What do you think of faking your identity as an author? And then winning $1 million Euro?
In a recent contest, three men revealed themselves to be the writers of Carmen Mola's novel "The Beast". They received Spain's 2021 Premio Planeta $1 million Euro award for their novel. It "came as a surprise" when they stood up to take their award. For an award worth more than the Nobel Prize, it seems odd more than curious that no one seemed to have done any due diligence on the author(s) before the ceremony.
Really? That can't be the case, can it? It can't have been a "surprise". You don't just let anyone in the door of a $1 million Euro award ceremony. And the story is carried by countless news organizations as the surprise reveal.
“Quite apart from using a female pseudonym, these guys have spent years doing interviews,” Beatriz Gimeno, a former head of the Women’s Institute, wrote on Twitter after the award’s announcement. “It’s not just the name — it’s the fake profile that they’ve used to take in readers and journalists. They are scammers.”
How were interviews with the author conducted? In writing, with "representatives", or by an impersonator? Finding an interview has proved difficult. Everything to be retrieved is about this "3 for 1" sleight of authorship at the ceremony.
Margaret Atwood's response: "A great publicity stunt". I search enough and find an article HERE that reveals the facts that Atwood is alluding to.
"Supposedly “The Beast” was first submitted for consideration for the prize under a different pseudonym; the authors then attributed the work to Mola. The prize is awarded to an unpublished manuscript, which, as part of the terms, must be produced by Planeta Group’s publishing house." More on publishing house award scams tomorrow.
The publisher says that they were aware the author's name was a pseudonym and the "real writer" wanted to be anonymous. "The publisher said she could not comment on when she knew that Mola was really Jorge Díaz, Agustín Martínez and Antonio Mercero. The secret was always part of the process, even after The Purple Network came out in 2019 and The Girl in 2020."
And the real revelation - a quote from one of the authors: “We’ve been lying like dogs for four years and several months,” laughed Díaz. “It’s been a long time since [I published my own] last novel, and more than one person had chided me for not writing anything else, for being lazy. And I would think, ‘If only you knew...’
Would you agree that they are Scammers? Con artists? Here's a definition of con artist:
a person who cheats or tricks others by persuading them to believe something that is not true. "the debonair con artist lives by scamming rich women"
Look at the synonyms to see the dark side: hustler, sharpie, shark, flimflammer, confidence-man, bunco, clip artist, cheater, fleecer, fraud and hoser. I think we're on to something.All the pictures show these three writers so pleased with themselves. Maybe I am being too generous in applying con artist.
Here's a Plaid City image that seems to go with the story.
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