Romance Lives At Romantic Love Books

This morning, I'm thrilled to have Kristyn Gansen, publisher of Romantic Love Books, guest starring on SlingWords.

I met Kristyn when she hosted Amy Edelman of Indie Reader on Romantic Love Books.

Amy guest blogged there about 5 Great Indie Romance Books and named my book JANE I'm-Still-Single JONES as one of those five books.

Since then, Kristyn and I have found we have much in common. She truly loves romance novels and is a great supporter of the genre. I not only write romance novels, but I also love them too. When all is said and done in life, love and relationships are the only things that truly matter.

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A Fine Romance
by Kristyn Gansen

I remember picking up my first romance novel. I was working at a health club at the time, and Harlequin had sent in boxes and boxes of books to distribute to the members in honor of the publisher’s 60th anniversary.

Never one to pass up a free book — or anything free, for that matter — I picked it up. I was done with it three hours after I started. Ever since then I’ve been hooked.

When people hear that I run a romance novel blog, or that I read romance novels all day — as a job, with income, no less — I get a lot of mixed reactions. Sometimes, people are excited and want to know all about it.

More often than not, though, people turn up their noses and ask me how I read so much of that garbage, day after day.

Stats Startle

In truth, I love reading romance. And it turns out I’m not the only one.

In fact, in 2009, more than $1.36 billion were spent on romance novels, according to Romance Writers of America. In 2008, more than 74.8 million people — 9.5 percent of them men — read at least one romance book. More romance novels are sold each year than novels in any other genre.

And those numbers don’t even include mystery, suspense, inspirational, etc., books with romantic elements!

Let’s be honest. Because love is a universal truth, something to which all people across all time can relate, plenty of non-romance books include romantic elements. In fact, a lot of those people who turn up their noses at me probably go home and read romance and don’t even know it.

Are You A Romance Reader?

So how do you know if you are reading romance? Romance novels are made up of two core elements: the story must have a happily-ever-after ending, and the love story must be central to the development of the novel. If you are reading a book with those components, you are reading a romance novel.

The novels are not all the same. They are not all full of sex and stupid women. Not all romance novels have brute men, not all have poor dialogue, not all have unrealistic outcomes.

Forget Stereotypes

And no, romance novels are not all read by middle-aged housewives with nothing better to do. In fact, 9.5 percent of romance readers are men!

So, it’s time to let go of some of those romance stereotypes, because chances are, the stereotype is wrong. Instead, stop into your local bookstore and give a good romance a chance. You might be surprised.

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Thank you so much to Joan for allowing me the honor of guest posting on her site!

Kristyn, it's been my pleasure.

Takeaway Truth

Readers, if you love romance novels -- and I know most of you do -- you'll love Kristen's website Romantic Love Books. Bookmark it today.

Coming Attractions

Here's a sneak preview of my guests for the rest of September on SlingWords.

Guest Stars

September 16, Friday: Kristyn Gansen of Romantic Love Books on the Romance Genre.

September 21, Wednesday, author Diana Rubino on Persistence.

September 28, Wednesday, author Cynthia Wicklund on Changing Genres.

Takeaway Truth

Guest stars offer valuable insights about books and writing.

Men And Romance

There are many misconceptions about romance. One of the biggest is that only women read romance; therefore, only women should write romance.

This reasoning is why many publishers require men to take female pseudonyms if they want to be published in romance, and why many women who write science fiction, suspense novels, and even business books take male pseudonyms or use initials.

Good writing should be the criteria for selecting books to read, not the genre classification or the author's gender. Dismiss preconceived ideas about genre and gender. Women write romance and suspense thrillers, as do men, and both sexes do it well.

Defining Romance

I'm going to define romance based on the way traditional publishers define it: a woman and a man learning to love, in a committed relationship that leads to a happy ending. You may think of it differently, but that's pretty much how the genre has always been defined.

Books that are primarily about sex, not relationships, or that contain a man and a woman or any plurality or combination thereof with lots of sex don't fit that description. Also books wherein either the man or the woman is involved in an adulterous relationship don't fit that description either. In romance, characters act heroically. There is nothing heroic about adultery.

IMHO

I'm a romance author who takes exception to books like The Bridges of Madison County being described as romance novels. While the book may be a love story, it is not a romance. In fact, I've said before that most men who elect to write what they think is romance, usually write a book about sex and adultery.

