Important!
If you are aware of the “artist” scamming writers phenomenon, that’s what happened to me. If you don’t know what that is, it’s basically this: So someone - a supposed fan, approaches you - a writer, saying that they are a fan of your work, then offer to do some fan art of your characters from your books. After that, you will agree and the art will be done. Then, the person will demand payment for the fanart THEY THEMSELVES wanted to make. If you refuse and reason, they guilt trip, manipulate you and force you.
And this, is what happened to me. A person, saying that they are a fan of my work wrote to me in one of my book’s comments. We had a chat, but I sensed something weird about it. They didn’t immediately say what they wanted to do, just said that they had an “idea” about my book. Then they eventually hit me with the “Can I do fan art of your characters” I was surprised but then I remembered hearing about this…From the start however that said person rose red flags. They were too pushy, using too many flattering words about me and my work. When I told them that I am an anonymous writer and do not wish to disclose my social medias (except the tiktok I made just for my writing), they kept on pushing me to create other accounts (instagram, discord). Then, out of curiosity, I asked them to tell me if they had an art page or a portfolio (since they said they are an artist), they said they didn’t and asked for my email to send their works.
ANOTHER TACTICS THISE SCAMMERS USE, BEWARE: Do NOT give your email especially personal email to those people. They can either send malware to you or some art generated by AI. And if you do actually go through with allowing them to do art of your characters, they tend to use AI to do so again and demand money!
If I wanted someone to draw my characters for my books, I would’ve commissioned an artist. Fanart is done from fans, because they enjoy something. Commissions is something else.
