The Lucrative World of Literary Scams — The Dial

“Hello Professor Snigdha Poonam,” the email began. I read that again. Nobody has ever called me “professor” for the obvious reason that I am not a professor. Bracing myself, I read on.The email was from Timothy Firth, organizer of a Seattle-based life-drawing community with 1,943 members that regularly has “thoughtful discussions inspired by creative works.” A recent inspiration was my first book, Dreamers: How Young Indians Are Changing Their World. The group wanted to discuss it, the email said, at one of its upcoming meetups. Attendees would be encouraged to post reviews on Goodreads and Amazon after.I looked up CAM Life Drawing and found an events page and an Instagram account. The latter had some photos of Timothy Firth — white, male — as well as testimonials from members who said he worked “day and night to create more community space.” Something told me this wasn’t the man who had reached out to me.Why would a hyperlocal life-drawing community in Seattle be interested in a nonfiction book about the shifting aspirations of young people in India’s small towns?  The book was published seven years ago. What did they want from me?This was undoubtedly a scam. Genuine book clubs don’t ask for money from authors. But who was behind it?I accepted the invitation. The next email had a slick poster promoting the Zoom event, with the book cover as the backdrop and blurbs from the Economist and other publications. My attention was drawn to something more intriguing: a request for a “contribution fee,” with no amount specified. It would cover promotion, coordination and administration. But, oddly, this email didn’t come from Timothy. Signing off this time was Stephen — “Organizer, Community Improv LA,” another group in another city. According to the improv community’s Facebook group, Stephen is indeed the name of the organizer. However, Stephen had written to me using Timothy’s email address. To add to the chaos, Stephen/Timothy had also left what I suspect was an AI prompt in the email, which included the line: “MAKE IT MORE PROFESSIONAL.”This was undoubtedly a scam. Genuine book clubs don’t ask for money from authors. But who was behind it?Had these individuals actually read my work, they would have wanted to stay away from me. I have spent the last 10 years reporting on transnational fraud. My first book, Dreamers, closed with a chapter on fake call centers in India; my second, Scamlands, traveled to other low-income countries in Asia to portray an invisible empire that thrives on inequality, technological change and the erosion of trust.Along the way, I met and interviewed the scammers whose labor keeps this empire running. For some, fraud was a route to upward mobility; for others, an act of revenge against the privileged. Though I have formally emerged from this underworld, I can never delete a scam email without wanting to know more.I agreed to pay the book club — but after rather than before the event. After clarifying that “Stephen” was a typing error, “Timothy” sent me a Google Meet link for the book discussion. I joined the meeting to find some 20 people already in there: Alexander, Andrew, Mira, Rajnish, another Alexander, and several others. Timothy was also there and so was Stephen. None of them had their cameras on. Going by the profile pictures they used, most of them appeared to be white.Then the questions began.“Professor, what was your inspiration for writing Dreamers?”“Professor, what did you learn while reporting from Indian small towns?”“Professor, what surprised you?”While the questions may have been AI-generated, the voices seemed human. They did not always align with their pictures. Timothy seemed to be a woman, not a man, judging by the voice. Who were these people? They left only one clue. All these ostensibly white people, men and women, spoke with a West African accent.✺I’m not the only author to have found myself stuck in a Zoom book club with fake readers. Countless writers with published books have been receiving invitations from reading communities that start to unravel after a basic Google search.As often happens with scams, most invitations sound too good to be true — thousands of members, incredible Goodreads clout, and, at times, something even more alluring for an author: a deep understanding of their book.Many authors spot red flags from the first email onward, but not all.One author who engaged with a book-club impersonator was told a $100 contribution for the online event would cover snacks for the participants; she withdrew without asking how they would partake of the snacks while on Zoom. Novelist Marsh Rose, playing along, exchanged 29 emails with the Chicago LGBTQ Book Club. “The individuals whose voices I heard on the Zoom didn’t seem to be speaking from Chicago. They all sounded like my