DA BWAHA Finalists

This is book pimping here.

The DA BWAHA is a yearly contest where Romance and quasi-Romance books slug it out for world domination.
For information on the contest and how to play (vote) see here.

This post here below is me reminding everybody of some wonderful books that came out in 2010.

I've listed 15 of the 64 DA BWAHA books.  Most of them I've had the opportunity to read and like.
There's also some that are on my TBR shelf that I haven't got around to reading yet.


I'm saying -- "Hey, go take a look."
Because the DA BWAHA always has great books.

(Click on the book to go to the book.  Click on the author to go to author website.)


Cold Magic by Kate Elliott
The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley
Dark Road to Darjeeling by Deanna Raybourn
Naked Edge, Pamela Clare
Something About You by Julia James
The Time Weaver by Shana Abe
Bayou Moon by Ilona Andrews
Iron Duke by Meljean Brook
Archangel’s Kiss by Nalini Singh
Last Night’s Scandal by Loretta Chase
The Summer of You by Kate Noble
Trial by Desire by Courtney Milan
His at Night by Sherry Thomas
Wicked Becomes You by Meredith Duran
Troubled Waters by Sharon Shinn

And, as long as I'm here,
let me add a couple few books that didn't get picked up by DA BWAHA.
These are some of the just Great Reads of 2010.
Some of them are just beautiful.   

Lady Isabella's Scandalous Marriage by Jennifer Ashley
The Accidental Wedding by Anne Gracie
Whisper of Scandal by Nicola Cornick
Barely a Lady by Eileen Dreyer
Blameless by Gail Carriger
In Too Deep by Jayne Ann Krentz w/a Amanda Quick
Love in the Afternoon by Lisa Kleypas
A Matter of Class by Mary Balogh
Butterfly Swords by Jeannie Lin
Queen Hereafter by Susan Fraser King
In for a Penny by Rose Lerner
Ten Things I Love About You by Julia Quinn
Lessons in French by Laura Kinsale
The Golden Season by Connie Brockway
Sinful in Satin by Madeline Hunter
Promises in Death by Nora Roberts w/a JD Robb (ok.  ok. It's from 2009.  So sue me.)
The Wicked Wyckerly by Patricia Rice
Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie
Wicked Intentions by Elizabeth Hoyt
Marry Me by Jo Goodman
Three Nights with a Scoundrel by Tessa Dare


ETA:

Now I am going to add some few selected more books.  Maybe like twenty.  These are reader favs.  These books competed for the 'empty slot' the DA BWAHA folks left as the 8th book in each category. 

I've listed the ones I know a bit about and like. If I already mentioned them, I don't repeat.

YA
Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins (Finalist)
Matched by Ally Condie
The Duff by Kody Keplinger
Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly


PNR/SF
Magic Bleeds by Ilona Andrews (Finalist)
Silver Borne by Patricia Briggs
Warrior by Zoe Archer
Play of Passion by Nalini Singh
 

Crossover
City of Ghosts by Stacia Kane
All Clear by Connie Willis



Contemporary
All I Ever Wanted by Kristan Higgins (Finalist)
The Search by Nora Roberts
Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor by Lisa Kleypas

Historical
Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake by Sarah MacLean
The Mischief of the Mistletoe by Lauren Willig
Married by Morning by Lisa Kleypas  
The Betrayal of the Blood Lily by Lauren Willig
The Heir by Grace Burrowes
A Kiss at Midnight by Eloisa James




For the whole shebang of 80 reader nominees -- go here.  It's an interesting list.

If there's a book on the DA BWAHA list or some other 2010 book I've missed, let me know.

The backbone of a query letter

Talking query letters,
which is one of the all-time horrible tasks in a writer's life.

Once you get past the, "this is why I am drawn to you as an agent," moment,
and the, "title, genre, length," moment,
you are likely to get to the "what is the story, anyway," moment.



There are two ways to go on from there.  Two organizational styles, if you will.



1.  You can relate the story.

Gordon and his squire rode into the tugley wood till they came to a mysterious hut beside a crystal lake.  The wizard who lived there gave Gordon a magic ring and the words of a prophesy.  "You will find what you seek in the mouth that does not close, behind the door that does not open."  Gordon continued into the wilderness till he encountered some bandits who took him captive and . . .

and so on and so on.

The agent may or may not find this useful.


2.  There's another way to approach the query.

This is not so much telling the story, as answering questions about the story.
We will choose questions of breathless interest to the agent.

This second sort of query is logically organized as 'question answering' --
an organization that may not be the way stuff happens chronologically in your story.

So.  What questions?



What kind of story do you have?

Heat of the Blood is a paranormal thriller
Running with the Bulls is a Suspense novel
Bump and Grind is Contemporary Romantic Comedy 
 
[with strong Romantic elements/with a mystery subplot/set against a backdrop of the California cult scene . . . or whatever is different about this story.]


Who is the protagonist?
What is her problem?

