2011 AAR Reviewers Choice: Black Hawk

I am so happy

I am deeply honored to get the nod at All About Romance
for Reviewers Choice for 2011,
for The Black Hawk.

The AAR announcement is Here.

They say such nice things about the book.  I'm blushing. 

Now, being perfectly honest here, I nipped in to top place, but just barely.  It was very close.  I just squeaked by these two great books:

Silk is for Seduction, Loretta Chase
The Rose Garden, Susanna Kearsley


These are the other Historical Romances the AAR reviewers loved:

A Night to Surrender, Tessa Dare
The Orchid Affair, Lauren Willig
What I did for a Duke, Julie Ann Long
Heartbreak Creek, Kaki Warner
A Lady's Lessons in Scandal, Meredith Duran 
When Beauty Tamed the Beast, Eloisa James
Follow My Lead, Kate Noble

If you are kind enough to like my books -- and I can't imagine why you would be reading the blog if you didn't -- you should go buy these.  Wonderful books.

The AAR Annual Romance Ballot

It's that time of year again. Who are your favorite Romance writers? Who are your favorite heroes and heroines. What book touched your heart?

Don't keep it to yourself. Tell the world.

The AAR Poll is the oldest and most widely respected Romance genre reader soundingboard on the net. And you can vote.

http://tinyurl.com/aarpoll

Authorial Intent and Reviews.

Jennie, at Dear Author writes:

 ***

"When I address authorial intent in reviews, it’s generally because I’m confused or bothered by something in a book. I don’t ever pretend to *know* an author’s intent, but sometimes I have ideas about what I *think* the author was going for. For instance, in the latest Joanna Bourne, I felt like the author made choices that deliberately made the heroine weaker than the hero (though no one seems to agree with me on that, which is fine). As is often the case, I chalked it up to romance genres conventions – the hero is favored a bit (by the author and presumably the reader) over the heroine, and the hero is expected to assert some mastery over the heroine. So I am assuming that the story is written a certain way to please the average reader.

"Is it wrong for me to assume I know the author’s intent? I don’t know, but I do know that I’m not just doing it to be an asshole – I’m addressing something that bothers me, and furthermore why it bothers me (my belief that romance still tends to be rather conventionally sexist in a lot of ways). I think I need to acknowledge my assumptions about the author’s intent to give context to why I feel what I feel."

***

I just about entirely don't respond to reviews or speak in the comment trail of discussions about my own books.  It's not that I'm not grateful for the interest.  But,

-- I don't want readers to think I'm looking over their shoulder when they discuss the books.  That has to be quelling.

-- I think books have to stand up for themselves, without explanation or defense.  

-- There's not much to say if somebody doesn't like the work.  It's like lichee nuts.  Lots of wonderful, intelligent, interesting folks are going to not like my books or lichee nuts and no amount of discussion is going to change this.

-- The most important reason I don't respond to comment or criticism is that I don't want to make a fool of myself, which is what folks mostly do when they try to defend something they've written.

But, breaking a long habit of keeping my mouth closed, I'm going to go ahead and respond here.

 ***

Dear Jennie,

I don't deliberately make the female protagonist of my stories less strong, competent or active than the male protagonist.  If I felt the Historical Romance genre demanded that the heroine be weaker than the hero, I wouldn't write Historical Romance.

It's true my heroes tend to be more skilled in killing than my heroines.  If there were only one sort of strength -- killing people -- then I'd have no argument.  But I'm trying to write stories about the decisions characters make, rather than stories that are primarily about killing people.   I'm writing about the strength that's shown by decision-making.     

At the end of Black Hawk, Adrian has grown to be the kind of man who refrains from killing his enemy until he has solid, incontrovertible proof of guilt.  Adrian's story, through several books, has been about acquiring ethics and self-control, not about learning to kill more skillfully.

