How to Declare Your Conflicts of Interest

The book blogger Edward Champion has written one of the greatest conflict of interest declarations of all time:

I have no connection with any of these authors. The only conflict of interest here involves one of the books being edited by a loathsome liar and rumormongering backstabber whom I strongly detest. He has pushed many kind heads beneath the undertow for careerist purposes and, despite leading a smear campaign accusing bloggers of unethical journalism many years ago, he has evinced pure unethical venality in regularly buying books for the publisher he represents that are agented by his partner, thus securing a crooked two-income stream. Still, quality work is quality work and this scumbag's unfortunate association with a book I happened to love did not deter me in any way from ranking the book very high. (I have elided this man's name, as well as that of another hateful and treacherous individual cited below, to make it slightly more difficult for him to name search himself. But if you really need to know who they are, Google is free.)

The entire review is a delight. Champion read the National Book Awards fiction longlist in full after the books were announced on Sept. 16, 2022. Finishing nine books took him two weeks.

Books · Ethics · Journalism · 2022/10/21 · 0 COMMENTS · Link