Kemp Trey is a paranormal investigator out to prove his best friend was murdered by demons.
Jenny Binn, Las Vegas cocktail waitress, is on the run from the mob. 
Bumper Grind, porn queen, is determined to marry the Reverend Goodman.


What is the setting and atmosphere of the story?

in the dripping alleys of . . .
under the deadly sun of . . .
and heads for the sleepy hamlet of Righteous Valley.


What does she do about her problem? 

Trey must penetrate the paranormal underworld to . . .   
Jenny heads for the Rocky Mountain cabin that had belonged to her grandmother, planning to . . .    
Bumper redyes her hair mousy brown, changes her name to . . . 

We are not looking at all kinds of actions.
Only action that deals directly with the central problem of the story.

(We know what the central problem is because those actions are going to solve it, which is kind of circular, isn't it?)

What or who is the major antagonist?

and mets the goblin king who ordered the hit on his partner.
. . . the crooked lawyer who . . .
Reverend Goodman's spinster sister, Maude, is skeptical of . . .


We can spot the major antagonist because this is what the protagonist faces at the turning point or climax of the story.


What are the stakes?

may lose not only his life, but his soul.
accused of a murder she did not commit.
the one man she could ever love.

Heat of the Blood is a paranormal thriller set in an alternate near future.  Kemp Trey, paranormal investigator, is out to prove his best friend was murdered by demons.  He must penetrate the dripping, demon-infested alleys of the New Orleans French Quarter to face the goblin king who ordered the hit.  One wrong move and Trey may lose not only his life, but his soul.

The question-answer query doesn't try to cover plot events unless they speak to the specific 'agent questions'.

Just general writing advice

Someone asked --"How do I make myself write?  How do I get writing again?"


First off -- congratulations.  You're way ahead of most folks who want to write.  You're doing it instead of talking about it.


Let me offer a few random pieces of advice.

-- Follow a writing routine.  Same time.  Same place. 

Put your butt in the chair.
Write every day.

Treat writing as a job.  You don't complain that you can't do the accounts today or you don't feel like teaching sixth grade this morning.
Write as if you were working for somebody else. 



-- The edges of sleep are strong writing times. 

Keep your computer set up and ready to go in a quiet place.  If you have ideas when you're falling asleep, get out of bed and go type them.

Write early.  Get up in the morning and head directly to the computer and work. 
Eat later.  Shower later.  Walk the dog later.  Don't talk to anyone.  Hold onto the dream state as long as you can.

If this works for you at all . . . give the first hour of the morning to your writing.

-- Write in little corners of time.  Keep a laptop with you, or a notebook and pen.   Write while you're eating lunch.  While you're waiting for the kid to finish dance class.  On the flight to L.A.

-- Write even when you're writing crap. 
Write bad stuff.  Just write something.
Nora Roberts said, "I can fix anything but a blank page."
Fill up the page and edit it later.  Just get something down.

-- Treat your writing as serious work.  It's not a hobby. 
It is more important to write than to have a clean kitchen floor.  You can send out for pizza.

-- Trust yourself.  There's endless creativity inside you.  If you lose an idea, it returns to the sea of your unconscious.  It will emerge again, that or something better.

And

AAR WIN for Best Non-UK Romance

I am so very delighted, so honored, and . . . may I say  . . .  surprised and knocked off my feet and spit-drying-in-my-mouth excited, that Forbidden Rose won one of AAR's categories.

See all the winners here.

Forbidden Rose, winning 'Best Romance not set in the UK'.


This is what I say:

Thank you very, very much. I am honored beyond words that folks nominated Forbidden Rose.

This book was hard for me to write.  I'd already pictured my hero and heroine as a happily married couple. I had to delve back into the past and imagine them much younger. See them at the moment they met. There was this also - their love story was set in a grim era of history. I wasn't sure anyone would want to join me in an adventure there.

Thank you so much for followin my Doyle and Maggie back into their dark and dangerous past. I am so delighted you liked the book.


I take this and I hug it close.  Because this is isn't just one reviewer saying she liked it.  This is READERS saying they liked it.

Since Readers were cool enough to say they liked the book, let me list the other cool books that won accolades.  There is just nobody on this list that isn't worth tracking down and reading if you haven't already.

We haz links.  Click on the author name to find out more about the book and buy it.


