Bethany Walkers/Anfal Khaliq, serial plagiarist

aliceshortcake · Aug 11, 2014

Holy cut-and-paste, Ratman*!

*My totally original crime-fighting character, who dedicated himself to the cause of justice when his parents were killed by cat burglars. Coming soon from CreateSpace!

Twitter has got hold of this tomfoolery and it seems that Ms Khaliq may also have plagiarized Mark Haddon. And I've just noticed that the plot of her Remember Me is clearly based on The Lovely Bones.

Alexandra Little · Aug 11, 2014

Queen of Swords said:
Move over, Gloria Tesch!

I've lost half of my day thanks to that site. But then again, it's hard to look away from train wrecks.

aliceshortcake · Aug 11, 2014

This is the bit I couldn't find earlier:

March 6, 2014

Paperbacks xx
Show No Mercy is now available in paperback http://www.amazon.com/Show-No-Mercy-B...

Race is being a really pain on me and I keep on having issues with submitting the cover. But it will also be ready for paperback in the near future.

Again, thanks for all the Kindle downloads! I'm now in the top 100 bestselling free Kindle books on the Amazon UK site and have had thousands and thousands of downloads on Amazon.com too! xxx I really appreciate everything you've done for me guys! You can still download until the end of Friday 7th!

Thank you for all your kindness and support, and best wishes to you all.

Bethany xxx
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7792667.Bethany_Walkers/blog

Thousands and thousands? Pull the other one, Bethany. I mean Anfal.

Maggie Maxwell · Aug 11, 2014

Alexandra Little said:
I've lost half of my day thanks to that site. But then again, it's hard to look away from train wrecks.

Oh good, it's not just me then. I had to read the whole sagas from the top two trainwrecks. Wow. Just, wow.

Gravity · Aug 11, 2014

Crap. And here I was, ready to announce my opus Fifty Shades of Laid, about a callow yuppie guy abasing himself daily to his sexually ravenous lady employer's every whim. Maybe if I changed the title ... ?

Alexandra Little · Aug 11, 2014

TAMaxwell said:
Oh good, it's not just me then. I had to read the whole sagas from the top two trainwrecks. Wow. Just, wow.

I think I've finished most of the Robert Stanek debacle; now, onto the others!

shakeysix · Aug 11, 2014

Wasted the whole afternoon on this and Maradonia Moronia but I was hooked by that line in the Maradonia editor's review of the novel she edited. "You got the tension in these two black moments perfect." --s6

mirandashell · Aug 11, 2014

Yeah.... I raised an eyebrow at that.

Marian Perera · Aug 11, 2014

I recently looked up Stanek on Amazon, just to see what the latest was.

He's republished ten-year-old fantasy novels of his under titles like A Clash of Heroes, A Storm of Shields, A Dance of Swords. Yeah, he's hoping to piggyback on George R. R. Martin's fame.

Sheryl Nantus · Aug 11, 2014

This is probably the biggest plague on self-publishing that I can think of.

Yes, there *have* been stories of trade publishing houses taking on works that have been plagiarized from other authors but usually that's discovered quickly enough and dealt with. Lawyers get involved fast enough and publishing houses move quickly enough to protect their authors.

This crap goes on and on and on with Amazon refusing to do a thing other than to keep making money off of a criminal's work.

I'd love to see some of the SP gurus step forward and start a movement to chase these criminals out of their ranks. Every time a story breaks it looks bad for all the hardworking self-publisher who play by the rules and end up getting screwed while Amazon rakes in the dough.

Filigree · Aug 11, 2014

Same here, Sheryl. I just blogged about it today: what can be the California Gold Rush for some authors, becomes Chernobyl for others. I've also either started or inadvertently continued #PlagiaristsArePathetic.

I notice that the SP gurus tend to be suspiciously silent on the issue.

mirandashell · Aug 11, 2014

I did think about self-publishing but all the reports on plagarism put me off totally. It's like the Wild West before the sheriffs.

