Watching the shitstorm.

A large percentage of my Facebook friends are in the horror community. Over the last few days, there has been a bit of a shitstorm. A horror writer announced that he was leaving the field because of how he'd been treated for complaining about not being paid by a small but prestigious horror publisher.

Apparently, most writers had been too afraid to speak up. Once the damn broke, a flood of stories came spilling out about said publisher. Not just about not being paid, but about being mistreated.

Ironically, the whole thing started with some of the followers of said publisher jumping on the writer. Slowly, but surely, the worm turned. Now the publisher is definitely on the defensive. To the point where you wonder if it will survive.

Trouble with this, of course, is that a lot of innocent writers are also going to be harmed. On the other hand, such behavior needs to be held to account.

I've stayed out of it, because I've never dealt with the publisher in question.

The small press horror community exists because the major publishers more or less turned their backs on horror. (It still seems ironic that a genre that includes Stephen King, Dean Koontz, and Clive Barker, and a seemingly endless tide of Netflix horror movies could be considered too small to bother with.)

Small publishers came along to pick up the slack, but like the many comic and game and bookstores I've seen over the last 40 years (including mine) they are under-capitalized to say the least. Many are unprofessional.

I've had three publishers fold from under me. Fortunately, all of them had the integrity to pay what they owed and to release me from contracts. One of my current publishers--Crossroads Press-- pays me monthly, which I think is pretty much unheard of.

It just seems to be part of the business these days.

Even though I'm not involved--despite being Facebook friends--I'm sort of an outsider. I mean, I was really impressed about how my books were accepted by the horror community, but I haven't met any of these writers or publishers in real life.

The drama is fascinating, like watching a car wreck. I just saw a fatal car crash a couple of days ago--it went by in a blink and I had the feeling of being a spectator, of also watching it all happen in slow-motion as if from a distance.

Life is messy.