 

Best Romance of 2010  

Last Night's Scandal by Loretta Chase

Honorable Mentions for Best Romance

The Forbidden Rose by Joanna Bourne

The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook

Best Historical Romance Set in the UK

Last Night's Scandal by Loretta Chase

Best Historical Romance Not Set in the UK

The Forbidden Rose by Joanna Bourne

Best Paranormal
The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook

Best Contemporary Romance

Something About You by Julie James

Best Short Story
Here There Be Monsters (from the anthology Burning Up) by Meljean Brook

Best Romantic Suspense 
Naked Edge by Pamela Clare

Favorite Funny

Ten Things I Love About You by Julia Quinn

Biggest Tearjerker
Love in the Afternoon by Lisa Kleypas

Best Chick Lit/Women's Fiction

All I Ever Wanted by Kristan Higgans
The Bikini Car Wash by Pamela Morsi

Best Series Romance

Marrying the Royal Marine by Carla Kelly

Most Kickass Heroine

Elena Deveraux, in Archangel's Kiss by Nalini Singh

Best Romance Heroine

Olivia Wingate-Carsington in Last Night's Scandal by Loretta Chase

Honorable Mentions for Best Romance Heroine

Margeurite de Fleurignac in The Forbidden Rose by Joanna Bourne
Beatrix Hathaway in Love in the Afternoon by Lisa Kleypas

Best Romance Hero 

Leo Hathaway in Love in the Afternoon by Lisa Kleypas

Best Romance Couple

Olivia Wingate-Carsington and Peregrine Dalmay in Last Night's Scandal by Loretta Chase

Best New Author of 2010

Rose Lerner

Best Love Scenes   
Wicked Intentions by Elizabeth Hoyt

Best Romantica

Patience by Lisa Valdez

Black Hawk -- the Excerpt

In celebration of February 19th, (why should one not celebrate February 19th, eh?) and because the excellent Annie asked -- here is a short excerpt from Black Hawk.

Black Hawk won't be published till November.  We will hope this excerpt does not make that seem too soon.

***

Justine had told the boy to meet her at the guillotine.  It was not because she was blood-thirsty--indeed, she was not--but because they would be inconspicuous here.

She was dressed as a housemaid today, in honest blue serge, white apron, and a plain fichu.  She became indistinguishable as the tenth ant in a line of ants.  She held her basket to her chest and leaned on the wall that marked the boundary between La Place de la Révolution and the Tuileries Garden. 

She was too young to pretend to the august status of lady's maid.  A thirteen-year-old must be a housemaid, no more than that.  But a housemaid was exactly what a respectable woman would take with her when she went to an assignation in the Tuileries Garden.  A housemaid could be left in a corner of La Place de la Révolution, bored and resigned, while her mistress played fast and loose with her marriage vows. 

To play this part realistically, she assumed her appropriate expression of bored and resigned.  She waited.  Hawker would find her easily.  She was still when everyone else was in motion.  Nothing is more apparent to the eye.

This was a good spot for enemy spies to meet.  From a hundred yards away Hawker could look across the Place de la Révolution and assure himself she was quite alone.  The chattering stream of humanity that flowed through the square would allow him concealment as he approached.  Beyond, to her right, the tight, milling confusion of the arcade and shops of the Rue de Rivoli offered a dozen paths of escape.  Her good intentions would be clear, even to an English spy of limited experience.

Or perhaps not.  She would not trust herself if she were an English spy. 

DABWAHA

Smart Bitches kicks off the 2011 DABWAHA event, here.

Nominate your favorite book.  The entry form for nominations is online.


For instance . . . you might have liked some of these:


The Accidental Wedding by Anne Gracie, ISBN  0425233820

The Broken Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin, ISBN 0316043966

Butterfly Swords by Jeannie Lin, ISBN 0373296142

Changeless by Gail Carriger, ISBN 0316074144

Forbidden Rose  by me, ISBN 0425235610

Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie, ISBN 0312303785

Spider's Bite by Jennifer Estep, ISBN 1439147973

The Wicked Wyckerly by Pat Rice, ISBN 045123071X

Sequels . . . Love 'em or Hate 'em

Over at Word Wenches, seven Romance authors discuss how and why they write sequels.  

My contribution:

What's written in the pages of any book is only part of the whole story.  There's worlds of delving and spinning, working and loving going on outside the scenes that land in Chapters One to Thirty-two.  I think we all feel these stories buzzing and nudging at the edges of books, begging to be told. 

And onward over here.

He loves her. Let me count the whys.

In celebration of Valentine's Day . . .

Let us consider the delightful question of why the hero loves the heroine.

Let me count the whys . . .








 
1. -- Because of her strengths.

Why did the author write about this woman?
Why did the writer decide to spend a couple months inside the heroine's head?

Because the heroine is smart and funny, or strong, honest and kindly, or courageous and resourceful.  Whatever she is . . . she has wonderful qualities.

Lasting love arises from an appreciation of the beloved's strengths and virtues. What the reader sees in our heroine, however deeply buried, the hero is going to see.

He loves her for being wonderful.

2. -- Because of her weaknesses.

Love is not only based upon what we want from the beloved, but also upon what we can give.
Nobody wants to live their whole life with somebody who doesn't need them.

If our heroine can't cope with large social functions or can't cook or is scared of lightning, the hero loves her because he can guide her through the intricacies of a formal dinner, or cook her a tarte tatin, or hold her during thunderstorms.

He loves her for what he can give her.


3. -- Because she has something he needs.

The hero needs something. Everybody does.
Validation of his beliefs. Healing for some past trauma. A challenge that excites him. Guidance. Inspiration. An audience. A safe harbor in a chaotic world.

