The Pearl at the Gate continues to surprise and delight me with the reception it's receiving. As well as the great reviews at MBaM and from Mrs. Giggles mentioned in my previous post, it also got two more wonderful reviews; a 5 Heart (!) one from The Romance Studio (read the review here) and a 4.5 Star from Manic Readers (read that review here).
I take my hat off to all reviewers. On the surface, as a voracious reader, I think it would be a great job. Under that though is a sea of difficulties. The number of books released each week is daunting; every writer wants a review, and wants it NOW; and each writer hopes above all to get a positive review, which can't always happen. Reviewers are people too, with their own tastes and preferences, and what they offer the public are their honest opinions.
Adding to the problem is the fact that writers also are people too, who get their feelings hurt when someone doesn't love their "baby." I know a positive review with even one caveat can make me feel like I'm under attack...fragile ego indeed! I'm forced to give my head a shake and remind myself everyone has a right to their opinion and, indeed, I would fight to the death to support that right. Get over it, and move on. Like Tom Hanks said, "Crying? Is she crying? There's no crying in baseball!" He may as well have been talking about writing. This business is not for sissies.
But every now and then a good crying jag can really clear the head!
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Saturday, July 5, 2008
Pearl at the Gate: the little novella that could...
Wow! When the Pearl at the Gate was released from Samhain Publishing on June 24th, I have to confess I was worried. My Editor, Laurie, had classified it as erotica, rather than an erotic romance, and I had just seen a discussion on the Samhain Cafe loop where some of the ladies said they had no interest in erotica, because of a lack of plot and emotion. I was gutted...First and foremost I see myself as a romance writer. Emotion is central to everything I write. Seemed to me, from that conversation on the loop, there were a bunch of people who wouldn't even give Pearl a chance because of the tag, 'erotica'.
Well, imagine my shock and intense pleasure when I saw two wonderful reader reviews at My Bookstore and More, got an 85 out of 100 from Mrs. Giggles, who makes no bones about her dislike of novellas in general (too short, with usually not enough character development, from what I gather) and saw Pearl rocket up the Top Ten Best seller's list, all the way to number 4!!
Okay, Laurie, I confess...you are an Editing Goddess. Remind me not to doubt you again!
Well, imagine my shock and intense pleasure when I saw two wonderful reader reviews at My Bookstore and More, got an 85 out of 100 from Mrs. Giggles, who makes no bones about her dislike of novellas in general (too short, with usually not enough character development, from what I gather) and saw Pearl rocket up the Top Ten Best seller's list, all the way to number 4!!
Okay, Laurie, I confess...you are an Editing Goddess. Remind me not to doubt you again!
Saturday, June 7, 2008
The dreaded back story
The other day I started reading The Witching Hour by Anne Rice, while simultaneously re-reading Sense and Sensibility, and it struck me...both books start with a positive plethora of back-story. Jane Austin makes sure we know the set-up of the family long before she gets to the present situation and their move to a new location. Anne Rice could be said to intersperse the present between long chapters purely concerned with the past. And, you know what? I didn't have the urge to flip through or jump ahead. Not one thought of, "Oh, good grief, just get on with it, will you?"
So, that left me sitting there, wondering...what's all the fuss about with back-story? Judges in competitions and critique partners are always saying, 'too much back-story' even when you try to pare it down to the minimum. I've been guilty of that myself, telling my own crit partners to cut back on the back-story and scatter the pertinent bits around the rest of the story as needed. We've been brainwashed into believing back story=bad and terse present action =good. But the truth is that sometimes back story works, sometimes it doesn't.
As writers we try to find a host of ways to sneak the history of the characters into the beginning of the story, feeling the reader will be lost without it. We introduce key players and then have them go through the kind of mental introspective most of us only have at times of great loss or upheaval. That can grate, especially if the present action is abruptly cut by four pages of what the character was like from age zero on. Worse if they somehow find the time to do all of this in the equivalent of a nano-second. Or sometimes we start the story far in the past with a prologue, then cut to the present. I sometimes like that (and confess to using it on occasion) but the trick is to make sure the prologue is the actual start of the story, and chapter one the continuation. Often the prologue consists of information the writer really could have put in later, and in doing so upped the tension to boot.
