The Sting: World's Worst Manuscript accepted!

Cafe Society
1

The worst of all possible novels has been accepted for publication!

The story.
There’s a vanity press publisher called PublishAmerica. Vanity presses have a terrible reputation (for good cause), so PA has come up with a new model: they give their authors $1 for their book and publish them using POD technology. But they overprice the books, and make it next to impossible for bookstores to order them. So authors end up paying for copies for bookstores, or for reviewers, or anything other than the two free copies they get. The hidden cost means that the authors end up paying as much or more than any other POD vanity press.

PA, however, insists loudly and stridently that they are a traditional publisher, and that, unlike a vanity press, they reject many of the novels.

The Plot
Author Jim Macdonald hatched a plot to show what PA really is. He gathered a bunch of authors, gave them chapter outlines, and had them write the worst possible chapter they could think of. Authors were not told about anything other than their chapter and could describe the characters any way they saw fit. Macdonald also repeated chapters, gave the same outline to more than one author and randomly generated another.

The entire mess was titled Atlanta Nights and sent off to PA.

The Catch
As we expected, PA took the bait. Macdonald (through a front author) got an e-mail and contract for the book. They were going to publish it*.

Then the hoax was publicly announced – in a venue where PA was known to monitor. It only took a few hours before the “author” received a “on second thought” e-mail, withdrawing their publication offer. They said they discovered one chapter was gibberish. They didn’t notice this when they read it before they decided to publish. :rolleyes:

But we do have the acceptance and the headers indicate quite clearly it came from PA.

The Book
And you can now see **Atlanta Nights ** in all its glory. An Rich text format version (which should be readable by most word processors) is available at Macdonald’s ftp site. You can also buy a hard copy version (all proceeds to go to the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Emergency Medical Fund) at Lulu.com.

Enjoy. Or not. :smiley:

*To keep everyone in the clear legally, under advice of counsel, Macdonald did not sign the contract.

2

One time I received a form acceptance letter for my novel from an agent telling me that they were interested. Since I’d been getting nothing but form rejection letters, I was a wee bit suspicious, especially considering that a form acceptance letter was just a tad odd. So I came up with the crappiest, most poorly-written summary of a novel I could think of, used a silly pseudonym, and sent it to the agent with my parents’ address on the return (with their permission, of course).

Not surprising, they thought the novel was something worthwhile and wanted to read the whole thing. Even funnier, that form acceptance letter had a handwritten note on the side letting me know they were particularly eager to read it. (I guess they thought anyone who wrote that poorly would be desperate for an agent by that point.)

I wish I could have been involved in this project. I can’t wait to read the results.

3

Oh my. I’m on page 7 and have laughed aloud more times than I can count. That’s the funniest thing I’ve read since the MST3K version of The Eye of Argon.

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All the gratuitous "y’all"s are making my eyes bleed.

5

My dear god, that is hilarious!!!

Alright, how can we get the film rights to this fantastic novel? :wink:

I’m determined to read it all the way through…it really is hilarious thus far.

See y’all…

6

Can you provide a link to where the hoax was announced? I’d be curious to read it (and the response from PublishAmerica if possible).

7

The first official announcement was by A.C. Crispin at the Absolute Write Water Cooler board (scroll down until you see her name). Jim Macdonald laid out the entire plot starting here. There are a lot of messages, so you’ll have to scroll through to find it all.

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Information is also at Travis Tea’s Lulu Store.

9

I think I actually got further into an Eye of Argon reading without cracking up than I got into the sting manuscript. (I lost it completely at “The tits bounced like Aunt Alice’s molded jello back at home”).

10

Thanks for the links. I’m reading them now.

11

I think this is my new favorite sentence EVAR.

But then, I’ve only gotten to the end of chapter Three. I anticipate much more.

12

I’ve been skimming . . . so far my faves are pp. 63-64 and 74-76. Bravi!!

13

Get famed director Alan Smithee on the line!

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Amazing stuff. I hope they don’t mind, I sent it to a journalist friend of mine and asked him to take a look at my new manuscript :slight_smile:

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My favorite bit:

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The readers of **Atlanta Nights ** have spoken:

“A note of caution: reading this thing may cause temporary brain damage.”
– Allen Steele

“Maybe once in a lifetime, there comes a book with such extraordinary characters, thrilling plot twists, and uncanny insight, that it comes to embody its time. ATLANTA NIGHTS is a book.”
– Adam-Troy Castro

“After reading ATLANTA NIGHTS, one has to believe that it was snapped up for publication by the very first editor whose desk it crossed. Its quality and literary value are evident from the very beginning.”
– Sean P. Fodera

“You have to read this book to believe it.”
–Laura J. Underwood

“Prepare to be amazed! ATLANTA NIGHTS shows readers a level of storytelling you rarely see in traditionally published fiction. It is an experience you’ll never forget.”
– Chuck Rothman

“Gripping, squeezing, mashing, bashing, this book will give a man cramps and a woman a prostate. It delivers.”
– Vera Nazarian

“ATLANTA NIGHTS is sure to please the reader who enjoys this sort of thing.”
– Raymond E. Feist

“…this… book… makes… for… wondrous… reading…”
– Derryl Murphy

“Rich and varied as a feast of fried spring chicken, Coca-cola ham, corn fritters, and black bottom pecan pie, Atlanta Nights drools with style.”
– Catherine Mintz

“Atlanta hasn’t seen anything like this since Sherman marched through Georgia. ATLANTA NIGHTS will awe you.”
– Charles Colman Finlay

“A must for aspiring authors!”
– Anonymous

“ATLANTA NIGHTS makes the legendary EYE OF ARAGON read like Asimov!”
–Nick Pollotta

“A love match between e. e. cummings and James Joyce might yield prose as profound as that found in Atlanta Nights”
–Megan Lindholm

“You won’t believe what’s between these covers!”
–Steven Harper

“Prepare to be stunned by the world Travis Tea revealed.”
– M. Turville Heitz

“Frankly my dear, you will give a damn…”
–Catherine Mintz

“If this unconventional story fails to sting you awake, you aren’t breathing!”
–Sheila Finch

“No one can read this book to the end and remain in the same place.”
– James D. Macdonald

Don’t miss out on this reading experience! :smiley:

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I haven’t read it yet, but I’m amazed at one thing:

I’m on a dialup connection here, and the RTF downloaded at over 10K/sec. I’ve never, ever seen anything go that fast on a dialup connection.

That is all. For now.