Spy novel "Assassin of Secrets" pulled for plagiarism

Agent007391

Yeah. Or he could self-publish through Amazon's Kindle (there's a larger market for that than I ever realized). No bookshelves to take that off of.

FromCanadaWithLove

I kind of want to read it now.

DarthDimi

I kind of want to read it now.

Of course there's no such thing a bad publicity, and you prove it, @FCWL. But to be fairly honest, the thought of giving this thing a little peek has creeped up inside myself as well.

Agent007391

Let's face it, we've ALL thought about reading it, if for no reason than to see if we can pick out all of the passages that were stolen from our favorite spy novels. It was the same reason many of us wanted to read The Killing Zone.

shadowonthesun

http://readersentertainment.com/2011/q-r-markham-assassin-of-secrets-faces-massive-plagirism-charges/

Rowan talked about being “disillusioned” by the success of other “wunderkind authors” from Brooklyn like Jonathan Safran Foer, and how working in a local bookstore made him feel like part of the literary scene, but also somehow not—presumably because, at the end of the day, they were celebrated writers, and he was just the guy behind the counter, selling their books. (Which is pretty sad, if it’s true; I know other writers who work at bookstores in Brooklyn, and they’re not anywhere near so insecure about themselves.) “There was a bunch of books by people who were technically my peers that felt showy and one-note,” Rowan added, before noting that he had basically written a thriller for the money.

With the benefit of hindsight, it’s hard not to see in comments like these a thinly-veiled contempt for the book world. Here’s a guy with so much resentment over the success of other writers that he flat out tells a reporter he was willing to “dumb it down” if that’s what it took to get a book deal. Did Rowan take that attitude even further? That is, was he so convinced that the big, commercial publishers are stupid and venal that he could sell them a book filled with other people’s prose and they’d be too ignorant to notice

Agent007391

So, he just assumed that because he sold their books, he was better than them? Is that what he's trying to say here?

shadowonthesun

I think that's part of it, but perhaps a little too simplified.

I think Rowan sold these books every day, but he felt the authors were undeserving of their fame and fortune because he thought so little of their work. In the end, he got fed up, and reasoned that if they could have that fame, then so could he - but in order to make the statement that he wanted to, he had to write something that stood out above them all. And that was a problem. So, as a fan of the thriller genre, he decided to splice together "the best bits" of all his favourite writers to produce Assassin of Secrets. That way, when he got his critical acclaim, he could criticise those authors that he felt were undeserving.

Agent007391

What an asshole. "I hate your work, so I'll steal somebody else's work to prove that I can write a better book than you!" Childish as can be.

4EverBonded

It's just sad really.

SaintMark

I think that's part of it, but perhaps a little too simplified.

I think Rowan sold these books every day, but he felt the authors were undeserving of their fame and fortune because he thought so little of their work. In the end, he got fed up, and reasoned that if they could have that fame, then so could he - but in order to make the statement that he wanted to, he had to write something that stood out above them all. And that was a problem. So, as a fan of the thriller genre, he decided to splice together "the best bits" of all his favourite writers to produce Assassin of Secrets. That way, when he got his critical acclaim, he could criticise those authors that he felt were undeserving.

Nice theory, nothing more.

I still think the man couldn't write a book himself and "borrowed" from other writers. He may have started out borrowing a little and ended up with borrowing most. Not to make a statement just because he is not capable of an original idea himself.

I would not spend one penny on the d***head, prefer spending it on decent writers.

shadowonthesun

I think that he would have liked to have been able to write his own book, but when he realised he did not have the talent, he started plagiarising.

Agent007391

That is sad, though. If he really wanted to tell a story, he could have just written up a plot and collaborated with a co-writer. He didn't NEED to plagiarize.

doubleonothing

I believe the word you were looking for was "stole", and yes, he did. This was mentioned above.

Yeah, blame autocorrect on the iPhone for that one.

Agent007391

This is now reason # 248 why I hate the iPhone...

SaintMark

I think that he would have liked to have been able to write his own book, but when he realised he did not have the talent, he started plagiarising.

As so many have found out, writing is actually a talent and a skill, both are needed.

Samuel001

This just gets worse and worse for the guy!

Agent007391

Let's face it, now that we know he plagiarized, we hate him.

Kennon

Guy will have a hard time publishing anything (even self-publishing on Kindle) that doesn't pass the copy&paste test. I doubt any professional in the publishing business will even touch Rowan for the forseeable future. He may have had his 5 minutes of fame, but only as a tragic case and despised by those he betrayed or tried to. Actually, isn't it just as much thievery if the perpetrator was caught before the deed? Didn't get the feeling Rowan was about to confess before he was caught, so by rights he still must have to face up to a lawsuit by the copyright holders.

NicNac

Many famous and noteable people have been accused of plagiarism over the years (H G Wells and Martin Luther King among others). These days it's far more difficult to get away with it (see Princess Michael of Kent).

Although it isn't the same thing at all the funniest case of plagiarism involved musician and former Beatle George Harrison. He was inspired by a song called 'Oh Happy Day' to write the similar 'My Sweet Lord' by playing around with the former song.

He never for a minute thought people would recognise where he got his worldwide number 1 hit from, but unfortunately, by creating My Sweet Lord from Oh Happy Day, he inadvertantly re-wrote The Chiffons early 60s hit 'He's So Fine'.

George was done for subconscious plagiarism.

Kennon

I'm not sure if some of the examples of plagiarism we know about really match this AoS book. From what I've read this guy took literally his entire book. That's
1) a larger scale and
2) a different quality of plagiarism.
Perhaps that got lost in the whole hype around the case, but I wonder what actually was Rowan's own work, if any, then?

In most other cases there would seem to be some kind of original work of the plagiarist involved. Is this really the case with what Rowan tried to sell as his own book?

Carrel

Assassin of Secrets author admits compulsion 'to conceal my own voice with the armour of someone else's words' - from The Guardian

echo

Here's an interesting article that shows some of the parallels to Licence Renewed:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/02/13/120213fa_fact_widdicombe

MrSpy

This really makes me sick. But it points up the idiocy of the literary establishment.