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He Achieved success in publishing and helped...

Aphrodite — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 15:56:06 GMT

He achieved success in publishing and helped struggling writers

JOHN BARBER

From Tuesday's Globe and Mail

Published Monday, Jan. 09, 2012 8:02PM EST

Montreal-born publisher and author Fred Kerner liked to tell the story of how he was grilled by the directors of New York’s Hawthorn Books when he worked there as president in the 1960s.

“How many books did you publish last year?” a director asked.

“Fifty-one,” the president replied.

“And how many were bestsellers?”

“Five,” Mr. Kerner said.

“So why,” the director asked, “did you publish the other 46?”

Mr. Kerner, who died Dec. 24 in Richmond Hill, Ont., at the age of 90, was “just an absolute fountain of amazing stories in publishing,” according to long-time friend Larry Muller, former president of publisher Scholastic Canada. As editor-in-chief at mass-market pioneer Fawcett Publications, Kerner published what may still be the fattest paperback ever sold – William L. Shirer’s 1,599-page The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. Later in Toronto, he helped turn upstart Harlequin Enterprises into the dominant global force in the lucrative field of romance publishing.

Always youthful-looking and debonair, Kerner was “like the movie stars from the 1940s who were quite capable of the whole gamut,” according to Muller. In addition to his contribution to publishing, Kerner was a successful writer with a keen sense of popular tastes. In the 1960s, he sold two and a half million copies of a three-volume cookbook series beginning with It’s Fun to Fondue, followed by Mad about Fondue and Fabulous Fondues.

In the latter half of his life, Kerner was known to spend as much time helping the careers of other writers as tending to his own. As a driving force behind the Canadian Authors Association, he worked to establish such institutions as the Public Lending Right, which compensates writers for books borrowed from libraries. He was also an active director of the Canadian Writer’s Foundation, a charity that helps to support indigent authors.

“He had tremendous success in his own life but he had infinite time for the people left behind, writers struggling at the grassroots level who hadn’t made it,” Muller said. “I know he did an awful lot of good in a totally private way by finding writers in desperate poverty and very quietly funnelling some funds to them.”

Born to immigrant parents, Kerner grew up in Montreal and attended Sir George Williams College, now Concordia University, where he first entered journalism as a correspondent for the Gazette. He rose to executive positions in the Canadian Press and later at the Associated Press in New York, after which he left journalism to enter publishing.

He experienced anti-Semitism early in his career, but Muller said it never embittered him. “He had felt it in his own bones, but because he was such a positive person it never seemed to leave a mark on him,” Muller said. “And he was open to everything.”

Writers’ Union lawyer Marian Hebb remembers Kerner as a “very astute” participant in the often grinding deliberations of such bodies as the union’s grievance committee. “He was a very gentle, non-confrontational person” widely valued for his experience and the sense of fun he brought to the work, according to Hebb. “If I had to pick one adjective, I would say he was wise.”

Kerner was “an extraordinarily accomplished person” whose greatest achievement was his own character, according to Muller. “Fred was one of those rare combinations of people who accomplished a lot and was also an amazing human being.”

Predeceased by his wife, Sally, Kerner leaves two sons, a daughter and three grandsons.

Romance blooms in Berkeley Heights

Aphrodite — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 13:06:36 GMT

By Tracy Ness/Independent Press

BERKELEY HEIGHTS – Even as a child Berkeley Heights resident Maggie James always had a vivid imagination and a passion for writing, rock n’ roll and romance novels. Now this mom of four is making her dream of becoming an author come true by self-publishing her first novel “Love Bleeds.”

“I tried to go the regular route with a publisher and received great feedback. I even made it as a finalist with Hatchett Publishing who represents Stephenie Meyer of Twilight Fame but it was just taking too long,” said James, who goes by her publishing nom de plume. "I was encouraged by their validation and decided to do it all by myself. The writing, publishing, promotions -- you name it,”

Love Bleeds is a paranormal romance that started out as three novellas chronicling a torrid cat and mouse game between a rock star vampire and his muse which she published on a writer’s website. “I received such amazing feedback that it encouraged me to combine the stories into one novel with more to come,” she said. Her e-book went live on Amamzon.com on March 7 and within the first few hours she had sold 15 copies. She is now in triple digit sales and receiving rave reviews. The book can be downloaded as an e-book or printed on demand at www.amazon.com.

“People are really falling in love with my characters and it is thrilling,” said James who is almost finished her second book in the “Only After Dark” series. The book is tentatively titled “Immortal Angel” and it will focus on the back story of the characters in the first novel and add a few warlocks to make things interesting. She will kick off a virtual book tour on June 6 at bewitchingbooktours.blogspot.com.

If that isn’t keeping James busy enough, she is simultaneously working on another series of books called “Rockin’ Love.” This series veers from the paranormal and is a contemporary romance with titles that pay homage to rock anthems from the 1980’s and ‘90’s. “Put on your spandex, get your lighters out and have a box of Kleenex handy,” James said. “This book will rock your world.”

To read more about Maggie James and her books, visit http://maggiejames-author.blogspot.com/.

Amazon.com to Be a Major Book Publisher?

Aphrodite — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 13:03:21 GMT

ByMARK VEVERKA

Amazon is turning another page.

After disrupting the retail distribution of books, it appears that the Seattle e-tailer plans to become a major book publisher. Earlier this month, the company announced the launch of Montlake Romance, a new unit that will publish original fiction.

But ConsumerEdge Research financial analyst Faye Landes suspects that Amazon.com's (AMZN:192.40, -4.30, -2.19%) "plans and ambitions are much broader, and are likely to be highly disruptive to the book industry in many ways."

Given the company's track record in electronic commerce and cloud computing, and the way Chief Executive Jeff Bezos thinks, Landes' speculation doesn't seem like much of a stretch. Amazon's Kindle electronic reading device already has revolutionized the book industry.

Landes predicts that Amazon will set up a book-publishing operation in New York City. She points to last week's hiring of literary agent and former publishing executive Larry Kirshbaum as another piece of evidence. Amazon's publishing plans were the focus of discussion last week at an annual publishing trade fair BookExpo America held in New York, according to Landes.

The reason Amazon wants to get into publishing is closely tied to its commitment to sell both paper and digital books, she explains. After all, books have been the "gateway drug" to Amazon's electronic-commerce Website ever since Bezos launched his Internet company.

By entering the business, Amazon will gain leverage with other book publishers. But most important, it might provide some defense against Apple (AAPL:345.51, -2.32, -0.67%), whose iPad tablet devices compete with Kindle.

"A robust publishing operation gives Amazon a nice negotiating tool if, as has been speculated periodically, Apple makes noise about taking a big cut of Kindle [content] sales through Apple devices," Landes posits.

Starting with romance novels makes a lot of sense. It's one of the most popular categories of e-books, and people who read them tend to read a lot of them quickly. The digital format is ideal because romance aficionados don't have to lug all those books around. But Landes expects that Amazon will also expand into other book categories, such as mysteries, thrillers and science fiction.

This probably isn't good news for other publishers, which already resent Amazon's distribution power. The company is the second-largest seller of physical books, with a 15% market share based on dollar volume, behindBarnes & Noble (BKS: 18.79, -0.83, -4.23%), with 23%. Borders Group, which has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is third with 13% but lost share in 2010.

Amazon's the largest seller of e-readers, with 29% of the market. Apple is second, with 17%, and Barnes & Noble's Nook device is third, with 8%.

To be sure, selling books over the Internet changed the industry forever and is killing shopping-mall owners as tenant book stores close down. But the game isn't over. Earlier in May, John Malone's Liberty Media (LINTA: 17.93, -0.28, -1.54%)(LINTA) made a bid to buy Barnes & Noble for $1.02 billion, about nine months after the bookstore chain put itself on the block. Now there are rumors that Liberty is also making a run at Borders.

Book publisher tries to patent the kiss

Aphrodite — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 15:12:52 GMT

By QMI AGE

A romance novel publisher is hoping to patent something people have been doing for as long as there have been romantic relationships — kissing.

Harlequin announced Thursday it has submitted a patent application for the "essential romantic kiss" to the United States Patent and Trademark Office. The patent application number is 61438360.

The company said it filed the patent to "encourage more kissing this Valentine's Day."

“If love makes the world go ’round, then a kiss is what fuels it,” said Michelle Renaud, who has been dubbed by the company as the chief kissing officer, in a press release.

“The kiss is the cornerstone of romance, the turning point of every good story. It can change lives, start a rumour or break hearts. And with more than 60 years of publishing women’s fiction, no one knows the kiss like Harlequin,” Renaud said.

“It’s time to stop thinking of the kiss as a mundane, everyday form of affection. This patent application celebrates the kiss and brings romance back to kissing.”

The patent outlines "a basic method by which two people can reciprocate their romantic feelings toward one another in a manner that deepens attachment, provides pleasure and promotes physical and emotional well-being," the release said.

In a telephone survey to go along with the patent application, Harlequin asked 1,000 Canadians and 1,000 Americans about their thoughts on kissing between Oct. 20-24, 2010.

When asked if a bad kiss was a relationship deal-breaker, only 10% said yes. But one in three women said they'd blab about a stinky smooch.

More than half, 53%, agreed men need to make the first move for a kiss.

The margin of error was 3.1 percentage points.

RWA Conference News Alert has Relocated.

Aphrodite — Thu, 06 May 2010 01:40:59 GMT

RWA Announces New Conference Location

We at RWA are deeply saddened by the events in Nashville and the mid-Tennessee region, and we wish a speedy recovery to friends and businesses in the area. It is our hope that RWA will have an opportunity to return to the Gaylord Opryland for a future conference. RWA has made arrangements to contribute a portion of our charitable donations from the 2010 Literacy Autographing event to Nashville Adult Literacy Council.

The Board of Directors is pleased to announce that the 30th Annual RWA Conference will be held at The Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Resort in Orlando, Florida, July 28–31.

The RWA Conference registration rate remains $425 for members/$500 for nonmembers through July 1. After July 1, the registration rate goes up to $475 for members/$550 for nonmembers.

Hotel rooms for RWA Conference attendees are available at the fantastic rate of $149 per night, single or double if booked by July 10, 2010. If more than two guests share a room, the cost will increase by $25 per person per night. Children under 18 may stay for free in their parents’ room using existing bedding. Room tax is 12.5 percent. Included in the room rate is a hotel service package that includes the following:

In-room high-speed Internet access
Two bottles of water daily
Up to 60 minutes of free local telephone calls, toll-free and credit card access calls (10 cents per minute after 60 minutes)
20 minutes of domestic long distance calls per day
Unlimited access to the hotel’s health clubs

For the convenience of our registrants, individuals who had previously registered to attend the conference in Nashville do not need to contact RWA to re-register for the conference in Orlando. Individuals who are unable to come to Orlando will be given a full refund. Details are included in the Conference FAQ .

Please do not call the hotel to book a reservation. The Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Resort will set up an online link for reservations. As soon as the link has been established, RWA will send hotel reservation instructions to all registrants. As before, the e-mail will include a link to reserve your hotel room(s) at the group rate.

RWA regrets the need to move our conference to a new location, and we appreciate your patience and understanding while we work to make the 30th Annual Conference a memorable event. As more information becomes available, it will be posted on the RWA website.

RWA Conference News Alert

Aphrodite — Tue, 04 May 2010 15:16:06 GMT

http://www.wsmv.com/video/23435320/index.html

Gaylord Hotels just issued a press release that the Opryland Hotel has been closed due to flooding. The release further states, “it is reasonable to conclude that the hotel will likely be closed for several months. Gaylord will assess the damage as soon as it is feasible to do so. The Company carries business interruption and property insurance associated with flood damage with an aggregate limit of $50 million.”

RWA is contractually obligated to hold its conference at the Gaylord Opryland over the dates stipulated in the contract. It is up to Gaylord to notify RWA if it cannot uphold its end of the contract, so we are in a wait-and- see mode.

Since RWA's conference is nearly three months from now, it’s too soon to tell if or how this will affect us. We are monitoring the situation and will post updates on the RWA website (www.rwa.org) ASAP.

Allison Kelley, CAE
Executive Director
allison.kelley@rwa.org

You are subscribed to this e-mail through your membership in Romance Writers of America.
Questions regarding RWA membership or the RWA Conference should be sent to info@rwanational.org.

Love, Drama, Sex, Family: All in a Day's Work

Aphrodite — Tue, 04 May 2010 15:10:13 GMT

by Felicia Pride
May 03, 2010

In June, Kimani Romance, an imprint at Kimani Press, Harlequin’s African-American romance publishing division, will release Hidden Pleasures, Brenda Jackson’s 75th book. That’s 75 books in 15 years, 10 of them being released across various Kimani lines in 2010 alone. Romance novelist Jackson, 57, plans to celebrate by, well, writing more. And reaching out to her readers; she is justly famous for taking very good care of them. Through monthly book giveaways featured in her electronic newsletter (www.brendajackson.net/page/brendas-newsletter), they will get to enjoy her anniversaries along with her.

