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Report: #1297487

Complaint Review: Dawn Rivers - Sydney New York

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  • Reported By: Kathy — Lebanon Pennsylvania USA
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  • Dawn Rivers Sydney, New York USA

Dawn Rivers AKA Brighids Fire Books AKA Wahmpreneur Publishing Publishing Fraud, Contest Scam, Reneged on Contract Sydney New York

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A woman by the name of Dawn Rivers (Dawn Rivers-Baker at the time) advertised a national manuscript writing contest through her publishing company Brighid's Fire Books/Wahmpreneur Publishing in 2009, as she had done for several years preious to that. There was a $25 entry fee, which was to accompany the first 50 pages of  your manuscript. In October of 2009, ten manuscripts were chosen as 'finalists', I was among them. At that point, the ten finalists were instructed to send the remainder of our manuscript. On January 1, 2010 she announced my novel as the first place winner.

The first place winner was given a contract with Wahmpreneur Publishing that awarded the author: a $1000 advance against royalites, author copies of their book once published, quarterly statements showing the sales/royalties earned, placement in the publisher's online store, among other perks. The advance was to be paid in 3 installments. When the first one came due, Dawn Rivers stated she was a bit behind, but would have it to me shortly. I didn't press. When that time period came and went I inquired about it again. Again, she apologized, but promised I would have it long before the release date, which was June 10th, 2011. 

I made several inquiries over the course of a year and a half, but each was met with another excuse until finally, she stopped taking my calls, refused to sign for the certified mail I sent, and ignored my emails. I remained professional and calm in each, but she simply vanished.

I later learned that she did the same thing to the woman who won the contest the year before me. I have saved those articles and even reached out to that winner. Since I was never sent a statement for sales, I have no way of knowing how many books have sold in which she kept all of the money, but I do know that the first printing sold out quite some time ago and there was no second printing.

Writer Beware! Given the opportunity to enter into a publishing agreement of any type and Dawn Rivers name is attached, seriously rethink your options. She is a fraud who reneged on EVERY aspect of our contract, took the money, and went silent/vanished. As I said, I am not the first person she has done this to and one can only imagine how many others have found themselves in such a position when dealing with her. Being that she had done it and gotten away with it the preious year, what she did to me was premeditated. You don't run yet another contest when you haven't paid the winner of the preious contest. I believe she stumble (or maybe plotted) onto a small-time scam and rode it out for as long as she could before the winners who were stiffed began to throw a stink.

This report was posted on Ripoff Report on 04/03/2016 05:42 AM and is a permanent record located here: https://www.ripoffreport.com/reports/dawn-rivers/sydney-new-york-138389/dawn-rivers-aka-brighids-fire-books-aka-wahmpreneur-publishing-publishing-fraud-contest-1297487. The posting time indicated is Arizona local time. Arizona does not observe daylight savings so the post time may be Mountain or Pacific depending on the time of year. Ripoff Report has an exclusive license to this report. It may not be copied without the written permission of Ripoff Report. READ: Foreign websites steal our content

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