Bait-and-Switch for Self-Published Authors

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Recently I heard from a self-published author (let's call her Author) who received an alarming email from a reader--or at least, someone claiming to be a reader (let's call her FauxReader).

FauxReader said she loved Author's book, but was distressed by the large number of errors in it--wrong tenses, mis-spelled words, and grammatical mistakes on nearly every page. Not only did this make reading less pleasurable, FauxReader was worried that it might result in bad reviews.

Author was shocked. She works with an editor, and carefully prepares her manuscripts. She didn't think it could be formatting glitches, because those wouldn't insert mis-spellings and grammar snafus. All she could guess was that she'd uploaded the wrong file.

When Author asked FauxReader where she'd purchased the book, and to provide a few examples of the mistakes, FauxReader became cagy. She did eventually offer a retailer's name, and also identified a few typos--but nothing like the major errors with which, she'd claimed, Author's book was riddled.

By this time, Author was suspicious. She did some research--and to make a long story short, discovered that FauxReader had recently hung out a shingle as a freelance editor, apparently undeterred by the fact that she had zero qualifications. Author was being set up; if she'd continued interacting with FauxReader, she probably would have received an offer to fix the "errors"--for a fee, of course.

This is at least the fourth (and most brazen) bait-and-switch scheme targeting self-publishers that I've heard about in the past couple of years. They all seem to operate similarly: the author gets an out-of-the-blue contact from someone claiming to have found text mistakes, or cover art problems, or even metadata deficiencies. The mistakes and problems may or may not be real. The person presents as a Good Samaritan, just trying to help the author out--but always, in the end, there's an offer of a fix for money.

That's one of the "beware" issues here. The other, of course, is the problem of unqualified service providers. Unskilled and less-skilled editors may seem appealing because they're often cheap compared to pricey skilled professionals, but they haven't the skills to do the job and may actually make things worse.

This isn't a new problem: Writer Beware has been receiving complaints about unqualified editors (both freelance and, unfortunately, employed by small presses) for almost as long as we've been in existence. But the boom in self-publishing has really given it legs. Scammers, con artists, and predators go where the opportunity is--and right now, there is huge opportunity in self-publishing. From small-time operators like FauxReader trying to rip off one author at a time, to big corporations peddling dreams that relieve thousands of authors of cash (*cough* Author Solutions *cough*), the danger is everywhere.

Self-published authors, you are the new frontier in literary schemes, scams, and cons. Be careful out there. Verify credentials, don't settle for unskilled service providers even if they're cheaper or you like them personally, and beware out-of-the-blue solicitations.

For another reason to be careful, see my post on self-styled book publicist Kerry Jacobson.

Robert Fletcher of SBPRA to Pay Author Restitution in Settlement of Florida Lawsuit

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Strategic Book Publishing & Rights Agency (SBPRA) is the tip of a fee-charging agenting/editing/publishing iceberg created by Robert M. Fletcher of Boca Raton, Florida. Since 2001, it has employed a veritable carousel of changing names (more than 40 to date), and Writer Beware has received hundreds, if not thousands, of complaints from authors who've cited abuses such as fees for literary agency services, fees for publishing, fees for editing, fees for marketing services, referrals to other branches of the business without revealing the connection, and more.

Fletcher's operation has long been the subject of an Alert at Writer Beware.*

In 2009, as a result of a public consumer-related investigation, the Florida Attorney General filed suit against Fletcher, his businesses, and several staff members under the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. Delays and legal maneuverings drew the case out for several years--but now, at last, there's a resolution.

According to documents obtained by Writer Beware via a public records request, Fletcher and his co-defendants (Leslie Williams, Lynn Eddy, and Mark Bredt, plus various corporate defendants**) have signed a Stipulated Settlement Agreement with the Florida Attorney General that, if certain provisions are fulfilled, will result in dismissal of the lawsuit. (The Settlement Agreement can be seen here.)