In some cases the reader would be completely at sea without some back story, and we need to give them a foundation to stand on as we build the tale for them. There are types of characters who simply scream for a real introduction, because there would be few chances to elaborate on them later. Loners and taciturn people come to mind, since one of the most effective ways of introducing back story later is in conversation with others. In other cases, we really could just make the effort to find places and situations that allow us to bring the past in to the present.
I guess it's all a matter of what will work for the story but there's one more perspective to take into consideration. Unless you plan to self publish, you need to produce what will attract the attention of publishers and I've always maintained that I, as a new and aspiring writer, can't expect to get away what Anne Rice or Jane Austin can. If culling back story and re-working the book will get me the sale, then that's what I need to do. As long as my voice still comes through and I'm not cranking out homogenized, boring stories, I'm fine with it. When I'm as popular as Anne and Jane, I can more blatantly break the rules!
So, that left me sitting there, wondering...what's all the fuss about with back-story? Judges in competitions and critique partners are always saying, 'too much back-story' even when you try to pare it down to the minimum. I've been guilty of that myself, telling my own crit partners to cut back on the back-story and scatter the pertinent bits around the rest of the story as needed. We've been brainwashed into believing back story=bad and terse present action =good. But the truth is that sometimes back story works, sometimes it doesn't.
As writers we try to find a host of ways to sneak the history of the characters into the beginning of the story, feeling the reader will be lost without it. We introduce key players and then have them go through the kind of mental introspective most of us only have at times of great loss or upheaval. That can grate, especially if the present action is abruptly cut by four pages of what the character was like from age zero on. Worse if they somehow find the time to do all of this in the equivalent of a nano-second. Or sometimes we start the story far in the past with a prologue, then cut to the present. I sometimes like that (and confess to using it on occasion) but the trick is to make sure the prologue is the actual start of the story, and chapter one the continuation. Often the prologue consists of information the writer really could have put in later, and in doing so upped the tension to boot.
In some cases the reader would be completely at sea without some back story, and we need to give them a foundation to stand on as we build the tale for them. There are types of characters who simply scream for a real introduction, because there would be few chances to elaborate on them later. Loners and taciturn people come to mind, since one of the most effective ways of introducing back story later is in conversation with others. In other cases, we really could just make the effort to find places and situations that allow us to bring the past in to the present.
I guess it's all a matter of what will work for the story but there's one more perspective to take into consideration. Unless you plan to self publish, you need to produce what will attract the attention of publishers and I've always maintained that I, as a new and aspiring writer, can't expect to get away what Anne Rice or Jane Austin can. If culling back story and re-working the book will get me the sale, then that's what I need to do. As long as my voice still comes through and I'm not cranking out homogenized, boring stories, I'm fine with it. When I'm as popular as Anne and Jane, I can more blatantly break the rules!
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
I'm baaack
Well, that was a heck of a hiatus! I've been slogging away at work and on a couple of subs, plus getting ready to move from one town to another. Blogging fell by the wayside for a while, but I'm finally coming out of the fog.
I'm very excited that my next novella, The Pearl at the Gate, will be released on June 24, 2008 again from Samhain Publishing. It's the story of Roake Barbenoir, who has everything a man could possibly want, wealth, social status, and the perfect Regency wife, Jenesta. The daughter of a Viscount, Jenesta is all he could hope for in a helpmeet, calm, capable and innocent. Yet Roake longs to shatter the very characteristics that first attracted him to her. In his dreams he is her demon lover, taking her to heights of passion he knows could frighten and repulse the gently raised Jenesta. He will do anything to protect her tender sensibilities.
