A literary agent who rejected a query from someone claiming to be a writer was stalked online and attacked in real life.
Here are the tweets about this awful incident:
@RachelxRussell no it was jackie but the guy was slamming my head into my steering wheel at the time so I think she's ok.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 13, 2012
@Jkagawa @agentsavant Put me against the steering wheel and then Jackie bit him. Its going to need stitches.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 13, 2012
Home now. They don't think this is random. A disgruntled querier? A guy I cut off? Like I thought, he didn't want my crappy car.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@the1stdaughter They have access to my inbox and stuff so they can find the querier who hates me.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@ColleenLindsay i thought i got car jacked but the cops say its a crazy guy from my email. they're picking him up now.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@ColleenLindsay that's their theory based on his emails and locale. it wasn't a car jacking, and i have no 'enemies' local.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@agentsavant me either. the guy had priors for abuse but anyone could. i think they're wrong.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@ColleenLindsay I didn't believe the pd but yeah they got him with my dog's bite on his arm.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
SJPD just called. They got the guy at his house with my dog's mark on his arm. It was the address that he used in querying me.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@literaticat The only way he could have found me is me being an idiot checking in on foursquare and tweeting where I am.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@Jkagawa Yeah he put his home address and phone number in the query.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
@literaticat they say my twitter and foursquare. I check in at bookstores and shit. @ColleenLindsay—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
And so the only reason I'm tweeting about this besides the fact you guys rock is to say be vigilant with tweets & FSQ. Check in as leaving.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
Going from thinking it was a random car jacking gone wrong and just a bump on the head to an actual targeted thing is freaking me out.—
Pam van Hylckama (@BookaliciousPam) September 14, 2012
This makes me ill and again emphasizes that you should guard your privacy as much as possible these days.
I never understood why people would announce their location online to everyone via Twitter and FourSquare. Or even announce that they were going on vacation.
Everyone called me paranoid for that — but would you have liked to have been in her position?
It just takes one determined nutbag to alter your life for the worse — forever.
Good luck, Pam. And good for your dog!
Additional:
Authors Behaving Badly: The attack on Pam van Hylckama
Literary agent victim of alleged assault by rejected author
I”m absolutely outraged by this! I hope Pam will be OK and not just physically. Bruises heal, but the fear? That’s a lot harder to manage. People should just quit writing if they can’t take the rejection.
What makes it even weirder is that anyone can self-publish, so why get upset over an agent turning down a query?
Reblogged this on Artistikem and commented:
I’m reblogging this because it must be done.
I believe myself a very savvy Internet user, even to the point of someone calling me Lisbeth Salander because of the things I’m able to find about people just by Googling them. This is an example of what can happen to you, yes you, if you’re using social media in a way that exposes your personal information.
Believe me, if it’s out there, someone will see/use it. And it can be as ugly as this.
Wow…I’ve heard of people getting upset about rejections, but not like THAT.
It’s down to celebrity culture. Everybody wants to be famous. Reject ‘em and they get mad. In this case, crazy mad. Dumb ass. Writing was never the way to become a celebrity. Not many celeb writers compared to other entertainment channels.
And yeah, don’t announce your whereabouts on social networks – unless you WANT people to find you and you ready with a .44 … come to think of it I might start announcing my whereabouts ;-)