Let’s talk about piracy, and no, not the fun kind of piracy with sexy men, swords, and mermaids.

A few days ago, I learned that my books have been pirated on three different sites (there are probably more, but that’s the three I found)

So, I’ve used way too much time that could have been spent on writing, filling out papers, and trying to get my books taken down, knowing full well that even if I somehow managed to get these copies taken down in a week, there will be more.

And it hurts.

It hurts so much knowing people are stealing from a small author who’s still trying to find her spot in the writing world.

I do not make a killing on my books. In fact, so far this year, I have spent more money than I have earned, and we’re only eight days into February.

So, knowing people would rather steal my books than pay the few dollars I charge is so frustrating. I try to keep my prices fair. I put my books in KU even though it means I earn way less because I want people to actually be able to read them.

What maybe frustrates me the most is that when working on taking down my books, I had to actually go to these pirate sites, and what I saw were thousands of Romance books. Popular, well-loved authors and small, mostly unknown indie authors are all writing in the romance genre and are all being pirated by women who think they have a right to our hard work without paying for it.

I made a post about it on Instagram, talking about how piracy is theft… within the hour, I had lost five followers, who clearly didn’t agree.

Five followers who got so upset that I called them thieves that they unfollowed me.

Well, good riddance. If you feel personally attacked when someone says piracy makes you a thief, then maybe you should take a good, hard look at yourself and your actions. And then fuck off, because I have no time to have that kind of disrespectful people in my life.