Via hate blog The Write Agenda (which over the past few years has been attempting--without much success--to discredit Writer Beware and other anti-scam activists), Fletcher has issued a triumphal-sounding statement declaring the Settlement "a victory."

“Anytime a business settles litigation with a government agency with no admission of guilt and no violation of the law, it can be considered a victory,” said Robert Fletcher, the CEO of a group of companies that have been dealing with government litigation for over six years.

“Unfortunately, most consumers believe that litigation equals guilt, but that simply isn’t true. This suit should never have been filed,” Mr. Fletcher continued. “If the litigation had any merit, they would have pushed it harder and not taken six years to deal with it.["]

Well...it's a bit more complicated than that.

It's true that Fletcher et al. have entered into the Settlement Agreement "without any admission either of guilt or that [they] have violated the law" (though if a court later finds that any of them have breached the Settlement's non-monetary provisions, the breach "shall constitute prima facie evidence of a violation of the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act"). However, the Settlement does impose a number of conditions directly relating to Fletcher's alleged business practices at the time the suit was filed (for a look at some of those practices, see this article by a former Fletcher employee). And it requires him to pay a substantial sum in restitution to authors.

Among other conditions, Fletcher et al. must:

• Agree to the permanent dissolution of the Corporate Defendants as well as "any related fictitious names".
• Use their real names when communicating with clients. (In the course of the investigation, Fletcher admitted to employing multiple aliases.***)
• Disclose their relationship with other entities when making referrals. (At the time of the lawsuit, authors were led to believe that the editing branch of the company--to which they were referred for critiques--was an unrelated enterprise, and that Strategic Book Publishing and Eloquent Books, Fletcher's vanity imprints, were also separate.)
• Create and maintain clear royalty reporting and payment systems. (For instance, authors shouldn't have to request their royalties in order to be paid.)
• Disclose in contracts "the exact services which are to be provided," and provide "a separate statement" to inform authors that "there may be additional fees which are not included...and to direct them to a price list of standard, more common fees which are associated with additional services."
• Disclose in any documents relating to purported mergers and acquisitions whether the merger or acquisition was made by a corporate entity associated with Fletcher or other defendants.  (Historically, one of Fletcher's strategies for evading bad press online has been to claim that a new company name had just acquired the old company name[s].)
• Make available to the Attorney General records and documents pertaining to the implementation of the Settlement, for a period of two years.
• Hire--and pay for--an Independent Compliance Monitor, who for a period of one year will monitor and report on their compliance with the Settlement conditions.
• Pay $10,000 in court costs and attorneys' fees, and provide author restitution of $125,000 (and they cannot file for bankruptcy prior to payment). Only when payment is fully made will the Attorney General close the investigation and file for dismissal of the original lawsuit.

Unfortunately, there seems to be a problem with this final stipulation.

The terms of the Settlement Agreement require payment of the full monetary amount on signing. But while the $10,000 in court costs was paid timely--on February 14, 2014, when the final signature was obtained--the $125,000 in author restitution was not provided, nor did it appear after March 7, when the Attorney General's Office sent a courtesy reminder to Fletcher's lawyer.

Accordingly, on March 20, the Attorney General filed a motion for enforcement of the Settlement Agreement, and for entry of a final default judgment against Fletcher and the other defendants, including a $10,000 penalty. The motion was granted by the court on April 15 (the signed order can be seen here).

Information I've obtained indicates that as of Friday, May 9, the money was still outstanding.

Over the six years of the suit, Fletcher has phased out most of the corporate names included in the original complaint (though some remain, and there are a few legacy URLs--such as www.theliteraryagencygroup.com--that default to current websites, although their interior pages haven't been removed). At the moment, he's doing business (and charging fees) primarily as Strategic Book Publishing and Rights Agency [SBPRA] and Publish On Demand Global [PODG].

He hasn't lost his penchant for multiple business names, however. Other corporate names in use as of this writing include Best Selling Book Rights Agency, Literary & Rights Agency, Professional Publishing Press, ePubCo, Rapid Illustrations, Author Services International, Author Marketing Ideas, and Author Success Stories.