Those books usually are not called romance by the publisher, but general fiction. Those books never have a happy ending. They may have an inescapable ending given the characters and their actions, and that ending may be appropriate, but it's not the kind of happy ending I, and millions of romance readers, want.

Men: Gotta Love 'Em

I have some guy friends who write romance. I also have some fans who are men, and I get emails from them about my books. I'm proud of my male reading audience, but I'm not surprised that there are some.

In 2009, an RWA research project found that 74.8 million people read a romance novel in 2008. Of that group, 24.6 million were regular readers, and that number was an increase of almost 4% over the previous year.

Of all those millions regularly reading romance novels, 90.5% are women with the remaining 9.5% being men. Don't blow off 9.5% as being miniscule because that translates into about 2.3 million men every year regularly reading romance. That is nothing to sneeze at and everything to embrace.

Male Romance Authors

The guys I know who write romance are manly men, if you get my drift. In fact, one of my best friends who has written romance was a mercenary soldier in South America, a swashbuckling adventurer who has been happily married for a couple of decades now, so he must know something about romance.

A while back there was a discussion thread on a social media site about men who write romance. The man who started it is published in traditional print, and he seemed to think he was the only man succeeding as a male romance author.

Most of the people weighing in with opinions weren't men writing romance, but authors of both sexes who, for the most part, were aspiring writers or indie published only. I make this distinction because I've found most newly-minted authors who go the indie route don't know that much about traditional publishing and the way it works with genre fiction.

I made a comment and listed some of the many men who successfully write romance. Their identities aren't some Top Secret "gotta kill you if you know" information, but in most cases, it's not bandied about until they are well established. There once was a Paris Cafe site on Geocities called "Outting Men: Male Romance Authors," but that no longer exists. They had a big list.

Morning Thoughts

I found myself thinking about this today -- don't ask me why because I don't know why my brain serves up some thought first thing in the morning -- so I thought I'd give you some resources so you could read about some of these trailblazing male romance authors. (Sure, I want you guys to read me, of course, but you might find it interesting to read some of these guys too.)

Writer's Digest article about Harold Lowry and Leigh Greenwood

Male Authors In Romance

Tall, Dark, and Gender Neutral

Questions and Quandaries

Male Writers of Romance

Takeaway Truth

Good writing is found in every genre of book, and authors of both sexes write in every genre. Why not try a different genre or a different author and broaden your horizons?

Scheduling Self-Pub Books

The lovely and talented Bonnie Edwards asked me a question last week about scheduling ebooks.

I won't address the matter of scheduling in regards to how many books one can produce in a calendar year.

Ruth Ann Nordin actually weighed in on that subject with a recent blog post that is excellent so please click over to see what she had to say on that subject.

Instead, let's talk about how Indie Authors release, or publish, books and how often they should do that.

Individual or Simultaneous Release

Some authors think that an ebook should have a staggered release on each platform. I assume this is so they can devote time to promoting the ebook on Kindle, then on Nook, etc.

I don't think there's any evidence that this is advantageous in any way. I say this because a Kindle reader is just that--a reader using a Kindle. Nook readers don't troll for books in the Kindle shop any more than Kindle readers shop the Nook bookshop.

If you publish on one platform and then wait to do the others, you're just losing sales and momentum. If anything, I imagine it might irritate these readers if you publish on one platform first and then wait a month to publish on the others.

If a book is out on Kindle, it should be available on Nook, Smashwords, Apple, All Romance Ebooks, etc. at the same time.

The best practice is to get all your file formats ready and then go from one platform to the other, publishing your book on each as you go along. I try to accomplish this all on the same day.

Book Publishing: How Often

The subject of how often you should publish a book harks back to the publishing days of yore when a prolific author was automatically judged as being a hack. The considered opinion among many is that good writing takes time. The longer it takes to write a book; the better the book.

That's just nonsense. Thankfully, ebook readers don't give a fig about this whole slow-writing vs. fast-writing issue. To them, the only sin is making them wait for a book when they really, really want your next book. If you're lucky enough to build an audience who wants your books, then get those books out there as quickly as you can.

Sure, you should take whatever time is needed to write good fiction, to make sure it's well-edited and free of errors, but an author cannot build a career or an income on 1 book every few years or even 1 every year.

