Long story short, I ended up "firing" her after one of her famous tirades. When I asked her to speak to me without yelling, she told me not to tell her what to do.

See you later! No amount of money is worth that! I'd rather flip burgers.

I didn't respond to him at all but reported him to his ISP and sent copies of some of the e-mails. They closed his e-mail account, and it took him a while to get another one. In fact, that was one of his complaints in the forum post about how horrible I was. He said I caused him to lose his Internet access and e-mail.

When he got back online, I never heard from him again directly, and that one forum posting was the only other time I heard of him.

Amie, do you love the book? I'm always looking for new reads.

I've been blessed with wonderful clients, but I when I was editor for an online publishing company, I was harassed by a writer.

He sent in a manuscript that needed a lot of work. He became very angry when I sent it back with revision notes and started sending me threatening e-mails. Then he subscribed me to the vilest porn spam.

Every day, my junk mailbox was filled with the most explicit and offensive stuff you can imagine, and my inbox was full of his threatening messages. I actually copied this trash to CDs for awhile because I really thought I might need evidence of the harassment in case he carried through with any of the threats.

I also forwarded messages to his ISP and got them to close his account.

Not long afteward, I saw a posting from him on a forum about how terrible I was—he sent me a wonderful manuscript, and I wanted him to make changes that would totally destroy it, etc. I just ignored that because he didn't make any threats, and I didn't see anything else.

That kind of behavior is scary, whether it's a client or a writer.

Listening to: Scarpetta (on my iPod) and Songs of the Humpback Whale (in my car)

I'm so prone to earworms, I skip music in favor of audiobooks.

Hubby sends encouraging, "This is great!" emails, while the wife sends the critiques of every little thing you did, that technically make no sense.

Then, when it's all said and done and all payments have been made to my account, an email comes zipping to the inbox from the irate wife. How dare I flirt with her hubby. Apparently, Thank-You's are considered flirting. Go figure.

Hubby wants to continue with my writing services, but dear ol' wife puts more demands on me, asking me to limit what I say and how I do other things. Sorry, I don't operate that way. You'll have to find someone else. I'd rather not get stuck in their personal problems. Thank You.