Author has a hell of a time with CIA...

From Publishers Lunch just this morning comes this tale:

JAWBREAKER Set for End of Year Release

In late October (after a second Federal Court filing earlier in the month), former CIA field commander Gary Bernsten and publisher Crown finalized clearances from the CIA's Publications Review Board to issue JAWBREAKER on December 27, two months after originally scheduled.

Crown executive editor Rick Horgan says, "We are going to publish the book with the redactions preserved," with blacked-out text throughout the book where CIA approval was not granted, to make transparent to readers "all of the violence done to the manuscript." (In the interest of readibility, places where multiple pages were redacted by the CIA will be indicated in notes from the author rather than a run of completely black pages.) Printed blackouts will "stop at 20 lines." Horgan notes that Crown has also included blacked out text in two books by Robert Baer, though to a much lesser extent than in this manuscript.

Bernsten has argued, and Horgan confirms, that "some of the redactions involved deleting material that was already part of the public record." So the author and publisher decided to publish the approvable manuscript rather than continue to submit to the CIA's "shrewd delaying process."

An author's note will chronicle the battle for approval from the Agency, and Horgan says the book will include "notations that allude to what the CIA removed." A cover burst will proclaim it as "The book the CIA doesn't want you to read." The house is moving quickly to show the manuscript to prospective foreign licensees and an arrangement with a network news magazine show "could be imminent."

Note: Work for the CIA and you'd best believe they WILL read what you write. TJ Waters, author of CLASS 11, available this coming March, went through that CIA vetting process too.

Note: Robert Ferrigno has one well-working imagination, lemme tell you. He writes:

Here's a link to my next book, PRAYERS FOR THE ASSASSIN (Scribners, Feb 2006), a thriller set 35 years in the future, after a civil war has left the US split into an Islamic republic and the Bible Belt. Fun ensues.

(...and I don't doubt it a bit!)
http://www.prayersfortheassassin.com/

Meanwhile, send a bit of sympathy to Sean Chercover, author of BIG CITY, BAD BLOOD... which will come out in 2007...and who is facing a fast coming winter. He is, he says, "Getting the snow tires put on the car this afternoon. Ugh." To which I say, "Ouch!! Been there, done that..."

Link to his website, www.seanchercover.com , and you'll see he knows whereof he speaks, since he's been...and perhaps still is...a private detective.

Final note: First, I do wonder just what a CIA Field Commander like Gary Bernsten does. Must be somewhat different from a CIA Station Chief. Interesting.... I have to say that I resent the devil out of that CIA Publishing Board getting to read all the good stuff first!

Wrap...