Writing, Self-Publishing, Book Marketing

Double Checking Material

September 29, 2009 at 2:31 pm luckymogwai Leave a comment

In an effort to complete manuscripts and get them ready for publishing, authors often miss a few important steps that can make the difference between a wildly successful book and a cautionary tale of what not to do.  Certainly no one can begrudge an author for feeling elated after finally completing a work that has consumed his or her life for a long period of time.  However, it is important to take pause and evaluate your completed work.

The most common, and most important, thing authors need to check for after the completion of his or her work is that there are no content concerns that could lead to future legal headaches.  There are three major ways there could be hidden problems in your manuscript: invasion of privacy, libel and copyright infringement.  If you don’t already have a firm grasp of these, or even if you do and want a little reminder, please look through your manuscript to make sure it does not fall into one of these three categories.

Invasion of Privacy: An invasion of privacy lawsuit can occur when a living individual feels the right to control personal information has been violated, causing emotional distress caused by those statements. There are various categories of invasion of privacy, but for publishing purposes, those that apply include: the disclosure of private facts that a reasonable person would find objectionable; publication of facts that portray the individual in a false light, even if the facts themselves are not libelous; and appropriation, or the unauthorized use of a person’s name or likeness.  Even if you change a person’s name in your book, that won’t be enough to protect you if there is enough in the story for a reader to deduce who the person is.

Libel: Libel is the written form of defamation of character, while slander is the spoken form.  Defamation of character and libel are any false statements that could hurt the reputation of a living individual, company, entity or institution. If you make a libelous claim in your manuscript and publish it, an individual or party has the right to take legal action against you to sue for a monetary sum.  Although truth does negate a libel claim, it can be extremely hard to prove in court, as well as time consuming and costly. Additionally, truth does not protect you from invasion of privacy suits.

Copyright Infringement: A copyright infringement lawsuit can occur when copyrighted materials, such as quotes, pictures, excerpts, etc. are used in a work without permission from the copyright holder. Any material obtained from a book, newspaper, magazine, the Internet, an artist, photographer, or another author is copyright protected by law, even if it is an unpublished work.  This also includes any clip art images that come with your word processing software.

If you feel you are not sure whether you fall into one of these categories, please speak with someone who is a copyright specialist.  Or, for more information you can visit the U.S. Copyright Office website at http://www.copyright.gov/.  Remember, it is better to take precautions early on to avoid any future legal conflicts.

-Michael F.

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