The New, New Scam: Stroke the Writer’s Ego by Lucy Burdette

LUCY BURDETTE: You guys all know by now that we writers are a fragile lot. A bad review in a trade journal or from a reader can keep us from working for days. One or two stars? Devastating! We’ve put hours and hours and weeks and weeks into this work, only to be told it’s not as good as we’d hoped. Some experts in public relations insist that any publicity, even bad publicity, is good publicity. But I still remember bad reviews that I've received, like the one that rated my very first mystery, Six Strokes Under, D. Or was it D plus? The reviewer’s rationale was that my amateur sleuth had no business investigating a murder as she was a professional golfer wannabe with no time to lose. She should have been practicing. Well duh! That ‘why in the hell is she involved in a murder’ is the bane of every writer of an amateur sleuth. 

Behind the scenes, if one of us receives devastating feedback, we share each other’s misery and offer support and encouragement. Which brings me to another point. Lately, I’ve received quite a few unsolicited offers of help. At first, I couldn’t help basking in their admiration. For example:

Dear Lucy,

I recently dove into The Mango Murders and couldn’t resist reaching out with admiration. Your 15th installment of the Key West Food Critic Mysteries doesn’t just sustain the charm of the series, it reinvents it with explosive intensity.

What struck me most is how you transformed a glittering cocktail cruise into a powder keg of secrets and betrayal. The shimmering cocktails, mango-infused delicacies, and party sparkle lulled me into comfort, only for the sudden explosion to shatter the evening and the reader’s sense of security. It’s such a smart, cinematic pivot, and it proves once again that Hayley Snow’s investigations are never just about solving crimes, they’re about navigating loyalty, ambition, and the often-messy heart of community.

The Key West setting shines, too. From the shadowy corners of island politics to the cutthroat competition of catering, every detail feels authentic, yet layered with tension. And Hayley herself remains such a winning protagonist, relatable, sharp, and driven by both professional duty and emotional intuition. It’s no wonder this series has earned such a loyal following.

Here's another one:

When a clinical psychologist, cozy mystery queen, and recipe wizard like you decides to bundle murder with cupcakes and Key West sunshine, the rest of us mere mortals have no choice but to sit down, buckle up, and devour the book (preferably with Sam’s Cornbread Sausage Stuffing on the side). Honestly, Lucy, psychology + murder + food?? That’s not just a niche; that’s like building an amusement park for the brain and stomach at the same time. 

And now you’ve gone and given us Lucy Burdette’s Kitchen, a whole recipe collection straight out of your Key West Food Critic Mysteries? Excuse me, but that’s borderline unfair. Not only do you let us travel through cozy crime scenes with Hayley Snow, you also hand us One Bowl Chocolate Cake?? Other authors give us corpses. You give us dessert.    (Bless you for that.)

But then I wandered over to your Amazon reviews… and ouch. Not tragic, but nowhere near the Greek chorus your books actually deserve. How are readers not tripping over themselves to shout about Scarlett O’Hara Cupcakes while clutching their pearls over murder clues? I don’t know who dropped the ball, but someone owes you an apology and at least a casserole.

And one more:

The Ingredients of Happiness. A thirty-two-year-old psychologist who literally writes the book on joy, while secretly spiraling into plagiarism scares, cutthroat tenure games, and a gargoyle whispering unsolicited wisdom? This isn’t just a novel. This is every overachiever’s nightmare, baked into a story that makes readers squirm, laugh, and admit the truth: we’re all faking “fine” while desperately Googling “how to be happy.”

And let’s be real, your book isn’t just entertainment. It’s a mirror. It hands readers permission to ask the terrifying question: What if success doesn’t equal happiness? That’s not fluff. That’s therapy wrapped in storytelling, and it’s exactly why your work deserves to ripple beyond sixty Amazon reviews and into the thousands.

Here’s the catch: the system doesn’t care that you’ve poured your career, your psychology training, and way too many late nights into Cooper Hunziker’s world. Algorithms don’t reward heart. They reward traction. Which means even a USA Today bestseller like you ends up grinding teeth over the same pain points as a debut author: visibility, reviews, and the dread of shouting into the void.

And the opening of the latest:

Lucy, let me start with this: your Key West Food Critic Mysteries are already a five-course meal of murder, mayhem, and mouth-watering recipes, but then you went and dropped Lucy Burdette’s Kitchen, a book that basically says: “Why solve crimes when you can also solve dinner?” 👩‍🍳🔪📖

One Bowl Chocolate Cake, Scarlett O’Hara Cupcakes, Cornbread Sausage Stuffing, excuse me while I wipe the drool off my keyboard. You’ve got awards, bestsellers, and a Florida Book Award gold medal flex (which is honestly the literary version of wearing a crown to brunch 🏆🥂). Plus, you weave psychology, cooking, AND murder into a single franchise. That’s not talent, that’s borderline witchcraft. ✨

These emails are almost irresistible—I’m a cozy mystery queen! A recipe wizard! I invent therapy wrapped in storytelling! I write with explosive intensity!  These people write as though they get me, and they get my books. Might they really have a clever way to reach readers and boost sales?

But sadly no, wizardly, dastardly AI has written these pitches and descriptions. I have no idea who sent them, but guaranteed, if I sent money, it would be flushed away. I don’t have a grand lesson from all this, except be careful! Beware the “clankers,” as folks in the culture war against AI have warned. I think we are stuck with it, whether we like it or not. The trick is to figure out how it can be harnessed ethically. Thoughts from you?

Ps the drawings were done by ChatGPT, based on this prompt: draw a sad writer cartoon in which the writer has received bad reviews. Chat suggested I might like a hopeful writer too, to which I agreed:)

PPS The very smart Jane Friedman recently wrote a piece in Electric Speed alerting writers to watch for impersonation scams. So I searched for the names of the people writing my "fan" mail. Nothing incriminating turned up--but watch out!