Vixenwriter

I know better. I know I shouldn’t read the letters in the RWR and yet every month I do. And I’m honestly never ready for the depth of audacity on the part of some of the people who write in to gasp and moan and put their hand on their foreheads and cry about the direction of romance.

This month’s little ditty is written by Linda Swift Reeder – who quickly assures us she’s not a prude and then follows up by calling erotic romance porn and women who have sex or who use curse words in these books sluts. This follows three months of letters crying about the “gang member” language on the part of heroines (including one written by a fairly well known pararomance author only signed in her real name and makes no reference to her writerly persona). Yawn. Won’t someone think of the children. *weeps* Yadda yadda.

I’m bored by the attacks on my morals by people who don’t know me. I’m agitated far more by what equals attacks on my readers. I mean, to consistently assail books my readers buy which contain curse words and sex scenes is at attack on romance readers and I’m not a genius or anything, but I love my readers and I can’t imagine why these folks attack them.

At this point I’m not even angry. I’m just sort of saddened by the lazy intellectualism this sort of letter shows.

I don’t think it’s jealousy that drives this sort of letter. I think there’s an expectation by people of Reeder’s ilk, that one’s opinion should be more than just an opinion – it should simply be the way *everyone* thinks and feels. This plays out in politics and every day life as well.

Some people don’t handle change well so they latch on to whatever they can to hang their anxieties. Erotic romance, sex, confident women – it’s all just a place to go when you can’t deal with your own insecurities.

There are indeed many romance novels that don’t contain graphic sex and bad language. There is indeed a middle ground in romance as well as the extremes on both sides (and I mean extreme as in polarity from the middle not in character). But people like this never rely on facts, they go straight for histrionics because that’s all they know. It’s lazy, but it’s prevalent.

There are many books I don’t read. Many genres that dont’ work for me. And many that do. I tend to turn my brain off whenever anyone starts wailing about “the children” or “our daughters” or “we as X women” because cripes, there are as many kinds of women as there are kinds of books.

I don’t think it’s sex she needs, or royalties, or whatever. I think it’s a damned open mind she’s in desperate need of and an ability to accept and understand she’s not the arbiter of what anyone but herself reads, does and says.

Books are amazing. Preferences are amazing. So put the two together why don’t you? Like what you like, don’t like what you don’t. It’s so very simple and completely unnecessary to attack what other people read and write.

So my editor, Angela James, is participating in AAR’s auction to benefit Hands On New Orleans. This is such a good cause and I heartily encourage everyone to run over to ebay to participate – there are many different items up for auction including a critque from the aforementioned Angie.

I’m totally biased of course, but I happen to think Angie has a fine hand at editing so she’s worth a bid!

This is a long one and it’s totally based on my perceptions of small and epublishing houses.

Recently, we’ve seen the demise of a few epublishers. Some people like to use this as a platform to crow about how epublishing is risky. Some people like to use this as an excuse to blather on and on about how they’re all mistreated and misunderstood and to make it seem like normal business practice to not pay authors, to sign contracts that are monumentally one sided like NET contracts or to make it okay to address the public as a publisher in all caps while screaming about hormones, sexually promiscuous family members or some other conspiracy.

There are basic things to guiding yourself through the publishing maze. First and foremost is a freebie – COMMON SENSE. Truly, your mother was right. Common sense will save a lot of heartache in so many ways. Despite what some in this business attempt to tell you (usually from a soapbox while holding a spotlight on themselves) there is no “one true way” to this business. There is simply the best way for you. This is about how I do it. Others do things differently. Your mileage may vary.

Firstly – folks, I know how much waiting sucks. God, do I know. I feel the pressure as much as anyone else does to hear back and get manuscripts contracted. But this is something you can’t be penny smart and pound foolish over. Yes, you can submit to a new epublisher and most likely hear back in a very short period of time and get your book out very quickly. This will feel good. At first.

