Calli Hynes, a popular BookTok influencer who goes by CallisReadingg online, is under fire after she was exposed on the platform for scamming indie authors out of hundreds of dollars.
CallisReadingg boasted over 240k followers on TikTok, while her main account @callikoa boasted a whopping 1.5 million followers. On her book channel, she often posted book reviews, unboxings, and updates on what books she planned on reading for the month. Given her large following, her influence was quite appealing to indie authors.
These self-publishing authors must handle all advertising for their books themselves, making TikTok an attractive platform to gain visibility. Many have learned not to underestimate the power of BookTok, as the platform has been known to increase book sales and is partially responsible for the rise of some of today’s bestselling authors, including Colleen Hoover and Sarah J. Maas. Sometimes, all it takes is one recommendation from a prominent BookTok influencer to kickstart a book’s popularity.
As a result, some influencers have made BookTok a career, offering paid promotions to predominantly indie authors looking to improve the visibility of their books. Unfortunately, one influencer saw her platform as an opportunity to scam indie authors.
CallisReadingg’s BookTok scandal
Recently, several indie authors took to TikTok claiming to have been scammed by Hynes. According to the videos, she has been scamming indie authors for at least a year. Author Jay Michael Night, an army veteran who works as a dentist during the day and pursues a writing career on the side, is one of those who spoke out. He has written the fantasy books The Balance of Gods, Fangs of Gold, and Relics of Power.
In his video, Night revealed he had been dealing with Hynes for two months but was hesitant to come forward until others started sharing their stories. He explained that she contacted him in April, offering to make two videos promoting his books in exchange for $600. Since he was struggling with low sales, Night agreed to pay the fee. On top of that, he sent her a book box worth $100 to help with her promotion. Then, he was met with silence for a month until she suddenly contacted him again, asking if he paid. When he confirmed he paid, she promised to make the videos in a week. However, months went by, and she never made the videos, aside from one in which she unboxed his books but never mentioned him by name or tagged him. Night says he paid her in April and never got his money back.
Luke Young, the indie author behind the Friends with Benefits series, also shared his experiences with Hynes. In August 2023, he says he agreed to pay her $450 for three videos. However, like Night, the videos were significantly delayed, as she released them in October despite allegedly promising to do so in August. Additionally, she only ever released two of the videos and wasn’t communicating with him to notify him when the videos went up. Young estimates that he only got a single book sale from her promotion but was more concerned that she didn’t do what she said she would than with the sales.
Indie romance author Krista Swanson, who wrote the Blue Ridge University series, also shared her experiences, saying she didn’t come forward sooner because she felt “embarrassed” at getting scammed. She explained how she was an indie author who was so excited to have a big BookTok influencer want to advertise her books, which led to her letting her guard down. In her case, she did receive videos, but she says they were poorly made, and it was clear Hynes hadn’t actually read her books. Meanwhile, once the controversy broke out, Hynes deleted the videos for Swanson’s book but did not refund the $200 Swanson paid for them.
Bo Grant, the indie author behind Running from Cupid, was among the first to share her experiences with Hynes. She says she dealt with Hynes for three months. Grant explained how she had worked three jobs at a time to make ends meet while trying to break into the publishing industry, just to have Hynes infiltrate the BookTok community to steal her money.
H. L. Brooks and Layla Sparks have also come forward, and it’s expected that there are still many more victims as well. Sadly, some may be ashamed to come forward, given how authors like Night and Grant blamed themselves for what happened, even though they never could have predicted that someone could be so cruel as to take advantage of indie authors this way. After authors like Brooks and Night provided text receipts corroborating their accounts, Hynes’ BookTok account was temporarily suspended. Unfortunately, as of the writing of this article, she got her BookTok account back up under the new username @callisreadsss. However, she turned off all comments on her videos.
She has a pinned video responding to the allegations. For the majority of the video, she tries to defend herself by claiming that her rates are lower than most BookTokers and that she offers refunds “all the time” when life gets in the way of her posting. However, she doesn’t directly address the allegations from all the indie authors who came forward.
On top of that, BookToker @lexialuvsbooks also noted that Hynes had already been “canceled” before for allegedly scamming small businesses via her main TikTok account.
Hopefully, BookTok influencers and authors will continue sharing their stories and raising awareness for the scam so that no other hardworking indie authors are exploited and scammed out of significant amounts of money. Fortunately, the BookTok community has been rallying around the authors who were scammed, offering to promote their books for free and working together to drive up their sales.
Published: Sep 3, 2024 01:39 pm