With one act of defiance, Jenesta shatters Roake's resolution, discovers passion beyond her wildest imagining and risks losing the very thing she craves - Roake's love.
This is a very HOT, very explicit story, not for the faint of heart. Maybe one day I'll write something I can send my old Auntie as a gift...but this ain't it. See the new cover and read an excerpt at the Coming Soon page on the Samhain Publishing site.
Happy reading!
I'm very excited that my next novella, The Pearl at the Gate, will be released on June 24, 2008 again from Samhain Publishing. It's the story of Roake Barbenoir, who has everything a man could possibly want, wealth, social status, and the perfect Regency wife, Jenesta. The daughter of a Viscount, Jenesta is all he could hope for in a helpmeet, calm, capable and innocent. Yet Roake longs to shatter the very characteristics that first attracted him to her. In his dreams he is her demon lover, taking her to heights of passion he knows could frighten and repulse the gently raised Jenesta. He will do anything to protect her tender sensibilities.
With one act of defiance, Jenesta shatters Roake's resolution, discovers passion beyond her wildest imagining and risks losing the very thing she craves - Roake's love.
This is a very HOT, very explicit story, not for the faint of heart. Maybe one day I'll write something I can send my old Auntie as a gift...but this ain't it. See the new cover and read an excerpt at the Coming Soon page on the Samhain Publishing site.
Happy reading!
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Slow down, I'm getting dizzy!
It’s a very exciting time for me, on a number of fronts. As I mentioned in a previous post, Samhain Publishing graciously offered me a second contract and a tentatively early release date. I won’t say what that date is, because it can still change, but I really, really appreciate the faith they’re showing in my work, and the professional way they conduct business.
Knowing that they hope to slot me into the release line-up fairly quickly, they promptly sent me all the paperwork necessary to get the ball rolling. That included the first edits, which I just as promptly did and returned. Hey, if my editor, Laurie, is willing to make the effort, how much more willing should I be?
Working with Laurie has been great. Having never had more than magazine and trade articles published, I was dreading edits on my first novella. Magazine edits can be brutal. There is a finite amount of space magazine editors have to work with. Even when they give you a word count, and you stick to it, the piece can still be cut to accommodate photos or side bars. I like logic in my writing—point A leads to Point B, which leads to Point C, and so on. When my editor cut chunks out of my pieces, it also cut the thread of the story in places; and left me feeling it was no longer really my work.
Not so with Night of the Cereus. Laurie sent the manuscript to me with her comments and suggestions, and asked that I accept or reject them. If I wanted to reject them, she asked that I let her know why. That wasn’t the end of it. Instead, that was the beginning of the dialogue. There’s something so satisfying about being able to give an opinion and find out it’s been listened to and even if it isn’t taken on board, you’ve been told why.
I also appreciated Laurie not trying to put words in my mouth, so to speak. If she felt there was something missing, she would say so, perhaps even going so far as to explain what she wanted, but I was given the option as to how to fix it. I can’t speak to how other editors work, but to me this is ideal. I don’t know how I would like getting a manuscript back with new sentences stuck in, instead being asked to make the change. Everyone has a distinctive voice and even one sentence in someone else’s could conceivably stand out like a hooker in a monastery.
So, my second release is in the works, and I have a few more projects on the go. Life is one big rollercoaster at the moment, but at least this is a long weekend. Hopefully that will allow me a nice whack of writing time. So many stories, so little time! Happy Easter all, and Journey On!
Knowing that they hope to slot me into the release line-up fairly quickly, they promptly sent me all the paperwork necessary to get the ball rolling. That included the first edits, which I just as promptly did and returned. Hey, if my editor, Laurie, is willing to make the effort, how much more willing should I be?
Working with Laurie has been great. Having never had more than magazine and trade articles published, I was dreading edits on my first novella. Magazine edits can be brutal. There is a finite amount of space magazine editors have to work with. Even when they give you a word count, and you stick to it, the piece can still be cut to accommodate photos or side bars. I like logic in my writing—point A leads to Point B, which leads to Point C, and so on. When my editor cut chunks out of my pieces, it also cut the thread of the story in places; and left me feeling it was no longer really my work.