“I write family sagas,” Jackson says. “And I know my stories. They are already written in my head. I just have to get them down on paper.” Jackson’s fans can’t get enough of what is in her head: complex relationships, love, drama, and sex.

Hidden Pleasures takes readers to Phoenix, Ariz., the home of the six Steele brothers, all successful, all playing the field, waiting to meet their one true love. “Each member of the Steeles is different,” Jackson says. “I wanted to show how African-American men bond. When I think of the Steeles, I think of togetherness.”

Jackson has six family series going. The Steele Family series has eight books. The Jeffries Family series (Spontaneous will publish in May) has four, while the Montgomerys have three, and the Bennetts/Masters Family series has six. Her two most popular series, the Madaris Family and the Westmoreland Family each have 17 books. Last month, Kimani Arabesque released Sensual Confessions, a long-awaited title featuring the Madaris family, who debuted in her first novel. In this latest entry, womanizing Blade Madaris meets his ultimate challenge, a woman who doesn’t easily succumb. “It’s going to be a very popular book,” Jackson says, “to see the mighty Blade fall.” From Jackson’s lips to God’s ears: Sensual Confessions has hit the New York Times Paperback Best Sellers Mass Market fiction list.

When she was a little girl, Jackson’s mother would read to her happy-ending stories like “Cinderella” and “Snow White.” Jackson also fell in love with movies featuring the young romance of teenage characters Gidget and Moondoggie. “I grew up thinking that this was how love was supposed to be,” she admits. “Boy meets girl, they fall in love. Yeah, they will have issues along the way, but they are together forever after.”

Happily, Jackson’s own love life mimics a fairy tale. She met her husband, Gerald Jackson, when she was 14. At 16 he gave her a “going steady ring,” which she still wears today. They married when she was 19, have been together ever since, and have raised two sons.

In junior high, Jackson wrote stories over the weekend, black versions of Gidget—to read to her classmates on Monday mornings. After being scolded by the principal when students were caught reading her work in class, Jackson put the stories aside.

Her job after high school at State Farm Insurance required her to take extensive tests, and studying made her turn back to her writing as an outlet. This time, it was her co-workers who read her stories, and they encouraged her to try to get them published. In the early ’80s, she submitted her work to publishers, many of whom told her that they weren’t accepting ethnic characters. She didn’t land her first book with a publisher until nearly a decade later, when in 1995 Kensington published Tonight and Forever.

Today, the bestselling author admits that her writing schedule is “crazy.” Two years ago, when she was still working in management at State Farm, where she spent more than 35 years, her writing time was neatly carved out. Every morning, she rose at 3 a.m. and wrote until it was time to go to work. Then she’d come home and write after work. She never missed a deadline. That was when she was only writing four or five books a year.
“It wasn’t really a dream of mine to write full-time,” Jackson says. In 2008, however, she signed a deal she couldn’t refuse—an exclusive five-year contract with Kimani—that allowed her to retire and write full-time.

Now, she says, “My goal is just writing, and I love it.” Kimani Press loves her new lifestyle, too. In 2011, Kimani plans to release eight new Jackson novels and two reprints.

Felicia Pride is the author of The Message: 100 Life Lessons from Hip Hop’s Greatest Songs.

Erotica gives book publishers surprising boost-2

Aphrodite — Sat, 01 May 2010 20:02:08 GMT

Continued..... Erotica gives book publishers surprising boost

As successful as the new erotica has been though, authors agree that readers demand more than a string of sex scenes separated by flimsy plot moments. The readers of mainstream erotic fiction expect the sex to be interwoven and integral to the novel or story “and that’s hard to do,” Gleason said. Other than that requirement, though, readers seem willing, even enthusiastic, to read about all kinds of sexual experimentation.

“We have everything, across the board,” Kensington’s Auerbach said. “Readers think variation is the spice of life ... We have a warning on the back of the Aphrodisia books, a little box, that says ‘This is a really hot book. It is sexually explicit.’ Readers know what they are picking up.”

Brian Alexander is the author of the book “America Unzipped: In Search of Sex and Satisfaction," now in paperback.

Erotica gives book publishers surprising boost

Aphrodite — Sat, 01 May 2010 20:00:07 GMT

The once-fringe genre is booming, with online book clubs, public readings.

Mainstream publishing has gone sexually wide-open. Erotic books like "Candy Licker" and "Thong on Fire" are a bright spot in a struggling publishing industry.

By Brian Alexander

updated 8:12 a.m. ET, Fri., April 30, 2010

Brian Alexander

• E-mail

"Thong on Fire" may sound more painful than sexy, but erotic books like it may just help keep the struggling publishing industry afloat. The popular novel is by Noire, a “twenty-something” writer of urban erotic fiction who has sold hundreds of thousands of books since she started publishing just a few years ago. Her book sales are huge numbers in the world of publishing and have made her something of a minor celebrity.

Mainstream publishing has gone sexually wide-open. Seventy-seven years ago it took an order by a federal judge, John Woolsey, to overturn the government’s obscenity ban on James Joyce’s classic novel "Ulysses." But in the past few years, Random House, Penguin, Kensington, Simon and Schuster and others have all inaugurated erotica imprints.

Exactly why erotic literature has become so popular now is a matter of speculation, though it doesn't seem entirely coincidental that the creators were mostly raised in the era of Madonna videos on MTV, open discussion of sex during the initial HIV scare, and the mainstreaming of porn. Much of the new erotica is simply porn moved to the printed page, only smarter and largely aimed at women.

Whatever the reason, publishers are pleased. At a time when overall book sales have been flat or declining for several years “we saw it as a growing opportunity; it has exploded,” Karen Auerbach, Kensington’s director of publicity told me. Cleis Press, a San Francisco Bay area publisher of erotica and other works has seen its sales rise by more than 56 percent over the past three years. (Neither Cleis nor other publishers would release exact sales figures.)

There are even a growing number of erotica book clubs, though, perhaps because of the explicit nature of the material, most don’t follow the same kind of meet-in-my-living-room format readers of the latest Mitch Albom tear jerker employ. For example, writers of erotica read their works at the In The Flesh reading series organized by writer and editor Rachel Kramer Bussel once a month at the appropriately named Happy Ending Lounge in Manhattan. The Erotic Literary Salon convenes every third Tuesday at a bar in Philadelphia. Online clubs and blogs like http://www.erotica-readers.com/ allow consumers to meet virtually. This month, Cleis started its own online book club.

Romance novels get raunchy
While erotic reading events may appeal to the kind of urban hipster who knows where to get the best chai lattes in Brooklyn, consumers of more traditional pulp romance are being enticed to cross over into erotica, too. The romance genre, which has traditionally featured passion in the context of adventurous love between one man and one woman and was rarely explicit, has expanded over the past several years to include bondage, fetish, multi-partner sex and same sex scenes. "Bound by Honor," for example, a book released last year by romance writer Colleen Gleason writing under the name Colette Gale, is a retelling of the Maid Marion/Robin Hood story.

“At court, Marian is torn between her duty to the queen and her desire for two men: one, the mysterious highwayman the peasants call Robin Hood, and the other, the dark, cold Sheriff of Nottingham,” the book’s promotional summary reads. “Given an impossible choice, she must submit to the carnality of Prince John’s court in order to fulfill her duty and maintain her honor.”

Of course she does.

“I tell people that if it were a movie it would be XXX-rated,” said Gleason, a 43-year-old Michigan wife and mother whose first erotica book wasn’t released until 2007.

Tryst with a shape shifter
Kensington started its Aphrodisia imprint in 2006 to feature paranormal romance with shape shifters, satyrs, vampires. That leaves a lot of room to experiment. Lead author Kate Douglas created the Wolf Tales series about human/wolf shape shifters and the series became a breakout hit. "Wolf Tales VIII," released this month, opens with a male-male-female threesome on the first page that is utterly unquotable, even in a sex column. I tried, but wound up with a series of ellipses.

American readers have always loved sexy books. Even in the late 1800s erotic tales circulated widely; Victorian novels like "The Pearl" and "The Romance of Lust" were popular on both sides of the Atlantic. But erotica was always underground because it was illegal.

Following the Ulysses case, and Grove Press braving prosecution to publish "Lady Chatterley’s Lover" by D.H. Lawrence and Henry Miller’s "Tropic of Cancer" in the U.S. in the 1950s and 1960s, sex in literature became increasingly acceptable. But novels and short stories in which erotica was the point were relegated mainly to fringe players. Now it’s mass market.

“Noire has been really fantastic for us,” Melody Guy top editor at One World/Ballantine, part of the Random House book group, said. “We launched her in 2005 and continue to sell her backlist.”

(Full disclosure: My most recent book, "America Unzipped," was published by another Random House imprint and I wrote an introductory essay for a book published by Cleis.)

'The sex is off the hook'
Urban erotic fiction like that from Noire melds so-called “street lit,” which usually features black American characters living in big cities and facing gritty drama, often involving crime, with erotic experiences.

“It reflects readers’ reality,” Guy explained. “The very real environment feels authentic yet there is still the fantasy of the sex … Noire was about the first person to define this; she tapped into something at that moment.”

The popular author may have a huge following, but due to the topic she writes about, she keeps the personal details about her life private. She won't reveal her real name and while she has a career outside of writing books, she won't say what it is.

“I am the type of writer whose books are pretty tough,” said Noire. “My situations are not necessarily filled with drugs and violence, but they are filled with what can happen to you when you are wayward and living on the streets. They are cautionary tales, but the sex is off the hook!”

Her first book, "G-Spot" was an almost instant hit as was her follow-up, "Candy Licker."

“If there was ever any doubt that pulp was alive and thriving, Noire’s highly sexy, highly vivid 'G-Spot' dispelled it,” stated the “Publisher’s Weekly” review. Noire, it said, “… delivers everything that lovers of this emerging micro genre — black urban erotic chick lit — are coming to expect: cribs full of music, sex, drugs and criminality; many dollars flying by; and an honest, often abused girl just trying to make it through.”

Zane, another urban erotic writer whose books appear on her own Strebor imprint, part of Atria/Simon and Schuster, was probably the first to combine urban pulp fiction and explicit sex. She’s been so successful she has turned herself into an industry, including a Cinemax series, an online store (where you can buy bras and body creams), and frequent appearances in Essence magazine.

Growing number of men reading erotica
While the typical reader of erotic literature apears to be a middle class woman under 40, there is a male audience, too, say both writers and publishers.

“I do get fan mail and I see a growing number of male readers,” Noire said. “Lots of men say they borrowed the book from the girlfriend. And I’ve been surprised at the number of gay men.” Continued.

Debbie Macomber Offers $10,000

Aphrodite — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 23:22:08 GMT

Debbie Macomber Offers $10,000 In the Gift of a Second Chance Contest

Learn More about the #1 New York Times and USA TODAY Bestselling Author's Contest at Hannahslist.com

TORONTO and NEW YORK, April 26 /PRNewswire/ -- What would you do if you had the gift of a second chance at something special in your life? #1 New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author Debbie Macomber is offering participants a chance to win $10,000 in her Gift of a Second Chance Contest.*

The Gift of a Second Chance Contest calls for entrants to go to http://harlequin.promo.eprize.com/hannahslistcontest/ and—in 100 words or less—tell the award-winning MIRA Books author what they would do with a second chance in their lives. One lucky winner will receive $10,000 for the chance to help to make a real change in his/her life.

Participants also have the daily opportunity to instantly win a signed copy of Debbie Macomber's new novel, Hannah's List. The contest opened Friday, April 23, 2010 and ends Sunday, July 4, 2010 Submissions must be received by May 29, 2010.

Hannah's List is the story of a grieving widower who receives an unexpected letter from his late wife on the first anniversary of her death. In it she urges him to give love a second chance and re-marry. To help him on his way, she suggests three women for him to consider—each very different from the other. The idea for this story is based on a true event shared with Debbie Macomber by a friend. The critically-acclaimed author was so moved that she was inspired to write Hannah's List. Hannah's List will be released on April 27.

With more than 75 million copies of her books sold worldwide, Debbie Macomber is one of today's most popular authors. She has topped the New York Times, USA TODAY and Publishers Weekly bestseller lists several times and is the first-ever recipient of the "readers' choice" Quill Award for Romance Fiction, for 44 Cranberry Point, the fourth book in her highly popular Cedar Cove series. Debbie has also been honored with a RITA®, romance publishing's "Oscar;" a Romantic Times Book ReviewsCareer Achievement Award and is a multiple winner of both the Holt Medallion and the B. Dalton Award. In July 2010, Debbie will be presented the Nora Roberts Lifetime Achievement Award from the Romance Writers of America.