And Justine's strength?  In Black Hawk I use Justine's willingness to give up her sister, her decision to risk her life to rescue the Caches, and her determination to overcome degradation and rape to show her strength.  She has spy skills -- they're probably better demonstrated in Forbidden Rose than in Black Hawk -- but I'm mainly interested in the hard choices she makes.

Is Adrian the 'better spy'?  He brings formidable spy skills to the table.  Consider his lockpicking.  He stands behind Justine and mentally complains about how slow she is getting through a door.  

But lookit at what's really happening in that scene.  Justine enticed him to that door, (which is why he's snarking at her.)  She holds all the knowledge in this situation.  In a few minutes she's going to make him do exactly what she wants.

Who's the master spy?  The boy who can pick locks?  Or that clever, clever girl with her knowledge and determination and her sure understanding of what makes him tick? 

I can't argue that you somehow should feel the balance of power and strength between hero and heroine is equal. Everybody who reads the book is going to have a different emotional response to what I consciously or unconsciously put in the story.  I can only say it is not my intention to show the heroine as weaker than the hero.

Jo

Putting Your Fiction Online

Someone asked, more or less,

"I'm an unpublished writer -- should I post chapters of my Work in Progress on my website?"


To which I reply:

There is a definite downside to this.  When you post a significant portion of  a work of fiction online, you may imperil your First Publication Rights.  (That's what you're generally selling when you sign a contract -- those First Publication Rights.) Putting your fiction online may also make your work less salable.  Publishers may be reluctant to buy a novel that's available free on the net.


Why would you want to DO this?
Why would someone want to post fiction online, on his website?
Seems to me there are a couple three possible reasons: 

-- Because he wants to fill up his blog with cool content, but doesn't want to write stuff specifically targeted to the blog and he has this piece of fiction handy.

Advice: If you want to keep a blog, write stuff intended for your blog. Don't be lazy.

Cool story example

-- Because he believes his fiction will draw traffic to his blog. He wants to build a following.

Advice: Do you read one chapter of a good book and then return it to the library?
Not so much.
Why would the readers of your blog feel good when you cut off your ongoing story, having just interested them?

Not the way to bring folks back to your blog.

'Teaser excerpts' of your cool story work when they point the reader to a buy button. If you can't include a link to the whole work, you've annoyed the folks you want to attract.


-- Because he wants praise/advice/discussion/feedback on his writing.

Typical Writer's Group

Advice: Join a writer's group.  Join or form a critique circle.  Print up copies for your friends.
 
Try Absolute Write.  
Try Compuserve Books and Writers Forum.



-- Because an agent or editor might drop by and see the work and be bowled over by it and get in touch with him about publishing it.  He heard this happened to somebody.

Advice: This is not so likely. 

Consider the slushpile an agent or editor has in her office: Here, Here. Here. Here.

With this kind of mail arriving every day, do you think agents and publishers go out trolling the web for more submissions? The odds of finding an agent or editor are astronomically better if you finish the work, send out queries, and submit the manuscript.


-- Because he does not have a completed manuscript and he wants someone to appreciate his writing right NOW.

Advice: I understand this.  Writing is a lonely business.  We don't get much feedback when we're working.
But . . .  posting a rough, flawed, unedited draft of your work is not respectful to the readers of your blog. If you intend to build a blog following, treat these people as you will someday treat your readers. Give them your best work.

-- Because he doesn't think the story will ever be published. He sees this as his only chance to share with a larger audience.

Advice: This is why folks post on fanfic sites -- this desire to share their work.
It's a generous impulse I hate to quell.

But do you intend to be a professional writer and get paid for it? 
Then trust yourself. Trust your work.

Later on, when you're published, you may regret that some of your apprentice work is out there online, haunting you, with all the newby mistakes that you can never, now, correct.

Technical Topic -- Historical Romance versus Historical Fiction

Someone asked elsewhere, "I write historical fiction. But I love a good love story. And so I set out to write a story where the love story played a prominent role  . . .  I've read about a "formula" that most romances adhere to; I know that I haven't stuck to it."

