Careercow Robert Stanek - Mediocre Author and Great Sockpuppeteer

[c-no]

After seeing the name being mentioned in the Gloria Tesch thread, I have decided to make a thread that is similar to Gloria Tesch in terms of being a terrible writer and having an army of sockpuppets who, unlike Gloria, are all from the man himself, Robert Stanek. Known for writing such classics like "Keeper Martin's Tales", "The Kingdom and the Elves of the Reach", and many now deleted sockpuppet reviews that were on Amazon. Fellow forumers, please discuss your thoughts on the man whose sockpuppetry makes Gloria's look rather tame in comparison.

The man himself, in a picture that has something missing in it:

My search results of Stanek
His Website: http://www.robertstanek.com/
Conjugal Felicity on Stanek: http://conjugalfelicity.com/robert-stanek/

 

[Grand Number of Pounds]

I can understand why 20-somethings become lolcows because they're young and dumb, but Stanek really should have grown up by now and realized he'll never achieve his dream of being a famous novelist.

 

[c-no]

I can understand why 20-somethings become lolcows because they're young and dumb, but Stanek really should have grown up by now and realized he'll never achieve his dream of being a famous novelist.

Yeah, at least Gloria Tesch has some years like say ten years before growing out of it, Stanek is basically a man with a family who has been pushing out crap novels and sockpuppets. He's an adult in like his forties and he is doing this immature crap of writing horrid fiction and making fake reviews to sate his ego and his wallet.

 

[Fialovy]

One word: avoid!

There's a saying that "you shouldn't judge a book by its cover", but in the case of a Robert Stanek novel, you CAN judge by the cover.
A monkey could design better book covers!

This is self-published dreck of the worst sort. I normally wouldn't spend any time actually shouting out a self-published novel here except for the one fact: Stanek habitually games the online rating systems.

A suspicious number of positive reviews have been posted at Amazon.com concerning this author’s Rune Mist saga, ranging from one to five stars. Rumor has it that Rob has been padding Amazon.com with fake reviews in an effort to hawk his own books. After reading book one, it was immediately apparent (after the first page) that the rumor is true. Stanek is, quite simply, the worst author I have had the misfortune of reading. He possesses not a single atom of writing ability. I’ll put it like this: Keeper Martin’s Tale evinces all the skill of an adolescent girl, writing her first creative piece on a prancing pony. Keep away from his books if you value your sanity. His prose is so bad, it'll make your eyes bleed. I even dedicated some time a few years ago to writing a post about how Robert Stanek is gaming Amazon with hordes of fake reviews.

Not ONLY is Stanek a bad author, he's also a nasty character. Fake reviews, aggressive behavior towards people who call out his practices, and his penchant for outright lying (a photoshopped picture of him at a panel with legitimate authors like Brian Jacques? Puhleeezzz!).

Because of all this, Stanek wins The Best Fantasy Books award for being the worst fantasy author and writing the worst fantasy novels. In fact, I'll go one further. Stanek is not just a bad fantasy writer, he's the nemesis of the fantasy world, the Dark Lord of fantasy authors. Please, if you see a Robert Stanek novel, run like hell, because you're risking your literary soul merely by opening the book.

This review from Best Fantasy Books is how I heard of this guy. They go so far as to call him the Dark Lord of Fantasy authors and yeah, his character especially is what makes him lolcow material and worthy of the title of worst fantasy author.

What you are looking at is the true Sockpuppet Master.

 

[c-no]

One word: avoid!

There's a saying that "you shouldn't judge a book by its cover", but in the case of a Robert Stanek novel, you CAN judge by the cover.
A monkey could design better book covers!

This is self-published dreck of the worst sort. I normally wouldn't spend any time actually shouting out a self-published novel here except for the one fact: Stanek habitually games the online rating systems.

