Romancing the Blog | Romance Authors and Readers Who Blog

by Kimberly Kaye Terry

At the age of 37 I have come to the realization that I am free. Free to explore and not be afraid. I will have no fear…

I have come to the conclusion that confidence is sometimes perceived as arrogance. I recently read an interview by an author, and this woman inspired me. She said she knew from the beginning that she had a talent for writing, it was her gift from the Creator. She said she just needed to learn her craft better.

She boldly went on to say she was going for the bestsellers list, and nothing was going to stand in her way. (I was laughing and cheering as I’m reading this.) She had lived in fear for most of her life, and was tired of being afraid. Fear is such a debilitating emotion, and totally useless, yet she had allowed fear to dictate who and what she would become. She knew there were those who didn’t like what she was saying, and to those she apologized. But at the same time, she no longer felt the need to be afraid to say what she wanted. To go after her heart’s desire.

She was funny, articulate, and definitely had a way with words. I liked this woman. Her spirit was amazing. I liked her spin on life and all the challenges it brings. I finished reading the interview smiling saying, “wow…how awesome… someone who isn’t afraid to say what she wants, and encourage others in the process. I feel like this woman does, I can relate to her.”

I happen to be the kind of person who loves to encourage others. I know how much it means to me when I’m encouraged. It’s a feeling unlike any other. I’m learning that writing is a lonely profession. With the upcoming release of my first book, I decided to join a few writing groups.

I eagerly reached out and tried to convey how much I appreciated being apart of the group and how I longed to help as much as I would request help. Tips, advice, honest opinions and all that.

I know I have a strong personality. It’s apart of who I am. I tend to be passionate in most things I approach. I come from a fairly large family, where my mother had a strong personality also. You had to speak up or you were left out in my house!

So when contributing to writer’s groups I have been blessed with a new understanding. Everyone has his or her own “persona”. You can choose any personality you wish to portray. No one has to see you, pick up body language, or facial expression or anything. When you read what they say, it’s all subjective. It’s kind of a scary thing. You can totally misread what someone’s intent was. Without reading their body cues you could be offended and it be for no good reason! Or I suppose, you could not be offended and maybe you should– LOL.

The only way I know how to be is the way I am. I don’t hide my true personality behind cutesy smiles and graphics (although I use them.) What you see is what you get with me. I enjoy life, try to encourage, and generally say what’s on my mind. I guess I should have listened to my Big Momma’s advice a long time ago. “Baby, not everybody’s gonna like what you’ve got to say, and not everybody’s going like you either.”

Now back to the confident funny writer. I shared this woman’s perspective with one group, and said I felt the same way—I’m going for the number one spot I laughed, and noticed that a few others had a totally different reaction.

Some loved what she said just as I did. Some found her to be “arrogant”. I mean, what right does this newly published writer have to be so bold? Why is she so arrogant? What gives her the right? And I’m sure in turn they probably thought Kimberly? Kimberly who? This chick who’s first book is e-pubbed? Who does she think she is? In reference to me!

I suppose in the end, either the reader is going to like what a writer says, or she isn’t. That’s the bottom line. So should I be bold like this writer, the way that feels natural for me, or should I hide my faith and excitement. Because that’s all it is. Faith. Faith that what is meant for me is meant for me. Excitement. Excitement of what possibilities may come in the future.

I have a new motto. It goes like this: “It doesn’t matter what vehicle is used to drive me to my wonderful destination, the only thing that matters is that I arrive. My job now is to have faith and know that once I arrive, the rest is taken care of.”

Can you be both confident and humble? I believe you can. For those who allow fear to dictate their life, as I once did, just caste it away like the useless garbage it is.

Love and Light makes it all right!!

*For information on how you can submit to Open Blog Night, click here

Sorry, it’s Halloween. I couldn’t resist.

So, it’s been an interesting week for me. I was sick. I submitted an ms to a new publisher. I created an amazing Batman costume for my son. I was informed that a waiting manuscript was enjoyed by an editor and would be passed to another line where it might fit better. And, miracle of miracles, I actually did my work.