Is this book a Historical Romance?

Well . . . it might be.  Then again, it might not.  A 'love story' isn't enough to put you on the Romance shelves.

What it is --
There are many more titles on the shelf that call themselves 'Historical Romance' than there are titles in the 'Historical Fiction' section. Maybe it looks like it would be easier to go the Romance genre route.

But, not so much.  The many Romances are not really germane to a book stuck in the no-man's land between Historical Fiction and Historical Romance.  They're lighter reads.  History is a backdrop in these books, not a main player. Getting a dense and accurate Historical Romance published is probably about as difficult as getting published in Historical Fiction.

What you cannot do is get a book published as Historical Romance if that is not what the book actually is. The agents and editors are really canny about this. They know.

To qualify as Romance -- (I'm talking via my direct link to Infallible Knowledge here) --

(a) At least half the manuscript should be the male and female protagonists in the same scene, face to face.

(b) Another quarter or so, if you can't put the two protagonists face to face, should be scenes directly related to the MMC (Male Main Character) or FMC (Female Main Character.)

(c) The POV should be either MMC or FMC, (unless it's Omniscient Narrator,) for more than 90% of the writing.  You will see that this means almost every scene has one of the two protagonists in it.

(d) Here we come to the big one:

The central problem of the story -- the stuff that sends everybody into action -- is solved when the MMC and FMC finally get together at the end.

That is -- the central problem is not the Queen's Pearl being misplaced or Princess Elizabeth dodging the ax long enough to inherit. The central problem is that Thomas and Anne can't get married because their grandparents are feuding.
You know what problem is central to the story because most important actions the MMC and FMC undertake are motivated by that. We see them act in ways that will get them married rather than merely recover the Missing Pearls.

(e) In a Historical Romance, the FMC should have considerable 'agency'. She does stuff, and important later events happen in response to her action.

(f) The ending should be upbeat. There is a plausible HEA for the MMC and FMC. Everybody walks away smiling, except the villain.

(g) Nobody kills a puppy. This means the MMC's friend does not die lengthily on stage. Nobody the reader cares about dies.

(h) As a minor note, the word count is going to be under 120K.  Better and more salable if it's under 100K.

(i) Roberta Gellis did this.  Georgette Heyer got away with this once or twice.  But a brand new Historical Romance author probably can't.

Do not write about history.

By this I mean, be as accurate as you want, but do not have the narrator or any character tell us 'Why Henry VIII had money in the treasury when he inherited' or 'Why the 1814 Battle of Paris was a good deal more important that the Battle of Waterloo'. No consecutive 300 words should convey historical information.

If the readers of dense, accurate, well-researched Historical Romances want to read Historical Fiction, they know the way to those shelves. When they pick up your Historical Romance they do not want to read Historical Fiction.

Giving Away Black Hawk. (Where I'm doing this . . .)

I've bumped the giveaway post up a bit, just so it stays on top.  I'll do this as long as I'm blogging around the town and giving away books.

The Dragon and the Pearl and an interview with Jeannie Lin

Joanna here, with Jeannie Lin, author of Butterfly Swords, (Harlequin Historical, 0373296142, buy it here,) winner of RWA's 2009 Gold Heart Award.  Lin was also a break-out favorite in my personal 'exciting heroines I wish I could write,' category.  

Now she's back with her newest book, The Dragon and the Pearl, (Harlequin Historical, 0373296622, you can buy it here.)

I like me some strong heroine and I like me exotic locales and strong, protective heroes.  That was Butterfly Swords.  I'm expecting the same three-for-three in The Dragon and the Pearl. 

On to the promised interview . . .

Me:  What sort of books influenced you when you were a growing up? 