I have a hunch that the story isn't over yet. Stay tuned.

-----------------------

* In 2008, Fletcher filed a retaliatory lawsuit against Ann Crispin, James D. Macdonald, and myself, alleging defamation, loss of business, and emotional distress, and claiming that he was losing $25,000 per month due to our warnings about his business practices.

In March 2009, Fletcher's suit against Ann and myself was dismissed with prejudice by the Massachussetts Superior Court, due to Fletcher's failure to respond to discovery or otherwise prosecute the lawsuit. Subsequently, through counsel, we filed a motion seeking recovery of our legal fees and expenses.That motion was granted in July 2009. The full ruling can be seen here, but here's the salient portion:

The plaintiffs have exhibited extreme bad faith in bringing this frivolous lawsuit for the sole purpose of causing great expense and harassment to Crispin and Strauss. Fletcher expressly states that it was his purpose in his emails. The Court concludes and finds that this case was brought in bad faith by the plaintiffs for the mere purpose of causing great inconvenience and financial costs to Crispin and Strauss (as set out in Fletcher's pre-lawsuit emails to the defendants). This case is frivolous and this Court finds so, finds that the two plaintiffs and their lawyer, Jerrold G. Neeff, knew it was frivolous before it was even commenced. This Court rules that the defendants, Ann Crispin and Victoria Strauss, are entitled to have all their legal fees and expenses incurred paid to them by the plaintiffs, Robert Fletcher and The Literary Agency Group.

This Court finds the claims asserted by the plaintiffs to be wholly insubstantial, frivolous, and not advanced in good faith.

** Corporate Defendants included in the suit: The Literary Agency Group Inc., Writers Literary & Publishing Services, New York Literary Agency, The Children's Literary Agency, Poets' Literary Agency, The Christian Literary Agency, Writers Literary Screenplay Agency, Rapid Publishing-Screenwriter911 Inc., Rapid Publishing Inc., The Global Book Agency, American Enterprises Group LLC, The Writer's Literary & Publishing Company, American Enterprises Group Inc., AEG Publishing Group, Eloquent Books, Strategic Book Publishing, Strategic Book Marketing, Group AEG, and ST Literary Agency.

*** Fletcher aliases mentioned in the suit: Robert West, Robert Williams, Bill Williams, Beth Stormes, Georgina Orr, Mary Bluestone, and Hil Mallory. There are many more. In a 2009 sworn statement (obtained by Writer Beware via a public records request), Fletcher admitted to using as many as 75 different email addresses.

#sfwapro

Author Solutions Inc. Expands "Partridge" Brand to Singapore and Africa

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

On April 30, Author Solutions Inc. (currently the subject of a class action lawsuit by authors who allege, among other things, breach of contract and unjust enrichment) announced expansion of its Partridge brand to South Africa and surrounding nations with Partridge Africa.

This follows expansion in March to the Malaysia region with Partridge Singapore. Both new ventures are being launched in "partnership" with Penguin Random House's subsidiaries in those countries, and both--while not promising any crossover--heavily leverage the PRH connection.

I blogged last year about Partridge India, the first of the Partridge ventures. Since that time, Writer Beware has received complaints from Partridge authors who've had problems with quality and service, similar to those experienced by authors with other ASI brands. Some of those complaints can be seen in the comments on my post.

Given what I know about ASI's PR strategies, I'm not surprised to see that both Partridge Singapore and Partridge Africa offer affiliate programs that allow individuals and organizations to make money by "introducing" authors to the services. From Partridge Africa:

Every customer or member is a potential author—you just need to present them with the opportunity to publish through your store, meeting place, or website. Here’s how it works:
1. Sign Up. Simply click the link below to review the official rules and submit your information.

2. Promote Partridge Africa. Affiliates will receive—at no cost—all the marketing materials you need to get started. We will provide graphics you can use on your website. You can be assured that the people you refer will get the services they desire. The mission of Partridge Africa is to empower authors and help them fulfil their book-publishing goals.