About MIRA Books

MIRA Books™ is Harlequin Enterprises' mainstream women's fiction imprint. Featuring a lineup of some of the bestselling authors across North America, MIRA Books is committed to publishing the very best in commercial fiction, from historical and contemporary romance to suspense and psychological thrillers. In 2009, 40 of our titles placed on bestseller lists (New York Times, USA TODAY and Publishers Weekly) for a total of 365 weeks. MIRA Books currently publishes over 100 books per year in hardcover, mass-market and trade paperback formats. Please see the MIRA Books Web site—www.MIRABooks.com—for more information.

About Harlequin

Harlequin Enterprises Limited is the global leader in series romance and one of the world's leading publishers of books for women, with titles issued worldwide in 32 languages and sold in 115 international markets. The company produces over 110 titles monthly and publishes more than 1,100 authors from around the world. Harlequin Enterprises Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Torstar Corporation, a broadly based media company listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TS.B). Harlequin's Web site is located at www.eHarlequin.com. Harlequin has offices in 19 countries, including offices in Toronto, New York andLondon. For more information please visit www.eHarlequin.com or press.eHarlequin.com.

*NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. Open to LEGAL RESIDENTS OF THE 50 UNITED STATES (and D.C.) AND CANADA (exceptQuebec) who have reached the age of majority. VOID WHERE PROHIBITED. Promotion starts on 4/23/10 at 12:00 a.m. ET and ends on 7/4/2010 at 11:59 p.m. ET. Submissions must be received by 5/29/10 at 11:59 p.m. ET. For Official Rules and prize descriptions, visit http://harlequin.promo.eprize.com/hannahslistcontest/. Canadian residents are required to correctly answer a mathematical skill-testing question in order to win an Instant Win Game Prize. One Grand Prize of $10,000 USD and 146 Instant Win Game Prizes consisting of a signed copy of Debbie Macomber's novel, HANNAH'S LIST (approximate retail value: $24.99 USD) available to be won. Odds of winning depend on number and quality of eligible Submissions received. Sponsor: Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, ON M3B 3K9, Canada.

SOURCE MIRA Books

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Romance of books key in digital age, says Penguin

Aphrodite — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 14:40:59 GMT

By Rina Chandran

Reuters
Wednesday, April 14, 2010; 3:39 PM

MUMBAI (Reuters) - With the excitement around the launch ofApple's iPad and the growing popularity of other digital devices, it is a challenge to retain the romance of the printed book, according to the head of publisher Penguin.

The iPad, a cross between a smartphone and a laptop, is helping foster a market for tablet computers that is expected to grow to some 50 million units by 2014, and with it, also expand the market for e-books, which has been hard to crack.

So far, book publishers like Penguin have struggled to find an online model that works successfully in terms of content and the consumer's propensity to pay, said Penguin's John Makinson.

But with the iPad, book publishers see a new chance to get their electronic offering right and win more bargaining power if the iPad emerges as a viable rival to Amazon' Kindle.

"Large screen digital devices are opening up bigger opportunities for us: opportunities for interactivity with readers, and around social networking," said Makinson.

"There are opportunities not just in a marketing sense, but for actual content and new material," he said on a visit to India.

It is not just a younger demographic of readers drawn to the cool applications and greater interactivity that are flocking to digital devices, but also older readers who like the ability to for example, increase the font size, said Makinson.

While there is huge potential in India, the world's fastest-growing wireless market with more than half a billion mobile subscribers, rising levels of literacy also means that appetite for newspapers, magazines and books is still strong.

Penguin, which was the first international publisher to also publish in Indian languages including Hindi and Marathi, is keen to tap that opportunity, Makinson said.

"The printed product still has a very lively future in India," said Makinson, who launched a new imprint in India, Shobhaa De Books, a line of celebrity memoirs, commercial fiction and biographies focused on lifestyle and cinema, picked by writer and former beauty queen Shobhaa De.

People often compare the book industry to the music industry, where digital sales have overtaken sales of CDs, but there is an emotional connection to books, said Makinson, who studied English and history at Cambridge and began his career as a journalist.

"We need to keep the emphasis on the reader's emotional relationship with the book. It's still important to produce a well-designed, beautifully printed book that looks good on a shelf, and that you can gift to a friend," he said.

"And the challenge is not to lose sight of the main act, which is still the book. The definition of a book itself is set to change, but there is a tradition, a romance to a book that is essential to retain," he said.

(Editing by Miral Fahmy)

RED WHEEL STRIKES DEAL WITH RAVENOUS...

Aphrodite — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 15:02:39 GMT

Red Wheel Strikes Deal with Ravenous Romance to Do P-books of E-books

Jim Milliot -- Publishers Weekly, 3/10/2010 10:09:27 AM

Red Wheel/Weiser, best known as a publisher of nonfiction titles, is entering the fiction market through an agreement with e-book publisher Ravenous Romance. Under the deal, Red Wheel has licensed world English rights to 12 Ravenous paranormal romance e-books that the company will publish under its new Red Silk Editions imprint. Red Wheel will launch the line in June and plans to release two $12.95 trade paperbacks per month.

Bonni Hamilton, director of marketing for Red Wheel, said the deal gives the company a quick way to establish a presence in the still-expanding romance market. The paranormal segment, she added, "fits well with our track record publishing occult and esoteric titles." The Red Silk imprint is being overseen by Red Wheel's California office head by publisher Jan Johnson. The titles for the program are being chosen in conjunction with Ravenous and will feature the bestselling titles. Since the books have already been selling as e-books, "it's like our consumer research has already been done," said Red Wheel president Michael Kerber.

Ravenous will help promote the titles through its various online communities and Hamilton said at some point the two might experiment with offering e-book and print book bundles. Kerber said Red Wheel could expand the agreement depending on how the imprint does. "Ravenous has no shortage of titles," he said. Reaction from Barnes & Noble and Borders has been very positive, Kerber added. Red Wheel will also sell the books into foreign markets and hopes to licensing foreign-language rights.

"We see this partnership as an enormous opportunity to expand our reach," said Holly Schmidt, president of Ravenous which she cofounded in 2008.

TAMING THE DARK HERO BEHIND HARLEQUIN SUCCESS

Aphrodite — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 00:35:38 GMT

Lesley Ciarula TaylorStaff Reporter t - thestar.com

An analysis of decades of Harlequin romance novels has found the secrets to their success: spinning a tale of an arrogant rogue tamed by the love of a devoted, fertile woman.

“In the books, she’s successful” at changing the hero’s ways. “In real life, not as much,” said Dr. Maryanne Fisher, an evolutionary psychologist who co-authored the study The Texas Billionaire’s Pregnant Bride.

Fisher, of St. Mary’s University in Halifax. and Anthony Cox of the Centre for Psychology and Computing in Dartmouth, seized on their title to hit all of the most popular words behind Harlequin best-sellers.

Their analysis, published online in the Journal of Society, Evolutionary and Cultural Psychology, reveals a clear female “mating strategy” defines the books.

Harlequins tend to start with an attractive, abrasive dark hero. “By the end of the book, he’s a loyal, socially acceptable, monogamous, stable character interested in getting married.” Fisher told the Star.

Which is a “very safe way” of indulging in a common female fantasy of changing the man she’s involved with.

Their distillation of 23,000 Harlequin and Silhouette book titles yielded some surprising results: male attractiveness doesn’t factor in much (“We were shocked.”) but cowboys do.

“I talked to my girlfriends and when I mentioned cowboys, they all said, “Oooh. Yummy.’ So ‘cowboy’ could be a proxy for ‘attractive and athletic.’ Prince and rancher were also high on the list of occupations. Whereas firemen and policemen are low. Maybe we see too many of them.”

The top 20 words were heavy on commitment (marriage, wedding, husband, bride), and reproduction (baby, child, family), closely followed by wealth (tycoon, fortune, diamond, billionaire. Of their analysis of themes, Western words (cowboy, Texas, sheriff) dominated and they were also surprised to see medical and royal themes so strong.

“When you look at who is reading the Harlequin novels, more than 90 per cent are women.,” said Fisher. “And the huge numbers are women 31 to 45 who are already in relationships. So they’re not the stereotypical lonely women looking for love.”

What they are, she said is “women who want to have their cake and eat it, too. This is fantastical, magical enjoyment.”

Grounded in tradition and plausibility. Men are doctors and women nurses. Men are bosses and women, secretaries.

To Fisher, who is part of St. Mary’s women and gender studies program, that is “a reflection of society. That’s what make them great as a research tool. They show where society is at the moment.”

Harlequin, the world’s largest publisher of romance novels, is owned by Torstar Corp. Since the company was founded 60 years ago, they have sold about 5.8 billion books.

Fisher and Cox began their research with a line-by-line analysis of Harlequin novels to investigate themes. The data mushroomed and they turned to a mathematical analysis of titles to get it under control.

An undercurrent theme depicts how women compete for men, often revealed through gossip. “So and so was hitting on the hero and they didn’t realize they loved him until that moment.” It’s research they intend to return to.

Now that they have their Texas title, will Fisher or Cox write their own Harlequin romance? “I have laid out the plot for one,” said Fisher with a laugh. “It’s based at a university.” And that’s as far as she’s going to reveal right now. “Secret” is a Harlequin title’s seventh most popular word.

YOUND ADULT LIT COMES OF AGE

Aphrodite — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 00:24:27 GMT

By Susan Carpenter

March 8, 2010

It used to be that the only adults who read young adult literature were those who had a vested interest -- teachers or librarians or parents who either needed or wanted to keep an eye on developing readers' tastes.

But increasingly, adults are reading YA books with no ulterior motives. Attracted by well-written, fast-paced and engaging stories that span the gamut of genres and subjects, such readers have mainstreamed a niche long derided as just for kids.

Thanks to huge crossover hits like Stephenie Meyer's bloodsucking "Twilight" saga, Suzanne Collins' fight-to-the-death "The Hunger Games" trilogy, Rick Riordan's "The Lightning Thief" and Markus Zusak's Nazi-era "The Book Thief," YA is one of the few bright spots in an otherwise bleak publishing market. Where adult hardcover sales were down 17.8% for the first half of 2009 versus the same period in 2008, children's/young adult hardcovers were up 30.7%.

"Even as the recession has dipped publishing in general, young adult has held strong," said David Levithan, editorial director and vice president of Scholastic, publisher of "The Hunger Games," as well as of J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books, the series largely credited with jump-starting this juggernaut of a trend.

"You go on the subway and see 40-year-old stockbrokers reading 'Twilight,' " said Levithan, himself a YA author. "That wouldn't have happened five years ago."

Levithan added that passing "the mother test" is an indication that a title could go wide. "If a lot of us on staff are sending a book to our mothers because it's really engaging literature, that's a good sign."

Books that have passed the Scholastic mother test? Judy Blundell's "What I Saw and How I Lied," which won a 2008 National Book Award, and the wolf love story "Shiver" by Maggie Stiefvater.

According to Kris Vreeland, children's department manager for Vroman's Bookstore in Pasadena, "You have a lot of different people coming to young adult in a lot of different ways."

Often, word of mouth will bring a teen title to an adult's attention, Vreeland said. Such was the case with the "Twilight" series, which has sold more than 85 million copies worldwide since the first book was published in 2005.

Other times, it's an award. When Sherman Alexie's young adult debut, "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian," won the National Book Award in 2007, it lent credibility to the entire genre.

"One strong writer leads to exploring that area more, so you've got several now who are leading people into all kinds of directions," Vreeland noted. "You can go the whole gamut: sci-fi, fantasy, mystery, historical fiction, romance, realistic fiction, humor. There's a lot of good stuff going on."

Add the growing number of movies made from kids' books, such as "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" and "Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief," as well as all the successful adult authors -- James Patterson, Carl Hiaasen, Francine Prose and Terry Pratchett -- now writing for younger readers, and you've got a phenomenon "that extends beyond the gatekeepers who want to know what their kids are getting into," Vreeland said.

Christel Joy Johnson is one. The 36-year-old actress doesn't have children, but she's an avid reader of young adult science fiction.

"There's something really wonderful about taking the journey with someone of that age. One of the main reasons I'm attracted to YA literature is just the openness of the characters," said Johnson, who recently finished the necromancer tale "Sabriel," by Garth Nix.

"I think part of the reason we're seeing adults reading YA is that often there's no bones made about the fact that a YA book is explicitly intended to entertain," said Lizzie Skurnick, 36, author of "Shelf Discovery," a collection of essays about young adult literature from the 1960s and 1970s.

"YA authors are able to take themselves less seriously. They're able to have a little more fun, and they're less confined by this idea of themselves as Very Important Artists. That paradoxically leads them to create far better work than people who are trying to win awards."

According to Skurnick, who also reviews adult fiction for publications including The Times, YA books are "more vibrant" than many adult titles, "with better plots, better characterizations, a more complete creation of a world."