Jeannie: I was highly influenced by adventure stories: King Arthur's tales, Greek myths, fantasy adventures (former D&D geek here), and martial arts movies. I always had a thing for larger than life heroes and heroines and ultra-dramatic scenarios (we might even say melodrama). 

 

Me: I also love me some ultra dramatic.  Nobody's going to be surprised to hear that.  What draws you to this period in history?  With me and the Napoleonic era, it's the clothes.  *g*  You?

Jeannie: Oh, I do have to admit the clothes were a part. 

I used to watch these gorgeous Tang Dynasty costume dramas (think Curse of the Golden Flower with Chow Yun Fat for a more recent reference). They featured Empress Wu and her irrepressible daughter Princess Taiping. It was an elegant, glorious, treacherous and bloody time and these little clever women emerged as the biggest badasses of them all in a court full of powerful men. I loved it.

Me:   What do you consider the Historical Romance canon?

Jeannie: Actually I feel super unqualified to answer this as I'm not well read in the canon and feel I must catch up! The historical romance police will take away my card when they learn I've only read Laura Kinsale's Flowers from the Storm and Judith Ivory's Beast this year. Woodiwiss' The Flame and the Flower is on my TBR. Similarly The Rake by Mary Jo Putney is also TBR'ed. 

Every time I read one of these "canon" books I'm blown away and think people who look down on historical romance "back then" weren't reading the right books. Can I lump Gone with the Wind in there? (I have read that one!) My foundation was Johanna Lindsey, Amanda Quick, Julia Quinn and Lisa Kleypas.

I'd really love recommendations on this front.

Me:  I like your choices of canon, and agree with them.  My own favs, in fact.  Let's talk about The Dragon and the Pearl.  How is your new heroine, Ling Suyin, alike, and different from, Ai Li, the heroine of Butterfly Swords?

Jeannie:  Both of the women are empowered, but I think of Ling Suyin as experienced in wielding her power whereas Ai Li was learning and earning her independence. Because of this, Ai Li was more willing to take risks and make mistakes whereas Suyin is more strategic and cautious. 

Ai Li was so darn nice! I know everyone thought she was all kickass and such, but at her heart she was a really good girl and always trying to do the right thing. The swords fooled everyone--even as a swordswoman she practiced all the time. Ling Suyin is not as honorable. She's a survivor. 

Me:  Random questions here.  What was the hardest scene to cut from Dragon?   

Jeannie:  This is a thought-provoking question.  Almost two-thirds of the book remained completely intact through all edits whereas the ending was tweaked quite a bit. There was an assassination attempt on Suyin's life where she was saved by a secondary character, the cripple named Jun. In the end, it wasn't needed for the central story, but I so loved the nod to so many martial arts elements in the scene (remember Jeannie, you're writing a romance...not a kung-fu flick). 

Me: I admire your strength.  I hate to cut good scenes.  I just hope you'll post it on your blog as an out take some day.  More random question.  Did your characters have any surprises for you while you were writing?  Anything you didn't foresee?

Jeannie: Oh...how do I do this without spoilers?

I knew Li Tao and Suyin before the story started because they had been featured in the previous book. Ling Suyin remains as the only character that appears in all three of my first books as they were originally written (Book #1 precedes Butterfly Swords and its fate is still in the air). 

What I didn't know is their past and I felt it was so important to who they were now. I see my scenes unfold like a movie and so though I sense the characters' secrets when I imagine the present scenes--because movies always do that, you know? Mysterious looks, close-ups, hidden innuendos--I had to learn who they were to know what it all meant. 

This is my only book that uses flashbacks which I normally don't favor, but I couldn't see Li Tao sitting down and ever revealing his past to anyone in a conversation, not even to the woman he loves. The same thing for Suyin. It seems like the trend in romance today is that when you love someone, you reveal all your dirty laundry to them. I don't think that's true-to-life and it wasn't true to the culture of background of these characters. 

There were also a few turns at the end with Suyin's character that I hadn't anticipated and that I had no personal experience with...darn spoilers.