3. Earn Revenue. How much you earn depends on your promotional efforts and the resulting referrals and authors who sign up to publish with Partridge Africa. But the more interested individuals you send our way, the more you can earn.

Class Action Lawsuit Against Author Solutions Inc.: Update

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

As I'm sure most readers of this blog know, self-publishing services provider Author Solutions Inc., along with its parent, Penguin Group, is currently the subject of a class action lawsuit, filed in May 2013 by the law firm Giskan Solotaroff Anderson & Stewart LLP.

Allegations include breach of contract, unjust enrichment, and violation of state statutes in California, New York, and Colorado.

In June 2013, ASI and Penguin filed for dismissal, labeling authors' complaints "a series of gripes" that would be better served by filing individual suits, and urging the court to toss all but the breach of contract claims against ASI, and to remove Penguin from the lawsuit entirely.

Legal maneuvering over the dismissal filings ensued over the following months (plaintiffs' Second Amended Complaint can be seen here), even as discovery proceeded on the contract claims.

Now Judge Denise Cote (the same Judge Cote who is in charge of the Apple ebook antitrust actions) has handed down a ruling that's good news for Penguin, but mostly a defeat for ASI. (The full ruling can be seen here.)

All claims against Penguin are dismissed.

Penguin is dismissed as a defendant in this action. The activities at issue here were undertaken by Author Solutions, a subsidiary of Penguin. Plaintiffs concede that they are not attempting to pierce the corporate veil in order to hold Penguin liable for Author Solutions’ actions. Accordingly, under basic corporate law principles, Penguin cannot be held liable for the alleged misconduct of Author Solutions.

ASI's motion to dismiss plaintiffs' unjust enrichment claims is granted in part and denied in part:

Plaintiffs allege two distinct forms of unjust enrichment by defendants. First, defendants unjustly profited by failing to pay royalties at the rate set forth in the contractual arrangement. Second, in failing to provide services that members of the class purchased without entering into a contract, defendants were unjustly enriched in the amount of the revenue received for those services.

Plaintiffs’ unjust enrichment claim as to unpaid royalties is dismissed. The royalty rate is governed by written contracts, which plaintiffs seek to enforce in their breach-of-contract claim. Accordingly, these royalties cannot be recovered under an unjust enrichment theory.

Plaintiffs’ unjust enrichment claim as to the non-contractual publishing services, however, is adequately pled. Unlike the claim regarding unpaid royalties, plaintiffs allege that there was no written contract setting forth the nature of the services for which they are seeking damages in their unjust enrichment claim.

ASI's motions to dismiss plaintiffs' claims of violation of various state statutes against deceptive acts and practices are denied. (Interestingly, in her discussion of ASI's alleged violation of New York General Business Law, Judge Cote cites New York State's 1999 lawsuit against fraudulent editing service Edit Ink.)

The surviving claims will now proceed to discovery, and the parties have submitted a proposed pre-trial schedule.

#sfwapro

Take the Money and Run: Kerry Jacobson, "Book Publicist"

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Starting in the summer of last year, self-published authors whose books made it onto Amazon's Movers and Shakers list began to receive solicitations from a publicist named Kerry Jacobson (here's an example).

Jacobson, who claimed more than eight years of experience boosting authors onto bestseller lists, promised a marketing push that would vault the authors' books onto the New York Times and USA Today lists, or propel them into Amazon's top ten. He also promised guidance and mentoring to help them make the most of the opportunity.

Jacobson's fees were enormous--a retainer of $2,500, $4,500, even $6,500--with, in some cases, a $10,000 "bonus" due after authors made the lists. Authors who tried to research him to verify his background and claims of success found little beyond a few social media profiles--and, somewhat worryingly, a number of defunct businesses.* But he was dynamic and persuasive--especially on the phone--and, in support of his services, offered a strong testimonial from one author who really had made the NYT list.** He also provided a money-back guarantee.