And often, those worlds are steeped in the imagination. In Patterson's "Maximum Ride" series, a 14-year-old girl leads a pack of laboratory-bred, winged teens on various adventures. In "I Am the Messenger," Zusak writes about a teenage cab driver who becomes an inadvertent hero, prompted by anonymous messages that lead him to specific addresses at specific times.

Many of today's young adult authors were born and raised in the 1960s and 1970s, when YA began to move beyond the staid, emotionless tales of Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys in favor of more adventurous work from Judy Blume, Madeleine L'Engle and Robert Cormier. Now, they're turning out their own modern masterpieces.

"There's some amazing, vibrant, fantastic literature in the YA venue," said Cecil Castellucci, a young adult author who recently started the Pardon My Youth book club at Skylight Books in Los Feliz to "help people understand that YA literature is not just for young adults."

According to Castellucci, author of "Boy Proof," "Beige" and other titles about misfit teenage girls, we're living in the golden age of young adult literature.

"As a YA author, I get tired of being asked, 'When are you going to write a real book?' " she said. "As if a YA book is not a real book."

Ask any of the genre's growing legion of fans: It is.

susan.carpenter@latimes .com

I-play Launches Nora Roberts: Vision in White for

Aphrodite — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 16:35:05 GMT

NEW YORK & LONDON --(Business Wire)-- I-play, Oberon Media's publishing division and the world's leading multi-platform casual games publisher, today announced that its latest game release based on a best-selling author - Nora Roberts Vision in White - is now available for PC download. Based on the wildly popular Bride Quartet novel series, of which the first two books have more than 1 million copies in print, the Vision in White game seamlessly integrates the familiar plotlines to deliver the most interactive Nora Roberts experience to date.

In this refreshingly romantic seek-and-find game, players take on the role of wedding photographer Mackensie ‘Mac' Elliott. They must help Mac find romance while running Connecticut's premier wedding-planning company with her three best friends. Through 41 beautifully designed locations, unique mini-games including floral arrangements, cake decorating and photography, and two modes to customize gameplay, players will become a part of the story like never before.

"It's tremendous fun to see Vision in White translated to the video game medium," said Roberts. "I often enjoy playing casual games and know how addicting they can be! I'm looking forward to providing readers another way to experience my stories." Vision in White is the first of four novels in Roberts' Bride Quartet, which is the latest book-based game series published by I-play. I-play also publishes games based on James Patterson's highly-successful Women's Murder Club book series and an Agatha Christie game series. These releases have generated more than 40 million downloads and have underscored Oberon Media's goal to provide high-quality game franchises across multiple platforms.

Recently profiled in The New Yorker, where she was labeled "America's favorite writer," Nora Roberts is a publishing phenomenon. She is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of 190 novels as well as the author of the bestselling futuristic suspense In Death series written under her pseudonym, J.D. Robb. There are more than 400 million copies of her books in print worldwide and with the publication of Vision in White, the first book in The Bride Quartet, Roberts became a bestseller in all book formats hardcover, trade paperback and mass market paperback. More information and a complete list of books can be found at www.noraroberts.com and www.jdrobb.com.

Nora Roberts Vision in White ESRB Rating: TEEN with Alcohol Reference and Mild Suggestive Themes.

View the Nora Roberts Vision in White trailer Here.

Learn more about Nora Roberts Vision in White at: www.NoraRobertsGames.comor www.Iplay.com/NoraRoberts Become a fan of I-play games on Facebook (News - Alert) at: Facebook.com/IplayGaming. Members of the I-play Facebook community can stay up-to-date on all I-play news including sneak peeks at upcoming games, sweepstakes, contests, giveaways and more! About I-play I-play, the publishing division of Oberon Media, Inc., is the world's leading multi-platform casual games publisher. With powerful franchises and massive distribution across the three most popular entertainment screens -- online, mobile, and interactive television -- I-play content reaches global consumers, and delivers fun, entertaining, accessible content to casual gamers of all ages. I-play's PC publishing division, formerly Oberon Games, is based in Seattle and created the hit Dream Day Series, as well as the first casual games for bestselling author James Patterson, Nora Roberts, and legendary mystery author Agatha Christie, including the Causal Connect 2007 Game of the Year, Agatha Christie: Death on the Nile. I-play's mobile division has delivered some of the biggest selling franchises in the mobile space, including the world's #1 best-selling racing franchise, The Fast and the Furious, based on the blockbuster movies. I-play's interactive television group, formerly PixelPlay, creates and distributes games featuring top brands including Centipede(TM), Missile Command(R), Asteroids(TM), Monopoly(R), Scrabble(R), Boggle(R), and Yahtzee(TM). I-play is headquartered in New York City, with offices in Seattle, London, and Dunfermline, Scotland.

HCI Books Launches Reality-Based Romance Imprint:

Aphrodite — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 17:43:11 GMT

Today HCI Books announced the new Vows imprint, publishing what they call a brand new "subgenre" of romantic literature--reality-based romance, or "RB Romance."

The series will match romance writers with real life couples, turning the wedding column into steamy nonfiction. In the words of the press release, it's "Life...Romanticized." Romance novelist Julie Leto will write the first book, a retelling of a real life romance in New York City. The series will launch in 2010.

Here's the juicy description of the first reality-based romance: "New York lobbyistMichael Davoli feels like he's been sucker punched when he meets Anne Millerat a concert ... Michael falls hard ... But while Mike effortlessly holds her with his gaze, he withholds the embrace she longs for ... he finally confesses that he suffers from a neurological disorder that he's learned to disguise from others but could keep him from ever holding her through the night--she makes a choice that changes the rest of her life. Anne isn't about to let anything like Tourette's Syndrome keep her from the man of her dreams ... Hard to Hold is a modern day fairy tale that proves that the best things in life--and in romance--are real."

If you want to confirm the reality of the story, check out the couple's wedding webpage. What do you think? Will real life romance sell beside the imaginary kind?

Harlequin Launches Digital-Only Publishing House

Aphrodite — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:32:41 GMT

TORONTO, Nov. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Harlequin Enterprises Limited, the global leader in series romance and one of the world's leading publishers of women's fiction, announced today the launch of Carina Press(TM), a digital-only publishing house that will operate independently of their traditional publishing businesses.

Carina Press(http://www.carinapress.com) is a digital-only publishing house whose eBooks will be sold direct to consumers through the Carina Press Web site and numerous third-party Web sites. Carina Press will publish a wide range of women's fiction -- romance, erotica, science fiction, mystery, family sagas, choose your own adventures, horror, thriller and more, including every conceivable subgenre of these categories.

"As a digital-only publisher Carina Press is a natural extension to our business; it builds on our digital strength and leadership position. We expect to discover new authors and unique voices that may not be able to find homes in traditional publishing houses," said Donna Hayes, CEO and Publisher of Harlequin Enterprises. "It definitely gives us greater flexibility in the type of editorial we can accept from authors and offer to readers. As well, we hope to reach a new group of readers with niche editorial."

Brent Lewis, Vice President Digital, is delighted to announce that Angela James is joining Carina Press as Executive Editor. A veteran of the digital publishing industry, James is a well-known advocate for digital publishing. James has enjoyed a long and varied publishing career, including senior editorial positions at digital-first publishers. "I have admired Harlequin's digital initiatives for years, and have always thought of them as leaders in the digital arena, so I'm unbelievably excited to join the Carina Press team," said James. "I believe Harlequin can bring digital publishing to the next level for both authors and readers."

Lewis added, "Angela has been a key player in growing the digital marketplace for romance. Her experience and insight is a tremendous benefit to the Carina Press team."

Carina Press is currently accepting submissions in all genres of commercial fiction. Carina Press will
consider shorter stories, genre novels of 50,000 to 100,000 words and longer, and complex narratives of over 100,000 words. Carina Press will also acquire books that have been previously released in print form, but for which the author has either retained digital rights or had digital rights revert to them. All submissions should be sent to submissions@carinapress.com.

Carina Press plans to launch in summer 2010 and will release new titles on a weekly basis. Between now and the launch, readers and writers can follow the progress of Carina Press via its blog (http://carinapress.com/?page_id=9).

For full submission guidelines (http://carinapress.com/?page_id=2) and more information on Carina Press please go towww.carinapress.com.

About Harlequin Enterprises
Harlequin Enterprises Limited is the global leader in series romance and one of the world's leading publishers of books for women, with titles issued worldwide in 28 languages and sold in 114 international markets. The company produces more than 110 titles monthly in print and digital and publishes more than 1,100 authors from around the world. Harlequin Enterprises Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Torstar Corporation (http://www.torstar.com), a broadly based media company listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange (TS.B). Harlequin's Web site is located at www.eHarlequin.com. Harlequin has offices in 19 countries, including offices in Toronto, New York and London. For more information please visit www.eHarlequin.com or press.eHarlequin.com.

SOURCE Harlequin Enterprises Limited

Recession Fuels Readers’ Escapist Urges Part 2

Aphrodite — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:42:22 GMT

Published: April 7, 2009

(Page 2 of 2)

Romance novels have also captured a larger proportion of the electronic book market than other categories. Whereas most publishers say that about 1 percent of sales come from e-books, Harlequin says that digital editions make up about 3.4 percent of its sales.

At Fictionwise, the e-book seller recently acquired by Barnes & Noble, about 50 percent of sales are romance books, said Steve Pendergrast, chief technology officer. “Romance readers tend to be voracious readers,” Mr. Pendergrast said. “The ability to instantly download and start reading is potentially more important to that audience than any other audience.”

The growing market for digital romance novels has attracted several newcomers, including tiny independent publishers like Ellora’s Cave, Samhain Publishing and Ravenous Romance.

Because they have no distribution or warehousing costs, they can sell books even cheaper than paperback editions — Ravenous Romance, which specializes in erotic fiction, sells e-books for $4.99 each. “That’s the same as a fancy drink at Starbucks,” said Lori Perkins, editorial director. “At that price, who wouldn’t want a book?”

The recession has also meant more business for other purveyors of romance books: public libraries. Robin Bradford, the fiction buyer for the Indianapolis-Marion County Public Library, said demand for many romance titles had gone way up. She noted, for example, that the list of borrowers waiting for a copy of “Nauti Intentions” by Lora Leigh, a popular romance writer, was now 69 — up from an average of 15 or 20 for previous titles by that author last year.

“People don’t have the discretionary income, especially for authors they are just trying out,” Ms. Bradford said. “It may sound interesting, but they’re not going to go spend $8 on something they may like, whereas before maybe they would have.”

Many readers are still buying. “I would give up something else if money was tight,” said Annmarie Anderson, a district manager in Atlanta for a national retail chain, who said she still spent about $100 on romance novels each month. “I would give up my manicure and pedicure. I have my priority list, and books are pretty high on my priority list.”

Recession Fuels Readers’ Escapist Urges Part 1

Aphrodite — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:40:58 GMT

By MOTOKO RICH

Published: April 7, 2009

In a recession, what people want is a happy ending.

At a time when booksellers are struggling to lure readers, sales of romance novels are outstripping most other categories of books and giving some buoyancy to an otherwise sluggish market.

Harlequin Enterprises, the queen of the romance world, reported that fourth-quarter earnings were up 32 percent over the same period a year earlier, and Donna Hayes, Harlequin’s chief executive, said that sales in the first quarter of this year remained very strong. While sales of adult fiction overall were basically flat last year, according to Nielsen Bookscan, which tracks about 70 percent of retail sales, the romance category was up 7 percent after holding fairly steady for the previous four years.

At Barnes & Noble, the country’s largest book chain, where its chief financial officer, Joe Lombardi, recently warned that overall 2009 sales were likely to fall between 4 percent and 6 percent, sales of romance novels are up. And in the first three months of this year Nielsen Bookscan tracked a 2.4 percent rise in romance sales compared with a slight decline in sales of general adult fiction for the same period. Those figures may underestimate the demand for romance, since a significant portion of sales come from retailers like Wal-Mart that are not tracked by Bookscan.

Like the Depression-era readers who fueled blockbuster sales of Margaret Mitchell’s “Gone With the Wind,” today’s readers are looking for an escape from the grim realities of layoffs, foreclosures and shrinking 401(k) balances.

“Given the general dismay and gloominess,” said Jennifer Lampe, a lawyer in Des Moines and avid romance reader who runs a book blog under the pseudonym Jane Litte at dearauthor.com, “reading something like a romance with a happy ending is really kind of a relief.”

Such escapist urges are also fueling sales of science fiction and fantasy, said Bob Wietrak, a vice president for merchandising at Barnes & Noble. Mr. Wietrak said sales of novels with vampires, shape shifters, werewolves and other paranormal creatures were “exploding,” whether they were found in the romance, fantasy or young-adult aisles, where Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series continues to dominate and inspire look-alike books like the House of Night teen novels by P. C. Cast and Kristin Cast.