A suspicious number of positive reviews have been posted at Amazon.com concerning this author’s Rune Mist saga, ranging from one to five stars. Rumor has it that Rob has been padding Amazon.com with fake reviews in an effort to hawk his own books. After reading book one, it was immediately apparent (after the first page) that the rumor is true. Stanek is, quite simply, the worst author I have had the misfortune of reading. He possesses not a single atom of writing ability. I’ll put it like this: Keeper Martin’s Tale evinces all the skill of an adolescent girl, writing her first creative piece on a prancing pony. Keep away from his books if you value your sanity. His prose is so bad, it'll make your eyes bleed. I even dedicated some time a few years ago to writing a post about how Robert Stanek is gaming Amazon with hordes of fake reviews.

Not ONLY is Stanek a bad author, he's also a nasty character. Fake reviews, aggressive behavior towards people who call out his practices, and his penchant for outright lying (a photoshopped picture of him at a panel with legitimate authors like Brian Jacques? Puhleeezzz!).

Because of all this, Stanek wins The Best Fantasy Books award for being the worst fantasy author and writing the worst fantasy novels. In fact, I'll go one further. Stanek is not just a bad fantasy writer, he's the nemesis of the fantasy world, the Dark Lord of fantasy authors. Please, if you see a Robert Stanek novel, run like hell, because you're risking your literary soul merely by opening the book.

This review from Best Fantasy Books is how I heard of this guy. They go so far as to call him the Dark Lord of Fantasy authors and yeah, his character especially is what makes him lolcow material and worthy of the title of worst fantasy author.

What you are looking at is the true Sockpuppet Master.

Seeing as how he is lolcow material thanks to his practices, the Dark Lord title is rather deserving. I never read his books and I don't intend too unless it's a sporking. I wonder what his family has to think about his practices if they aren't the kind who delude themselves in believing he's a good author.

 

[WWWWolf]

I can understand why 20-somethings become lolcows because they're young and dumb, but Stanek really should have grown up by now and realized he'll never achieve his dream of being a famous novelist.

Or at least realise that when everyone has called him out on his sockpuppetry and general terribleness, it might pay to start trying harder.

I'm thinking Stanek is getting a little bit battle-weary about this himself, too. He's still trying to confuse people, but he's not doing anywhere near as good job at it, mostly because he's not doing such a good job on social media era where real people don't need to spend quite as much effort to call him on his bullshit. It's one thing to flood old sites like Amazon or make ginormous sock puppet forums, and altogether another to try to look presentable in Facebook or Goodreads or something.

He just wanted to publish his Ruin Mist Keeper Martin Ramble! Newsletters and leave out cards saying "I'm a 18-____ page terrible fantasy novel, if you're a novel-free fantasy reader please order this book from Amazon, ISBN 1-57545-042-9". And after tons and tons and tons and tons of failures and ridicule now he's in the phase where he says "Curse the Wikipedia and various blogs! I wish I had never found the dang things, and I wish it taken down forever", while doing a whole lot of nothing.

Someone recently psychoanalysed the photographs he had been posting of himself, about how awkward and inconvenienced he's looked in the recent photos. Things have clearly taken a toll. He hasn't even completed the novels - I just wonder if he will ever get around to do so.

 

[c-no]

I can understand why 20-somethings become lolcows because they're young and dumb, but Stanek really should have grown up by now and realized he'll never achieve his dream of being a famous novelist.

Or at least realise that when everyone has called him out on his sockpuppetry and general terribleness, it might pay to start trying harder.

I'm thinking Stanek is getting a little bit battle-weary about this himself, too. He's still trying to confuse people, but he's not doing anywhere near as good job at it, mostly because he's not doing such a good job on social media era where real people don't need to spend quite as much effort to call him on his bullshit. It's one thing to flood old sites like Amazon or make ginormous sock puppet forums, and altogether another to try to look presentable in Facebook or Goodreads or something.