And then you will realize why waiting is part of the process. Because, and I can tell you this from experience, the difference in sales is monumental. The difference in name recognition (which is after all, what you’re trying to build) will have far more impact if your book is read by more people than less people. That’s basic math. I don’t mean to sound harsh. I don’t have any beef with start up epublishers as a general principle. But there is a reason why you’re going to wait months to hear back from Samhain or EC (just as an example – there are others out there, I just write for them so I can speak with some firsthand knowledge) and just days from other epublishers. Demand usually means an established reader base.

If you go with a start up or with a very small publisher, do it with your eyes open. Just as an example: I submitted Giving Chase to Samhain when they were very new. It was a risk for them to take something totally different from me and for me to sub to a start up. But I did my homework and I knew Crissy Brashear was a smart woman who’d done a lot of great things for EC before she started Samhain. I also looked at who was writing for them and I asked a few folks what their experience was. I subbed and went through the process before I sent them anything else and I’ve been thrilled. EC was established long before I started writing for them and had a group of excellent authors writing there (many you see writing for major NY houses now).

CONTRACTS: Here’s where things get tricky because the things I personally hold to be important may not be important to you. There is no one true way, but you have to read that contract carefully and don’t let your eagerness to sell a book overcome your common sense. This is just some basic stuff based on things I find important.

Think about several things: Length of rights. How long will the publisher own rights? Are you okay with that? I have book contracts for all sorts of different terms. In truth, this, to me, is about relative power. When you’re new, you don’t have a lot. Also, how important was it to me to sign with the publisher? Did I think they’d do something with the rights? Did I have a way to get them back if my book went out of print? Etc.

Here’s one thing – people don’t sign a contract where you have to pay to have your book up for sale. Seriously. A reputible publisher isn’t going to charge you to list the book at their website, or to make you pay the credit card fees or anything like that. It’s ridiculous and totally scadalously unfair to authors. There are costs authors have to bear in certain circumstances in certain contracts (front and backmatter sometimes although that’s one of my particular issues, some other authors don’t care) or if you pull a book you might have to pay for the editing or the cover art, READ YOUR CONTRACT BEFORE YOU SIGN IT. If you ask questions and aren’t dealt with professionally, that’s a big red warning flag. They might refuse to budge, but a publisher who flips out when you ask questions is not professional.

Percentages – in ebooks there’s a pretty standard range that’s about 40% (give or take a few percentage points one way or another). If it’s very low, and we aren’t talking about a NY publisher who is also putting your book out in digital form, you might really think on it. If they can promise you a hell of a lot of sales for 5%, it might be worth it. But how many sales does that have to be? Because you’d have to sell roughly eight books to one at a standard rate.

Distribution: what is the distribution like? Where do they sell your book? Can people find it? What do they do to help people find it?

Look at their website. Is it easy to navigate? How easy is it to buy a book? Because let me tell you, some epublishers have the worst freaking point of sale situation ever and it does effect sales. I won’t buy from some epublishers because of how stupid ridiculous it is to get the book to my hard drive. Is it updated frequently? Is it horrible to look at with terrible colors? Do they give focus to three authors while everyone else’s books are hard to find? (because folks unless you are those three authors, that sucks). Do they only take paypal or some other form of payment not everyone will be able to use or want to use? Do they have a page for individual authors? I have my mom go to the site, if she can navigate it, it’s pretty easy. But that’s just me.

How does the staff conduct themselves? Because seriously? As an author seeing publishers and editors get out in public and make ridiculous statements and do stupid stuff makes me cringe. And it’s not just confined to a few publishers either and this puzzles and enrages me. I don’t want to know about your personal beefs with other publishers. I don’t want to know about your personal beefs with your authors. I don’t want to know about your personal problems at home, your money problems or whatever fungus is growing between your toes. STOP OVERSHARING. My god. You may be having money problems or problems at home and I’m sorry for you. But the author loop, your public blog, the business loop and other people’s blogs are not the appropriate or professional place to share your business. It makes you look unprofessional. It hurts sales for the authors at that house and nothing pisses me off more than when someone’s behavior messes with my bottom line. I work hard and I don’t think it’s fair when I hold up my end of the deal to have someone come and blow that all to bits with unprofessional behavior.