Romance readers are considered among the most loyal fans, sticking to a series or an author once they have grown attached to one. “It’s a very dedicated audience who doesn’t see it as a luxury as much as a necessity,” said Liate Stehlik, publisher of William Morrow and Avon, imprints of HarperCollins Publishers.

The romance genre may also be especially attractive to consumers during difficult economic times because so many of the books are sold in the mass-market format, smaller paperbacks often found on racks at the grocery store or in airport bookshops. These books sell for $7.99 or less, compared with $12 to $15 on larger trade paperbacks.

Romance novels also often appear in discount chains like Wal-Mart or Kmart, where shoppers make impulse buys.

“If you’re going to Wal-Mart or Target anyway, you’re more likely to go and pick up a book,” said Ms. Hayes of Harlequin. “And a book is such incredible value in this environment.” Several retailers including Kmart, Wal-Mart and Kroger have been running three-for-$10 or two-for-$5 specials on Harlequin’s new titles.

Romance readers have always tended to buy in much higher volumes than people who read other genres like literary fiction. So even though some romance readers may be cutting back — Sue Grimshaw, the romance buyer at Borders, says people are buying four or five instead of five or six books a week — they are still buying more than readers of other book categories.

Some publishers have seen such strong sales on particular authors that they are willing to test hardcover editions for the first time, even in this market.

New American Library, a division of Penguin Group USA, has published six paperback-only versions of vampire romance novels in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series by J. R. Ward. Later this month it will publish Ms. Ward’s “Lover, Avenged” in hardcover, with a planned first printing of 125,000. (These numbers are generally known to be exaggerated, but they are a sign of the publisher’s confidence.)

Valley Romance Writer Penning Her Last Book

Aphrodite — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 14:37:36 GMT

By Becky Bosshart

Thu, Feb 5, 2009 (6:37 p.m.)

The beginning of Mary Schramski's first book was set in Las Vegas.

Now she is ending her last book here, which she's writing in her Sun City Anthem home.

It just seems like it was meant to be, said the 57-year-old writer, who has penned 13 novels, most published by top romance seller Harlequin/Silhouette and its more serious literary branch, Harlequin Next.

Schramski will conclude her novel writing career with "The Unicorn Tree." This novel has taken a lot of emotional strength to write, she said. It is about an adopted woman who was abused when she was a child. She comes out to Las Vegas to search for her biological mother.

"I wanted my last book to take place in Las Vegas, because I have an affinity for the city," Schramski said.

She was raised in Las Vegas and graduated from Rancho High School in 1968.

Schramski's first mainstream novel, "What to Keep," published in 2002, starts in Las Vegas with a 21 dealer who returns to her family home in North Carolina.

Schramski, a self-described feminist who went to Union Institute and University, what she termed a "radical left" school, doesn't seem like the type who would start her literary career as a bodice-ripping romance writer. She lives in a minimally decorated home — no lacy curtains or heart-shaped throw pillows.

With her white blond hair and sensible sweater and pants ensemble, she looks more like a professor than a writer of dewy-eyed tales of love lost and won.

Schramski said she picked up a romance novel one day, read it and decided that she could do that, too. It started out as something fun. Schramski shook off her "literary elitism" after she received a letter from a fan who said one of her novels helped her get through her husband's illness.

"I don't want to denigrate romance — it's a big seller," Schramski said. "I played around with it. I sent it off to Harlequin/Silhouette and it was published. I realized through writing those books, I learned how to write a novel and how to work with an editor."

And she made money at it. Schramski said she earned about $16,000 with an advance and royalties on that first book. It's been published in about six languages. Her subsequent novels made similar amounts from the major New York City publishing house.

Harlequin is known for its passionate paperbacks often found on wire racks in grocery stores. Those steamy sex scenes are fun to create, she said.

"It's more technical. You have to have things happen at the right time and you have to be descriptive enough."

But Schramski is putting these commercial successes behind her, even in an economically difficult time (she has two more novels set to be released this year, with expected moderate profits). Schramski is instead looking to guide writers to their own successes.

Jennifer Archer, of Amarillo, Texas, is partners with Schramski in their writing business Sterling Pen.

"Mary is very approachable," Archer said. "Clients seem to enjoy working with her, because she's easy to talk to and is great at giving advice. She taught for many years, so that helps with guiding clients, whether that's helping them ghostwrite a book or overcome a creative hurdle to continue a project. She's able to take what she's learned over the years and apply that to the struggles other writers go through."

Schramski will focus on editing, ghostwriting and creative coaching.

"Creative coaching is when you help bring an artist through the creative process," she said. "My goal is to help the person become the writer they want to be."

Visit Sterling Pen online at www.sterlingpen.net.

Becky Bosshart can be reached at 990-7748 or becky.bosshart@hbcpub.com.

HOW TO GET STARTED WRITING A BOOK

Aphrodite — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 16:24:57 GMT

BY BETH J. HARPAZ
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
Published: February 3, 2009

NEW YORK (AP) - Is writing a book on your life list? Maybe you want to get your family history down, or create a collection of poems or recipes. Perhaps you’d like to write a manual or a how-to book for your clients. And while some folks dream of commercial success, others just want to express themselves.
Whatever your goals, here’s some advice on everything from getting started to self-publishing.
START WRITING: Get into a writing routine. Some people swear by journals; others like to write early in the morning, before dreams are forgotten and the day’s distractions begin.
One way to do it: “Every morning at 5:30 a.m., get up and meditate, then write,“ said Jan Sadler, a writing coach and publications specialist in western Massachusetts.
Deborah Edler Brown, who runs writing workshops in the Los Angeles area, had a student who worked out daily but couldn’t find time to write. Brown said, “What would happen if you took your notebook to the gym, and wrote either before or after? It’s a place you already made a habit of going to.“
Some writers treasure solitude. For others, a class can help.
“It’s like having a trainer,“ said Brown. “Anybody can exercise by themselves but not everyone is successful doing that.“
Sadler recommends writing retreats. “Just leave behind the cell phone or the BlackBerry,“ she said.
Don’t worry about making your writing perfect. “You don’t know how many times bad writing clears the way for the thing you really want to say,“ Brown said.
Brown uses random words to prompt short in-class assignments: “When you sit with a group of people and write for five minutes after pulling the word ‘apple’ out of a bowl, you realize how much can be done in a tiny amount of time. You don’t need three hours a day.“
Sadler, who offers writing workshops at the Springfield (Mass.) Museums, recommends visual prompts. “Visit the museum if you want to get away,“ she said. “Take your notebook some quiet morning. Sit in front of a painting or in a corner. The quiet and the imagery will really speak to you.“
GET ORGANIZED: Create “physical homes” for your project, said Brown. Get a file folder, and “when you see an article that has to do with the story you want to write, or the photo that goes with your memoir, put it in there.“
Create a folder in your inbox, too, and save copies of all relevant e-mails.
Sadler said nonfiction writers should also make a “map or plan of where you’re going. It’s another word for an outline with subject headings, and once that’s done, everything just flows in.“
Sadler added that nonfiction writers must “define the boundaries of their material” and be able to explain their projects in a sentence or two.
Once you start writing, find ways to keep going. “Life interrupts you and three weeks later, you’re trying to pick up the thread and you’ve lost the spark. That’s heartbreaking,“ said Sadler. “If you have to leave a piece, jot down a few notes as a memory jogger. Do Post-It notes.“
Try leaving the last sentence unfinished, so that you have something easy to start with when you resume.
LIFE STORIES: Would you like to write up your childhood memories, or help a loved one tell the family story?
GreatLifeStories.com can help. This Web site is free, easy to use and fun, with tips for interviewing and an outline for capturing a life story in 12 chapters. Themes range from childhood and school years to jobs, romance, favorite pets and vacations.
Uploading stories and photos is free. GreatLifeStories also turns stories into books for as little as $20 a copy - perfect for the next family reunion.
Reading other stories on the site may inspire you. Or get out a photo album and “begin recollecting stories that the pictures bring forward,“ said Phil Gibson, a co-founder of the Web site.
But don’t wait too long to approach family elders. “Capturing a family’s life stories only becomes urgent almost when it’s too late,“ said Gibson. “If there’s a serious fall or serious illness, it can make you realize that the person who is the keeper of family knowledge can fade away very quickly.“
SELF-PUBLISHING: Recent technology has lowered the cost of self-publishing a book, from “thousands of dollars to hundreds of dollars,“ said Jason R. Rich, author of “Self-Publishing For Dummies” (Wiley, 2006).
“You can publish a few copies for yourself, 100 copies for a family reunion, or 1,000 copies to distribute and sell. You can do full-color books that look as good as any book in the bookstore, and you don’t need an artistic or publishing background,“ Rich said.
One type of self-publishing, printing on demand, is basically “a glorified Xerox machine that takes a PDF file and creates a bound manuscript with a push of a button,“ Rich said.
Print-on-demand services like Lulu.com sell books through Amazon or other sites. Copies are only printed and shipped when someone orders them. Authors set the price for the book, pay $5 to $10 of the printing cost, and earn 15 to 20 percent of the sale.
Alternatively, you could order a set number of copies, pay all costs upfront, and distribute and sell them yourself.
But consider hiring a professional editor from a site like Craigslist, eLance.com or guru.com before you publish. “If you’re an expert in your field and you publish a book that has typos or other errors, your credibility gets shot,“ Rich said.
Remember that bookstores generally do not carry self-published books. To sell your manuscript to a conventional publisher, you’ll probably need an agent. A book like “Jeff Herman’s Guide to Book Publishers, Editors & Literary Agents” (Three Dog Press, 2009) can get you started, but be prepared for a long, frustrating process.
That’s why Brown encourages her writing students to have fun. “Success in writing is always such a long shot that you have to enjoy the process,“ said Brown. “If you’re not enjoying it, what’s the point?“
—-
Beth J. Harpaz is author of several books, including “13 Is the New 18.“

DREAM ON, WRITERS by Janet K. Brown

Aphrodite — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 14:05:31 GMT

DREAM ON, WRITERS
By Janet K. Brown of Red River Romance Writers Chapter

"Never quit dreaming." That's what my eighty-four year old
mother-in-law told my husband. Even at her age, she dreams and works toward
them. Good advice, and one we writers should take to heart as we begin a new
year. Dreams change, but should never depart.
When I started learning the craft of writing, I listed my six- month
goal which I made; my three-year goal, which I didn't make, but that's okay;
and, my lifetime goal which I plan on achieving.
My first January I took an online course from Suzanne McMinn which was
wonderful. One assignment she gave us was to determine our goals month by
month for a year. I've continued that practice.
During the time I took the course, a sermon at church jarred me from my
lukewarm ideas about dreaming. "Are you talking to me, Lord?" I took out pen
and paper and began an acronym. Daily, I read it and meditate on the words.
After all, we're word freaks. Right?
Here's what I have listed:
Decide if and what you should write. What do you read? What do you enjoy?
How many different things can you balance with your other obligations?
Record goals (like I suggested, or however you want); Look back at them from
time to time with a realistic approach.
Educate yourself in the craft. What do you need to study? How can you best
train - writing groups, loops, online course, books, critique groups,
conferences or a combination of all? How can you best spend your time and
money?
Associate with people who help you, build you up. Become accountable to a
mentor or critique partner. Network with authors online and in person
whenever possible. Listen to them. I've heard it said, more writers become
published through the recommendation of another author than by a pitch to an
editor. With certainty, we can learn from their experience.
Measure your success and your commitment each year. What have you done to
further your writing career? Do you maintain a strong desire and/or need to
keep writing? Where have you failed or procrastinated?
Now at the beginning of this new year, survey your desires and
accomplishments in the past year. After you've done that, write your goals
for the year, for the month, for the week. Make it something you can
control. Being published or contracting for more sales is technically out of
our hands, but following these guidelines with persistence makes those
things doable. So, survey, keep goals, and dream on, writers.

--- Janet K. Brown loves writing short stories which she's published and
longer fiction which she's still dreaming of publishing. She lives in
Wichita Falls, TX and loves travel with her husband, visiting her grandkids
and line dancing when she's not writing. She belongs to Red River Romance
Writers.

__._,_.___

No mystery why people like "Love is Murder" event

Aphrodite — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 15:59:49 GMT

January 29, 2009

By AMY GAIL HANSEN Contributor

Misery may love company. But in Chicago, it's mystery that draws a crowd. Fans of the genre -- readers, writers and aficionados -- will at the 11th annual Love is Murder mystery conference Feb. 6-8.

This year, the conference has a new location, the Westin Chicago North Shore Hotel in Wheeling. But when it comes to workshops, panels and presentations, it seems organizers have rounded up the usual suspects: editors, agents, publishers, and bestselling authors, including Jeffery Deaver, Alex Kava, Steve Berry, Sharan Newman and guest of honor Raymond Benson of Buffalo Grove.

