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SB Sarah
https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/09/what-to-do-if-you-think-youve-been-plagiarised/
https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=152169
It is with a lot of listener and reader encouragement that I’m writing this out, so thank you to everyone who said, “Yes, write the thing.”
You might be thinking, given that we are rather familiar with plagiarism going back to 2008 (!) with our adventures with Cassie Edwards’ books, that I would know what to do if it maybe happened to me.
And, honestly, I’m used to being cited in roundabout ways. Sometimes editors are totes ok with the whole “bitches” thing and sometimes editors, even at the same publication, are like, “Heck no” when citing the site. This is, btw, why I own trashybooks.com. There are many creative workarounds, including using my name.
The beginning:
On September 9th, 2025, I vented on Bluesky that I suspected my work had been used in an article without attribution, and I wasn’t sure how to proceed.
Yes, I really did not know what to do next.
I was extremely upset, and very confused, but I didn’t know the next step except to screech and wave my arms around.
Suleikha Snyder gave me some good advice: “Contact them and ask why it wasn’t sourced…. Citing sources, linking back to other works on the same subject, should be the bare minimum when someone is doing any sort of reporting or longform essay work.”
Then other journalists I’ve worked with reached out to me privately (thank you) while other writers in the romance community messaged me to say it had happened to them. Several times.
Which, no. That’s not okay.
I got excellent advice and really helpful support, and I’m deeply grateful about that.
Here are the details.
Back in October 2024, I wrote about AI Narrators in Overdrive. Remember that? It was very popular – a lot of librarians emailed me after the link was circulated, including by the American Libraries Magazine newsletter, saying they were now working on AI policies for their collections.
In this article, I wrote about how Robin Bradford noticed some AI narration in her library’s catalog after a patron complained about the audio quality in one file. She started digging and got suspicious at the number of AI narrators in her library’s catalog (yikes) and then even more suspicious about the writers of said books.
So I reached out to her, and we did some digging, and that investigation formed the bulk of the article.
Fast forward to September 2025, when “Books by Bots: Librarians grapple with AI-generated material in collections,” an article written by a freelance journalist, is published in the American Libraries Magazine.
This article is available online, and was in the print magazine as well.
Please note, the above link may take a few moments to load because it’s an archive.org link to the original version of the article.
Y’all. I was super into it the minute I saw the headline.
This was what Robin and I had been investigating, and what I’d written about – how cool that it was in the ALA magazine?! Yes! Let’s talk about the proliferation of AI narrators, and AI authors, and how libraries are having to deal with infiltration of AI materials in their collections! This issue is important, and increased coverage is good!
I read it closely, noting details that seemed to match what I’d written, and waiting to spot a citation to my work.
There was none.
This was actually factually me, including the hands
Like, what?
Why was my writing on AI narration was not cited in the article at all, when the text seems to reference specific details from my October 2024 article?
What did I do next?
Based on the advice I received, I started by contacting the freelancer and an editor and publisher at the American Libraries Magazine.
I asked why I hadn’t been cited, and provided an example comparing my work from October 2024 to the article published in September 2025:
The text references my October 2024 article, “AI Audiobook Narrators in OverDrive and the Issue of Library AI Circulation Policy” which was the genesis of online discussion regarding AI narration in libraries.
The text…also references specific discoveries that Robin Bradford and I made, including notations about similar author names, lack of online presence, and the connection of these author profiles to Noah Lukeman and Lukeman Literary Management….
The American Libraries Magazine also cites my original article in a “Latest Links” post from October 2024, and links back to my original work: https://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/latest-links/spotting-ai-audiobook-narrators-and-authors-in-overdrive/
The language in the current article reads as follows, and both bolded (by me) sections appear to reference my work without a link or citation:
“Eklund is far from the only librarian grappling with AI issues. Last fall, Robin Bradford, a collection development librarian at a public library in Washington, accidentally bought an AI-narrated audiobook on OverDrive. Only after a patron checked it out and complained about a file-corruption issue did Bradford realize the book’s narrator was listed as “Scarlett (synthesized voice).” Looking through her library’s collection, she found more than 100 audiobook titles with the same narrator, all of them thrillers from Lukeman Literary Management.