Series Books: How Far Apart

Another scheduling issue you might want to think about is how far apart your books should be when you're writing a series.

The answer to that is purely subjective and varies from author to author. If you've got the books in the series already written, then you've got an edge. If you're having to write some from scratch, then how they are spaced out depends on how fast you can bring each to completion.

I'd say to take any current inventory and compute how long to write the other books, then schedule them on a calendar so that you can release them at roughly the same intervals.

I do think a shorter interval--say 6-12 months--is better than a longer interval, i.e., over 12 months.

Poor Planning

I've got a series called Texas One Night Stands. I had 2 books already written. I published The Trouble With Love in April.

Four months later, I published Romeo and Judy Anne. Book 3 is underway and scheduled for release next summer with Book 4 the following summer.

That was poor planning on my part. I'd have preferred to release all books about 9 months apart, but real life interfered with my writing life, and I didn't get the first book of a new series finished when I had planned. I was receiving emails asking for a new book. I felt pressured to get another book out so I went ahead and released Romeo and Judy Anne.

Timing

Figure out what kind of timing works for you. Everyone is different, and everyone has different stress thresholds. Know yours.

I'm a big proponent of planning, but I make mistakes too. I set nearly unreachable goals like my goal this year of publishing 12 ebooks. And I didn't even get started until the last week in March! Dumb, huh?

I cave to pressure sometimes when I shouldn't. Of course, I learn invaluable lessons from all this that I can then pass on to you.

Lessons Learned

1. Make a written plan and stick to it.

2. Make sure your plan has built-in flexibility for those real-life issues that always crop up when you decide to achieve something extraordinary because--trust me on this--the storms of life will be unleashed on you with a vengeance.

3. Know how long it takes you to bring a book to completion so you'll know how many books you can publish in a specified period of time.

4. Know what kind of promotion you want to conduct for each title, and know how much time that will take from writing.

5. Build in time to play because all writing and no play makes Jack--and Joan and you--dull, boring burned-out authors.

Takeaway Truth

What's the most important element of comedy--and of just about everything in life? Timing. Timing is everything. Figure out the various timing strategies that work for you, and stick with them.

Note: If SlingWords helps you get ahead, please consider buying one of my books (Written Wisdom is perfect for writers--readers too!) or making a donation by clicking the button below or, perhaps subscribe, for only $.99 per month to the Kindle Edition of SlingWords. Thank you for your moral support and any monetary support you see fit to contribute.

Give Your Blog A Facelift

We are in the 3rd month of the 3rd quarter. Now is a good time to take a look at things and see what you can do to reach your goals. Also, it's a good time to see what needs to be tweaked.

If you don't have a blog, now is a good time to start one. If you have one, but it's not serving you well, maybe it needs a facelift.

Don't settle for the rather mundane templates allotted by the blogging platforms. Choose one that reflects your content and your personality.

There are hundreds of websites that offer free templates. Here are a few to get you going. It's time to shop around.

Blogger

Enter a search string "free Blogger xml templates" and you'll get hundreds of results.

Tutorials by Jennifer Apple offers some really good Tips For Blog Templates & Blog Design using PhotoShop.

FalconHive specializes in converting popular Wordpress templates to Blogger.

Wordpress

Same thing. Enter a search string "free Wordpress blog templates," and you'll get hundreds of results.

Free Theme Layouts has some stunning themes.

Free Wordpress Themes has 301 templates.

Clone 24 offers a huge selection with a category search in the right sidebar.

Don't limit your imagination to these few websites. Do your own search. You'll find a dizzying array of choices, and most are free.

Takeaway Truth

Time is accelerating. Write an action item list today, focusing on effective changes that can pay off immediately--like giving your blog a facelift.

September 11: In Remembrance

September 11. What were you doing that morning?

I read a psychology article once about how certain days mark ends of eras and the beginning of new eras. Those days are remembered with great clarity. Stephen King wrote about this in his book Danse Macabre. He tells of being at a Saturday matinee when the launch of Sputnik was announced. He remembered every detail of that morning at the movies.

Ask anyone who was old enough at the time what they were doing when John Kennedy was assassinated. They can tell you whether they were children at school or adults at work.

Similarly, ask those of different generations where they were when they heard that James Dean, Elvis Presley, Janis Joplin, or John Lennon had died?