Hoplite · Aug 11, 2014

Queen of Swords said:
I recently looked up Stanek on Amazon, just to see what the latest was.

He's republished ten-year-old fantasy novels of his under titles like A Clash of Heroes, A Storm of Shields, A Dance of Swords. Yeah, he's hoping to piggyback on George R. R. Martin's fame.

I looked it up as well. Those books are all part of series called (something to the effect of) "The Keeper Martin's Tales". Oh, just another key word that would link him to G.R.R.M's stuff.

JustSarah · Aug 11, 2014

What get's me, is how it makes other honest self-publishers look bad.

Filigree · Aug 11, 2014

That's really my problem, beyond the stolen earnings; all these idiots taking shortcuts are the ones who drag down the really great, diligent self-publishing authors I know. The former are the ones who, when they chirp 'Oh, I'm self-published!' make me strongly tempted to ask, 'Yes, but are you any good?'

BenPanced · Aug 11, 2014

Alexandra Little said:
I've lost half of my day thanks to that site. But then again, it's hard to look away from train wrecks.

Especially since so many of them are in slow motion.

Gravity said:
Crap. And here I was, ready to announce my opus Fifty Shades of Laid, about a callow yuppie guy abasing himself daily to his sexually ravenous lady employer's every whim. Maybe if I changed the title ... ?

John Robinson: A Memoir

Helix · Aug 11, 2014

Anfal Khaliq was certainly aware of the 'Bethany Walkers' plagiarism issue, because she tweeted about it in April.

ETA: That 'Sherlock' account looks as though it's been set up by someone who had made the connection between the two names. The whole thing is tangled and messy.

Channy · Aug 11, 2014

Possibly someone else who also managed to make the connection between the two names and wanted to try and bring it to light...?

Or am I really grasping at straw men there.

aliceshortcake · Aug 12, 2014

Sherlock's semi-literate Tweets are painful to read but he/she certainly has strong views about plagiarism. What a shame he/she doesn't have the investigative skills of his/her namesake.

Oh, and do have a look at Khaliq's Twitter:

Hey y'all, I spend way too much time on Twitter, gonna start cutting down a lot, need to focus more on revision and stuff so yeah x
https://twitter.com/AnfalWrites

What's the betting that she'll soon go the way of 'Bethany Walkers', ie vanish from social media altogether? And someone is having a bit of fun at Khaliq's expense:

Retweeted by Anfal
Namra♡ @NamraRazzaq1 · 15h
Can't believe this gal > @mamakiladli stole @AnfalWrites bio!! What's wrong with her? She doesn't even look 15 she looks 18!!

Anfal @AnfalWrites · 15h
LOL why would you copy my bio? You're not a writer and you're probably not 15 either. And you follow me?! @mamakiladli

Mamakiladli stole Anfal's bio! The filthy plagiarist!

Anfal @AnfalWrites · 17h
Getting an email from a reader saying that they really enjoyed your book is actually such an amazing feeling!!!

Confession time! That was me. I emailed her to say how much my (imaginary) daughter and I loved Three-Legged Madness, the novella she plagiarized from Karen McCombie's The Past, the Present and the Loud, Loud Girl. All I got in return was a brief "thank you so much!" She didn't reply to my second email in which I called her out on her plagiarism of McCombie and, in her Bethany Walkers persona, of Colleen Hoover and others. Well, unless you count her decision to cut down on Twitter as a response...

In case you were wondering what's happening re. the Three-Legged Madness situation, Karen McCombie's editor has been in touch with the Rights Department at Scholastic (I was both impressed and appalled to hear that they have a book piracy hotline). Let's hope that they take decisive action! As for the rest of Khaliq's collected works, it seems unlikely that a "writer" would produce just one plagiarized book:

Kate ‏@Magic_Kitten 20h
@Yayeahyeah @Kerensd @KarenMcCombie @mark_haddon she seems to have a huge list of books loosely based on CBBC dramas from what I could tell
https://twitter.com/KarenMcCombie/status/498772474172284928

Helix · Aug 12, 2014

aliceshortcake said:
I've just found a PDF extract from Anfal Khaliq's Enemies Always, published by Lulu in 2011.