So the audiobook narrators weren’t human. Were the authors themselves? With monikers such as Blake Pierce, Kate Bold, Molly Black, and Mia Gold, the authors appeared to have many titles to their names, but little to no social-media presence and only bare-bones websites with no substantive author bios—just a list of books written.
I’ve really appreciated the ways in which the American Libraries Magazine has supported my work in the past, and am dismayed to not be cited in an article on this topic.
I didn’t hear back from the freelance journalist, and still haven’t.
However, I did receive a reply from the editor, who said that they’d scanned the transcript of the interview the writer did with Robin, and reached out to the journalist and the editor of the story.
According to this editor, Robin mentioned my article, and the journalist based their reporting on their conversation with Robin, and “other sources.” Then the editor offered to add a “For more on this” link to my blog post, and did that seem reasonable.
My reply: no. This does not seem reasonable to me.
I replied with even more detail (and let me say, my blood pressure medication was getting a workout).
…To be clear, this paragraph uses information that appears to be directly lifted from my work:
So the audiobook narrators weren’t human. Were the authors themselves? With monikers such as Blake Pierce, Kate Bold, Molly Black, and Mia Gold, the authors appeared to have many titles to their names, but little to no social-media presence and only bare-bones websites with no substantive author bios—just a list of books written.
My work from the original post:
We started googling the authors and the results are very similar: websites that are mostly pages listing the books in a series, sparse bios that follow the same format of listing what series the author has written, and very, very few with social media outside of a Facebook Page…, and none of the social media accounts are linked from the author websites.
Let’s take another look at that list of names:
-
- Blake Pierce – website is all series lists, no social media linked, but does have a Facebook page
- Kate Bold – website is all series lists, no social media aside from a Facebook
group page, which isn’t linked that I could find.
- Molly Black – website is all series lists, same template as Kate Bold, no social media
- Fiona Grace – website is all series lists, same template, no social media links
- Rylie Dark – website is all series lists, same template, no social media linked,
but I found a Twitter account, a Twitch account, and an OnlyFans**
- Ava Strong – website is all series lists, no social media links
- Jack Mars – website is all series lists, no social media links
- Taylor Stark– website is all series lists, same template as Bold, no social media links
- Mia Gold – website is all series lists, same template, no social media
The names listed are in the same order, along with the details about basic websites, lists of books, and lack of social media presence.
Moreover, the question of whether the authors using AI narrators were AI themselves (“So the audiobook narrators weren’t human. Were the authors themselves?“) was the subject of Robin’s and my investigation in October, the details of which form the narrative of my work. Further, the involvement of Lukeman Literary was initially revealed in my article.
The paragraph I have mentioned should have been attributed to me, because a reasonable person would infer that this is [the writer’s] own reporting. I do not believe that it is.
This situation does not seem like a coincidence either, given the similarities in sequence and the details about investigating whether the AI narrated books were written by AI authors. This information appears to have been lifted from my work, and a responsible journalist would cite me as the source. A generous read would be that it was accidentally sloppy, and a more serious read would be that this is plagiarism.
If it was their own reporting, where did they get this information, in that order, if not from my work?
You mentioned they used other sources – could you tell me what those other sources are?
My request is as follows: I would like to be cited in the paragraph where my work was used without attribution, “as first reported by Smart Bitches.” I would also like an acknowledgement of this additional attribution at the bottom of the piece.
If that’s too much words and you’d like a TL;DR, no worries. I got you:
- I published an article in October 2024 on AI narrators and allegedly AI authors that began with Robin Bradford’s post on Bluesky, and was based in our research into the authors named.
- In September 2025, The American Libraries Magazine publishes an article titled “Books by Bots” about AI authors and narrators.
- In this article, the list of authors who are allegedly AI seems to match the same list in the same order as in my article.
- The details about these “author” websites, book lists, and social media presence (or lack thereof) also appears to match our research and my account.
