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When Books Go Bad: Tales of Literary Feuds, Publishing Errors and Withering Reviews
The literary world isn’t all bestsellers, it is also a world of insults, physical blows, snide acknowledgements and publishing errors. Books are messy, personal things and writers have been grappling with them in the metaphorical mud for centuries.
Some writers have gone at each other in ink, while other bookish brawls are more literal. It usually ends in regret – or death. But books don’t need authors to go bad. They get stolen, misprinted, censored, some are even cursed or bound in questionable materials.
When Books Go Bad is a rousing collection of publishing mishaps, its narrative twists and turns taking a light-hearted look at poor editing, poor judgement, and a whole range of bad behaviour.
Some writers have gone at each other in ink, while other bookish brawls are more literal. It usually ends in regret – or death. But books don’t need authors to go bad. They get stolen, misprinted, censored, some are even cursed or bound in questionable materials.
When Books Go Bad is a rousing collection of publishing mishaps, its narrative twists and turns taking a light-hearted look at poor editing, poor judgement, and a whole range of bad behaviour.
- GenresNonfiction
176 pages, Hardcover
First published October 16, 2025
About the author
Alex Johnson
236 books9 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
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Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review
January 31, 2026
What a collection of anecdotes! The stories and “mishaps” are funny, others will have you shaking your head and/or take you by surprise.
For example I didn’t know that O.Henry was charged with embezzlement, claimed to be innocent but vanished to Honduras which might not exactly be a move of an innocent man. Thanks to good behaviour he only served two years in the end.
Some of these authors scribbled things in their journals and likely never meant certain things to be made public and might have been mortified by the thought of it being published.
Others happily expressed their thoughts openly like Evelyn Waugh who called James Joyce a “poor dotty Irishman…” and more on a BBC interview.
I already knew about Charles Dickens who tried to damage his wife’s reputation to cover up his own affair. As great a writer he might have been, this was not a decent move by him and leaves a permanent mark against himself in my opinion even though I call several of his books among my favourites (Dombey & Son, David Copperfield, Nicholas Nickleby, A Christmas Carol).
What was new to me is that George Eliot and her husband George Lewes were gifted a copy of The Europeans only to push it onto Henry James two weeks later with the words “ Take them (the volumes) away, please, away!” without realising it was his own book 😱😂.
So if you want to read about the bad behaviours in various degrees of authors through time, this would also be one for you. I might also have to look up some names which are unfamiliar to me though I don’t know if it’s for adding or avoiding books by said people 😂 a mix I suppose.
Thank you NewSouth Books and British Library Publishing for sending me When Books Go Bad by Alex Johnson.
For example I didn’t know that O.Henry was charged with embezzlement, claimed to be innocent but vanished to Honduras which might not exactly be a move of an innocent man. Thanks to good behaviour he only served two years in the end.
Some of these authors scribbled things in their journals and likely never meant certain things to be made public and might have been mortified by the thought of it being published.
Others happily expressed their thoughts openly like Evelyn Waugh who called James Joyce a “poor dotty Irishman…” and more on a BBC interview.
I already knew about Charles Dickens who tried to damage his wife’s reputation to cover up his own affair. As great a writer he might have been, this was not a decent move by him and leaves a permanent mark against himself in my opinion even though I call several of his books among my favourites (Dombey & Son, David Copperfield, Nicholas Nickleby, A Christmas Carol).
What was new to me is that George Eliot and her husband George Lewes were gifted a copy of The Europeans only to push it onto Henry James two weeks later with the words “ Take them (the volumes) away, please, away!” without realising it was his own book 😱😂.
So if you want to read about the bad behaviours in various degrees of authors through time, this would also be one for you. I might also have to look up some names which are unfamiliar to me though I don’t know if it’s for adding or avoiding books by said people 😂 a mix I suppose.
Thank you NewSouth Books and British Library Publishing for sending me When Books Go Bad by Alex Johnson.
Displaying 1 - 1 of 1 review