If you've read the previous chapters then you should know that I do reckless BUT reasonable things. And today, I signed a contract with Rnovel.

I'm kidding-- God that's a terrible joke.

Well technically, I was THIS close to signing it. I only had to put my name, book title, pen name, other details, send it back, and I'll be doomed for as long as I live. At least, that's my take on the whole thing.

RNovel, AnyStories, Dreame, HiNovel (and a lot more I can't remember)... I'd say they're all at the same level. Which is FYI, way below Wattpad.

I already talked about this situation (briefly) in a past chapter but that was mainly focused on Inkitt so here's a much more detailed one.

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To those who aren't aware, there are some instances wherein you suddenly find this kind of message in your Wattpad inbox (photo inserted above the title chapter) and you'll feel like you just won the lottery.

Because you know, it's great that you're actually given the option to be paid for writing stories! It's hella amazing and you're flattered that you were asked in the first place and you want to grab the opportunity before it goes away—

Hold up, mate. Let me break it down to you first.

Of course, the first thing a sane person will do is search online and try to find information that'll clear their doubts. Come on, it sounds too good to be true! And if you do that... The results ain't pretty.

[Last two photos are taken from 'Publishing Trends and News' by WattpadBookshelves]

I won't be including the others so feel free to search for the rest. Let's get right to the matter in hand and not delay it any further hmm?

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Fun fact: Most, if not all, of my decisions come from boredom.

I was having classes online like every other responsible student out there when I got a message from RNovel (which wasn't a new thing cause this was the third time they contacted me).

The problem was, I was bored to death, and it was when the idea hit me like a truck: 'Hey Alina, have you ever thought of actually humoring them?'

And me, who only wanted to leave the meeting, feel the warmth of my bed, and sleep until 2020 is over, was like: 'Hell yeah, I'm up for it.'

Long story short, I did what 'Tracy' asked and sent them an email. I waited for a reply, which surprisingly, I got within ten minutes.

(The email is pretty long so I'll just summarize it)

She introduced herself, mentioned that I can visit their site 'www.rnovel365.com' to find basic information about them, and that I can already download their app on IOS (which frankly, I can't since I use Android). I also got this:

'As a fresh developed APP, we would put large investment in promotion and advertisement to boost its popularity. This would be a great opportunity to earn fairly higher profit than new-coming writers. :)'

Y'all I don't like the smiley face, and they sure phrased this oddly...

Additionally, she introduced that they provide three ways of cooperation for authors:

Exclusive contract, Non-exclusive contract, and On Free to Read program.

Basically, the first two is wherein they'll pay you for writing a book in their site. The only difference is that in the first one, you aren't allowed to publish that certain work in other online platforms. In the latter, you can, but your pay will be lessened. The third one isn't important so I'll skip that.

She ended the email with this:

'How about your ideas? I found your works on Wattpad and I would like to sign all them if you don't mind. It would be appreciated if you can send me a book list that you can work with us.:)'

Again with the smiley face. Of course, when I read that my first thought was: 'Sign my works? What in the world does that even mean? I ain't letting your filthy hands go near my babies.'

Apparently, the 'sign' part was referring to their contract, which I will be discussing in detail at the next chapter (stay tuned).

I replied:

I'm not impressed. Their website's interface looked cheap to me, not to mention it didn't look like they put a lot of work into it. She sent me these screenshots in return (the second one was obviously a surprise):

I posted that on my Instagram story after trying to figure out what apps they might be (couldn't help it). They're all writing/reading apps, as you can tell. Including Wattpad.

It makes sense that one of RNovel's staff member has those kinds of apps on her home screen, 'observing' them and maybe even taking inspiration (which I guess is fine). But I had to consider the big possibility that they are poaching writers from all those apps as well. That was a big turn off for me.

Honestly, the largest problem about everything for me was how writing platforms like RNovel contact writers. You know they make new accounts just to message people, which makes them more suspicious, but have ever thought why?

Obviously, it's because THEY KNOW that it's against Wattpad's guidelines, yet they still do that. They ARE AWARE that we have already been warned not to take their offers and report their profiles, which is why they skip from one new account to another.

The audacity.

Ask yourself this. As a writer who is not/barely experienced with the publishing industry, are you sure you want to take the risk? Are you willing to involve yourself with a writing platform that can't even follow simple regulations? Are they worth trusting?

No one knows.

[from the App Store on web]

They don't look good, don't you think? F for first impressions. Their stories seem not be of good quality, and I bet RNovel is gonna turn out like those kinds of writing apps whose advertisements on Facebook look like this:

ODD PHRASES THAT ARE WORTH CRINGING AT. BEAUTIFUL EYEBROWS THAT WERE GOING UP AND DOWN. WORDS THAT AREN'T EVEN IN THE DICTIONARY. PROMOTION OF VIOLENCE.

CURSED ADVERTISEMENTS. NEED I SAY MORE?