He loves the heroine for what she can give him.



  4. -- Because together they do what neither can do alone.

The two are greater than the sum of their parts.
They become a gestalt.
What is added to the mix when these two join hands?

Do they become Gilbert and Sullivan? Spies working together? The heads of a Nineteenth Century mercantile empire? Nick and Nora Charles solving crime?

He loves her because she is the other half of his team.

5. -- Because it is natural for him to love.

The Romance hero has a great capacity to love.  He's not afraid to be a lover.  Not ashamed to be a friend.

Heroes may express their love in a thousand different ways, but the heroic quality of these men springs from a heart that knows how to love.


 
And y'know what. 
These are the same reasons the heroine loves the hero.

Technical Topics -- The Final Edits

Someone asked:  HOW can you tell if edits you made on work you let sit for a while are good?
I'm having A LOT of trouble with this.





 Couple o' thoughts.

It seems to me the last work on the manuscript falls into three stages:

Rewriting
Final polish edit
Specific fixes.

It is good to know which stage are you actually in.

-- Are you committed to the major plot points? Do you feel the events make sense and they're in the right order and you are not going to fiddle with big story stuff any more?

Until you declare the plot pretty much fixed, you are still in the 'rewriting' stage, not the editing stage.

In 'rewriting' you're still dreaming up story. Your eyes are all unfocused and you get surprised by new stuff you come up with. You're not analyzing. You are still creating.

I'd say to finish this creative stage, if you can, before you start your last edits. It is frustrating to spend Tuesday nitty-grittying away at Chapter Twelve, then toss it out on Wednesday or change the POV or something.



 -- The true 'final edit' process is a trip through the entire manuscript, reading out loud, fixing infelicities of language, character incongruities, plot glitches and pacing.
The final edit is going over the manuscript with a magnifying glass. it is inherently detailed, small-scale process work. The approach is starkly analytic. It works best if it proceeds as one fast, continuous run through.



-- During both rewrite and final edit, you may concentrate on specific problems. That is, you may go into the manuscript with a defined and limited goal.

This might be something your beta readers brought to your attention.  Might be something your editor wants worked on.

You want to "expand the protagonist's internals," or "add more description," or "clarify how the suspense plot works."

In 'fix-it' mode, you skip forward and back, following that one thread of the story wherever it may crop up.

This limited-goal approach is tremendously useful. You look at changes in terms of what they accomplish for the story as a whole. You can ask yourself whether an edit expands the character POV or clarifies a story point instead of a nebulous 'is this better?'.



As a purely housekeeping note,
it's best to keep both old and new version. Come back in a day or two and compare them.

You can keep the old version in another document, or you can keep it in the major working document by putting it in brackets or a different font or color.

Secrets from the Underbelly of Paris

 
It's 1800 or so. 
There you are, sitting in a café in Paris, relaxing, wearing something Parisian with great éclat and style. 
Unless you are feeling deeply philosophical it's unlikely you wonder about what secrets lie hidden beneath your feet.   

"All secrets are deep. All secrets become dark. That's in the nature of secrets." 
Cory Doctorow

It is not solid earth down there. 

See the rest  at Word Wenches here

Sign up for the AAR Annual Reader's Poll -- Best of 2010

All About Romance is holding its Fifteenth Annual Readers Poll for Best Books of the Year.

When do they meet?

Someone asked:  In a Romance, how long can you wait before the hero and heroine meet?


All else being equal,  [(all else) = (=)]  in genre Romance, you put the protagonists together in Scene One or Scene Two.
This is because the story is about the relationship between the H&H
and you want to get the story started.

Now, sometimes you can introduce that relationship without putting the H&H onstage at the same time. Books might start with letters exchanged or one protagonist neckdeep in dealing with problems related to the other.  In such stories the H&H do not 'meet', but they do have a relationship,
and that relationship is put onstage.

Or, look at the question the other way round --

What is more important in those early chapters than the relationship story? If you decide not to put the H&H together . . . are you instead frontloading backstory, worldbuilding, or suspense subplot.  Consider whether those would be better fed in later as backdrop to your main line of story.

When traditional wisdom says, 'the H&H should meet in the first or second scene,' what C.W. is saying is, "Stop putzing about and Get The Story Started.'
That is good advice in any genre.

Technical Topics -- Five Pointers on Openings

Someone asked:
What should I do?  I'm sixteen.  All my openings are lame.


Whether you start writing at sixteen or sixty, the mantra is:  The first million words are for practice.

You are not unique in having trouble with openings.  It is technically difficult to write the start of a story.

The very first page of a book has to strong-arm the reader away from the checkout line at the drugstore or the kitchen table at home over a bowl of oatmeal
and into your story.

You have to make the reader care about the character before she knows much about him.
Grabbing the reader is never about something the reader knows.  It's always about how she feels.

But -- talking information here -- you also got to get across where everybody is and why,
and what it looks like,
and what's gone on,
and what just happened,
so the reader doesn't feel all-at-sea.