Not so with Night of the Cereus. Laurie sent the manuscript to me with her comments and suggestions, and asked that I accept or reject them. If I wanted to reject them, she asked that I let her know why. That wasn’t the end of it. Instead, that was the beginning of the dialogue. There’s something so satisfying about being able to give an opinion and find out it’s been listened to and even if it isn’t taken on board, you’ve been told why.
I also appreciated Laurie not trying to put words in my mouth, so to speak. If she felt there was something missing, she would say so, perhaps even going so far as to explain what she wanted, but I was given the option as to how to fix it. I can’t speak to how other editors work, but to me this is ideal. I don’t know how I would like getting a manuscript back with new sentences stuck in, instead being asked to make the change. Everyone has a distinctive voice and even one sentence in someone else’s could conceivably stand out like a hooker in a monastery.
So, my second release is in the works, and I have a few more projects on the go. Life is one big rollercoaster at the moment, but at least this is a long weekend. Hopefully that will allow me a nice whack of writing time. So many stories, so little time! Happy Easter all, and Journey On!
Thursday, March 13, 2008
All love should be like this...
When I started this blog, I promised myself to stick to subjects more or less to do with writing. After all, I'm no movie star or international woman of mystery. My life is pretty prosaic in the grand scheme of things. I'm breaking that rule today, just because my heart is so full there is nothing else I could blog about this week.
I lost a very dear member of my family this week, my beloved dog, Skipper. To many people this might sound silly...after all, he was just a dog. Yet, he wasn't 'just a dog.' Skipper was a personality. He disliked most men, although he adored my husband and son. He was a great athlete, could run like the wind and jump higher than any other dog I've ever owned. He was a coward and was known to pee if frightened badly enough, but he was a loud coward, so he served his purpose in the watch-dog department. Skipper was an international traveller, having left Jamaica with us to settle in Canada, My husband forgot that many civil servants leave their sense of humour at home, and told the customs officer at the airport Skipper was a "Jamaican Bush Dog," and to date he has the distinction of being the only official member of the breed.
Yet, there was so much more. Skipper was a happy dog. He almost always had a smile on his face and his tail was always wagging, often in what we called 'helicoptor mode'; going around in circles and almost blinding the cats. He was the kind of dog who sensed when you weren't at your best and came to rest his head on your lap. He greeted us at the door, leaping straight up in the air so you could see almost his entire body through the glass at the top. You knew if anyone stirred in the house by the sound of his tail beating a tattoo on the floor or wall. He could charm food out of anyone except me...most of the time. Sometimes those liquid brown eyes were truly irresistible.
My daughter summed it up best. She was away when the decision was made that we could no longer be selfish and hold on to him, when he was obviously so ill and in such pain. When her father told her what had happened she said we made the right choice because, "he was so sad, and he was never sad, ever," before he got ill.
He was never sad, ever. What a wonderful epitaph. All love should be as happy, forgiving and selfless as that which he gave to us. We miss the love and the joy he brought to our lives and always will.
I lost a very dear member of my family this week, my beloved dog, Skipper. To many people this might sound silly...after all, he was just a dog. Yet, he wasn't 'just a dog.' Skipper was a personality. He disliked most men, although he adored my husband and son. He was a great athlete, could run like the wind and jump higher than any other dog I've ever owned. He was a coward and was known to pee if frightened badly enough, but he was a loud coward, so he served his purpose in the watch-dog department. Skipper was an international traveller, having left Jamaica with us to settle in Canada, My husband forgot that many civil servants leave their sense of humour at home, and told the customs officer at the airport Skipper was a "Jamaican Bush Dog," and to date he has the distinction of being the only official member of the breed.