Many authors looked at Jacobson's fees and said "no thanks." But others bit. They signed contracts, sent funds, provided requested publicity materials, and waited for the promised mentoring and guidance to begin.

And waited.

Authors discovered that, after the initial setup, getting in touch with Jacobson was like pulling teeth. Basically, except for sending invoices, he never contacted them unless they contacted him first. To their questions and concerns, he offered excuses--he'd been sick, he'd been crazy busy--or promises that everything was good on his end. He also pushed back agreed-upon marketing dates--sometimes repeatedly--with vague but important-sounding explanations like "several big titles are being released that week, and I don't want your campaign to suffer from the sales competition."

As their designated campaign dates approached, authors began to be seriously concerned. But, as is often the case in such situations, they hung on to hope--plus, having already invested thousands of dollars, many felt that they had no choice but to stick. So they promoted the marketing push to readers and fans, paid for advertising, and prepared to lower their books' prices to 99 cents as demanded in Jacobson's contracts. When their launch weeks arrived, they held their breath and waited for their sales ranks to rise.

And waited.

Some authors told me that they did see a sales boost, which they attributed entirely to their own promotional efforts. But others' sales ranks barely budged--and either way, they got nothing even close to the mega-sales that Jacobson had led them to expect. As for Jacobson himself, he was MIA--no sign of any action at all on his end. Authors who contacted him to demand what the hell was going on got the same vague answers and promises as before: big sales would come "tomorrow." It was taking a while for the numbers to build. He was focusing on the end of the push week rather than the start, because that was the way to get sales to rise organically.

It was all B.S., of course. And when angry authors attempted to hold Jacobson to his money-back guarantee--either after their failed promos or after watching their friends crash and burn--I'm sure you can guess what happened.

The mess went public in early March of this year, when one furious author posted a webpage (since removed) about her experience. She sent me a link, I put out a call for contact, and a number of other Jacobson victims responded. They paid a variety of fees and were promised a variety of results, but otherwise their experiences are remarkably similar.

Jacobson seems to have gone to ground. He's removed his Twitter profile and I've had no word of any author solicitations past February. But his AuthorBub website (which promises promotion to a claimed 2.4 million email list for the low, low price of $2,800), is still online--and people who get started in the author-fleecing business have a tendency to come back for more. So I wouldn't be surprised if he reappears at some point.

* Jacobson is or has been the officer or the registered agent for a number of other Florida-based businesses, including Venture Direct Worldwide, Generation Health, Tank Top Media, KnowSomebody.com, Ovid Consulting, Collaborative Push, Mile High Swap, Pernax, and Invitation Only.

** I've corresponded with the author, who told me that Jacobson was not responsible for her book's appearance on the NYT list, and that her testimonial was presented out of context.

Jacobson also claimed to have been the "project manager" for the marketing campaign for Jordan S. Rubin's The Maker's Diet, which he said spent 47 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. The book and its bestseller status are real (although not necessarily its science; the same year the book was published, Rubin's company, Garden of Life Inc., was ordered by the FDA to stop making unsubstantiated claims about some of its products and supplements). A "Kerry Jacobson" is mentioned in the "thank yous" in the front matter of The Maker's Diet, but I could find nothing to verify Jacobson's specific claims.

Another Small Press Horror Story: Silver Publishing is Gone

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Another small press disaster came to an ugly conclusion last week.

In mid-2012, I began getting complaints about Silver Publishing, which started up in 2009 as a self-publishing facilitator, but in 2010 transformed itself into a "traditional royalty-paying press" (I put that in quotes because, these days, it means so little).

Reported problems included poor editing, delayed and missing royalty statements/payments, royalty reductions due to claimed "overpayments," arbitrary changes in royalty payment schedules, and lack of communication--or, alternatively, rude responses to authors' questions and concerns. (See the Silver Publishing thread at Absolute Write for examples.)

All signs of a publisher in, if not terminal disarray, at least trouble.