Me:  Flashbacks are the very devil, aren't they?  *g*  What are you working on right now?

Jeannie:  Right now I'm going back to the series with a star-crossed love story about Shen Tai Yang (Ai Li's 3rd brother) and a daughter of the Gao family (Gao is the enemy warlord in The Dragon and the Pearl). 

It's a Romeo and Juliet tale if Romeo and Juliet had to consider fighting to the death. I've finished several projects that are now in the Harlequin queue that didn't have swords and warlords and focused more on the high culture of the Tang Dynasty, so that's why I'm going back to the melodrama.

Me: Thank you so much for stopping by, Jeannie.

So.  Here's a recommended read.  And if you haven't latched onto Butterfly Swords, I recommend it as well.(See the wiki here for a discussion of butterfly swords, which is interesting in its own right.)

I love both of her covers too.  Just saying.

Banner finis

And I have a banner concept. 

Not final.  Not just the way it's going to look.  But I expect it will bear some relationship to the final design. 
The web designer is either pleased or tactful and we are talking technical details about drop down menus and search boxes.  I like it that we've got to the point I have no idea what is going on and cannot add usefully to further websiting.   


Could Romantic Scientist and Skittles get in touch with me.  You guys won an ARC of Black Hawk.  Hard decision, when everyone was so very helpful and intelligent.  Yeah! 

Banners Yet again.

So.  Still playing with the banner:

This one has a blue banner and the 'e' is not covered.
Then the same banner with the 'e' covered.

I am not at all sure about this shade of blue.  No.  Not sure.
And I have to work with the edge of that door.  It needs to look like a door.  Maybe I can add a dark strip down the side.

 This one has a more active woman.  I like the concept, but the picture of her takes more space, it being active and all.

In the first case, I've moved the lettering on top of her.
This might work with more powerful lettering, but seems illegible as is.

Here, I keep the picture, but make the name smaller so it all fits.
I do not know what to do with the right side of the picture.
The whole photoshop thingum is kinda beyond my grasp.  Obviously more tinkering is required if I want to do this.

  This one has a wedge-shaped upper line. 
Somehow I think the concept of wedge-shaped upper line is cooler than the execution.

 And here we see one with a thicker upper line altogether. 

Banners again

So.
I'm still looking at possible banners for the blog,
because I dither a bit on this,
and also I have to do the work when I have an odd minute free.

Somehow one is never expected to have even minutes free.

Could gamistress66 and Christine get in touch with me?  I'll send you each an ARC of Black Hawk.
I had a very hard time -- an impossible time -- deciding who was most helpful.  So I picked out the five great comments and did a blind drawing and you two won.

I have another copy of Black Hawk -- 'the ARC' to give away.  It'll be for further comment or for what was already said or a combination of both.

What I'm thinking of right now is:    

Or its kin an kith:

Then we got blue options:

And we got variations:

Website design

 I'm working on the banner for my updated website.

Not that I'm going to actually do the banner thing myself, you understand.  This is just me trying to communicate a 'feeling' to the website designer.

Since there are all kinds of visually skilled folks out there . . .  can you give me some opinions?  What's the direction to go with this?  What's the working idea?

Oh . . . these are photos I mostly don't have rights to, so I'm just using thumbnails and I'm going to pull the banner designs after a bit. 

The person who gives me the most help with this, (it's one of those subjective thingums,) gets a Black Hawk ARC, as soon as I actually get some.






********************

Let me go add another one here:

*******
Going down to add a modification of the design above.  This one is meant to sorta break outta the box.  Don't know how technically feasible it is.

*****
Looking at making the concept punchier . . .  I've added red to it.
It is not just straightforward and easy to add add red to a dress, so It's all a little clumsy.

I think this is a bit too much red.  Maybe a gentler pink on the dress.
Or . . . there's blue.  Let me try blue.