There are other things – promotion, advertising, covers, EDITING! Read what they put out. What is the quality of the books they publish? If you write for a house who puts out crap and who doesn’t edit, you’re going to look bad by association. EVERYONE can benefit from editing and sometimes, even great authors get rejected. A house that accepts everything isn’t one readers are going to be able to count on. A house with crap editing isn’t one that people will have a good perception of. This affects your bottom line. It also affects your overall reputation.

CAN YOU ASK QUESTIONS AND HAVE YOUR CONCERNS ADDRESSED? This is not solely a problem with start ups or those epubs who’ve gone out of business. I’ve had a very negative experience and I’ll never go back again even though others are happy there. LISTEN TO YOUR GUT. You aren’t a troublemaker for bringing up concerns. It’s how you conduct yourself that’s the issue and I’ll get into that part another day. But if you feel like you can’t even ask a question, that’s a red flag. If there are authors who are in the good graces of the publisher and anyone who asks questions is put at the bad kids table, that’s a red flag.

However, preferential treatment IS NOT NECESSARILY A PROBLEM. It’s a reality. I have no problem with it because of course any smart publisher is going to keep slots open for their big sellers. Sales matter and they help mid listers and newbies too. Big names attract readers. This is a good thing. It’s how you make your own name. What you do with the attention is up to you. Publishers who take care of their big sellers AND make opportunities for others are a good thing. Publishers who show preferential treatment to punish people are a bad thing. This is something you need to decide for yourself.

I’ve started to write five different entries today but deleted them all. Damn filters. Sigh.

In general – a letter from a president of a professional organization that contains the phrase, “Who told you life was fair” will always sound condescending. Why? Because it is condescending. Clue: You’re not my mother and I’m not nine years old. I’m also not paying my mother dues (although she claims she’s paid hers). For the record – I happen to be a career focused romance writer. You can ask most people who know me, I’m very careful about the choices I make, about where and what I write and when. My career is extremely important to me so don’t waste my time with “who told you life was fair.” If you ask for feedback from people and you actually get it, well, that’s sort of the point, isn’t it? Or was the point that you only wanted to hear what supported your particular perspective. If so, perhaps it would be more accurate to call for “feedback on proposed rule changes that conforms with my perspectives” because well, life isn’t always fair, as you so correctly point out and not everyone is going to agree with us. So feh.

Something else and as a matter of FYIage, this is not actually related to the above point but something else I read earlier today – epublishing. I love epublishing. Or at the very least, the epublishers I write for. If there’s interest I’d be happy to talk about my experiences – positive and negative. Got a question – ask it and I’ll do my best to answer it.

Epublishing gave me my start. Ellora’s Cave took a chance on me and helped me build a career. Samhain contracted a book in a totally new genre for me and has been amazingly supportive of me an an author. My editor Ann Leveille has made me a better writer each time I’ve gone through edits. The same goes for Angie James, my editor at Samhain. And yes, I do go through edits and I don’t know any authors who haven’t done edits at an epublisher. As to whether or not they’re the hardest edits I’ll ever do, I can’t say. I’ve got a lot of books left in me so who knows what will come down the road? In any case, every book has its own challenges.

