Last month we at «EKSMO Publishers» have been officially claimed by mail from «LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae, L. L. P.» to «stop publishing , reprinting, marketing, distributing and selling unlawful books» (by «unlawful» they meant books about Tanya Grotter written by Dmitry Yemets). «LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae, L. L. P.» also claimed for written confirmation that the said activities by EKSMO have been stopped and that EKSMO will never resume any of those activities. Moreover there was one more demand by «LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae, L. L. P.» that we should inform them of our total incomes received by the «Tanya Grotter project». And in case they don’t get their satisfaction by Nov. 10, 2002 their clients may decide to go to law and/or other state institute to claim for compensation. But at the same time they write: «We hope you will not miss the chance to solve the problem without public opposing between our two parties». And the very next paragraph already reads as follows: «This letter is not the agreement of lawsuit». Do you feel any contradictory? They didn’t make it clear whether they are going to the law or not but they did make it quite clear that they need not any law to proclaim Tanya Grotter is «unlawful», and EKSMO confidential financial information has to be open for them. Such demands like mentioned above look more like helpless attempts to bluff and intimidate a well-known Moscow publishing house. And with that level of a barefaced impudence it all would appear to be a paragon of professional incompetence if it wasn’t sent by such a respected law firm.

It is reasonable that we have made our opinion about why «LeBoeuf, Lamb, Greene & MacRae, L. L. P.» didn’t send this letter a couple of month ago when the first book «Tanya Grotter and the Magic Double-Bass» was just published. They sent it two month later because now it’s clear that Tanya Grotter became a super-popular personage and the whole project is very successful. They just want to get rid of a serious business rival. And, naturally, the wider Tanya Grotter books are spreading in an international market the stronger becomes their desire to stop it. But the quality of certain works of young Russian authors is often even better than that of world-famous brands. One of the large publishing houses in Holland and more than 20 other publishers all over the world have already gained the rights to publish Tanya Grotter books. Do you really thing they would want to buy any «unlawful» product?

So, if to sum up all these facts, it becomes obvious that those who «launched» a boy on a broomstick into the sky are very eager to stay monopolists in airspace not allowing other young people flying on double-basses and vacuum cleaners to join the pioneer pilot.

Feebleness and unachievable, unrealizable dream to smother, suppress their competitors makes people to write the letters that are as much insolent as they are stupid. Such a Triwizard Tournament we have…


PR-department, "EKSMO Publishers", Moscow