Young Writers con

donquine

Similar thing happened when I was eight... The difference was, I knew the poem I had written was not particularly good, knew all of my classmates were getting their work published too and thought the whole thing was a con. My mum bought a copy anyway! Still think she has it somewhere...

mjm3346

From another thread on this

Mumto5 wrote: »

Mine too - what a small world. Incidentally the whole class has won bar the 2 kids who were absent on the day the poems were done.

To do the maths......

25 kids x a minimum of £15.99 = £399.75

or to put a really rosy glow on it with all the pride from the parents

25 dids x 2 books for a third free of £31.98 £799.50

Nice work if you can get it.

mjm3346 wrote: »

I wonder how much of a "kickback" the schools get?

Even for "vanity" publishing a large print run reduces costs. The, presumably hardback with posh bindings, book will include far more than just the 25 in the class (if it does not then it is little more than a pamphlet and even more overpriced than it first appears).

At on-line photo shops you can create for example a "deluxe diary" including over 150 of your own photographs @ less than £18.50 each or less than £16.50 for 20+.
One poem £15.99!

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.php?t=328177

Pilkingtonpost

Wow sorry to hear about the problems caused by this company:/

whitegoods_engineer

Sounds like a similar scam of baby photo 'competitions' where Mothers are told that their baby is being entered for a competition whereas it is in fact a slick way of getting people to buy an expensive set of photos.

Vik_36

Same thing happened to me, we ordered 3 of the books and still haven't received them :mad:

I wish I'd have seen this thread about it being the whole class winning! what a scam!

jess1974

Well lo and behold we got another letter from these jokers yesterday saying my sons ghost story has been selected from thousands of entries for publication, what a con its going straight into the fire....

no-oneknowsme

jess1974 wrote: »

Well lo and behold we got another letter from these jokers yesterday saying my sons ghost story has been selected from thousands of entries for publication, what a con its going straight into the fire....

Is that wise?

Surely the best thing to do is to sign the consent form , send it back and let them publish your Son's poem in their book.

Its only a con if you actually have to BUY the book

The fact that you could have a poem belonging to your Son published in the book is good enough reason to give your consent.

cambelt2001

I had my doubts about 'youngwriters.com' but this and other posts found on the internet confirm my suspicions. My son was really excited when we received the letter in the post saying he had been selected from 20,000 other children etc etc.. I thought it odd as he is not exactly top of the class at this sort of thing. I told him well done and he immediately told other relatives. He then went to school very excited and wanted to tell his teacher except he had to get in the queue as his other class mates had also been 'selected'. Any other scheme like this would have gone in the bin but to get children's hopes up by tugging at their parents/guardians heartstrings is shameful. Luckily I would not part with any money until I was sure but expect others have fallen foul of this.

MrsMulberry

Just about to throw the letter from these people in the bin and then I felt guilty as having opened it ,I told my son it was a load of rubbish and a con . I felt bad because in a round about way I was telling him he wasnt good enough . This is a no win situation on the parents part as we feel bad if we dont buy the bloomin book and we feel taken for a ride if we do buy it . I think I will bring this up with the school as they are obviously getting paid some money for letting the students participate in this scheme .

trumpton

I think it is the schools fault for not seeing that this is a money-making scam. They shouldn't put parents in the position of having to say to a child that they won't buy a book with their poem/story in, because that's a tough thing to do to a child. If schools all stuck together and said they weren't taking part, the scam would soon disappear.