But I didn’t write.

I edited, I sculpted, I even wrote a bloody synopsis (not without some headbanging by supportive CPs). But in the back of my head, I knew exactly what I was doing. I was hiding. And I still am.

Since it’s Halloween, I thought I’d cover the topic no one likes to think about, much less discuss: Picking The New Project.

Tomorrow is November 1st, the start of National Novel Writing Month. Halloween has nothing on November for scariness. If you’ve signed up for NaNoWriMo, you’re looking at that deadline–er, rather, startline. The great plotters out there have probably done their prepwork, outlines, character designs…they’ve done everything but write the book. Pantsers are totally geared up, mentally considering who they’ll write about, footing around with inciting incidents and a little bit of conflict. Mostly they’re excited. Then there’s folks like me, watching the calendar roll by and starting to shake in their boooties because they have no idea what they’re going to do.

My deep, dark, scary secret? I haven’t written anything new since July. *gasp of horror* Summer is generally a bad writing period because my son is home and my mind runs away in terror. Fall usually returns me to sanity. Apparently, my mind is still in Bahamas, because no brilliant writing has taken place. Good editing, I’ll be vain enough to say. I’ve been keeping busy polishing, redesigning, reworking and resubmitting. But my eye has been nervously on my blank new project. I have ideas, but I’m riddled with indecision. Nothing is rising to the top. Nothing is particularly screaming my name and I feel as rusty as a red-headed metal-mer-step-child.

How do you choose? What process enables you to know that this is the right one? Particularly when you’ve got multiple lines to consider? When is a good time to try something new…or something challenging? They can all be books of your heart…how can you tell when one is your Book In A Month?

“It’s a small world.” “There’s light at the end of the tunnel.” “All’s fair in love and war.” “You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.” “Don’t burn your bridges.” The list of cliches is endless but one that I’ve created specifically for this blog is:

Publishers make strange bedfellows.

While many of us are preparing to be tricked or treated for Halloween, romance authors are waiting with bated breath to see if the recent merger between Harlequin and BET Books is a trick or a treat.

BET Books, the largest publisher of African American romance and women’s fiction recently merged with Harlequin bringing with them three imprints, an extensive back list and a stable of authors that are some of the best unsung romance authors in the business.

On the one hand this appears to be a major plus for the BET authors. The man/womanpower of the Harlequin machine is unparalled in the industry. Ideally, with the support and worldwide distribution of Harlequin, the authors of BET will see successes that previously have been unavailable to them. But there is always the other “slight” of hand.

As with any merger there is change, there is consolidation, there is reorganization. How this will play out among the authors is yet to be seen. Questions abound: will the guidelines remain the same or become more stringent to adhere to the guidelines of Harlequin which have proved so successful for decades? With so many authors under one roof is there room for everyone in the house? And the big question: will African American romances now be merged, sold, shelved and distributed alongside the Harlequin romances and with the same enthusiasm as the Harlequin titles?

The hope among the BET authors is that they will finally get the visability that they have missed over the past decade. But will this visibilty translate into greater sales from those who don’t, can’t, or haven’t read an African American romance? Will putting the books in the faces of those who say the reason why they don’t read them is because they can’t find them, make a difference and ultimately make names like Gwynne Forster, Francis Ray, Rochelle Alers, Monica Jackson, Lynn Emery, Jacquie Thomas, Shirley Hailstock, Donna Hill (grin) household names?

Will white readers be more inclined to pick up an African American romance when it is alongside one written by Nora Roberts, Holly Lisle, Brenda Joyce, Alison Kent? Will the might of Harlequin give African American romances the legitimacy, the validity that seems to have eluded them?

Or will this apparent treat only be a slight of hand, a changing of the guard and life simply goes on as usual?