Silver's owner, South African-born Lodewyk M. Deysel, made an appearance at Absolute Write in August 2012 to aggressively deny negative reports. By November of that same year, however, he was admitting in company email that there was "a deficit when it comes to paying our royalties"--in part, apparently, because he'd spent royalty income on business and other expenses. His solution: putting authors on a "partial payment plan" or giving them the option to terminate their contracts--contingent, in at least certain cases, on payment of a fee. Other authors, fed up, took matters into their own hands and hired lawyers to negotiate the return of rights or to compel payment.

Silver limped on through 2013, despite a lack of improvement on the financial front and mounting author dissatisfaction. Then, in March of 2014, Deysel abruptly announced that Silver's "South African division" would be closing* and its "US division" had been sold. The purchaser? A company called Empire Entertainment, LLC, a Wyoming corporation registered less than a year previously. According to an email sent to Silver authors by the alleged new owners, Empire was "new to the publishing industry and excited about the future of the company."

Is this starting to sound familiar?

Not surprisingly, authors were suspicious. Why, they wondered, did Empire Entertainment have no website and zero web presence? Why was it registered with Wyoming Corporate Services, a company specializing in the establishment of shelf corporations, that was the subject of a damaging Reuters expose? Who would pay good money, anyway, for a publisher in so much financial trouble?

Well, we all know what happens when authors start asking inconvenient questions. On April 8, Deysel announced that the (probably entirely bogus) sale had fallen through "due to the unrest among the author base which represents Silver Publishing LLC's value." Uh huh. Deysel claimed to be consulting with Silver's attorney to figure out what came next.

Apparently, "what came next" was absconding to South Africa. Just a few days later, Silver author A.J. Llewellyn broke the news: Deysel was gone. With him went any hope of payment for Silver authors (though at least it appears that rights reversion letters are going out). A notice on Silver's website indicates that it will go offline permanently on May 1; it's being left up only so that people who bought books can still download them.

A.J.'s lengthy blog post unpacks the whole sordid story of Deysel and Silver, including illegal entry into the USA, spending sprees with authors' money, secret deals to pay some authors but not others, altered royalty reports, and more. I can't corroborate most of the information cited--unlike the recent debacle with Entranced Publishing, and unfolding problems at another press I'll be blogging about shortly, I've heard from only a handful of Silver authors, and no former staff members--but given what I do know, the allegations seem plausible. A.J. has posted a followup that references Deysel's alleged prior legal troubles in South Africa. A group of Silver authors plans to pursue Deysel in hopes of bringing him to justice.** I hope they succeed.

So what's the takeaway here?

Silver was in business long past the "wait a year" precaution for small press publishers. Looking at it from the outside, authors could reasonably have assumed it was stable. Also, complaints didn't really start surfacing until well into 2012, nearly two years after Silver started up--so at least at first, authors trying to research the company wouldn't have found anything (and once complaints did start surfacing, authors trying to go public not only received pressure from the publisher, but were apparently pilloried by their fellow Silver authors, so there were probably fewer complaints to be found than there might otherwise have been).

However, for approximately half of Silver's existence, multiple reports of problems existed online; and if you'd contacted Writer Beware, we would have given you a warning. So for at least part of the time, the information was there to be found. Yet authors kept signing up.

Any publisher can go bad. You can't always predict which ones. And if a bad publisher is diligent about quashing complaints, or has a firm base of loyalists, it may not be easy to find out about even substantial problems. But that doesn't change the vital importance of thoroughly researching any publisher you're thinking of using--and just as important,  researching it BEFORE submitting, rather than waiting until later. Don't trust your ability to say no to a contract once it has been offered. I've heard from too many authors who delayed due diligence, and, in the flush of acceptance, closed their eyes to warning signs.

* Was there ever really a South African division? The company was originally registered in South Africa, and Deysel claimed that it was based there--something that, as he was no doubt aware, made legal action for his primarily US-based authors difficult--and that he was based there as well. According to A.J. Lewellyn, however, Deysel was living in the USA from 2006 on--and from 2011 on, Silver was registered in Michigan and Delaware.