Yet, there was so much more. Skipper was a happy dog. He almost always had a smile on his face and his tail was always wagging, often in what we called 'helicoptor mode'; going around in circles and almost blinding the cats. He was the kind of dog who sensed when you weren't at your best and came to rest his head on your lap. He greeted us at the door, leaping straight up in the air so you could see almost his entire body through the glass at the top. You knew if anyone stirred in the house by the sound of his tail beating a tattoo on the floor or wall. He could charm food out of anyone except me...most of the time. Sometimes those liquid brown eyes were truly irresistible.
My daughter summed it up best. She was away when the decision was made that we could no longer be selfish and hold on to him, when he was obviously so ill and in such pain. When her father told her what had happened she said we made the right choice because, "he was so sad, and he was never sad, ever," before he got ill.
He was never sad, ever. What a wonderful epitaph. All love should be as happy, forgiving and selfless as that which he gave to us. We miss the love and the joy he brought to our lives and always will.
Friday, March 7, 2008
Uni-sex Erotic Romance
A friend suggested I do an article about why men should read erotic romances; or why men would or do read them. Really now—if men read erotic romances, I’m willing to wager it has more to do with the erotic and a lot less to do with the romance! To me, it was a no-brainer. There’s sex in them there books, and most men do so love sex. And if they’re not actively looking to have it, they’re probably quite happy to be reading about it.
It actually brought a very interesting fact to light though; one that bears some thinking about in my own life. When I wrote my first book, my loving Hubster read it from beginning to end. He made constructive and useful comments and suggestions concerning plot, characterizations and structure. Even now, with that book shelved, awaiting a possible (complete) overhaul, he still talks about it and asks when I plan to go back to trying to get it published. He honestly seems to love that book. That book was a historical romance, with no overt sex involved…
When I made the shift to writing erotic romances, my husband’s style of editing underwent a dramatic change. He no longer offered constructive criticism on anything, except the sex scenes. I would ask him if he thought a characterization in the story rang true, or if a plot twist was surprising enough, and his response would be a blank stare, accompanied by a bewildered, "Huh?" This was usually swiftly followed by a lewd and lascivious suggestion involving my need for additional research and his availability to be my guinea pig.
That’s when I realised he wasn’t actually reading the stories, he was simply skimming from one sex scene to the next…
So, to respond to my friend’s contention that men should read erotic romances, unfortunately in my house the opposite is happening. My Hubster hardly gets a chance to read my work anymore, because, damn it, I need constructive criticism, not a roll in the hay, which all I’ll get from him.
So, if he wants to read erotic romances, even mine, he’s gonna have to buy them like everybody else! Mind you, I may slip him one every now and then. After all, a writer really shouldn't neglect her research...
It actually brought a very interesting fact to light though; one that bears some thinking about in my own life. When I wrote my first book, my loving Hubster read it from beginning to end. He made constructive and useful comments and suggestions concerning plot, characterizations and structure. Even now, with that book shelved, awaiting a possible (complete) overhaul, he still talks about it and asks when I plan to go back to trying to get it published. He honestly seems to love that book. That book was a historical romance, with no overt sex involved…
When I made the shift to writing erotic romances, my husband’s style of editing underwent a dramatic change. He no longer offered constructive criticism on anything, except the sex scenes. I would ask him if he thought a characterization in the story rang true, or if a plot twist was surprising enough, and his response would be a blank stare, accompanied by a bewildered, "Huh?" This was usually swiftly followed by a lewd and lascivious suggestion involving my need for additional research and his availability to be my guinea pig.
That’s when I realised he wasn’t actually reading the stories, he was simply skimming from one sex scene to the next…
So, to respond to my friend’s contention that men should read erotic romances, unfortunately in my house the opposite is happening. My Hubster hardly gets a chance to read my work anymore, because, damn it, I need constructive criticism, not a roll in the hay, which all I’ll get from him.
So, if he wants to read erotic romances, even mine, he’s gonna have to buy them like everybody else! Mind you, I may slip him one every now and then. After all, a writer really shouldn't neglect her research...
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