on pre-order based on reviews and my reading of the excerpt from Amazon's See Inside feature. I've almost given up reading fiction for sheer lack of time, but I think this one will be worth making time for.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

It is, I assure you. It's the first book in decades that kept me up all night reading it.

The charity is called The Soldiers' Charity.

[shezan.livejournal.com]

I hadn't seen she gave it to The Soldiers Charity. Hats off.

[ravenclaw-eric.livejournal.com]

I'd say that a lot of the people lashing out at her are themselves envy-ridden midget-minded people of the sort Ayn Rand spent a lot of her venom on...the kind who would love to be authors themselves, but couldn't finish a publishable book to save their lives.

JKR's not perfect; she's done some things I don't agree with, and the HP books themselves often have bad plot holes, but she's light-years above those types.

[super-pan.livejournal.com]

I'm glad to hear you say you like this book; I will try it! As for your post, I bet she just wanted to stretch her horizons as a writer and wanted to sell the book on its own merits. And since she is a gazillionaire, she can write purely for fun and challenge, and I think it's great she's giving away so much to charity. I doubt it was a publicity stunt on her part. As for the people pooh poohing her, well, sometimes it's hard not be jealous of gazillionaires! :-)