More than 'who dun it', but how

If you have questions about how to write and sell mysteries, Love is Murder provides answers. Master classes will focus on plot and characterization, accuracy in research and the business of being a writer. Workshops and panels will run the gamut, from writing dialogue to adding suspense, from infusing humor to revising a draft. For writers who have completed a manuscript, there's Pitch-a-Palooza, an hour in which to "sell" their story to agents, editors and publishers.

"We've come up with 27 authors who have sold a book, either by finding an agent or a publisher, at Love is Murder," boasted Luisa Buehler, president of the conference board and author of The Grace Marsden mystery series. Before landing a publishing contract in 2002, Buehler was a longtime attendee of the conference.

Publishing aside, the conference is a good place to meet other writers in this lonely profession. Meals, banquets and an afternoon tea aid socialization among writers of not only mysteries and thrillers, but also cross-over genres like paranormal, sci-fi and romance.

"Writers learn that they're not alone out there; there's a commonality in success stories and rejections," explained Buehler.

Beyond novice

Published authors find the conference equally useful, said Raymond Benson, who wrote the James Bond 007 series from 1995 to 2003, as well as many serial and stand-alone works.

"For me it's about networking and business, getting to know people in the industry," he said. "We look out for each other; if we're able to recommend someone, we do. We write blurbs for the back of each other's books."

On Saturday, Benson will present "The James Bond Phenomenon slideshow" and field questions about this "archetype that came at the right place and right time."

Benson attends conferences throughout the country, but this hometown event has a different feel. "It's intimate and smaller," he said. "After hours is even more fun."

The conference attracts a slew of successful Chicago writers -- Sara Paretsky, David J. Walker and Linda Mickey to name a few. And yet it remains small and friendly.

"We could not have the cozy, comfortable fun event that everyone loves if we had hundreds and hundreds of people," said Buehler.

After attending a crime scene reenactment, playing Mystery Jeopardy or visiting with ghost of honor Sherlock Holmes (a.k.a. Augie Aleksy, owner of Century & Sleuths bookstore in Forest Park), fans have the opportunity to "rub elbows" with their favorite authors. Headliners commit to attending all meals, the social aspect of the conference.

"You could end up sitting at the bar or breakfast with a national and world renowned author and say 'I love your work,'" Buehler said.

LOVE IS MURDER MYSTERY CONFERENCE

Feb. 6-8 at the Westin Chicago North Shore Hotel, 601 N. Milwaukee Ave., Wheeling. Schedule and registration at www.loveismurder.netor call Hanley Kanar at (847) 891-6588.

Amazon Posts Record Sales this Holiday

Beverly — Fri, 26 Dec 2008 17:58:25 GMT

This year, Amazon posted its highest holiday season revenues, ever! According to preliminary sales data, over 6.3 million items were ordered on December 15, its "peak" day, equating to 72.9 items ordered per second. Amazon also shipped 5.6 million units that day. Overall, Amazon shipped products to over 210 countries all in time for that special gift-giving day.

Boy, 9, who wrote 'How to Talk to Girls'

Aphrodite — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 14:37:52 GMT

By David Usborne in New York
Thursday, 11 December 2008

In the world of boy-meets-girl dating, you don't have to be old – or even the right side of puberty – to be wise. This we know from the newfound fame of nine-year-old Alec Greven from Colorado, author of America's latest self-help book that is now set to become a major Hollywood film, How to Talk to Girls.Alec was only eight when his teacher at the Soaring Hawk Elementary School in Castle Rock asked her pupils to write an essay about something they had observed about ordinary life. He chose to explore the perils of boys trying to win the attention of girls in the playground, offering tips for success.

"Boys have a lot of trouble with crushes," he said in an interview. "I wanted to help the boys with crushes. But I also wanted to say there is a girl for every boy and don't give up and don't think girls are gross. They are just girls."

The nuggets of wisdom from this "pint-sized pickup artist", as some have called him, include combing your hair, cutting down on sugar (to avoid being too hyper), and knowing that while 73 per cent of girls "ditch boys", 98 per cent of pretty girls do it. The pretty ones are "like cars that need a lot of oil".

The class essay might have remained just that had his teachers not been so tickled by it that they suggested Alec turn it into a stapled pamphlet which he was allowed to sell at the school's book fair for $3 apiece. It wasn't many days before the local media got wind of it and then along came the comedian and daytime talk show host, Ellen DeGeneres, who invited the boy onto her show.

Young Master Geven was, by then, set on a course towards stardom, which culminated first in his essay being released as a hardback book late last month by HarperCollins, with seven chapters of observations and tips, and then the announcement this week that Fox had signed the six-figure movie deal. His mother, Erin Greven, recalls how at first she didn't even know about her son's homework assignment. "I started getting emails from teachers saying, 'Oh, we just love your son's book. We think it's the funniest thing,'" she recalled. "So I called the teacher and said, 'What's going on? What's this book?' None of us even dreamed it would turn into something like this."

With book publishing in a slump, the Greven phenomenon is a ray of Christmas sunlight, particularly for HarperCollins. Fox, which like HarperCollins is owned by Rupert Murdoch's NewsCorp, originally passed on securing its film rights but changed its mind after the book began to draw headlines.

Things that single men everywhere, young or old, might take from his pages include: Never seem too keen. "Girls don't like desperate boys," he writes. Highlight your best side. "You can also show off a skill, like playing soccer or anything else you're good at. If you are spurned, don't mope.

"Sometimes, you get a girl to like you, then she ditches you," our young romance guru notes. "Life is hard, move on! Or sometimes it just doesn't work out. I had a crush on a girl in preschool. Then my family had to move, so I had to let her wash out of my mind."

E-Book Romancers Set Out to Capture "New Mass Mark

Aphrodite — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 18:40:44 GMT

When we spoke with the founding partners ofRavenous Romance over the phone Monday afternoon, the electronic publishing house was in its first few hours of operations, and they'd already managed to sell "a couple hundred" erotica and romance e-books, from the genderswitching comedyOpposite Sex to The Glass Stiletto, a dominance-and-submission-themed variation on the Cinderella story. The company also planned to publish a new novel ($4.99) and a new short story (99 cents) every day, including a special "12 Days of Christmas" batch of short stories later this month that uses the carol's list as a jump-off point. All of these stories will be available in PDF, PRC, and .epub formats; Ravenous will also sell audiobooks in MP3 format (for $12.99).

Ravenous is a cooperative venture that brings together veteran literary agentLori Perkins with Allan Penn and Holly Schmidt, who had previously created the book packaging firm Hollan Publishing. "Allan and I had been talking about getting into the romance genre for a while," Schmidt told us, "and Lori wanted to launch a line of erotica fiction." But Schmidt didn't want to start a publishing company and have to deal with physical inventory. As the discussions continued, electronic publishing arose as an increasingly viable option. "It took me a while to adjust to the economics of e-publishing," Schmidt confessed, but "I really think this is the new mass market... We would love to be the e-book publisher that bridges the gap" between the sales figures for electronic and print editions of erotica and romance titles.

There's certainly money to be made if they can do it—the Ravenous press release places the romance genre's annual sales at $1.37 billion, accounting for more than a quarter of the book units sold. And the readers themselves are a desirable demographic: More than half of them under 44 years old, and nearly three-quarters of them college-educated. These women are computer-literate, eager to adopt new technologies, and as recently as 2006 they were buying, on average, nine romance novels a year. (We have no data handy to determine whether recent economic conditions have caused a dip in romance novel purchasing, although anecdotal evidence suggests the genre thrives in periods of widespread social and cultural anxiety.)

Perkins added that she had come to work with a number of talented erotica writers over the course of her career, and had become frustrated with the limits to what they could achieve in the traditional publishing world. "The problem with the print world," Perkins explained, "was that [authors] wanted to write 10 books a year, and I could only sell two." Now, she said, Ravenous not only provided an outlet for their work, it was also able to pay authors at a competitive royalty rate of 38 percent.

As Schmidt interjected that she was "thrilled and inspired by the quality of the work we're receiving," Perkins mentioned some of the writers involved: In addition to erotica fiction stars Rachel Kramer Bussel and Cecilia Tan, Ravenous has already published a supernatural romantic comedy from writerJohn Skipp (writing as Gina McQueen) and a forthcoming novel from Catherine Hiller that would feature a blurb from her literary mentor, John Updike. "At the end of the day," Perkins observed, "everybody wants to write about love and sex."

Posted by Ron |

Samhain Publishing Announces Expansion Plans

Aphrodite — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 18:36:42 GMT

In a bold move, Samhain Publishing (www.samhainpublishing.com) announced the purchase of Linden Bay Romance (http://lindenbayromance.com/). In light of the downward spiral of the economy and the rapid consolidation of many of the larger publishers, Samhain Publishing has seized their chance to expand their market share by creating a new fiction line under the popular Samhain brand.

Macon, GA (PRWEB) December 5, 2008 -- In a bold move, Samhain Publishing (www.samhainpublishing.com) announced the purchase of Linden Bay Romance (http://lindenbayromance.com/). In light of the downward spiral of the economy and the rapid consolidation of many of the larger publishers, Samhain Publishing has seized their chance to expand their market share by creating a new fiction line under the popular Samhain brand.

"From the beginning one of my goals was to create multiple lines within Samhain," says Christina Brashear, owner of Samhain Publishing. "With Linden Bay Romances' excellent reputation, I made the offer in the hopes the owners would see this sale as a mutual benefit to both houses."

The offer came at a time when we realized under the Samhain umbrella, Linden Bay Romances will be stronger and reach its full potential faster.

"We hadn't considered selling Linden Bay and we were slowly making inroads with regards to increasing print distribution, but we've found, especially in light of the economy, neither sales teams nor buyers are very open to taking a chance on a smaller, less established press," says Lori James, part owner of Linden Bay Romances. "Samhain Publishing has the relationships in place that would take us years to develop." James continues, "The offer came at a time when we realized under the Samhain umbrella, Linden Bay Romances will be stronger and reach its full potential faster."

"For Samhain, it is a win-win situation," says Brashear. "We will expand our lines with an established name in the electronic book industry and we'll acquire an excellent stable of authors, editors and artists."

Samhain Publishing opened its doors on November 1, 2005 and already they've made a splash in the publishing world. From Publisher's Weekly features to dozens of fiction and cover art awards, this publisher is one to watch.

Contact Info

Christina Brashear, CEO
publisher (at) samhainpublishing.com
478-919-0143

Lisa Amrine, Marketing Director
marketing (at) samhainpublishing.com
478-919-5984

Bellevue romance writer Jane Porter's life imitate

Aphrodite — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 16:28:34 GMT

Bellevue romance writer Jane Porter's life imitates art in novel and on TV.

By JOHN MARSHALL
P-I BOOK CRITIC

Jane Porter was sitting poolside at the luxe Halekulani Hotel in Hawaii when the idea for a novel came in a rush, like the trailer for a movie.

One element was being at a crossroads in her life after divorcing at 40. Another was being "adrift" from her "whole identity" as a mom on her first solo trip minus her sons. Another was right beside her -- a very tan older guy buying drinks, yammering about money, clinging to her like Velcro.

"If this is my future," Porter thought, "am I in trouble!"

Something crucial was still absent from the unfolding plot when she heard a cry of "Ty." Porter's younger son has that name, so she could not help but look. She almost gasped."There was this surfer guy walking by -- oh, my God!" Porter recalled. "He was tattooed, with a bulldog just above his board shorts. He was very young. He was incredibly good-looking. He was exactly the kind of person I am not attacted to. I was a little afraid of him."

Bingo!

Porter had her novel's final plot element -- the alluring surfer and the dilemma he would present: "Should a woman stay on the road previously traveled? Or be brave enough to follow a road not traveled?"Fast forward to this coming Saturday at 9 p.m. "Flirting With Forty," the novel that came to Porter on the beach at Waikiki, airs as a movie on Lifetime. Sitting by the hotel pool as divorced mom named Jackie Laurens is Heather "Melrose Place" Locklear. Portraying the rock-abs surfer is Robert "Lipstick Jungle" Buckley.

It's an intriguing case of a TV flick based on women's fiction that parallels a woman's real life. Porter finally had the guts to interview surfer Ty Gurney for her book research, and that led to a relationship. After five years of frequent trips between Hawaii and Seattle, Porter and Gurney are, as she put it, "loosely engaged to be be married sometime in the future." And the 36-year-old surfer and 44-year-old writer are thrilled that their first child is due in May.

These days, Porter is a happy "homebody" who basks in the pregnancy glow as she pads around her traditional home in the posh Eastside enclave of Yarrow Point. Her new second home -- on the beach in Hawaii near Diamond Head -- is being remodeled. Plus, Porter, who will receive a low-six-figures sum from the film, is sure to reap many new readers from its star power, its holiday cheer and its heartening message for older women.

Two of her other novels also have been optioned for films, so life now could not be better.

"I'm proud of what I do," Porter said. "I've got great kids, a great guy in my life. There is no need to shift another way."