My epublished books are, in fact, real books. I work hard on them and I put as much effort into their writing as I do the books aimed at New York. In turn, what I write for New York is just as good as what I write for epublishing. I’m not “too edgy” for New York. When I get rejected it’s not because “New York isn’t ready for me” or whatever. (clearly it’s because they don’t recognize my brilliance)

I want to resist the us v them mentality (and in a way, that is related to my first point). I’ve seen a lot of defensiveness from epublished authors and I understand why. I do. But it’s not necessary. In the first place, the only person whose opinion matters is the one who looks back at me when I’m brushing my teeth (this morning with this new toothpaste with green tea that sucked big time but I digress). Do I know I’m doing the best job I can? After that, do my editors think so? Do my readers think so? Does it matter to me what someone else who doesn’t know me or what epublishing entails thinks of me? Not a bit. Well unless it affects me professionally, and that’s a reality sometimes, but still, as a human being you can only control so much. You can’t control the fact that “I’ll get to it soon” doesn’t actually mean the same thing in publishing that it means in a restaurant or in your daily life. You can’t control the petty ignorance that allows some people to make themselves feel better at your expense by belitting your publisher, genre, mode of publication, age, dress size, etc. You can’t and you know what? It’s not worth the time anyway.

I want, as a professional seeking to advance my career, to expand my base. To write for more places and reach more readers. Hell yes I want to sell to New York! Yes, I want my books at the Top Foods (by the way, I LOVE it when I see my fellow authors there like Lisa Renee Jones’ fab new Blaze for instance). There’s a kind of distribution I will have when my Spice book comes out that I don’t have now. That’s a fact. The only value judgements about that fact are those I let anyone else imbue upon it. It will reach more people in many countries. It will be an audio book and it will be translated into several other languages. That’s freaking cool and I love it.

Does that mean I reject epublishing? Not at all. I love Samhain and EC and I love the ability to write with more freedom. Because I’ve earned it. By that I mean, they took a chance because in fact, they have the ability to take more chances on unknown authors. I ran with it and I’ve been blessed with a nice bit of success and because I have a track record, I can have the freedom to push the envelope. I treasure that. That isn’t to say New York doesn’t offer the chance to push the envelope – but they have financial and other constraints which make the wheels turn slower and it takes longer to make a track record. Again, a fact and the only value judgements are those we give ourselves.

I’m sick to death of watching this sort of west side story situation. WE ARE ALL ROMANCE AUTHORS. Our strength is in our diversity. That’s also a fact. Give it whatever value judgements you wish.

Professionalism. Okay, let’s talk about being a professional for a moment since it’s the topic of the moment (super fabulous discussion over at Smart Bitches, by the way – as per usual because they are smart cookies as well as smart bitches)

Professionalism – I get my manuscripts in on time and I do my level best to be sure they’re clean and will be easy to edit. I reply to communication from my editor, agent, publisher and readers in a timely manner. In my communication with them, I remain professional – I don’t use text speak (although I do say “dude” to my agent and Angie but not at first until they knew me). I work my ass off to promote my books in a professional manner. I don’t drive by promo spam on loops. I don’t make every comment about me and my books. I work hard to sell well and to be responsive to my market and my readers. In public I don’t slag off other authors, I don’t slag off reviewers or reviews, I don’t slag off publishers, editors, etc. I may express dismay over something like the recent RWA ruling or when a letter shows up in RWR or RT slamming gays or erotic romance or what have you, but I’m going to try very hard to do so without getting raw and crossing lines even while being professional. I NEVER drag readers into my professional issues.

I show up for promotional events early. I do my part in promoting the event. I bring treats. I work well with others at events. I am polite and orderly and I act according to the situation. For example – at Babeland I did a reading with several other wonderful erotic romance authors. This is an adult toystore, I read sex scenes. At Borders I wouldn’t generally do a reading but if I did, I’d choose an action scene or an emotional scene without sex. At a conference I’d also read non-sex scenes unless the reading was specifically geared toward sex writing.

