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Agent Kern Expelled from AAR
Judy Quinn -- 9/10/97
The Board of Directors of the Association of Authors'Representatives announced today that it is expelling Portland,Oregon-based literary agent Natasha Kern from its membership.The action -- a rare and most serious sanction for theorganization -- comes after AAR's Ethics Committee looked intocharges about misconduct surrounding the May 19 auction ofBruce Fergusson's thriller The Piper's Sons, first reported by PW, in which Dutton paid a reported $500,000 advance for this and another Fergusson book, only to discover afterwards it was actually the only participant in what it thought was a heated auction. The Ethics Committee has determined Kern did violate the AAR's Canon of Ethics by making misleading and deceptive statement to a publisher. Ironically, the publisher later renegotiated a $100,000, one-book deal to keep the book. Watch for a full report in PW's September 15 issue.

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