** Will Deysel, like so many bad publishers, start up again under a different name? He may already have been contemplating doing so back in 2013, when Gia Press (its website is gone, but its domain registration remains; note the name server) popped up on people's radar.

#sfwapro

How to Succeed in Authorship Without Really Trying

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Got the yen to write a book, but lack that essential creative spark? Looking to ride the coattails of the Kindle self-publishing craze, but don't want to bother with all that pesky scribbling? Want an author to create a story for you, but don't know where to find one?

Fret no more. The Internet's got you covered.

Here, for instance, would-be but inspiration-challenged authors can "Cash In on the Kindle Fiction Publishing Craze" by purchasing a "MASSIVE SET OF PRE-WRITTEN FICTION PLOTS."

That's right! A diligent ghostwriter and her crack writing team are offering "THIRTY-SIX plots in one huge package!" For only $27! Romance, erotica, science fiction, fantasy...it's all here, ready to use. Just add a touch of butt-in-chair, bolstered by this helpful advice:

So, how do you actually USE these plots?

First of all, do NOT publish them as-is! Even though some of the plots are almost short stories by themselves, they are not meant to be published in their current form.

Instead, you will use the plots as a guideline and change up different parts to make your own unique story. No two people will write these plots just alike. Change the character names and descriptions. Change the setting. Change the time period, careers of the characters and any number of other plot points.

Don't want to go to even that much effort? Buy Now Books will sell you an entire completed book, ready to upload to KDP or another self-publishing platform of your choice. No research required! No creativity necessary! No writing at all!! Just content, ready to use. You get plenty of extras, too:

In your book package you get the following files:

a. Microsoft Word Source Documents for Print & Digital.
b. EPUB, MOBI and Web PDF versions for your Digital Book.
c. Print PDF for Large Print & Trade Paperback Books.
d. Book Detail File including all Metadata need to publish your book.
e. 5 300 DPI Images that are used inside your book.
f. Cover Art: An eBook Cover, Large Print and Trade Paperback Cover & Audio Book Cover.(includes PSD files for editing)
g. 7,500 Words of Unique Content inside your book.

Prepare for a hit to your bank account, though--these "book packages" cost a cool $397.

(Buy Books Now is at pains to explain that it's not a PLR scheme:

We don’t use any PLR. These books are created with unique content written by our own in house writers. The book is created and SOLD ONLY ONCE. After that the files are deleted from our harddrive and you are now the sole owner of the book, the content and the copyright attached.

Good to know your "ghostwritten" ebook won't trigger Amazon's inappropriate content algorithms.)

And then there's StoryMondo, which crowdsources the whole "get it written for you" thing. They take requests for stories and/or poems, do an email blast to writers who've signed up to receive notifications (and some who haven't--me, for instance), and let the customer choose from among the submitted works.

Just the thing for seekers of bizarre egoboo. For example,

Our customer is Jason Womack who is a leading workplace performance and productivity expert. Jason is based in Ojai near Los Angeles, California and he runs a company that provides seminars, executive coaching and team performance programs. Jason has also written a book “Your Best Just Got Better” and he produces a weekly podcast.

Jason’s requirements for a story are:

• Stories only (unfortunately no poems for this request)
• Maximum length of 1,500 words
• Jason Womack must be the protagonist and the story plot must fit with what The Jason Womack Company does
• Any genre is OK – but the story must be suitable for distribution to customers of The Jason Womack Company
• Can be set anywhere in the world or have multiple locations
• Some inspiration is http://vimeo.com/87092997 and http://vimeo.com/90717681

The writer of the winning story gets $250. The writers of the rejected stories get nothing.

(This, by the way, is the same Jason Womack who is running a "make money publishing" workshop at the Ojai Wordfest. Will he be advising writers to use StoryMondo?)

Thus endeth this bulletin from the weird fringes of the brave new digital world.