I always dress up for promotional events because well, it’s about image and to a certain extent, Lauren Dane is a character. Some people won’t like that or don’t agree but to me, it’s true. When I am Lauren Dane at a promotional event, I am not the person I am at home. I’m not going to yell at my kids or wear sweats and show up with my hair shoved in a messy pony tail and wear flip flops. I am there in a context. I put on makeup, make sure my nails look good, etc. I have a few outfits I love, most of them are vintage looking because I love the way 40s and 50s inspired clothing looks on me. Feminine and sexy but not overblown. I feel pretty and comfortable in it. If it’s a signing and I’ll be there a while, I try to go for comfortable, a pretty sweater, nice pants, etc. I thought in the future I’d probably dress up more for signings though (although I’ll still bring treats, I promise).

There’ve been some rumblings in romancelandia about how “unprofessional” it is to dress up in costumes for promotional events and I disagree. Firstly, as I said, I believe we’re all in costume anyway and secondly, because dressing up is fun and if an author can do it and feel comfortable with it, why not? I resent the idea that Liz Maverick and Marianne Mancusi dressing up like their characters to promote their books and the fabulous new Shomi line at Dorchester was “unprofessional” and I really, really resent both women being referred to as prostitutes or “pedophile lure” because they took on the anime/manga look of the covers from the line.

Here’s a picture of their outfits at the signing. I hope they don’t mind that I’m putting it up here. They’re both clearly of age, neither of them looks slutty or “pedophile” bait. They’re clearly promoting their books and the characters (BTW, the covers of the Shomi books are fabulous).

Mainly at a signing, you sit at a table. People come to you with your book and you sign it, chat and really, it’s a very cool thing that anyone actually wants your book much less takes the time to come and get your signature. If Maverick and Mancusi felt comfortable in their costumes and didn’t get so drunk they couldn’t stand or puked in a trash can, I can’t see why anyone else would care what two authors out of 400 did.

When you’re in public, don’t get so drunk you pop someone in the nose. Don’t flash your girls at the waiter. Don’t tell Nora she’s wrong when she says she likes Heather Locklear. Don’t treat the staff with disrespect. Don’t snub people at the book signing. Be gracious, be who you are but with filters, laugh, enjoy and worry about your own behavior. Worrying about whether or not reviewers are allowed at RWA Nationals, worrrying about whether or not Sherrilyn Kenyon wears a swan on her head, worrying about Liz Maverick’s skirt length – it’s all just, well, none of your business and frankly, a waste of your time. For the record, I’ve been with Sherilyn Kenyon at a few cons with signings and you know what, her line is always long. People, READERS LOVE her. I’ve never seen her be anything less than gracious to her fans either and let me go on a limb and say a swan on her head isn’t really turning readers away from her or romance.

Romance is a HUGE genre. That’s our strength, not our detriment. There is room for the feather boas, the pink hats, the chiffon dresses as well as the costumes like Mancusi and Maverick wore – and everything in between. We all approach our writing differently. I don’t expect everyone to think the way I do about their careers. But I certainly don’t expect to be called a streetwalker because my view is different either. Professional does not mean bland, it doesn’t mean hateful attacks on the morals of the people who do things differently either. We can all do our thing without the sky falling.

After this I’m done with it, but Angie James, my editor who kicks butt, takes names and makes me a better writer each time she edits me posted this on the author loop and also at her blog and as she’s given her permission to forward, I’m going to post it here.

Yes, Samhain will lose recognition after conference. It doesn’t change anything for our business or with the deal with Kensington, nor our IPS print program. We’ll still pay royalties on time and do business as usual ;) For us, it means we can’t do publisher type things at nationals next year. Perhaps someday things will change and we’ll be back at RWA, doing editor appointments and so forth, but until that time, we continue on as always. RWA is an organization for authors to network and learn from one another. As the guidelines have been set up, removing our recognition doesn’t take away your ability to utilize it as such and the benefits of RWA remain for those authors who wish to enjoy them.

Of course it’s disappointing to us that RWA is unable to accomodate small presses at this time, but it’s understandable that they must do what they believe is best for the authors and the organization.