That's just in the first couple paragraphs.

So beginnings tend to give a writer the pip.
Even if she is not 16.

General advice
(and what is an army of suggestions without a general?)

1)  Hit the ground running.

This is sometimes expressed as 'start in the middle of action'.
But what it boils down to is -- something interesting is going on.

Not so much, Grandpa lost the ranch fifty years ago.
And more, signing the mortgage that buys the ranch at great financial risk.


Not so much, the airport and talking about take-off and checking through baggage.
But more, the protagonist, 30,000 feet over Cleveland, noticing that the cabin crew are all giant penguins.
With teeth.


2) Reveal character.

Many people believe, (well, I do,) that stories grow out of character.

So one purpose of the first scene is to reveal character.  We disclose the inner heart of our protagonist with action.

So, not so much folks explaining the protag's problems.
And more, noting that our heroine is up to her knees in dragon guts and wiping the ichor off her blade and shuddering  but even so she steps over the still-twitching dragon and heads inside the cave.

3)  Something is about to happen.

It's not just that Penelope has slain a large reptile.  It's what awaits her in the cave. 


It's not that Mary stands in the lunchline, swiping change from the backpack in front of her.  It's Gregory, turning around, catching her with her hand on his wallet.

Why?

4)  Leave questions.

Don't tell the reader all the 'why'.
Make the reader ask . . .  'why'?


5)  Keep it short

Here, if ever, be concise.  Stick to the point.  The reader will forgive discursion later, when she is immersed in the story.  Not on page one and two.

Forbidden On the ALA Genre List

I am so pleased. 

Forbidden Rose was short-listed by the American Library Association, Reference and User Services Association, on their Top Genre Fiction List.

The press release, here, says,
"The Reading List annually recognizes the best books in eight genres . . .  This year’s list includes novels that will please die-hard fans, as well as introduce new readers to the pleasures of genre fiction."

I am delighted and honored that Forbidden Rose is on this list and in such wonderful company. 

Romance

A Matter of Class by Mary Balogh, Vanguard Press.

 

A lady is ruined. A merchant’s son is trapped. Class differences loom large in this charming and playful take on the arranged marriage. Balogh’s Regency gem, where nothing is quite as it seems, is filled with affection and wit. 

 

         

Short List:

Barely a Lady by Eileen Dreyer, Hachette

The Forbidden Rose by Joanna Bourne, Berkley

The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook, Berkley

Something About You by Julie James, Berkley Sensation

These are wonderful books.
These are the books you hand to your friends who say . . . "Romance is nothing but cookier-cutter plots and sex scenes." 

(I mean, you hand them these books after you've sneered at them and maybe kicked them in the shins a little for being so closed minded.)

The Mac Arrives

The Mac arrives in a plain brown box,
brought to the door by a stranger
in uniform.

I slit the side.  It has paper triangles at each corner, tough and smooth, like playground equipment for juvenile pixies. 

I slide it out.


This is when the cat comes to help.
"You have a computer that is not full of cat hair," says the cat.  "I can fix that."

"Thank you," says I.

"Think nothing of it," says the cat.

The Macbook comes sitting on a soft cushiony black pad, with black and white things about it.

 





It's wrapped in a layer of thin plastic, which I remove, being handy that way.

The cat helps.

For a while I try to open the computer from the back, wrong way round.

"Hmmm . . ."  hmmms I to myself.  "I know this has a magnetic lock, but that is a very strong magnetic lock.

Eventually, I get it right.

and take the keyboard protection off.

Hello, Mac, says I.

Technical Topic -- Use of Images, Public Domain and Copyright

This is somewhat an extension of the post on Art and Image Resources.  It's talking about using the images on your blog.



Preface

Let me preface everything below by saying, 'I Am Not a Lawyer'. 

I am an enthusiastic supporter of Intellectual Property rights since this is how I earn my bread, so I'm not going to suggest anybody go violating copyright. 

Finally, I believe an artist has a moral and ethical right to control the sale of her own work.
I feel about cybertheft the way my chicken-keeping friend feels about foxes,
but without the gun.


Having finished all that prefacing, I'll do some backstory.
(If this were a work of fiction I would have lost all the readers long since.)

What is Public Domain?

Artwork and writing and Intellectual Property of every kind falls into two legal categories --

1.  -- work that is protected by copyright. 
That is -- somebody has rights on how the work gets used.

2.  -- work in the Public Domain. 
Nobody has rights to say how it gets used. 
And the artist is most likely dead.

What's in the Public Domain?

In a rather large nutshell,
in the United States,
if the picture or writing was published before 1923 it's in the Public Domain.

You can find information about Public Domain at the authoritative and well-written Stanford and Cornell sites.  You want details about in-or-out of copyright?  See here.

I give a site for international law way down at the bottom of the page, but those are deep waters in which I do not swim or even float on a lilo.