In other news, not to be outdone, Kensington Publishing made an announcement that they were taking over Genesis Press (the second leading publisher of African American romances)–all of its backlist and authors and would kick off their new venture with reprints of books by Donna Hill, Gwynne Forster and Rochelle Alers. To say the least the legitimacy and work ethics of Genesis Press is questionable at best, but I will leave that for another diatribe. Hopefully under the helm of Kensington, what has plagued Genesis Press authors for the past five years will be rectified.

In the mystifying world of big business, mergers and takeovers are commonplace. But as the world gets smaller there are fewer places to hang your hat. If you have a falling out with your publisher it will become less and less easy to move somewhere else. Soon there will be nowhere to go as consolidations of publishing houses turn what was once a vast ocean of opportunity into a single stream with no outlet.

But if I may borrow yet another cliche: “where there is faith there is hope.” My hope is that this will be one of the most positively significant changes the romance industry has seen in decades. My hope is that all those faceless, nameless, talented African American authors will finally enjoy the fruits of their labors alongside their sister authors. My hope is that this will indeed be a treat and not a trick.

Stay tuned!

Last month, I did, uh, research for my Jayne Ann Krentz appreciation. Part of this research involved rifling through plastic tubs of stored books because, of course, I needed to find certain favorites, and filing alphabetically would ruin all the fun. In the process, I found what can only be called “The Regency Tub”. It turns out that I have a lot of Regency romances that I consider keepers.

What with one thing and the other (the other being the sneaking them back into the house without the husband noticing), I’ve been rereading these old favorites over the past month. I’ve also slipped a few new releases into the mix. Plus my regular reading regimen. And I’ve realized that this year, only one new title has achieved possible keeper status for me this year. We’ll do the unveiling later – first I want to talk about why I keep books.

The Regencies, for the most part, fell into two camps: hilarious yet emotional (Emma Jensen’s “Coupe de Grace” and Michelle Martin’s “The Adventurers”) or connected stories that stirred my imagination (Anthea Malcolm and Dawn Aldridge Poore are two favorites there). I even have the first Regency I ever bought – another one of those “I have nothing to read purchases” – “An Accidental Romance” by Elizabeth Mansfield.

As a re-reader (something I did not inherit from my mother – she never goes back and revisits a book, and I think that’s really sad), I tend to pick up old favorites because I love the characters or the story or a chapter or even a paragraph. Heck, I keep some titles around just because one sentence in the middle makes me really happy. Such is the case with a title called “The Spy Who Loved Her” by an author whose name escapes me – the heroine says something about the fact that sex is supposed to be messy, and the way it was phrased really stuck with me (not enough, of course, for me to be able to quote it accurately here, but that’s a function of age more than anything).

I don’t know why my keeper retention rate has dwindled in the past years, but it has. I think it’s a mix of factors: uninspired, cookie cutter stories, safe writing, flat characters. Whatever the reason, I don’t remember most of these books once I close the cover. One of the new Regencies I recently read had an interesting plot with a great twist: the heroine needed to marry for money and lied about being rich; the hero didn’t want to be pursued for his fortune; and, the heroine, needing to keep food on the table, took a job writing a gossip column about her husband-hunting adventures. Had the author executed on this last element – and she started strong – it would have elevated the story above humdrum. Instead the author held her punches (and humor), and I felt cheated and bored. You don’t want to bore me. I’ve only kept the basics of this story in my mind because I wanted to use it as an example.

This year’s one keeper, Loretta Chase’s “Mr. Impossible”, executed on all levels for me. I bonded with the characters. Chase has a strong, assured writing voice. When she pulls out a tried-and-true plot, she puts her own twist on the story. If I don’t like a book, it is amazing how much effort I’ll put into avoiding it. Heck, I’ve been known to clean instead of read. It is also amazing how much effort I’ll exert for a book I enjoy. We become inseparable. I stay up late. I avoid friends. I might even skip a meal. It becomes a relationship that I don’t want to end, yet when it’s finally over, it’s because it’s the right time.

