In Words for the Taking: The Hunt for a Plagiarist author Neal Bowers takes the reader on an unusual hunt for a literary stalker. A poet and teacher by profession, Bowers became a detective out of necessity when he discovered one of his poems had been plagiarized and repeatedly published by someone calling himself David Sumner. Later, he learned Sumner had stolen more of his work and the poems of other writers as well. Here he describes his almost surreal search for the plagiarist and its surprising aftermath.

For Neal Bowers, David Sumner--a.k.a. David Jones--became an almost mythic adversary, and Bowers's quest for justice a kind of heroic quest. The character of the plagiarist is at the heart of this story: who was "David Sumner" and why did he steal another man's words? The answers to these questions prove as troubling as they are startling.

This beautifully written case study about the discovery and attempted resolution of an intellectual crime will appeal to academicians and general readers alike who care about language, the state of poetry, and intellectual property in contemporary America.

Early Reviews:

“As Bowers pursues his nemesis through a maze of deception and impersonation, he discovers more than he bargained for about shattered lives and unsavory ambition.  Words for the Taking is a compelling exposé not only of plagiarism but also the literary culture that unwittingly tolerates it.”
                                                                            —Dana Gioia, author of Disappearing Ink: Poetry at the End of Print Culture

“Neal Bowers’s engaging detective story presents a fable for our time: an honest man, the author, finds himself caught in the riptides of a low dishonest culture. . . . Every informed reader will find it fascinating.”
                                                                            —George Core, editor of The Sewanee Review