Use of COPYRIGHTED Images

Copyright images can be put on your blog

if:

-- You buy rights to use the image.  There are sites that sell all kinds of stock images.  Ummm ...  here.  here.  here.  Sometimes this doesn't even cost much. Or,   

-- You get permission from the holder of the copyright.  When I write for permission, I've found blogs and commercial sites come back about half the time saying I can use their images.  They want me to attribute and put up a link, which I am glad to do. Or,


-- The works are licensed under Creative Commons -- see the wiki here  (thank you Larry Lessig, Hal Abelson, and Eric Eldred.) -- which means you can use them under specific conditions.  Use requires attribution for many of these.  You add it in small print in a caption or at the bottom of the blog. 

You can copy creative commons icons here.  Or,

-- Your use is 'Fair Use' alllowed under provisions of the Copyright Law.  When it comes to artwork, 'Fair Use' is pretty stringently defined by the court. See Section Two here. 

From a bloggers' point of view, Fair Use of images is likely to be (a)  transforming the image to a new artwork, (b) using low resolution thumbnail views to talk about the art for non-commercial scholarly or review purposes.  Court cases have held that thumbnails are so small and graphically inferior that they do not compete with use of images by the copyright holder. Or,
 
-- The work has been placed deliberately in the Public Domain.
Copyright holders can place images on sites that allow unrestricted download and use. Or,

-- It is a work produced by an agency of the U.S. Government.  These are copyright to the U.S. Government and placed in the public domain.  (However, works produced by Federal contractors or under Federal grants are not necessarily in the public domain.) 


Use of Public Domain images

You can use exact reproductions of images of Public Domain artworks any way you want, including commercial and derivative use.

Wait -- 

Computer files of Public Domain images can be used?
Even those from private individuals?
Even those from museums?

Yes.


A simple, straightforward copy of a Public Domain painting or print can be used any old way you want.


Taking a picture of the Mona Lisa doesn't give you any rights to the Intellectual Property that is the Mona Lisa.

Owning the Mona Lisa doesn't give you Intellectual Property Rights either.

The ownership of the copy of a visual work, whether it is a painting, print, photograph, video recording, or .jpg file is distinct from the ownership of the Intellectual Property Rights.
Owning the physical work does not entitle one to the intangible intellectual property.

Photographing a work and creating a computer file of the two-dimensional visual image does not necessarily produce a copyrightable product.  Making 'slavish copies' of works of art may require both skill and effort, but there is no spark of originality which would make the reproduction copyrightable.  Indeed, the point of the exercise is to reproduce the works with great fidelity.

One way to think about the rights you acquire by making a copy is to compare it to Intellectual Property Rights to written works.  If I quote War and Peace on my blog and move a few commas around, I do not then have the right to tell other people how they can use that novel.  Even if I prove they copied it from my blog, I have not somehow generated rights to War and Peace just because -- hey, look, I'm so clever -- I copied it.


But the Museum site says I can't use the images. 

In the comment trail of the post on Art Resources, the Excellent Annie writes, in part:

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

. . .  If the painting or whatever is owned by a museum or is in the hands of a private collector, permission for its use may be and probably is required.

. . . 

the reality is that institutions and private collectors have leverage here if only because individuals and publishers are not willing to cough up the legal fees required to challenge their assertion of . . . [reproduction rights].

********
  
Which is a good and careful approach for a publisher of print works to take -- and something to think about if you're planning to add illustrations to your manuscript.

But.

Museums, (may their shadow never grow less,) are as fallible as the rest of us.  They give in to temptation and attempt to scoop up rights to which they have no shadow of a moral or legal entitlement.

For a summary of why they have no legal entitlement, see Public Domain Art in an Age of Easier Mechanical Reproducibility here. 


I see no reason for bloggers to encourage a wholesale rights grab by private and institutional holders of the world's art heritage.

Will you get in trouble if you download a copy of Innocence Preferring Love to Wealth by Pierre Proudhon, currently in the Hermitage Museum?
I don't think a blogger has to worry about this.  

It would be a poor and shabby world if bloggers were intimidated into giving up their rights to use Public Domain images.


What about the museum images of pots and swords and drinking cups?
 
Taking a photo of a drinking cup is a creative act.  The picture of the drinking cup is copyright, even though the cup may be from 1599.

So --
Still Life with Drinking Cup painted in 1599 -- Public Domain.
1965 photo of 1599 drinking cup in the museum collection --  copyrighted.

Copyrighted images in a museum collection should only be used with permissions of the museum.  The museum's restriction on the use of their copyrighted images is found in the small print someplace on the site.


What About Works physically in Other Countries?  Are they Public Domain?

Is an artwork painted by an Italian living in Russia in 1896, sold in Germany, now displayed in Abu Dhabi, owned by a Brazilian conglomerate, posted on a website hosted in Switzerland whose owner is physically located in France, and downloaded in Hawaii
in the Public Domain?

Look.  Let's just not go there.
 
