Cassie Edwards

Romance novelist Cassie Edwards, who has recently come under fire for copying material from reference books and articles and using it in her books, seems to have lost the unqualified support of her publisher, Signet Books, who just last week were saying with confidence that Ms. Edwards had "done nothing wrong."

Now, the AP reports that Signet--an imprint of Penguin Group USA-- has issued a statement essentially saying that their earlier remarks may have been premature, and that a full review of Ms. Edwards' work is required.

"Our original comments were based on Signet's review of a limited selection of passages," the statement read, according to the AP. "We believe the situation deserves further review. Therefore we will be examining all of Ms. Edwards' books that we publish, and based on the outcome of that review we will take action to handle the matter accordingly. We want to make it known that Signet takes any and all allegations of plagiarism very seriously."  read more »

The Associated Press’s Hillel Italie got in touch with romance literature’s queen bee Nora Roberts yesterday and asked her what she thinks of the plagiarism accusations that have been hurled in recent days at Cassie Edwards, “the world’s most prolific and popular author of Native American historical romance.”

Ms. Edwards, who, like Ms. Roberts, is published by an imprint of Penguin Group USA, admitted this week to “taking” passages from reference books and magazines after a website about romance lit posted side-by-side comparisons of passages from her book Shadow Bear and an article about black-footed ferrets from Defenders of Wildlife.

Ms. Edwards has said she didn’t realize she was supposed to cite sources, explaining that “When you write historical romances, you’re not asked to do that.”  read more »