We lived in the NASA area for many years. If you ask me what I was doing on the morning the Challenger exploded, I can tell you.

Like all days that mark historical changes in our country, our culture--the very fabric of our lives--we all remember exactly where we were and what we were doing on that September morning 10 years ago. We'll never forget.

In remembrance, I honor those lost on September 11 and pray that their loved ones have found peace. I also pray for those who survived and have struggled to overcome injuries.

With that thought in mind, I urge you to make a donation to help those struggling with physical and emotional injuries. I checked out many organizations with Charity Watch to find one where donated monies actually end up with those who need help rather than end up as payment for office expenses, salaries, expense accounts, and bonuses to those who run the charity.

Sadly, I found it next to impossible to find a legitimate fund for 9/11 victims. So many were scams or, if they were legitimate, funds were misused or derailed. People who take advantage of others' misfortunes ought to receive maximum punishment which still wouldn't be severe enough in light of what they've done.

I've chosen Injured Marines Semper Fi Fund because our soldiers are the ones who ended up paying a tremendous price for the war that resulted from the September 11 attacks.

If you follow the link, there's a big green donate button on the menu bar on the main page. They take major credit cards, and it's a secure site. In the Comment box at the end of the donation form, I put simply: In remembrance of Sept. 11.

Takeaway Truth

Thomas Campbell wrote: "To live in the hearts we leave behind is not to die."

Bridge Between Talent & Success

A few years ago I blogged about something I learned from prolific author Robert (Dick) Vaughan.

In case you don't know much about Mr. Vaughan, allow me to educate you about this remarkable author who sold his first book when he was only 19. He's written over 250 books under 35 different pseudonyms--men's and women's names.

Early in his career, he was nominated for the Pulitzer. He won the 1977 Porgie Award (Best Paperback Original) for The Power and the Pride. He's written television movie novelizations and books in just about every genre. In 1998, he was inducted into the Writer's Hall of Fame. His novel Brandywine's War was named by the Canadian University Symposium of Literature as the best iconoclastic novel to come from the Vietnam War.

I guess one could say he's a man's man because he served 3 tours in Nam and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross, the Air Medal with the V for valor, the Bronze Star, the Meritorious Service Medal, and the Purple Heart. Let's just say that he can bring a sense of realism to his books, and that's probably one reason he's such a popular author of what my husband calls men's fiction.

This Man Knows Writing

I give you his credentials in order to make the point that Robert (Dick) Vaughan knows a lot more about writing and publishing -- and staying published -- than most of us will ever know. How has he produced so many words? So many books and every kind of writing?

I was fortunate to attend several workshops Dick Vaughan led at writer's conferences in Beaumont, Texas. One thing Dick said really stuck in my mind. I owe much of my writing career to following this one bit of advice from him.

So I want to talk about that -- about a subject to which most people don't pay enough attention because it sounds like, well, hard work.

Remember This

In the workshop I attended, he said if you look at writing talent that it's maybe 15% of writing success. And that might be stretching it.

He then said writing opportunity (going on the internet, finding editors who were acquiring, networking with other writers, etc.) is maybe 10%.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that those two elements make 25% of writing success. What's the other 75%?

Work Discipline

He said, and I agree, that Work Discipline makes up the bigger part of the equation called writing success. Dick Vaughan said to embroider this on a sampler. I didn't do that, but I did print it out into a big sign that I taped above my computer.

The bridge between talent and success is Work Discipline.

He advocated establishing a daily page quota whether it be 1 page or 10 or more. Every day, produce that page quota. That's work discipline. That's how he approaches every project. He knows how long it takes him to write a book, and he breaks that down into pages per day.

Meet your established quota. That's work discipline. That's what will get you going when you don't feel like writing. Work Discipline is often the one thing that many writers lack. I always say that you can move a mountain one shovelful at a time just like you can write the biggest book by writing one page at a time.

Takeaway Truth

The bridge between talent and success is Work Discipline. Start building your bridge today.

Note: If SlingWords helps you get ahead, please consider buying one of my books (Written Wisdom is perfect for writers--readers too!) or making a donation by clicking the button below or, perhaps subscribe, for only $.99 per month to the Kindle Edition of SlingWords. Thank you for your moral support and any monetary support you see fit to contribute.