Wicked Pretty Update

[cleolinda]

Quick recap: Jessica Verday dropped out of the "Melissa Marr-ish" Wicked Pretty Things YA anthology after being asked to change a "G-rated" male/male romance to male/female. The editor, Trisha Telep, made a bizarrely cheerful non-apology; Running Press claimed to both support LGBTQ writing and stand behind the editor 100%. Out of thirteen stories

Comments

[bienegold]

I can certainly think of various reasons why they can't let her go, but their use of the word support kind of boggles me.

[cleolinda]

Yeahhhh... she's done so many books with them that I suspect there's some personal attachment there. I mean, if a good friend of mine had gotten caught up in this, I would have to sit down and think very carefully about how to say what needed to be said next.

I'm not sure "We stand behind her 100%" would have been it, though.

[crantz]

"I'll have a word" tends to be what I say.

This is very ineffectual as a PR statement, however.

[cleolinda]

They've contracted her for a certain number of editorial anthology jobs, maybe? For all we know, they're sitting there with lawyers trying to figure out how to break that contract. Or trying to gently talk her into dissolving it.

This may also be why some of the other writers haven't responded yet (besides the fact that it's the weekend). If someone has an ongoing relationship with Running Press, trying to get out of the anthology could be really, really awkward. There may be some phone tag going on, some "let me talk to my lawyer on Monday," who even knows.

[sadlikeknives]

Hell, for all we know she could be a major shareholder in the company or something extra-messy like that.