Things weren't always like this for the native of Visalia, Calif., a small town between Bakersfield and Fresno. Behind her are a succession of trying challenges over many years, including the death of her father when she was 15 and serious relationships with several men that ended because of their infidelities or, in one case, because the man was apparently gay. Then there was her marriage of 12 years to a brilliant executive in the wireless industry who is a paraplegic, conceiving two children with him through intense high-tech medical wizardry, and finally their wrenching divorce.

Porter attended UCLA, but not before a final summer's romance with a wisecracking Class A minor league pitcher from Bakersfield named Mark Langston, who later became an All-Star for the Seattle Mariners.

After UCLA, Porter got a master's in writing from the University of San Francisco. She soon had a plan to get published. Harlequin, the publishing giant of the romance genre, was pumping out 60 titles a month and Porter figured "somebody has to be writing those books, so why not me?"

Breaking in was tough: Her first 14 novels were rejected.

"I refused to accept," she recalled, "that I couldn't do it."

She finally had a book accepted and still writes formulaic Harlequins, with popular editions published around the globe. But five years ago Porter ventured into new territory with a different publisher, Hachette group. She set longer novels in suburban settings that include Bellevue, with characters closer to her own age and lifestyle -- "Mrs. Perfect," "Flirting With Forty," "Odd Mom Out."

Jayne Ann Krentz of Seattle, one of America's most popular romance writers, has high praise for Porter's work.

"Jane is on the leading edge for this new kind of writing," Krentz said. "She's pulled it off."

"Flirting With Forty" (5 Spot, 352 pages, $12.99) showcases Porter's talents -- an engaging first-person narrator, well-paced dramatics, realistic characters, sassy dialogue. What may be surprising is her examination of the emotional terrain of divorce, from the lingering pain of young children to tripwire relations with an ex-spouse.

Porter spent a week on the set during filming in Hawaii, which was fascinating for the former theater arts major. A 20-minute conversation with Locklear was a highlight. They attended UCLA around the same time and had other things in common. As Porter related, "Heather was sweet, warm, smart, articulate. We talked about being single moms."

Locklear, via her agent, offered her own compliments: "I loved working with Jane, and loved the story from the minute I read it. Hawaii? Surfing? Shirtless younger man? What's not to love? Most importantly, though, Jane captures the humor and real moments in everyday life. That's something everyone who reads her books, or sees the movie, can relate to."

Porter has watched the film three times, including once with Jake, 13, and Ty, 10.

"Mom, it's good" was her kids' verdict.

Porter has a couple of quibbles. Her "biggest disappointment" comes when Locklear's character turns into a drunken "Chatty Cathy" on the plane to Hawaii. There have been alcohol problems in Porter's family, so she never creates characters "who are dependent on alcohol." Nor does she drink.

She also wishes the film were set in Seattle like the novel. It was moved to Denver for a white Christmas aura, but also because filming was cheaper in Canada (where Calgary subbed for Denver).

Porter's capsule view of the film: "A feel-good holiday movie that is fizzy like champagne."

Porter's continuing relationship with Gurney has persuaded her to change her view of endings in real life. The two partners may be high-profile pros in their chosen fields, each with a Web site (janeporter.com, tygurneysurfschool.com). But their temperaments and outlooks are quite different.

Porter admits to being "a control freak," a driven professional following a calculated career path. Gurney, as befits Hawaii, is more laid-back, less into status or stuff.

Gurney's influence, plus the complexities of a relationship across 2,600 miles, led Porter to drop her longtime practice of "planning endings." She said, "Ty always tells me, 'How can you play the game and stare at the scoreboard at the same time? You can't know the outcome until the end of the game.' I now recognize that the good stuff in life is unscripted.

"Things surprise us -- you have to be willing to take risks, perhaps get hurt or have things not work out. I have stopped worrying about that. Now I'm just going to live the story. ... After years of being a drama queen, it's nice to be more mellow."

johnmarshall@seattlepi.com, 206-448-8170

Update: Google Print Decision

Beverly — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 21:58:39 GMT

As we have been following the Google vs. Authors and Publishers saga, we thought we would keep you updated on the most recent ‘going-on’s’.

Apparently, with Google’s 125 million pay out, they have been granted the right to pull millions of out-of-print texts and place them online. Google's co-founder Sergey Brin called the agreement "a real win-win for us all, the real victors are all the readers. The tremendous wealth of knowledge that lies within the books of the world will now be at their fingertips."

For the history on what started this mess, click here for past information on “Google Print”.

Gay Marriage Merely 'A Matter of Choice'

Stories — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 18:03:32 GMT

CLAYTON, N.C., Nov 06, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire via COMTEX/ -- A Novel Response to Proposition 8

P.D. Publishing announced today the release of A Matter of Choice, a novel by G. Carlos Smith that explores the lives of two young men as they find their way during unforgiving but changing times. In a moving but delightful love story, the novel considers the tragic effects of laws like Proposition 8 while offering a new hope.

Like thousands of others, Smith and his spouse were married following the landmark California Supreme Court decision that recognized the right of same-sex couples to marry. "We can't help but wonder why our desire to make a legally binding commitment to each other and our children remains so objectionable to so many," Smith said. "But we look forward to a day when laws that stigmatize and discriminate are repealed, and we all will be able to love and marry the person of our choice."

"We're particularly pleased to publish this touching romance novel," said Linda Daniel, President of P.D. Publishing. "In this debut work Smith does a masterful job challenging our views while warming our hearts."

SYNOPSIS

At Conrad's wedding, everything appears perfect as he embarks on a life with the woman of his dreams and a legal career that holds every promise. By contrast, his best man and childhood friend, Marcus, works at a dead-end job parking cars after coming out at home and dropping out of college. Building on his traditional upbringing, Conrad successfully pursues a calculated plan for professional success, while Marcus rejects that life and drifts, drinking with friends and clubbing in San Francisco. But as Conrad locks in his law firm partnership, his marriage suffers. And when a relationship for Marcus finally blossoms, he finds himself unsure. While their choices have predictable results, the old friends are surprised to discover a rekindling of their youthful bond and an unexpected peace as they find their way during unforgiving but changing times.

In a love story that reverberates from beliefs that stigmatize and laws that discriminate, these boys becoming men resonate with the power and elegance of the concertos they choose to perform.

DISTRIBUTION

A Matter of Choice (ISBN 978-1-933720-55-5) is available to booksellers through Ingram Book Groups, Baker & Taylor, and ASP Wholesales at 40% discount. It is available to readers through local bookstores and may be purchased directly from Amazon.com (world-wide), Amazon.ca, Amazon.co.uk, Barnes and Noble, or Lambda Rising.

ABOUT G. CARLOS SMITH

G. Carlos Smith lives with his spouse and their three children in Woodside, California. He has a background in music and is currently a partner in the Silicon Valley office of a large international law firm. He graduated from Stanford with degrees in Music and History before completing law school at Columbia. The author's net royalties from the sale of the book will be donated to the San Francisco AIDS Foundation or other charity. Visit the author at redroom.com/author/g-carlos-smith

ABOUT P.D. PUBLISHING

P.D. Publishing is an independent publishing company catering to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered Community as well as the Independent Bookstore Community. With the talents of a fine staff possessing years of publishing experience, P.D. offers the LGBT community professional publishing, distribution, and fulfillment. P.D.'s goal is to feature the most talented voices, both new and experienced, who are writing LGBT literature today. More information about P.D. is available at pdpublishing.com

SOURCE P.D. Publishing

 http://pdpublishing.com

Google and Copyright ... Again

Beverly — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 05:45:48 GMT

It was announced today that Google paid 125 million in settlement dollars to two book publishers and this news has other content owners, primarily Viacom, smiling.

With the announcement of Google’s payout, Viacom took the opportunity to remind folks about its $1 billion dollar claim against Google. "Copyright laws provide creators with the incentive to create the works consumers crave," Viacom said in a statement Tuesday. "It is unfortunate that the publishers had to spend years, and millions of dollars, for Google to honor that principle. We hope that Google avoids the wasted effort and comes more quickly to respect movies and television programming."

Google’s settlement today has many wondering how the search giant will move forward with their mission to digitize content. Is 125 million enough to make Google think twice?

Hollywood lives - Jackie Collins interview

Stories — Sat, 25 Oct 2008 14:53:02 GMT

Published Date: 25 October 2008

By LEE RANDALL

She's been a Hollywood Wife, known the odd Stud and taken her Chances, but through it all Jackie Collins has always been herself – the glamorous author of more than two dozen bestselling novels

I love it when people say – and they think they're being complimentary – 'Oh yes, your books are great trash!' And I go, 'Well, actually they're not trash, because trash, people throw away." There's flint in Jackie Collins's mellifluous voice, calling up images of an iron fist encased in a velvet glove.

Collins isn't boasting. She interacts with her readers all the time, answering comments they post on her website, via Facebook, and the good old-fashioned way, by getting out and about. This summer she even took to the road in Mariah Carey's former tour bus – the height of luxury, she assures me – to promote her latest novel, Married Lovers.

"I was in New Orleans and there were 500 people waiting. They'd tell me their stories. Some would say, 'You know, I had all your hardcover books and I lost them in Katrina.' I felt, oh my god – you're worried about losing my books when you've lost so much? I've sent so many books off to people. It's just a teeny little thing but I guess it means a lot to them."

It's easy to imagine fans pouring their hearts out to Collins. In the course of my research I watched countless clips in which she exuded effortless charm. Why, then, did I feel trepidation as I entered her suite at London's Dorchester Hotel?

Maybe it's the stern glare and flaring nostrils familiar from the famous double portrait with her big sister Joan, which appeared in Vanity Fair. Maybe it's the fact that she's a publishing phenomenon who's still at the top of her game. Since releasing her first novel, The World is Full of Married Men, in 1968, Collins has sold more than 400 million copies of her books, racking up bestseller after bestseller. She lives in elegant splendour in Los Angeles in a house she designed herself. It's so vast that it's a major expedition getting to the gym she built for her late fiancé, Frank Calcagnini. "I always think, by the time I get there I'll be too tired to do anything," she jokes, adding that she'd always rather work than work out.

All this is to come, of course. If it's true that you never have a second chance to make a first impression, I'll admit right now that she had me at "Hello." She didn't make an entrance, merely materialised by my side, hand extended to shake mine, compliments flowing like nectar.

"The black hair, white shirt, black blazer – it works!" she said. I swooned a little, but parried, "Could your saying that have anything to do with the fact that you have on almost the exact same outfit?" (With much better jewellery, I hasten to add.)

Over the course of our conversation I found Collins wickedly funny and particularly adroit at staying just this side of indiscreet. What's most remarkable and, to me, admirable, is her technique of circling back to ensure frequent references to specific novels or characters in the course of answering questions about herself. It's savvy brand awareness, reminding me that however cosy our chat, we're here to do business. For the first time I understood the covenant she's made with her audience: readers are passionate about her books because she is. This is her life's calling and she's in her element.

She's wanted to be a writer since she was eight years old. "I remember my mother would take us to Roehampton swimming baths and I recall coming back one day, it was a glorious day, and I took out my father's card table and set out pencils, pens and paper. I wrote a book called These Things Called Teenagers: Americans. Then I wrote a book called These Things Called Teenagers: French. I already understood about a series! And I would cut out the illustrations for my heroine and my hero out of magazines."

Long before moving permanently to Los Angeles, some 25 years ago, Collins pined for the place. "When I was at school I used to pretend that my father was in the CIA and I was American. I was a loner and wanted to be in Hollywood. I loved it, loved movie stars, loved the whole ambience."

And her books reflect a particularly American take on the world, it's safe to say. If you have to classify them, she says, how about calling them Flash Readings? "I write relationships, not romance. They're about ordinary people leading extraordinary lives, and that's what the American dream is all about. People like to read about it."

Not to mention the element of escapism. Who doesn't have a wishlist of wild adventures they'd embark upon if, like so many of her characters, they possessed unlimited power, a killer body and great wealth?

"Yeah! It's creating a fantasy that I have observed and giving it to people to take them out of their lives. I get so many e-mails from readers saying, 'Your books got me through a hard time and they're the only way I can relax,' or, 'I've never read a book before but I love all your books.' It's been very rewarding." In more ways than one – if the 2008 Sunday Times Rich List is accurate, Collins is worth around £90 million; but she's never written for the money.

"My husband (nightclub owner Oscar Lerman] could have kept me very nicely. I think it was a passion for creating characters that I've always had. I never in a million years envisioned myself writing 26 books and being on the bestseller lists every time. It's amazing! I go out and speak to women because I think I can inspire them. I say, 'You know, I am a school dropout and 26 bestselling books later, I can tell you that you've got to do something in your life and with your life.