My rule of thumb is that if it's before 1900 it's probably not copyright anywhere.  Information on this international law is here, but I do not delve.

Art and Image Resources

Here's a list of places to find high quality, public domain images of historical costume, settings and objects.  I'm mostly interested in 1750 to 1830, so these will be best represented  

[ETA  -- now has both links and the URL printed out.]

Big Sites


Victoria and Albert Museum (allows use of museum images for noncommercial personal use.)
http://collections.vam.ac.uk/


Web Gallery of Art (These are all public domain.)
http://www.wga.hu/index1.html

Art Renewal (All public domain)
http://www.artrenewal.org/articles/Philosophy/AngelSpeech/angelspeech.php


The Artchive (These are all public domain, I think.  Browse by artist and title.  Get largest image by clicking to select, click on the blue line that says 'To order".  Then click on the painting.  Image has watermark.)
http://www.artchive.com/web_gallery/


The Louvre -- Virtual Visit (Groups images by time, place, and artistic school)
http://cartelen.louvre.fr/cartelen/visite?srv=col_frame

The Louvre -- Search the Collection (Type a word into the search box)
http://cartelen.louvre.fr/cartelen/visite?srv=crt_frm_rs&langue=en&initCritere=true

Base Joconde (Searches all the museums of France.  This is in French, so use babelfish for the search term.  Type search term into the box on the lower right and tick avec image.) 
http://www.culture.gouv.fr/documentation/joconde/fr/pres.htm


New York Public Library Digital Image Collection
(You can limit this by date.  See the lower part of the search parameters.) 
http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/dgadvsearch.cfm

Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met approves scholarly, noncommercial use with attribution and link to Met.)
http://www.metmuseum.org/works_of_art/collection_database/

Flickr  (On the bottom of the form, click to search creative commons photos only.  These CC images must be attributed.)
http://www.flickr.com/search/advanced/?

(You can copy creative commons icons here.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Creative_Commons_icons)

Hermitage Museum (Does not expressly allow scholarly posting, but many are public domain.  Images said to be invisibly watermarked.)
http://www.hermitagemuseum.org/fcgi-bin/db2www/advanced.mac/step1?selLang=English

The British Museum (Approves noncommercial scholarly uses.  Mark images copyright British Museum)
http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/search_the_collection_database.aspx


Boston Museum of Fine Arts
http://www.mfa.org/search/collections

National Portrait Gallery  (Can be searched by date to find public domain.)
http://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/advanced-search.php

Brighton Museum 
http://searchcollections.brighton-hove-rpml.org.uk/

Yale  (250,000 images on line, all expressly free for use.)
http://discover.odai.yale.edu/ydc/Search/Results?lookfor=&type=allfields&filter%255B%255D=resource_facet%253A%2522Resource%20available%20online%2522

Yale Center for British Art
http://britishart.yale.edu/collections/search
With its cool search engine and many public domain images.c

Wikipedia  (All the images on Wikipedia are either Public Domain or have been placed in all-use, non-attribution Creative Commons or equivalent.  When you search a topic, check the bottom of the page for a notice saying 'Wikimedia Commons has media related to . . . '.   To specifically search Wikimedia, the entry page is here.  http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Pictures_and_images )

British Paintings Online
http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/
There are over 200,000 of them.  Just wonderful. 


Web Gallery of Art  (Again, these images are public domain)
I had just a terrible time finding the 'search' feature.  Go to Gallery and the search tab is at the bottom of the page.  Not a bad search engine once you find it.
http://allart.biz/


Art.com  This is a commercial site, beautifully searchable by subject.  Many are Public Domain, but a good many are copyright, so you have to use common sense. If possible, search here to find the works, then find the image at a site with better resolution. 
http://www.art.com/


Smaller Sites

The Noel Collection (Allows use of images with acknowledgement of source and a link back) http://jamessmithnoelcollection.org 
The page is here. 

Brooklyn Museum (Non-commercial use of images permitted, with attribution, as Creative Commons.  Yeah Brooklyn!)
http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/search/?advanced

The Tate   (No explicit permission for image use for scholarly purposes, but many images are public domain.  Images tend to be poor quality.)
http://www.tate.org.uk/collection/

The National Trust Museum of the U.K.  (The museum forbids use without licensing.  Images tend to be small and poor quality.  They have some public domain images.)
http://www.nationaltrustcollections.org.uk/

Olga's Gallery (Russian oriented)
http://www.abcgallery.com/

Crocker Art Gallery (Only about 500 items.  Strong on California.)
http://www.digitalcrocker.org/DCG/main.php

Tufts Bolles Print Collection (Not indexed or searchable that I can see.  Try it out to see if it matches your interests.)
http://dl.tufts.edu/view_collection.jsp?pid=tufts:UA069.006.DO.MS004&page=1&cmodel=info:fedora/cm:Image.4DS:::info:fedora/cm:Image.3DS&sel=image

LACMA, (wide range of European and American artworks.  Searchable.) the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, has a goodly number of searchable images.   The search engine includes a parameter for selecting date.  Many public domain images.
http://collections.lacma.org/
 
Greypony  (Mainly C18 and C19.)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12946229@N05/



Scholar's Resource  (Small images only, but it says where the site got them so most can be tracked down in larger format.)
http://www.scholarsresource.com/browse/classification/1?page=1

Romantic Query Letter (Not indexed.  Cool pictures.)
http://theromanticqueryletter.blogspot.com/

Getty Images  (On the advanced search page, click 'Creative stock images' and 'All royalty-free collections'.  Each image has release information below the image.  Read the license agreement.)
http://www.gettyimages.com/Search/AdvancedSearch.aspx
Similar to Getty is Diomedia here.   There are other stock image collections as well.