- The involvement of Lukeman Literary (sidenote: a quote? – heeeey, nice job getting him to respond) is included, also a fact that Robin and I discovered in October 2024.
- I can find no other sources that reported the information in the same sequence or with the same details, leading me to request attribution for my work, which appears to have been used without citation.
I received confirmation of receipt, but then no further updates.
UNTIL…I notice the article has been updated on September 15 with precisely what I asked for.
I did not hear back from the journalist at all, and beyond confirming receipt, I didn’t hear back from the editor, either. I discovered the updates on my own.
So on one hand, I’m very glad to have been cited!
Writing a story like that with links, screenshots, passing citations back and forth, and trying to write it cogently is a lot of labor. I appreciate very much that the article was updated to include attribution to the work that we did.
But on the other hand, I don’t think I should have had to argue repeatedly for credit for my writing in this case.
And I should not have had to point out that this journalist seems to have not done the job correctly the first time.
This is a basic, fundamental concept: cite your sources! And the need for citation seemed kind of obvious, from the fact that details we discovered appeared to be copied without attribution, to the part where the author names and details were listed in the same freaking order.
What’s funny is that I fret constantly about thorough attribution. Hell, I’m mad that Xitter links in the archives of the site are now broken because Xitter Xit the bed and folks understandably deleted their accounts! I’m peeved I didn’t screencap everything because my citations are broken.
Journalism is already in crisis ethically and professionally, with newspapers cowing to the current administration, firing journalists, and curbing or eliminating coverage based on pressure from oligarch owners and the government.
And, honestly, I don’t always consider myself a journalist. I am and have been a blogger, for more than 20 years.
Sometimes, though, I do a journalism.
And whether I’m blogging or doing a journalism, I know to cite my sources. I learned that in high school.
Moreover, I’m not going to be complacent when I think my work has been disrespected by another writer and by another publication. There’s enough of that going around already, and I’ve been doing this too long to tolerate any lack of attribution for the work I do on a website that is free and open for people to read.
So, if you think you’ve been plagiarized, here’s what I did:
- Yell. Really loudly. I also recommend sending texts in all caps to vent vent vent.
- I reached out to people via social media and email, and I asked for help.
- I gathered the clips from my work, the sections that I thought should have been attributed to me, the original links and messages that comprised the research, and organized them into a document.
- I shared that information with other journalists who were offering guidance, and with other writers who are familiar with my site and my writing, to verify that I’d explained myself clearly and that this was worth pursuing.
- I emailed the writer.
- I emailed the editor and publisher of the magazine in which the article was published.
- And then I did it again when I didn’t receive an answer that fully addressed the issue.
I’m glad to have received the attribution I requested, and I’m glad the online version is updated to reflect it. The print version, of course, is not. And that’s what most librarians across the country have on their desks.
I want to call out this line from the “Books by Bots” article:
Even when the nature of an AI-generated work is clear, from a librarian’s point of view, there are potential copyright issues to consider. Does a book that may have plagiarized from other books belong in a library?
I dunno. Does an article that may have plagiarized another article belong in a library magazine?
This entire situation just sucks and I hope it doesn’t happen to you. And what’s most bothersome about this is not the lack of credit, but the fact that the intersection of generative AI and library policy is a deeply important issue.
The proliferation of AI-generated writing and narration affects the quality and reliability of library collections, at a time when libraries are already facing attacks from several directions.
Libraries in our country are already facing:
These are all extreme threats to the fundamental service that libraries provide, and to our ability to access information. And on top of all that, they’re also facing a multifaceted threat from AI-generated materials.
I’m on the side of libraries, full stop, and I’m also on the side of writers who are constantly doing the uphill battle to publish accurate information about current events. It’s exhausting, too: for context, this account took me more than two hours to draft, assemble, link, edit, proofread, and update. I have so many things I could be doing with those two hours.
But all of this – library attacks, unchecked generative AI proliferation, accurate current events reporting, and citation of sources when writing?
It’s all important.
https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/2025/09/what-to-do-if-you-think-youve-been-plagiarised/
https://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/?p=152169
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