Constance Hall is being taken to the Supreme Court by her former business partner and friend over alleged unpaid royalties from her best-selling book.
According to Perth Now, the mummy blogger has been fighting a 15-month private battle with WA journalist Kristen Watts, after the latter claimed she she hasn’t receive payments for editing Hall’s hugely successful memoir Like A Queen.
The self-published book sold over 150,000 copies, making Hall the countries highest selling author last year, with the tome racing to the top of the best-sellers list, despite not having a distributor and all copies being sold online.
In a writ lodged in the Supreme Court on Friday, lawyers for Ms Watts argue that Ms Hall broke the terms of their contract by not paying Ms Watts a royalty of at least 30 per cent of the book’s net profits and accusing her of ‘oppressive condict.’
‘In the circumstances, the conduct of Ms Hall and Like A Queen is oppressive or un-fairly prejudicial to or unfairly discriminatory against Ms Watts as a shareholder of Like A Queen,’ the writ states.
Her lawyers argued Hall has broken ‘written publishing facilitator agreement’ and their client has experienced ‘loss and damage’.
They claim Watts was ostracised from Like A Queen Pty Ltd, a company she and Hall have equals shares in, since September last year in an attempt to block her from accessing financial records on the books sales.
Watts received a royalty payment of $109,150 when the book was released, but her lawyers are arguing that she is owed more.
It is claimed that Hall has made no contact with Watts since the payment and has denied her accessing the book’s records.
Last month 34-year-old she was pregnant with her fifth child, and earlier this week she posted the first picture of her baby bump to social media.
‘Guys…The commune is welcoming another baby,’ the post began.
‘We have no idea how it slipped through. We tried everything, on and off bouts of the pill (until it flared my colitis too much), withdrawal, morning after pills,’ she said of the ‘miraculous’ conception of her first child with fiancé Denim Cooke.
Ms Watts’ lawyer said his client was a “reluctant litigant” and wanted a quick resolution, but was serious about pursuing her contractual requirements.
“She very much wanted to keep this matter private between the parties. Litigation in this sense is very much an option of last resort,” he said. “My client thought that this book would be successful for a variety of reasons but no one thought it was going to be the success that it has been … all she wants out of this is the bargain that she struck in the beginning, that’s it, nothing more, it’s not opportunistic.”
Constance paid tribute to her ‘friend’ Kristen on Facebook in August last year, writing:
‘I have to say a massive thanks to my dear friend Kris Watts who has facilitated my publishing (basically published) this book for me. She is the brains, the experience and the instincts and the day she came into my life has turned out to be the best twist of fate I’ve had.’
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