However, it’s my belief that the allure of epublishing is our ability to sign a wide variety of books and genres without a huge monetary risk. Offering even 1000 dollars advance would remove our ability to do that. Our gain from being approved is not as significant as our gain from being free to take on books because we love them, not because they’ll earn out their advance. Once we enter into the world of larger dollar amount advances, we become a publisher who can’t take the publishing risks that we do now, never knowing what will hit and what will…not so much.

I know it’s important to some authors that their publisher be recognized and that there will be some who are disappointed by the
way things have gone and choose to seek publication elsewhere, and that saddens me because at the heart of things, I think we’re a pretty damn good publisher. We’ll move forward from here just as we would have had we been able to eep “recognition”. Nothing changes. Samhain will remain the same publisher next week, when the policy goes into effect and we’re no longer “recognized” as we are this week.

Permission to forward granted

Angela James, Executive Editor
www.samhainpublishing.com

I think this response is another example of what class truly is. I think some others could learn a lot from this.

Bottom line, I feel no less validated in my writing for Ellora’s Cave and Samhain than I do Harlequin. I got my start in epublishing and I have an amazing amount of freedom. I am a romance author and my publishers are romance publishers. In the end, it’s what I think that counts.

No Thursday Thirteen for me today. I wrote until midnight last night and our internet was out from 2 pm until this morning so I’ll do it next week.

Anyway, I’m done being pissed at the RWA. I’m waiting to hear back from my publishers who are there and then I’ll write a letter. I can’t see renewing next year but it’s all water under the bridge and truly, aside from the ability to advertise in Romance Sells, it’s not like I’ve gotten a lot of benefits from the RWA anyway. Although I did love that article on writing from Nora in the RWR and I do read at least one thing in it every month. I’m always impressed with something another author says – Cathy Maxwell’s interview a few issues back for instance, I’ve never read her before but after that interview I went out and picked up a few of her books because wow, the woman is wicked smart.

I wish we could all just focus on the important stuff and not act like a bunch of sixth grade girls creating private clubs to keep people out. But I can’t control other people, I can only control what I do and so whatever. I was a romance author before I joined the RWA and I’ll be one after I let my membership lapse as well.

I’m over at The Bradford Bunch today talking about characters. Contest goodness as well…

The abominable heat of yesterday and the day before has broken, yay! It’s like 75 now instead of 100.

43,816 / 70,000 (62.6%)

Wolf Unbound – up 2720

And then after I got that far, I gave in and wrote this opening scene that’s been poking me in the brain. This one is post apocalyptic with a romance sub-plot.

1,300 / 90,000 (1.4%)

Sisters of Mercy – up 1300

41,096 / 70,000 (58.7%)

Wolf Unbound – start of Day 4 – up 3063 from yesterday! Wheee!

Smidgen of the day:

His father nodded. “I’m glad to hear it. I don’t know what to say, son. I’ve just never imagined this situation. I like it very much that this Tegan makes you happy but I’ve never met a werewolf before much less had one in my family. I’d be shocked if you married a Protestant girl, this is way out of my league.”

Now – so I go back and forth on the whole issue of RWA membership because of some of the attitudes from the National Organization regarding epublishing, small presses and erotic romance in general. But I do like what the chapters offer and I’m of the opinion, or I have been, that the voices within the ranks should speak up. So when my dues came last month I paid them and now I’m sorry.

I am because on the eve of the national conference (one I am SO glad I didn’t spend a dime to attend) they’ve unveiled two of the most exclusionary new rules I’ve seen from them in a while. The first one is how publishers become RWA recognized. In the last few years several epublishers have received recognition: Ellora’s Cave was the first, then Trisk (a very controversial decision) and then Loose Id and Samhain. This agitated many people who seem to think the RWA should be about excluding people to make those members feel better about just how special they are because others aren’t.