Plus I know we’ll keep in touch – even if my new best friend finds itself buried in a plastic tub for a few years.

In honor of Halloween, which is just days away, I’ve been thinking about monsters. And about ghosts, and way cool old haunted houses, and costumes, and chocolate, but mainly about monsters. And when it comes to creatures like that, I’m definitely one of the girls the title applies to. (And yes, for you clever readers, it’s a Buffy quote.) Maybe I don’t need some monster in my man, but boy, is it ever hard for me to resist one.

Trouble is, I like true monsters, and they’re hard to find. They’re real anti-heroes, I suppose. A kind reader who commented on one of my previous posts mentioned that Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer is an anti-hero, and he and Angel are the kind of monsters I love.

No, no, I won’t go on at (too much) length about TV characters, but I think it’s a valid point. Vampires grabbed the public imagination by the throat (heh heh) at least a century ago, but the vampires we get in today’s romances have, in my opinion, lost their bite, pun entirely intended.

Christine Feehan, Amanda Ashley, MaryJanice Davidson, and Katie Macalister, among others, have all created their own unique versions of vampires. And the best thing about cultural myths like the ones surrounding the undead is that they’re just that—myths. They can be elaborated on, tweaked, and adapted to suit any and every author. But, for me at least, they’re not….scary.

A vampire who doesn’t bite? For me, he becomes a big woobie, an object of pity who simply gets to keep his sexy fangs and his immortality in a true case of having your cake and eating it, too. He looks like the ultimate bad boy, but he’s a tame kitty at heart.

Not that there are easy answers to the issue of making fictional monsters more monster-like. The paranormal twist to a vampire (or a werewolf or a shapeshifter) story is usually shorthand for a deeper issue. Being an outsider, or being an addict or an alcoholic come to mind. Many critics have said that the character of Angel on Buffy, and his own show, worked well as a metaphor for a recovering alcoholic. The demon was always in him, even if his soul prevented him from loosing it on the world; an alcoholic’s temptation to drink might always remain, requiring a lot of determination to keep from drinking again.

Of course, Angel didn’t kill people anymore, when we got to know him on Buffy (except for a brief, and thrilling, foray when his demon took charge), and after a while even Spike was defanged thanks to a handy government chip. Of course, it’s hard to love a man, anti-hero or not, who kills viciously, at random, and with glee. So I get why romance vampires don’t bite, at least most of the time. Or why they bite only those who “deserve” it, using criminals and psychos as dinner instead of everyday folks.

But the thing that drew me to Angel especially was his need for redemption. He’d been called the Scourge of Europe, he’d killed so many innocent victims over the years. He needed to reclaim his humanity by helping the helpless. And viewers (not to mention Buffy) didn’t hold his past crimes against him, maybe partly because he wasn’t considered truly responsible for his massacres, since the demon inside him was the one who’d committed all those atrocities.

It would be tough to create a fictional vampire who still indulged his fangs, and make him sympathetic. Maybe what I’m really looking for is more metaphor in my man. Undead heroes with no fright factor are cool when you want the sexy, eternal, brooding vibe, but what I really want is that deep-down scare – a guy who’s faced down evil, maybe unsuccessfully, a guy who’s looked into the dark depths of his own soul, a guy who has to fight hard to be a card-carrying member of the human race.

The line between love and hate can be thin. The distinction between a monster and a man, as we see all too often in the news, can be even thinner. And as scary as that can be, for me the payoff is enormous. Maybe there’s a bit of “taming the beast” mythology mixed into my own reading fantasies.

How do you feel about monsters like these? Do you want to see fictional vampires and werewolves and the like with more teeth, or less? What kind of hero couldn’t be redeemed, in your opinion?

I have decided I am the most oblivious reader on the planet.

This was hammered home the other day when a fellow reader remarked that a book she just read was rife with typos. I had read the same book, and hadn’t noticed even one.

