The Paladin Group has filed a complaint with the California Labor Commission against the RSWG Literary Agency and its agent Geoffrey Sanford. Paladin claims that neither RSWG nor Sanford are licensed agents or attorneys under California law, and thus illegally took 20 percent commissions for licensing the late John Steinbeck’s literary works.

Before getting into the complaint, let me first walk you through what literary agents do to get a better idea why Paladin is suing RSWG.

What is a Literary Agent?

Literary agents are an author’s first step toward publication, and they are essential to the publishing process unless an author decides to self-publish. It’s extremely difficult to land one since hundreds of thousands of books are published each year. If an author obtains a literary agent, that person helps with the manuscript and/or proposal before pitching the book to acquiring editors. Auctions, or bidding wars, can occur if multiple editors want the book and believe it can be a best seller; however, most books get acquired by one editor who expresses interest.

The author then signs an author agreement with the editor’s publishing company, which states the author’s advance (i.e., how much the publisher is paying the author for his book before royalties), grants (usually) the author the copyright to his or her literary work, and gives the literary agent a 10-15 percent commission. The literary agent’s commission can be peanuts if a book’s advance is say, $10,000, which is an average debut novelist’s advance.  However, take Bill Clinton’s advance, which was reportedly more than $10 million. Who wouldn’t want 10-15 percent of that?  Thus, it is easy to see why agents are extremely picky about who they represent because best-selling authors can generate the agent millions of dollars.

What is a Co-Agent?

However, that isn’t the end of the road for an agent’s and author’s potential revenue. When a book publisher grants an author the copyright to his literary work, the author receives a bundle of exclusive rights (e.g., motion picture, television, audio book, e-book, large print, Braille, book club, abridgements, first serial, second serial, etc.) to do with what she pleases. Usually, the author’s agent hires a co-agent or sub-agent to license these rights, which are known as subsidiary rights in the book publishing industry, to third parties.

Sub-agents may specialize in licensing certain rights.  For example, a sub-agent may license rights of an author’s book, such as motion picture rights to help get a novel adapted as a feature film. More frequently, however, sub-agents try to sell an author’s book in countries around the world. You may have seen book covers with the words, “Published in 37 Countries.” You can thank sub-agents for that. Sub-agents generate commissions of 10 – 20 percent depending on the right that is licensed.

Enter Steinbeck

In Steinbeck’s case, Steinbeck’s literary agency is McIntosh and Otis, which is located in New York City.  McIntosh and Otis hired RSWG as a sub-agent, and RSWG negotiated motion picture rights for remakes of Steinbeck’s “Grapes of Wrath” and “East of Eden” and received 20 percent commissions for its services.

According to the Hollywood Reporter, the Paladin Group, created by Thomas Steinbeck who is Steinbeck’s only living son, argues that RSWG had no right to negotiate the motion picture rights for “Grapes of Wrath” and “East of Eden” without the Paladin Group’s consent.

Attorney William Briggs who spoke on RSWG’s behalf, however, argued that the heirs of the Scott family are the rightful owners of Steinbeck’s literary works, so the Paladin Group could not object to RSWG’s negotiations. In 1968, Steinbeck left the majority of his estate to his third wife, Edith Scott, who died in 2003, and left all of Steinbeck’s rights to her heirs.

Briggs also alleges that the Paladin Group misunderstands California law because there is no rule that RSWG must be licensed to sell rights of Steinbeck’s literary works.

Although I do not have access to the Paladin Group’s complaint, the company is rightly concerned about RSWG’s actions. The Paladin Group receives a portion of revenue for every license that is negotiated for Steinbeck’s works, so it is invested in who licenses that work. If RSWG is not properly licensed, the license agreements are null and void and the Paladin Group receives no money. However, even if RSWG is licensed, the Paladin Group may have been able to receive more money than what RSWG negotiated. The 20 percent commissions that RSWG received are likely a huge number, but given that Steinbeck is a Nobel Prize-winning novelist, the price for remaking motion picture rights for any of his works, let alone “Grapes of Wrath” and “East of Eden” — two of his most popular books — can be potentially millions more.

Hence the value of choosing a literary agent and sub-agent.

Joseph Perry

Joseph Perry is a graduate of St. John’s University School of Law whose goal is to become a publishing and media law attorney. He has interned at William Morris Endeavor, Rodale, Inc., Columbia University Press, and is currently interning at Hachette Book Group and volunteering at the Media Law Resource Center, which has given him insight into the legal aspects of the publishing and media industries. Contact Joe at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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Rachel Ann Nunes may not have made it to your personal library (or maybe she did — I don’t know what you read), but she apparently made it to Tiffani Rushton’s. Nunes is the author of, among other books, a Christian novel entitled A Bid for Love. Third grade teacher (that is pretty irrelevant to the story, but somehow makes what I am about to say that much worse) Rushton read the book and had a thought.