Old Paint Now here. (Searchable for keyword in box at upper left.  Searchable by date on left sidebar.  Some are not public domain.)
http://oldpainting.blogspot.com/
http://oldpainting.tumblr.com/

The Blue Lantern (Searchable for keyword in box at upper left.)
http://thebluelantern.blogspot.com/

Japonisme (Searchable for keyword in box at upper left.  Original photos are copyright to site.  Prints are copyright as per date of creation.  Many are public domain.)
http://lotusgreenfotos.blogspot.com/

Res Obscura (Another small blog of interesting Public Domain images.)
http://resobscura.blogspot.com/

Pre Raphaelite Art   (Searchable for keyword in box far at lower left.  These are old enough to be public domain.)
http://preraphaelitepaintings.blogspot.com/

Art Experts (A wide and interesting collection, searchable only by artist's name.  But LOTS of minor artists.)
http://www.artexpertswebsite.com/pages/artists.php

100 Years of Illustration (Vintage magazine covers and Adverts.  I'm assuming these are all pub dom on the site.)
http://giam.typepad.com/100_years_of_illustration/

National Education Network (These images are for educational use.  Interpreted broadly, this should include blogging on historical topics.)
http://gallery.e2bn.org/search.php

National Gallery of Australia  (search by keywords.  Set for list+image.  No express permission for scholarly use, but many are public dom.)
http://artsearch.nga.gov.au/

National Gallery of Ireland (Search by artist or date of artwork.)
http://onlinecollection.nationalgallery.ie/search/advanced/Objects;jsessionid=07866704D872FEF8832F34044A5D0F14?t:state:flow=696c0767-314f-4274-86ce-85f48b6e642a

Museum of the City of New York  (Lovely powerful search engine.  See the 'rights&reproductions tab at the top. Though they attempt to restrict use of public domain work, they have no right to do so.)
http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=CMS3&VF=MNY_HomePage#

Powerhouse Museum Collection  (Many creative commons images, but you have to check each image.)
http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/

Kunst Historisches Museum (This is German, so use babelfish to translate your search term.  No express permission for scholarly use, but many are public dom.)
http://bilddatenbank.khm.at/

Henry Luce Center for the Study of American Culture
(New York Historical Society's eMuseum.  No express permission for scholarly use, but many images are public dom.)
http://emuseum.nyhistory.org/code/emuseum.asp?style=Browse&currentrecord=1&newprofile=objects&newpage=search_basic&newvalues=1

Canadian Museum of Civilization    (No express permission for scholarly use, but many are public dom.)
http://collections.civilization.ca/public/pages/cmccpublic/emupublic/AdvQuery.php?lang=0

Musee McCord  or here on Flickr.  (Images may be used for educational purposes under the terms of use.)
http://www.mccord-museum.qc.ca/en/keys/collections/
or
http://www.flickr.com/photos/MuseeMcCordMuseum/

The Winterthur Collection  (No express permission for scholarly use. A few are public domain.)
http://museumcollection.winterthur.org/

Royal Ontario Museum  (No express permission for scholarly use, but many are public dom.)
http://images.rom.on.ca/public/index.php?function=home&sid=&ccid=

Anne Brown Military Collection  (Collection of military images, many pub dom.) 
http://dl.lib.brown.edu/catalog/catalog.php?verb=search&task=setup&colid=13&type=basic

The Athanaeum (Should be public domain.  Searchable.)
http://www.the-athenaeum.org/art/

Dobedobedo (Random but interesting.)
http://www.stumbleupon.com/stumbler/dobedobedo/all/

Madame Guillotine  (Women's C18 clothing.  All pub dom.)
http://madameguillotine.org.uk/

Victorian and Edwardian Paintings (Public Domain paintings and photos. )
http://goldenagepaintings.blogspot.com/

Creative Spaces (Searches several British museum data bases at once.  The individual sites have more thorough search engines.)
http://vna.nmolp.org/creativespaces/?page=home

Geograph Britain and Ireland These photos of British Isles places -- and many of them are just lovely -- are Creative Commons.
http://www.geograph.org.uk/

BibliOdyssey (Great images from old books and prints, almost all public domain.)
http://bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/ 

Do you know other collections of historically interesting images?
Please share.