Most days I’m not a stupid person. However I can honestly say that I will never win Grammar Girl Of The Year (Exhibit A – my blog). Grammar was always my worst subject and I still get confused over it’s vs. its and when to use a semicolon instead of a common.

However even if I wasn’t a horrible grammar student, I still suspect that typos in books would fail to invoke my wrath. Why? Because frankly, I just don’t care.

I tend to read fiction, regardless of genre, for the characters. My main mark of a good story is when the author can make me believe that the fictional characters could truly exist in real life. If the author can make me care, I tend to overlook a lot of flaws.

This doesn’t just include grammatical mistakes, but historical inaccuracies as well. If the hero and heroine are engaging and the plot enjoyable, I’m more likely to forgive the author who says that Henry VIII had a 7th wife named Sunshine. I’ll read over these errors much in the same way other readers will stop dead in their tracks and hurl the book against the nearest wall.

I am not condoning sloppiness, although I suspect many readers would argue that I am. By failing to become indignant over historical and grammatical errors in books am I part of the problem? I’d like to think that I’m not, given my various ramblings on online forums, but again many readers would call me to the mat.

What camp do you fall into?

When the time came to sign my name on the dotted line, I never really considered using a pseudonym. Oh sure, I had an in-depth, responsible discussion with my husband about the pros and cons. But I was just humoring him. I didn’t wait my entire life to see my name on the cover of a book just to have a book with somebody else’s name on it.

Most of the people I talk to regularly know I write romance. Most even know I write erotic romance. The support ranges from “Oh, isn’t that nice?” in that voice—you know the one—to wild enthusiasm from a woman who loves me enough to cheer for me even though she knows what I write would offend her horribly. And, to be honest, most of the people I “know” are online. I don’t get out very much. (They don’t let you bring Dunkin Donuts iced coffees anywhere nowadays.) So I’m somewhat accustomed to people being aware that I write, as well as what I write.

I forgot about my children.

Not that I have them, but how very much they like to spill things about their mother to random people for no reason.

The short kid’s teacher: I hear you write! Are you published?

Me: Ummm…yes. Yes, I am.

Teacher: What do you write? Can I read it?

Me: (facing lovely woman and a classroom full of innocent little angels) It’s…ummm…romance.

Teacher: I love romances.

Me: It has…well, it has a lot of really naughty words in it.

The tall kid mentioned to his friend that I was writing a book, who then mentioned it to his parents, who then asked me about it. The lovely older ladies at the library knitting group who were knitting pretty little gifts for their grandbabies and asking me about my book because they love romances. My sister called me on the morning it released and told me my aunt who lives in the Midwest was standing by with credit card in hand waiting for it to go live. I think I may have actually begged my sister to stop her.

The absolute worst:

Dad: So where can I get your book?

Me: What? Papa, you can’t read it. It’s…you know…no.

Dad: I’m an adult, you know.

Me: I’m still your daughter. Trust me, Papa. Don’t go there.

I wrote the book, and I’m very proud of it. But I realized after the book news was out that the people I’m used to socializing with daily are aware that Twice Upon A Roadtrip is an erotic romance. They know that, being an Ellora’s Cave book, it has explicit sex and really naughty words in it. I forgot about all the people I know casually here in my town. My small town. My small, New England town filled with people whose ancestors are just waiting for an excuse to roll over. (My own ancestors are just plain tuckered out from the spinning.)

I didn’t see the caveats in my future. I didn’t imagine standing red-face and stammering in the grocery store with an acquaintance in front of my children, trying to explain that yes, the stay-at-home mom next door wrote a book with F, C & P words in it. And I can’t hide. Stick a dot com after my name and BAM! Next thing you know nobody’s allowed to play at that Stacey boy’s house anymore. His mother said that word in a book. (That hasn’t actually happened yet, but I’m honestly a little nervous about it.)

I love seeing my name on my cover. I can’t deny that. But there are moments when I wish I’d taken a pen name and not told anybody what it was. Dad would never think to look for Ezmerelda Neidaschnitzel.