“What,” I assume she asked herself, “could make this Christian novel even better?” And then, light bulb! She knew the answer!

Graphic sex scenes!

Because, of course, every book is made better with graphic sex scenes.

Now that she had her million dollar idea, she just ran with it. She wrote The Auction Deal – an e-book that, from what I gather, is basically just A Bid for Love with the aforementioned sex. Unfortunately for her, Nunes somehow got a hold of the novel and was not left as satisfied as all that sex was supposed to make her.

Courtesy of Tumblr.

So, she sued Rushton claiming plagiarism.

Perhaps Rushton had an agenda here. She is, after all, a third grade teacher. And the best way to remember things is if you have a real world example, right? So, maybe ‘plagiarize’ was going to make the weekly vocabulary list and Rushton had the perfect example sentence for her students…

“For word three: plagiarize. It means to act like somebody else’s ideas are your ideas. For example, when Ms. Rushton added detailed sex scenes to someone else’s story and then said she wrote the whole book, she plagiarized, which is why she probably will lose a whole lot of money in court.”

I bet a lot of students will get that one right come test day, so Ms. Rushton might just deserve teacher of the month.

Assuming education was not her main goal, though, did she really plagiarize? I wanted to see just exactly how closely these books were related. To that end, I went to my favorite store, Amazon, to look up the descriptions of these books. Here is what I found –

A Bid for Love:

Cassi is the head buyer for a prestigious art gallery in California. Jared is a buyer for an exclusive New York gallery. Sparks fly as the two come head to head in a bidding war for a hideous but very expensive Indian Buddha. Cassi and Jared are both determined to win the statue, but others also want the Buddha—at any cost. Thugs, art forgers, the FBI, or Jared’s beautiful and alluring boss . . . who will end up with the statue? During a string of hair-raising exploits, Cassi and Jared are forced to develop a tentative friendship that deepens into romance. Will they survive long enough to see it through? Best-selling author Rachel Ann Nunes has crafted a wonderfully intriguing and romantic drama in this fast-moving novel, bringing two idealistic people together from opposite edges of the continent and allowing them, in their own way, to find an unexpected connection to their Christian faith and each other. In the end, their very lives depend on the trust they’ve developed. If you love romance and excitement, you’ll be captivated by A Bid for Love.

The Auction Deal:

Huh. A search for this book (and Tiffani Rushton) just brings back results for A Bid for Love. Okay. So that doesn’t help. Because I have nothing to give you from Amazon, and I am much too lazy to see if other sources have a description, I am forced to write my own idea of what this book is about (completely out of my head and with no help from any other source):

Cassi Ella is the head buyer for a prestigious art gallery in California. Jared Lance is a buyer for an exclusive New York Chicago gallery. Sparks fly as the two come head to head in a bidding war for a hideous but very expensive Indian Buddha. Cassi and Jared Ella and Lance are both determined to win the statue, but others also want the Buddha—at any cost. Thugs, art forgers, the FBI, or JaredLance’s beautiful and alluring boss . . . who will end up with the statue? During a string of hair-raising exploits, Cassi and Jared Ella and Lance are forced to develop a tentative friendship that deepens into romance. Will they survive long enough to see it through? Best-selling author Rachel Ann Nunes Tiffani Rushton has crafted a wonderfully intriguing and romantic drama in this fast-moving novel, bringing two idealistic people together from opposite edges of the continent and allowing them, in their own way, to find an unexpected connection to their Christian faith and each other by having hot graphic sex. In the end, their very lives depend on the trust they’ve developed. If you love romance and excitement, you’ll be captivated by A Bid for Love The Auction Deal. 

Hmm. I don’t know if I am convinced these sound that much alike. I guess we will all have to wait with bated breath for the sinewy, devil-may-care judge to slowly but powerfully pound his long gavel…

Courtesy of Tumblr.

…and give us his ruling.

(Here is a real summary of Rushton’s book from Goodreads. As you will note, the full title appears to be NOT A BOOK: The Auction Deal.)

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Ashley Shaw (@Smoldering_Ashes) is an Alabama native and current New Jersey resident. A graduate of both Kennesaw State University and Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, she spends her free time reading, writing, boxing, horseback riding, playing trivia, flying helicopters, playing sports, and a whole lot else. So maybe she has too much spare time.

Feature Image courtesy of [Stephen Coles via Flickr]

Ashley Shaw

Ashley Shaw is an Alabama native and current New Jersey resident. A graduate of both Kennesaw State University and Thomas Goode Jones School of Law, she spends her free time reading, writing, boxing, horseback riding, playing trivia, flying helicopters, playing sports, and a whole lot else. So maybe she has too much spare time. Contact Ashley at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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