To wit – the new board ruling on publisher recognition unveiled today:

Commencing with RWA’s 2008 National Conference, for official publisher participation, a romance publisher must verify to RWA that it: (1) is not a Subsidy Publisher or Vanity Publisher; (2) has been releasing romance novels via national distribution for no fewer than three years, with no fewer than two full-length romance novels or novel-length romance anthologies published in each of three consecutive years; (3) provides per book advances of at least $1,000 for all books; and (4) pays all authors participating in an anthology an advance of at least $500.

and they give us this little “note”
Note:

The Board wishes to note that a $1,000 advance for a novel is an extremely small sum. It is, however, a minimal indicator that a publisher is invested in an author’s career to the degree that RWA can reasonably allocate its conference resources to that publisher, as some consideration has been paid for use of an author’s rights.

What they’ve done is effectively pushed all epublishers out the door. Firstly, ones like Samhain who do give nominal advances and go to print but who’ve not been open for three years yet and then for everyone else with the 1K advance requirement.

I don’t talk about money in public. It’s crass and it’s like talking about how great your books are or how special your writing is or whatever, it’s tacky. BUT, I will say because it’s germane here, I make good money with epublishing. I can’t compare it to NY because my NY book isn’t out yet. But I am a romance writer for two very good romance publishers other than Harlequin (and hey, Harlequin is the grand damme so hee!). Moreover, is that all that makes a romance author? Money? Because what about those authors who struggle and don’t sell through but do so with a big publisher? Are they suddenly not romance writers because something they wrote didn’t resonate with enough readers to make them count?

And the advance stuff is another total blind spot. Look I’m not saying I hate advances, I love them, LOL. But it’s not the only indicator that a publisher is invested in an author. In fact, as far as I’m concerned, the size of the advance is such a small part of it. Look at publishers who do pay small advances but who do a lot of promotion for their authors and give their authors many avenues to write different things and explore. Dorchester does this. Look at Shomi! It’s a great line but totally experimental. They’ve done a lot of advertising for it though. My biggest point is, let the authors make the decisions based on what they feel is most important. Aside from fraudulent places charging authors to print books, etc, this stuff is all smoke and mirrors.

How is this reorganization to close the “club” doors on epublishers good for authors in any way? This is an organization made for romance authors. If they only mean those people the board thinks are worthy, they should say so and stop using my sales numbers to make romance look better. Stop taking my fucking dues then, damn it.

The continual moving of the goal posts to keep out the “undesirables” from RWA is so obvious and so ridiculous, I must admit I’m flabbergasted (and I love the word flabbergasted!) at the absolute, in your face bias I see. And yep, it’s bias. It’s bigotry from people who have no idea what it takes to be a working writer so they assume everyone faces the same struggles and has the same goals with their writing. I want to know how those board members voted on this stuff. Does anyone know? Does it have to be unanimous?

And the PAN stuff, not surprised. More of the same. As if by shutting people out it protects them. Like segregation protected people. It’s backwards logic but sadly, it’s pretty common.

So the five author anthology that has my quickie from last year, Sudden Desire is now out in print!

Sexy Summer Fun features stories from me, Katherine Kingston, Hannah Murray, Nikki Soarde and Ravyn Wilde! To celebrate, I’m going to run a contest (because they are fun and I can). Tell me what your favorite romantic summer activity is! Easy yes? Just leave them in the comments to this post and I’ll choose a winner for the paper anthology at 3 pm pacific on Saturday.

And a quick comment on the RWA PAN/PRO thing: Okay so it’s not quick so I’m going to put it behind a text cut. If you want to read it, click the read more text…

Read the rest of this entry ?

So I learned of this last week but had to keep it quiet until today – Samhain has announced it will have a named line with Kensington! Essentially, it’ll be like Brava or Aphrodisia – a unique line of trade paperbacks (for now, they may do MM in the future) and are looking to see the first releases later next year. Congratulations to Samhain for making such a huge step for small publishers everywhere. I can’t wait to see how it goes.