When RTB launched less than a year ago, there were just a handful of blogs listed on the sidebar. I had about six or seven I visited regularly, and all was right in the world.

Have you noticed the exploding sidebar? I have. I used to check out the new blog links to see who was who and what they blog about, now I barely have time to keep up with my own list (which has grown to about 40 blogs I visit at least once a week.)

Like all new trends, blogs grew exponentially. Blogs are growing because people have a new toy.

They will come and go. Good blogs will rise to the top. Bad blogs will disappear.

Bloggers often have more than one blog. Many authors have their personal blog and share a community blog.

Like yours truly. I have three. Four if I count RTB. My personal blog is temporarily down (long story, I won’t bore you with the details), but that’s okay because I can blog in a community blog! (Addiction fed.)

At first I was skeptical when my former critique partner Sharon Long suggested our crit group put together a blog. Who would come? What could I possibly say that would interest people? We launched Writeminded and I was pleasantly surprised at the response. Each of us had a distinct voice and brought in different people.

But there are several other community blogs and I find that I’m enjoying them. Even some author blogs, like MJ Rose, have regular “guest bloggers” that provide information that relates to the theme of her blog (about the publishing industry, marketing and promotion.)

For example, RWA’s Published Author Special Interest Chapter (PASIC) launched a community blog last month: 2B Read. The purpose is to give exposure to published romance authors by offering insights on the industry, writing, reading and the like through the blog format. Who better to talk about reading and the state of the industry than published authors, each with their own unique perspective? And we get to promote our books the month of their release. How cool is that?

I’ve noticed several communities of writers, either publisher-centered like Harlequin Intrigue and Warner Women; or genre centered like Lipstick Chronicles and Literary Chicks–have launched group blogs. And these are the ones I can think of off the top of my head! I’m sure if I did a little research more would pop up.

I discovered other group endeavors as well: the Science Fiction Blog which talks about (surprise) science fiction novels and ancillary subjects; the LitBlog Co-op which seeks to promote great literary novels that have been overlooked; and Fresh Fiction, which I just discovered, which is a group of readers talking about . . . what else, books!

I’m sure there are group blogs about everything under (and around and beyond) the sun, not just books, but since books and writing is pretty much my life outside of family, that’s all I’m reading.

I recently agreed to join a group of suspense authors in a new venture: a suspense blog we’ve launched called Murder She Writes. We’re all published suspense authors of different genres — romantic, erotic, mainstream, humorous, horror — so people who like suspense can get everything they want (we hope!) in one place.

I don’t know if RTB was the first, but I think the founders of this group blog really jumpstarted a trend. And, like with all trends, the cream will rise to the top.

Other than RTB, what group blog do you find yourself reading regularly? Do you think it’ll last the proliferation of blogs and why? Do you prefer group blogs to individual blogs? Why do you come back to your favorite blogs?

Procrastinating minds want to know.

by Cynthia Eden

Be honest. You looked at the title, and you thought—either she’s talking about something fun and naughty, or she’s talking about the paranormal.

Well, actually, I’m talking about both. When mixed just right, I feel the elements can be a very potent combination, indeed.

Let’s start with the paranormal. Halloween is just around the corner. The time of spooks, goblins, and all things scary. For as long as I can remember, I’ve loved Halloween—I’ve loved the idea that there is one night out of the year when everyone believes…just for a moment…that maybe there is something out there in the darkness. When everyone believes that maybe, just maybe, that howl was from a werewolf (and not the neighbor’s hound dog). Or that maybe, just maybe, that flash of light…was a ghost (and not some kid shining his light in your window).

When the paranormal market heated up a few years ago, I was thrilled. I thought, finally, more of MY kind of books! More vampires, more witches, more werewolves! You see, for a while, it seemed that the only really good vamp books I could find were those written by the oh-so-wonderfully talented Christine Feehan. But then things changed…Susan Sizemore released her lovelies. MaryJanice Davidson took a bite out of the scene. Angela Knight showed us that the undead could be very, very sexy…and the paranormal world began to call to more and more people.

