I'm Yelling on TikTok.
A very tired rant about Paul Castle's drama on TikTok.
I have been unbelievably, disasterously sick for almost two weeks now. I was miserable on my 31st birthday, frankly, I didn’t care that much about.
I’ve been stuck in bed, miserable, full of mucus and restlessness, and surprisingly, the will to jump into some drama on TikTok.
Now I have participated in commentary online in the past. It is a catch-22 for me whenever it comes up: I usually have some critical thoughts I want to discuss, but I’m hyper-aware I do not know this person and they do not know me.
I won’t ever know the “full story” about what’s going on behind the scenes.
But here’s the thing…
I do believe this is a toxic presence in the commentary space that is simply gossip and venom; however, we need to be able to discuss things critically and do so publicly with the publicly available information.
Let’s talk about Paul
I think
has done a much better job at summing up the recent drama in her article When Pity Becomes a Marketing Strategy.What we have here is an author who has received undo, uncool criticism because of his disability, his queerness, his art and inclusive children’s books.
But he is also not without valid criticism. This criticism is not targeting who he is as a person or the message of love and inclusivity he is championing, but of the spun narratives and sympathy-inducing misinformation about how book publishing works.
I made a few posts on TikTok commenting on the controversy, hitting around 20K views on one video (love that for my ego), but I was done talking about the situation.
I was done talking about Paul Castle and ready to focus on my biggest concern: helping authors and addressing misconceptions about publishing as someone who’s worked in this industry for over 8 years.
That was until about 30 minutes ago (at the time of drafting).
I was reheating my coffee in the microwave, scrolling through TikTok, when I see another update from Paul Castle addressing more of the controversy.
I am livid.
Unfortunately, I’m not going to recap what he said, I’m not going to summarize it all because it is convoluted and not really the point I want to get to.
While this might be infuriating to some, here is a mini playlist for you:
Paul’s initial video (Paul and Matthew)
One of Paul’s responses, the one that set me off (Paul’s Account)
Here’s what I do want to say
I think this author has an incredibly compelling story and has already achieved great success, and I truly wish him more, that every book in his warehouse is sold.
But I am not going to hold my tongue about how inappropriate it is to conflate one’s journey as an author with being a publisher.
The root issue publishing industry people are taking with Paul and this drama is the fact that he is fully acting as the publisher (he has a small publishing company for his books) but speaking as the author.
There is a difference. And it completely changing the meaning of what happened with his conversations with said-unnamed major book store chain, the decision to change the book title, and the challenges of securing a distribution deal through Ingram.
How a message is delivered and presented wholly effects the meaning of that message. The authority or role of the person presenting the message defines how it will be received by its intended audience.
And it’s not lost on me (or anyone with media literacy), that Paul’s responses to the controversy on his “Paul and Matthew” account (with over 3 million followers) are actually posted on his solo account “Paul Castle” (with over 200K followers).
Which account is the author? Which is the publisher? It is unclearly defined but how these announcements and responses are being handled is intentional, just as we’ve learned from every YouTuber drama-response video posted on their second channel.
It is intentional and manipulative.
Why does this bother me? Why do I care?
Short answer: what we say matters, how we say it matters more.
I’ve had authors pull some of the craziest mental gymnastics on me, call me a liar, and lie to me with their whole chest, but I love working with authors and 90% it’s a rewarding job.
What about the other 10%? Well, I’m underestimating that number here, but I do believe authors are not quick to trust or hold faith in the publishing process because it is harder, more time consuming, more vulnerable than they can ever imagine.
It’s a simple process, but it is not an easy one no matter how many times you’ve published a book.
And I am intimately familiar with the trap of publishers overpromising to their authors and falling short.
It’s scary out here. I get why authors might be quick to bolt or question what someone is telling them.
There’s so much information out there about the publishing industry, how to become an author, what it takes to be successful, yet only some of that information is sound and honest.
Why would an author believe me (no makeup, super sick, hair a mess in my TikToks) over the put-together author with over 3 million followers?
I’m just frustrated, and I think I made my points. I’m okay to deal with whatever consequences come from what I have to say.
And if I get into actual beef with a TikTok darling, you’ll be the first to know.