Technical Topic: Finding an Agent for Romance

Someone writes:
"I've finished my Romance manuscript.  Now I'm looking for an agent.  How do I find one? 




Congratulations on finishing the manuscript.  You are now part of the 'finished your manuscript' fraternity.  Only one person in a hundred who says, "I'm going to write a book" makes it this far.  I am so glad you picked Romance.  The world needs more great Romance stories.

As to finding an agent . . . 

There are a couple of books that list agents.  Writer's Market and Jeff Herman's Guide are the two standard.  Most libraries carry them, but it's probably worthwhile owning one or the other. 

I used my own copy of one of those books to make marginal notes of information I found in many sources.  It was my 'central file", as it were. 

I could cross through agents who flat-out didn't handle Romance.  When I tracked down the agents of my favorite writers, I could add this information right in the Guide.  When I googled agents and read interviews they'd given, I wrote my impression of their outlook and personality in the guide. 

It kept everything nicely in one spot.

Another source of agent information is Agent Query here , which will give you a quick, partial list of Romance agents.  Between the two books and the online source, you'll find more agent names than you can shake a stick at.

The trick is finding the right one for you.  You and your agent are going to be together for many years.  You don't just want 'an agent'.  You want an agent who is both good and right for you.

Preditors and Editors here is a good spot to 'vet' your candidates, as is the Absolute Write Bewares and Background Checks Forum here.   This will help you eliminate the outright frauds and the incompetents.  Remember, being listed in the Guides or Agent Query and having a website is not a guarantee of quality or honesty.

Absolute Write also has sections for asking questions about agents and query letters and is just a generally excellent spot for a writer to hang out. 

moving right along . . .
It's worth subscribing to Publishers Marketplace here for a few months.  PM lists many of the sales agents make to publishing houses.  It will tell you which agents have sold and the sort of books they're selling.  It is by no means exhaustive -- many excellent agents don't supply information there -- but it's another source of information.

Another useful line of approach in your agent search is to look at folks who represent writers whose work has something of the flavor of your own.  This is good to do with long established midlist writers, of course, but you might look especially at debut writers whose work you admire.  They'll have agents who are taking on new clients. 
To get the name of an author's agent, check the acks page of their books, or google "author name + agent + literary".

I'd suggest a Romance writer with a completed manuscript join Romance Writers of America for a year.  Join your local chapter.  Join some of the online, special-interest groups.  You will meet other authors, which is reassuring in the sense that we are all in the same boat.  You will meet published authors who can give you advice.  And, with luck, you will make friends.  

For information on query letters, see Miss Snark's Blog here and Evil Editor here.   

Finally, if you plan to submit to some publishing houses -- Harlequin, for instance, and all of the e-pubs, you do not necessarily need an agent right now.  You can submit directly to HQN, e-pubs, Avon and Tor.

I wish you the very best of luck.

Cover Cafe Contest

The 2010 Cover Contest is on!  Here.

This is always fun.

Every year I go there and sigh over all the beautiful and excellent covers. 
Alternate Reality is always breathtaking.  I get envious.  The paranormal folks get the best covers.  Why?  Why?  Why?

Then I head straight for the Worst Covers of the Year.  Because there is great snark involved.
I sympathize with the authors, but I can't help myself.

Anyhow.  Forbidden Rose is in the 'Two Cover' category which delights me because I think that is a beautiful cover.


The information given about artist is limited to --  Artist: Cover Art by Lott Reps; (They are here.)  Cover photo by Shutterstock; Cover design by Springe Design Concepts LLC (Penguin Group, USA)  

I love that stepback cover on TSL.

Stepback by Judy York

mass market cover by Judy York

 I do not know exactly which artist at Lott Reps did the Forbidden Rose cover.


Alan Ayers, here,  did the trade Spymaster's Lady cover.  Judy York, here, did the mass market Spymaster's Lady.

The Alan Ayers trade cover