Greetings to all,

As many of you may be aware, some of Freelance Academy Press’ authors have been involved in a dispute with a previous publisher, Chivalry Bookshelf. The community will be pleased to know that these authors and Chivalry Bookshelf have reached a mutual agreement that resolved all remaining issues. As part of that agreement, ownership of all the authors’ intellectual property as well as the remaining stock of each of the authors’ books has been transferred to the respective authors.

At the authors’ request Freelance Academy Press is pleased act as the sole broker, until supplies run out, of the remaining stock of the following, limited edition titles:

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These books are new and in perfect condition. Although these titles were originally published by Chivalry Bookshelf, there is no longer any affiliation between the authors and Chivalry Bookshelf and all proceeds of the sale of these books will go directly to its author as part of the settlement. These books represent some of the seminal modern research into western martial arts and European martial culture and have become the foundation of the modern curricula now used by many schools around the world.

All these titles may be found in their own separate category on the FAP website.

All the best from Freelance Academy Press,

Congratulations on getting these back under your control!

Congratulations it must be a relief, and a good degree of satisfaction, to be again in control of one's own work.

Opens up the possibilities of reprinting new editions for those books in sufficient demand and maybe updating some books with revised interpretations or new research while being able to use to original texts that are still current.

Also a golden opportunity to buy some " classic " works that where unavailable or difficult to find and really nice to know that the money is going to the authors.

Congratulations!
It is good to know that you managed to get this under control and that the titles are available again. To know that the profit go to the right person is a big incentive here, as far as I am concerned.

Good news to me. Now I can finish buying the titles I want knowing the profit goes to where it should. Orders forthcoming.

Since Christian made his announcement, we've received a number of questions about other titles, other authors, etc. Due to the terms of the settlement, Christian and the other authors have a non-disclosure agreement, and cannot discuss details, but I can.

The original suit involved Christian, Tom, Steve Muhlberger, Jeff Forgeng, Guy Windsor, Luca Porzio and myself. The final settlement included all but Luca and I. The below should explain what the settlement means vis a vis Chivalry Bookshelf and the titles not listed on the Freelance webpage.

1. Why aren't Stephen Hand, Bill Wilson, Paul Wagner, Mark Rector or John Greer's books included on the Freelance website?
Simple - they chose not to be a part of the lawsuit, each for their own reasons. Actually, Paul Wagner wanted to join the case, but with his two co authors (Rector and Hand, respectively) declining, he had little recourse.

2. Did those authors receive a settlement?
Once it became clear that we were going to go through with arbitration, Ann Price rushed to try cut deals for cash and return of rights to each of the above. I do not know the particulars of those deals.

3. What will happen to those authors' titles?
I don't know. My understanding is that the authors have their rights back, so Chivalry Bookshelf/Revival Enterprises can continue to sell its stock (oh yes, more on that, later), but the authors can also do whatever they want right now to create new editions.

4. Why isn't Greg Mele's "Arte Gladiatoria" title available at Freelance?
Well, it *is* available .... from Chivalry Bookshelf. (And thus, the subtitle of this thread.) Here is what happened:

Brian's contract with my co-author, Luca Porzio, required binding arbitration - I had no such arbitration agreement with Brian, either for author or editorial royalties. Once it became clear that the Prices would force the case into arbitration, Luca decided to withdraw from the case, as he could not see how to be part of an international dispute, which could drag on for some time, where the publisher refused to provide our counsel with:

a. independently verifiable sales numbers - not their own home-grown spreadsheets;

b. an inventory of remaining product and its current retail value;

c. had already been found "dumping" titles on a resell and Lulu site to try and liquidate the stock of the titles that were in dispute.

Brian also sent Luca an email accusing me of leading a witch-hunt, and asserting that he had never believed me to be a "legal co-author" and that he had "granted that as a courtesy", and asking that Luca immediately accept a check for back royalties, and write a letter supporting Brian's position

I will let you all imagine how that story can make sense, seeing as a) the book is copyrighted in my name, b) Luca specifically named me as a co-author in his own acknowledgments to the book, c)I have an email from 2011 from Luca reaffirming my role as the co-author, d) the one and only royalty payment Luca received before Brian attempted to buy him off in the 11th hour stated that the total royalty had been divided in half for the "co-author, Gregory Mele". (No, I never saw that other half of the royalty payment.)

With Luca removed from the case, we knew that it would be a challenge to have my case heard by the arbitrator, but at the same time, we couldn't take the entire case to court, because the other authors *did* have an arbitration clause. As expected, the arbitrator ruled that although he felt there was a good case for copyright infringement, he could not rule on my part of the suit because he did not have the authority to do so. Note, he did not say that Mr. and Mrs. Price had done nothing wrong; merely that I should sue them in court.

At some point, practicality must rear its ugly head. I could not drag this case on, with no clear way to resolve both sets of issues, without accruing thousands of dollars more in court costs, for what the Prices claim was about 80 books. (Our legal bills could buy a reasonably nice car - I know, it is almost to the penny what I paid for mine!) So, I agreed to be separated from the settlement, but at the same time made it clear that I would not be part of the final agreement, nor sign a mutual non-disparagement, etc. Although, I will add that Ann Price tried to hold the settlement hostage to indeed get me to sign that gag agreement. I'll let ya'all be the judge in what my possible motivation or benefit in doing that would be.

So, to be really, really clear: if you buy my book, anywhere, you are only giving money to the Prices - not to me, and I doubt Luca will ever see another dime.

5. So who gets the money now?

As Christian said, the *authors*. Freelance is recouping its shipping and warehousing costs, and then taking a small cut to cover on-going warehousing and shipping. The remaining 90% goes to a) legal bills, b) recouping the authors who had no physical product to sell and c) to the authors. Once a and b is resolved, we intend to send a percentage to the Wounded Warriors Program, as we did previously.

That pretty much sums it up.