Writing about real people can raise a number of complicated legal issues for authors. Legal issues such as defamation and rights of publicity have a number of fact-specific rules,  exceptions, and exceptions to exceptions that can be difficult to navigate without help. We’ve found that these issues can be an obstacle to creation for all types of authors, from bloggers to narrative nonfiction authors to historians, cultural anthropologists, and other scholarly authors. 

As part of our highly used series of guides on legal issues for authors, Authors Alliance has set out to create a guide to writing about real people for nonfiction authors. We’ve got a good start and edited draft already, but would like your input as we refine the guide –  what should we be highlighting? What’s trickiest, most salient, and for which types of nonfiction authors? 

We invite Authors Alliance members, A2P2 partners, and others who are interested to join us for a community call on Monday, November 14, 2022, from 1-2pm Eastern/10-11am Pacific. The meeting will be held on Zoom, and you can register here.

We plan to share our plans for the guide, including scope and coverage, ideas for additional content (e.g., teaching resources), and publication plans. We’d like to hear from you: 

• What important issues have we not included in our plans for the guide that we should? 
• Which issues in the guide seem most salient or important for nonfiction authors?
• What helpful examples do you have that we might include to help authors? 
• How can we format, structure, and disseminate the guide best to support authors who need this information?