So it's basically the same book as Bethany Walkers' Show No Mercy - proof that nobody has ever seen Bethany and Anfal in the same room at the same time! The borrowings from Colleen Hoover's books Hopeless, Slammed! and Point of Retreat must have been added later as none of them had been published yet.

I'm just reading that extract from Enemies Always. It is so close to Ghajini that the names of the main characters are the same: Sanjay Singhania, Kalpana...and Ghajini.

aliceshortcake · Aug 12, 2014

Many thanks to Helix for bringing the following conversation to my attention. It's from a Lulu forum dated 2011, when Khaliq was supposedly only twelve years old:

HOW TO BLOCK GOOGLE?
‎07-20-2011 07:36

I WANT TO BLOCK GOOGLE AND OTHER SEARCH ENGINES FROM LISTING MY LULU BOOKS, BUT WOULD STILL LIKE MY BOOKS TO BE LISTED ON LULU. HOW CAN I DO THIS?
Anfal Khaliq - Greater Manchester, UK

Peter May replies:

I don't understand.

You have three different websites naming and publicising your books -- Google will find them too.

Surely the more people find your books the better - why did you create all those websites if you didn't want Google to find out about your books?

Khaliq again:

hi peter, i don't want my lulu products on google because i've put some personal information on lulu, and people will find out this, such as my organization name. they might track me down!

sorry, i'm sounding a bit weird and scared. i am weird.

DRichardson knows why she's so nervous:

Please forgive me if this is completely wrong, but is this anything to do with the fact that using TinEye on your covers shows that they use graphics from anime and manga - and one is from the movie 'The Matrix'.

And one of the books uses a picture of Aamir Khan, that he has posted on his blog - again forgive me if I am wrong, but I can't help thinking that you probably don't have permission to use his picture on your book cover.

You do say on the other that the image is copyright 'google images' - but google images is just a search engine, not the holders of the copyright of any images that you might find with it. You would need the explicit permission of the picture's copyright holder.

If this is indeed the case, I advise you to change your covers to pictures that either you own the copyright for, or are definitely copyright free, and as suggested above, ones that are relevant to the book's contents.
http://connect.lulu.com/t5/General-Discussions/HOW-TO-BLOCK-GOOGLE/m-p/103357#M19051

So Khaliq can't claim ignorance of copyright laws.

JustSarah · Aug 12, 2014

So apparently cutting down on twitter makes one a copywrite infringer? Maybe she is cutting down on twitter, but you know how many people don't use twitter?

And there are perfectly valid reasons for removing yourself from the internet. It's not always this book related thing.

Not defending her, just making a point.

Helix · Aug 12, 2014

JustSarah said:
So apparently cutting down on twitter makes one a copywrite infringer? Maybe she is cutting down on twitter, but you know how many people don't use twitter?

And there are perfectly valid reasons for removing yourself from the internet. It's not always this book related thing.

Not defending her, just making a point.

Not respecting copyright makes someone a copyright infringer.

JustSarah · Aug 12, 2014

Helix said:
Not respecting copyright makes someone a copyright infringer.

What I was getting at, as someone prone to this sort of rechid theft, is going to do it with or without social networks.

aliceshortcake · Aug 12, 2014

JustSarah said:
Not defending her, just making a point.

With respect, you're missing the point.

When Khaliq's alter-ego 'Bethany Walkers' was exposed as a plagiarist she quickly vanished from Facebook, Twitter and other social media. It just struck me as more than a coincidence that after Khaliq herself was outed she hinted that a gradual withdrawal from Twitter might be on the cards.

Why you thought I was implying that "cutting down on twitter makes one a copywrite[sic] infringer" I cannot imagine.

Bethany Walkers/Anfal Khaliq, serial plagiarist

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