You Better Not Cry, You Better Not Pout

You better behave or Harper-Collins will terminate your contract and get all its money back.

Honest to God. Harper has added a morals clause to its contracts. If you do something that--in their sole judgment--negatively impacts sales of a book, they can boot you out of Harper Heaven:

8. PUBLISHER’S RIGHTS OF TERMINATION
If (i) Publisher determines that any of the representations of Author set forth in Section 6(a) is false, or (ii) Author breaches the covenants set forth in Sections I(f), I(g), 2(c), or 2(d), or (iii) Author commits a breach of any covenant contained in the Special Provisions section of Part I above for which Publisher is given a right of termination, or (iv) Author’s conduct evidences a lack of due regard for public conventions and morals, or Author commits a crime or any other act that will tend to bring Author into serious contempt, and such behavior would materially damage the Work’s reputation or sales, Publisher may terminate this Agreement and, in addition to Publisher’s other legal remedies. Author will promptly repay the portion of the Advance previously paid to Author, or, if such breach occurred following publication of the Work, Author will promptly repay the portion of the Advance which has not yet been recouped by Publisher.

Go read the whole article, by agent Richard Curtis. And don't miss the first comment.

Life in/with Teens: Triple Play/Chickens in the Trees

1) This morning, as it is MLKjr Day, Avocado went off to do three hours of community service clearing trails for the National Park Service up near the Legion of Honor. I drove her there and back. I had the radio on (of course she had to turn it off the station I prefer to one of the "all autotune all the time" stations. A note on A: she hates Alanis Morrisette, whom I really rather like.

So: Alanis Morrisette comes on the radio. "Ew!" she cries, and changes to another station. Which is in the middle of ...an Alanis Morrisette song. "ACK!" Changes to another station which is playing...omigod...another Alanis Morrisette tune. "GAH!" She finally finds a station which is not playing Alanis Morrisette, settles there, and glares at me as if this were all, in some obscure fashion, my doing.


2) There used to be a song on Sesame Street that began: "Oh, there are chickens in the trees, there are chickens in the trees! Won't you listen to me, please..."

So: When we came home from the Legion of Honor and a side trip to the market, there were two teenage boys sitting in the trees opposite our house. They are known to Avocado--she was planning on hanging out with them this afternoon--but they had decided to stay in the trees until such time as A was ready to be social. As I was taking Emily out for her afternoon constitutional I looked across the street and there were Avocado and the two boys just lounging in the trees, and all I could think was "Won't you listen to me, please..."