Now, paranormal is HOT. And I’m not just talking about the book sales. The stories are rich, deep, and sensual. Quite honestly, I love those stories! I flip through the pages like the books are on fire. There just seems to be a whole new level of tension that arises in these books. Perhaps it is because so often these characters are in life or death situations—their lovemaking reflects that intensity, and it heightens the read. Or perhaps it is because many of these characters have a beast that lurks very close to the surface of their humanity, and that beast is wild, and often desperate to find a mate. Or perhaps writers feel that they can push the envelope more in these tales…after all, who can say how vampires or witches make love? They like to experiment, they like to be bold. And readers love to read their tales.

So, for me, the mix of paranormal and steamy erotica is a good blend. I tried it out in my upcoming novella, Bite of the Wolf (Red Sage Secrets Volume 15). Yep, I just had to write my own werewolf tale! And you know what? I think I’ll have to write more. Because there is just something about these paranormal stories…something that pushes you to read them, something that pushes you to write them.

What about you? How do you feel about those things that go…BUMP…in the night?

*For information on how you can submit to Open Blog Night, click here

Saturday’s column here on RTB was titled I Like Sex Books and I Cannot Lie… and the author, Angie W. talked about the increasing level of heat in erotic romance.

…fear that authors and publishers are pushing the envelope a little too far. Less plot, more sex. And not only more sex, but more graphic sex, less “vanilla”…

Have erotic romance authors/publishers grown so quickly and flooded their consumers with such intensity in sexual escapades that readers have become desensitized and need more graphic sex to catch their attention, to make the books stand out?

Not to toss the blame completely in the publishers’ court, but a lot of this has to do with marketing, IMHO.

I can only share my experience as an erotic romance author. I write exclusively erotic romance, which is obvious by the four publishers I write for. One of my editors asked me to tone down my story. I was told to remove one sex scene, and change genitalia descriptions to be more medical–c*ck to penis, c*nt to vagina–as part of an image overhaul. Another of my editors asked me to add more sex and use cruder wording. I made the requested changes, which altered the sex/story ratio in both tales. It was the erotica publisher who asked me to tone it down, and one of my erotic romance publishers who asked me to heat it up.

The definitions of erotic romance, erotica, and porn are a hot button issue. Everyone has their own unique view, but basically (IMHO) erotic romance ends in HEA with sex scenes showing the relationship growth. Erotica does not have to end in HEA (although it can, it’s not forbidden) and the sex scenes show character development instead of relationship development. Porn is written for sexual titillation and doesn’t have character or relationship development.

Why is this important to know?

Different editors have different views on what they’re selling. As publishers quickly establish “erotica” imprints to ride the sales wave, they tweak the image in an attempt to reach the widest possible audience. In the end, this may mislead readers. One imprint that started out touting itself as an “erotica” imprint, changed its books to say “erotic romance”, but the stories remain the same as submitted. This left the erotica authors scrambling. They don’t write “erotic romance” and readers picking up a book with this label may be disturbed to find they’re not getting the romance they thought they were. They’re getting erotica.

One of my titles has a very tame excerpt, but the book is heavily sexed. Another book by the same publisher has a very hot excerpt, but the book itself has far less sex than mine. Publisher marketing has a great deal to do with the reader ending up with a product that is different than what was expected.

…are we simply seeing a natural progression in the growth of the market as readers and booksellers become more accepting of the erotic romance trend?

I’m not sure what the trend is. I’m not sure the publishers know either. They’re making adjustments to sell more books and this takes a bit of experimentation. The erotic romance sub-genre is having growing pains. In the end, I don’t think hardcore sex in erotic romance is going to become the norm. I think as readers, authors, and publishers learn the difference between erotic romance, erotica, and porn the books will become more clearly labeled and readers will find less surprises and get more of whatever it is they’re looking for.