friend in Nigeria,” she wrote in a blog post for WritersWeekly.com, an online resource for authors that offers writing opportunities and industry news.Writers are also being bombarded with offers to publish our next book, market our book, handle social media for us, represent us as agents, and get us book-to-movie deals with Netflix and Paramount. Every major publisher, agent, editor, author union, or literary award executive is at risk of being impersonated.Angela Hoy, the founder of WritersWeekly.com, told me she is in touch with “authors all day long, every day thinking they got an offer from one of the top five publishers in New York or thinking they’ve been contacted by a famous literary agent.”The money requested often seems small. “Amounts reported to me range from $55 to $350. In one case, the scammer offered three ‘spotlight packages’: Basic, Essential, and Premium, for between $100 and $200,” Victoria Strauss, co-founder of Writer Beware, an anti-scam watchdog, wrote in a blog post. Often, the paper trail leads to Nigerian third parties holding bank accounts in America. Author Jon Cocks paid $478.65 to one “Mary Brown,” who claimed a wide network of book clubs across the U.S., the U.K. and Australia, only to later notice the name Dayo Oguntuase listed as the recipient on the PayPal statement.The Writers’ Guild of Great Britain (WGGB) reports “an explosion” in the number of members seeking advice about unusually enticing offers in recent months. “Even the most vigilant of writers are understandably falling prey to these scams,” WGGB General Secretary Ellie Piers said in a statement commenting on new guidance, co-issued with the Society of Authors, to help authors protect themselves against scammers in May. “Our Advisory team receives at least a dozen reports of scams each week,” Anna Ganley, the Society of Authors CEO, said in her own statement, tracing the spike to the emergence of generative AI. The U.S. Authors Guild says it hears from authors who have been scammed, or nearly scammed, every day. Angela Hoy, the founder of WritersWeekly.com, told me she is in touch with “authors all day long, every day thinking they got an offer from one of the top five publishers in New York or thinking they’ve been contacted by a famous literary agent.”A prominent trendsetter was the PageTurner scam, named after a fictitious U.S.-registered publishing company that operated between 2017 and 2024. Call center staff in Cebu claimed PageTurner was an intermediary between authors and literary agents, film studios and streaming services and persuaded authors to pay so-called taxes, transaction fees and other costs before their books could be published or adapted.The scale of the operation became clear after U.S. authorities launched an investigation into the business. According to the Justice Department, more than 800 authors were defrauded of upwards of $48 million. Writer Beware received hundreds of complaints about PageTurner. One author reportedly lost more than $600,000. The prosecutors found that at least $42 million in proceeds were laundered through accounts in the Philippines. One defendant pleaded guilty in May of this year, while three others are awaiting trial.Judging by the surge in both the number and range of baits used on authors over the past couple of years, the scams seem to be launched from multiple territories. Anyone who has researched publishing would know most authors don’t have bundles of cash lying around. So, why are the scammers coming after us?Hoy, who has dealt with thousands of writers at WritersWeekly.com, puts it down to ego. Brian Whiddon, the site’s managing editor, elaborated: “Not every author is a narcissist, but they all want to be recognized. … That’s exactly what these scammers are targeting. They have identified a very, very lucrative niche.”Writers are waiting “for somebody to read their writing,” Hoy added. She argued that is why many writers believe the praise scammers heap on them. AI makes many of the compliments sound nuanced and personalized. Elderly authors are particularly vulnerable. As Hoy explained, a significant number of people who have a book in them leave off the writing until they have retired. Something else also kicks into the picture at this life stage: a sizable retirement fund. Scammers know American people have worked their whole lives and have retirement accounts, Hoy said.Some authors are so hell-bent on signing up for the deals the scammers promise that they disregard Hoy’s counsel. Others come to Hoy when it’s too late. She has said one of the writers in her community paid more than $100,000 for a fake book-to-movie deal.“I've actually used some of the verbiage from these emails talking about how fantastic my book is in my advertising,” author Donna Strong commented in the Goodreads discussion forum Readers Group Scams.