He just wanted to publish his Ruin Mist Keeper Martin Ramble! Newsletters and leave out cards saying "I'm a 18-____ page terrible fantasy novel, if you're a novel-free fantasy reader please order this book from Amazon, ISBN 1-57545-042-9". And after tons and tons and tons and tons of failures and ridicule now he's in the phase where he says "Curse the Wikipedia and various blogs! I wish I had never found the dang things, and I wish it taken down forever", while doing a whole lot of nothing.

Someone recently psychoanalysed the photographs he had been posting of himself, about how awkward and inconvenienced he's looked in the recent photos. Things have clearly taken a toll. He hasn't even completed the novels - I just wonder if he will ever get around to do so.

If he doesn't complete the novels, than those will end up like Sonichu. Kinda makes me wonder if he ends up in a predicament that can have some or little similarities to Chris'

 

[DykesDykesChina]

Two questions here...

1. Why does he think using mirrored nature photographs for title images is a good idea?

2. Does he draw the illustrations to his books himself? If so, he's a far better artist than writer.

 

[A-Stump]

That short wizard guy looks like Danny Devito.


www.youtube.com/watch?v=dJ8G2s--1zA lol

 

[Jewelsmakerguy]

2. Does he draw the illustrations to his books himself? If so, he's a far better artist than writer.

http://www.robertstanek.com/images/2-4.jpg

If he does, his hands could use a fair bit of work.

 

[Zim]

The man himself, in a picture that has something missing in it: http://conjugalfelicity.com/wp-content/ ... nekfun.jpg

My search results of Stanek
His Website: http://www.robertstanek.com/
Conjugal Felicity on Stanek: http://conjugalfelicity.com/robert-stanek/

I think the bigger missing element in these pictures is legs. Where are they? He must have forgotten to bring them that day.

 

[DykesDykesChina]

There's also his sugary generic picture book series Bugville which teaches the littl'uns oh-so-valuable life lessons.

These characters are mainly generic cutesy humanoids with slapped-on antennae and wings - except the caterpillar (or millipede?) girl, she's kinda original.

 

[c-no]

2. Does he draw the illustrations to his books himself? If so, he's a far better artist than writer.

http://www.robertstanek.com/images/2-4.jpg

He could of gotten someone else to do the illustrations. Wouldn't be surprised if it was a family member or a friend who made the drawings.

 

[littlebiscuits]

I dislike authors who use sockpuppets to promote themselves.

 

[Stalin]

I bought one of his books for a penny.

I paid too much money.

 

[Grand Number of Pounds]

OK, this ticked me off. Stanek claims he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. This clown is lucky that the Stolen Valor Act was struck down or he'd face prison time for pretending to be a war hero. What a joke.

 

[Dilbertmann]

OK, this ticked me off. Stanek claims he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. This clown is lucky that the Stolen Valor Act was struck down or he'd face prison time for pretending to be a war hero. What a joke.

Stanek needs to prove that he was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross. But who cares? I found a blog on him - he's so goddamned desperate that even Gloria Tesch can't beat him in a race of desperate tactics. What a fucking prick.

 

[Phil Ken Sebben]

Does anybody actually have a copy of this first book of his? I'm really curious to read it.

Also, from what I've read on the subject, the names of the characters and places are stolen from different languages. The one that struck me the most was the name of the protagonist. His name is Vilmos. It's not a common name but I can tell you right now that I believe him to be an author self-insert. Why? Well, Robert's first name is in fact William and guess what? Vilmos is the Hungarian form of William.

A pretty big co-incidence I must say.

 

[Stalin]

Does anybody actually have a copy of this first book of his? I'm really curious to read it.

I do. It's impossible to get through.

 

[Grand Number of Pounds]

LOL, my library has three copies of "The kingdoms & the elves of the reaches" on interlibrary loan so guess what I'm going to borrow? They also have a few of his computer books, audiobooks and his picture books for kids.

I wonder if Stanek sent these books to libraries in Ohio or some poor librarian bought them for the library after reading his sockpuppet reviews?

TRUE and HONEST review