"All women have to have an identity. That's why there are so many miserable women who say that they're invisible when they get to middle age – because they are! They become a mother and a wife, and their husband is slaving over a hot secretary and their children are going off to have their lives, and they have nothing. You need something that's yours, that gives you an identity."

Kids leave and many husbands do, but not hers. Collins and Lerman were married for 26 years, until his death from cancer, in 1992. Sadly, history was to repeat itself some years later, when her fiancé Frank Calcagnini also died of cancer, in 1998. She's since discovered she has an affinity for solitude.

"I live on my own because I like to write on my own. I've been married my whole life, or engaged, and in a million years I'd never give up the television clicker again – never! I love the freedom. I decided to come to London what, five days ago, so what do I do? Pick up the phone and book a ticket. I don't have to say, 'do you mind?', none of that crap. If I want to stay an extra week I can, I don't have to answer to anybody. If I want to buy a Ferarri while I'm here, I can."

Once I stop laughing, I sputter, "It's not everybody who can say that." She laughs. "No! It sounds like one of my heroines."

When Lerman met Collins she was at a crossroads. Her first husband, the father of her eldest daughter, was a wealthy businessman and drug addict, who killed himself after their divorce. As a young, single mother she was modelling and acting, but not exactly setting the world on fire – and was very much in the shadow of her famous older sister.

Lerman was older and American, from Philadelphia. He told her he'd moved to London because seeing her photograph left him desperate to meet her. "That's a very romantic come-on. And he proposed to me the first night we went out," she says.

"He owned the Ad Lib (nightclub] and I was going out with this guy who ran it, so I would be there every night. Oscar would be sitting there watching me. One night he said, 'You know there's a concert, Diana Ross and the Supremes, would you like to go see that?', and I said 'Yeah.' And then he said – this is so romantic; I've never written about it but I should – the concert was on a Tuesday, and he said, 'OK, Tuesday night is now mine.' Eventually he came up with another great plan, until he got the whole week."

When he asked what it was she did, exactly, Collins replied, "I'm a writer." Except she never finished anything and hadn't been published. But Collins had half of The World is Full of Married Men written – in longhand, her preferred methodology even now. After reading it, Lerman said, "You're a very talented storyteller. You have to finish this book."

Taking his encouragement to heart, she hopped on a plane to New York and holed up in the beach resort of Montauk. "Being English I loved getting a suntan, but I said 'I'm not going to allow myself to sit in the sun until I've written ten pages a day.' And that's how I finished the book. Ten pages, throw myself into the sun."

It would be easy to fill the rest of this space with anecdotes about her wonderfully romantic husband, but what I'm really curious to know is how they remained such great friends without it quenching the passion? "Role playing," she retorts. "I am a great admirer of becoming other characters. It's great to take the weekend away where you have the blonde wig and he's a soldier or whatever. It's so much fun. Not the whole time, but once in a while. I think I wrote about it in Hollywood Divorces, with Lola, my Latina. I loved Lola."

Do we suffer from overly romantic notions of marriage, then? "Yes. We all know that the great passion you have with a new lover will last maybe two years. After that you have to like that person. You can still have great sex, but not the same sex you were having, when you couldn't wait to rip someone's clothes off. It's like a meal. If you love lobster and have to eat it for two years straight, you want to have it cooked in a different way.

"People have to be realistic. Marriage changes things. Children change it completely. The mistake a lot of women make is they take the frustration they feel with their marriage and put all the love they have into their children. I know women in Hollywood who are married to very successful and powerful men. Men will find themselves a new Asian wife at some point. The wives are still looking great, but the reason that he left is that she gave all her attention to the children."

But if we're being completely realistic, isn't monogamy too much to ask of a man? Her big eyes widen further. "I think if you treat a man right, you can keep him for however long you want to!" And actually, in Collins's books, adulterers always repent the error of their ways, or pay a horrible price for their perfidy. Small wonder the late film director Louis Malle dubbed her a "raunchy moralist".

The Jackie Collins we knew very little about – by design – is the mother of Tracy, Rory and Tiffany, all of whom have blossomed into successful young women, none of whom I could put a face to. How did the best-connected woman in Hollywood manage to keep her kids off the radar?

"My daughters are my greatest achievement. They are really spectacular women. They don't want to be in the public eye and have no desire to do the photo spreads with mummy. I had no desire to put them in that position. When I was very young I was Joan Collins's little sister. They still think of me that way in England, but never in America. I never wanted my girls to have that tag: Jackie Collins's daughters. They'd never tell their friends who I was – though the friends would get a surprise eventually. I never left them alone when they were growing up, I was very hands-on. I'd meet them from school, cook for them every night. I'd go out to the nightclub at 10 o'clock, when they were asleep, and I'd get up every morning to take them to school. When they were little I'd write the books when they were napping."

This hands-on approach might, she admits, be her way of overcompensating for being a wild child. She was thrown out of school for smoking, had a few dangerous liaisons, and was generally mischievous, though she quite enjoys keeping most of the details shrouded in mystery. When I pester her to write her autobiography, she says, "Maybe, maybe. I'm not sure how much I could go into my juvenile delinquent years. I don't know if I want my kids to read it, though I have managed to lead a very private life, too, so I think people would be interested."

Um yeah, just a bit. In our short time together she's alluded to a close encounter of the mobster kind when she was new to LA, and has mentioned close friendships with people such as Michael and Shakira Caine, Sidney and Joanna Poitier, and Paul O'Grady. ("He came to LA as Lily Savage and we got thrown out of Harry Winston's on Rodeo Drive. Silly me, ruining my reputation – in I come with this 8ft tall drag queen. Paul's so much better looking as a man.")

Unlike Lily Savage, Collins exudes glamour, despite being simply dressed. It occurs to me that apart from her stellar cleavage, the world hasn't a clue about her figure. Does she have nice legs, for example?

"They're quite good, actually. I remember Katharine Hepburn saying, 'I have ten pairs of black pants, ten turtle-neck sweaters,' and I follow that, because then I don't have to be running around thinking about clothes all the time. I can just change my jewellery. I've developed a look that pleases me. I have it custom made and I'm very comfortable. I don't give a shit about fashion."

Maybe not, but just out of curiosity, if I managed to get past her security, would she look this impeccable when she's home alone? "No. I would be wearing gym shoes and a T-shirt, black pants and probably a black shirt and I'd have my hair on top of my head – but I would have make-up on. And sunglasses."

How rock'n'roll, wearing shades indoors.

"Not inside, but when I came out to let you in. After you'd jumped over my security fence," she says, with a grin.

She really is good at this role playing game.

• Married Lovers is published by Simon & Schuster, priced £17.99. IEW

CULTURAL WRITER CONNECTS WITH TORONTO

Aphrodite — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 02:14:41 GMT

By JON SARPONG

October 23, 2008

Writer Stacey Marie Robinson is fulfilling her lifelong dream as an artist and writer. Her most recent novel, Video light is a part of her Urban Toronto Tales series, a collection of books centered on urban culture, which has created a critical and commercial buzz across the city.

"This recognition is great," says Robinson. "The feedback has been wonderful. People come up to me and tell me how much they love the books. Young people, who normally wouldn't read find me and tell me they read my stories. Hearing this feedback makes me really happy."

Robinson's ability to connect with young readers has allowed her to penetrate a difficult market. Competing with video games, online social networks, sports and other extracurricular activities, her novels are set apart by the recognizable and realistic Toronto characters and landmarks which appear in her stories.

"If you don't live in Toronto, you may not understand the book," Robinson says. "It takes place at Caribana and the language, feel and characters reflect Toronto. The story is real - I'm mentioning places like Scarborough and Mississauga so readers can relate to this Toronto experience."

After years of energy spent struggling to gain recognition in the world of traditional publishing, Eventually, she realized the only way her work would be read was to self publish. Robinson is pleased with her choice, which has ultimately allowed her Caribbean-Canadian focused story to become available to her readers.

"There were a lot of rejection letters piling up," she says. "Publishers said my work didn't fit their mandate and style. I'm not sure what the issue was - I think maybe the subject matter seemed superficial to those who didn't get it or perhaps it didn't seem like it would reach a big enough market. So I realized that the best thing for me to do would be to create my own opportunity and self publish."

Robinson's book reveals her love of Toronto and its dynamic cultural mosaic. For her, the novel is a unique Toronto story which deserves to be told.

"Video light is a Toronto story," she says. "It has Caribbean-Canadian characters and is an urban romance story with a bit of a Toronto flair. The young people who are reading this book can relate to what's happening in the story because it truly is their experience. Video light is a combination of people that I see every day. I'm so proud that young men are reading the book and young girls love it and can't put it down. People come up to me and say, 'I never read books, but I read yours.' I'm just happy I can get people interested in reading."

Due to the success of Video light, Robinson plans to release new material in order to satisfy the literary hunger of her growing legion of fans. To find out more about Robinson's work or to purchase books from the Urban Toronto Tales Series, visit: staceymarierobinson.com.

Newspapers Axe Book Reviews

Beverly — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 03:45:06 GMT

We’ve all seen the text “New York Times Best Seller” and I am here to tell you that this type of accolade is in jeopardy at major, daily newspapers.

Just this past weekend, the Chicago Tribune terminated their book review section and the LA Times did so last year. Now, the only name plate newspapers still housing a book review section in their daily are the Washington Post and the New York Times. This change in traditional media content just means that writers and editors need to become far more innovative with the ways they use book reviews in other mediums. Perhaps they will start to explore using commonplace social media and network sites to build hype, as these mediums have been said to have a reach rate of over 80%.

Whatever the next steps will be to overcome the loss of the print dailies book review section, these changes give insight to the greater picture plaguing traditional media and giving good reason for writers and editors to explore more e-methods of publicity.

Book Review by Amelia Richards at Cataromance.com

Aphrodite — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 20:44:18 GMT

Review: Veiled Truth by Vivi Anna

Magically fascinating in plot and characters, VEILED TRUTH makes you believe the unique city of Necropolis can actually exist.

The Valorian Chronicles series continues with another captivating look inside the lives of Otherworldly beings and how crimes are solved by some of their own. Vivi Anna let her imagination take VEILED TRUTH to new heights, as fervent passions, dark mysteries and perilous danger intertwine.

When circumstances lead to Lyra Magice and Theron LeNoir working together, she is not at all happy. Lyra is a witch who works for the Otherworld Crime Unit and uses her abilities to get to the bottom of crimes in Necropolis. There have been several unsolved murders in her city, and she is determined to get answers to the many questions her team has encountered. She met the charming Frenchman, who is half vampire/half witch, once before and knows she could easily fall under his charismatic spell. However, Theron has a book in his possession which could possibly help to decipher some of the clues left at the murder scenes, so Lyra will try to work with the man and ignore the mounting desire she feels whenever they are together.

As a consultant to the OCU, Theron would like to stop the dark evil which he fears is in this city. Even though he harbors some secrets about his past, he hopes they will not make a difference in his present life, especially if Lyra should happen to discover them. He was intrigued by the witch when they met before, and he finds himself becoming even more entranced as they spend time together working on the case. When another person is killed, a high official is a potential suspect and this causes more complications during the investigation. Making matters worse, Theron thinks Lyra may become a victim of the possible demonic activity in the city. As their inner secrets and desires constantly battle, this couple must come to trust each other or all may be lost to them.

Creatively talented in numerous genres, Vivi Anna never disappoints her readers. With enthralling storylines and dynamic characters, each book by this gifted author will keep one totally engrossed in every compelling scene. There is not a page of VEILED TRUTH which does not offer something to capture the thoughts of the reader and pull them even more into the story. From the first, there are intriguing scenarios and mysteries to be solved, where each new revelation further grabbed my interest. As the OCU uncovered facts about this disturbing case, the anxiety levels of its members escalate and their dissimilar personalities show their concern in different ways. Although these individuals are supernatural beings, they still come across as very human in how they react to situations plus the emotions they portray. The spirited natures of Theron and Lyra are especially engaging, as these two had secrets but their inner feelings are hard to contain when facing troubling circumstances. These extremely honest emotions are depicted with such sincere openness, and I found myself responding likewise to their anguish or joy. The longing between this couple is revealed with heartfelt desires, and also beautifully told through word and deed. VEILED TRUTH will leave the reader feeling completely satisfied, as this is a noteworthy story in every aspect. http://www.vivianna.net Silhouette Nocturne

A Reader for your iPod

Beverly — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 03:30:20 GMT

If you've got an iPod and like using it to view video while travelling or waiting between appointments, you will want to check out eBook Hood to download books to your iPod as well.

eBook Hood allows iPod users to format the text into a readible format, download as many books as a user would like and purchase the actual book for their collection if they so desire.

Torrent Sites Interested in e-Books

Beverly — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 04:01:11 GMT

There seems to be a lot of attention on the e-book industry and the recent attention is one without borders. In a topical article we came across today, we found out that one of the founders of Pirate Bay, a Swedish torrent site, has alluded to his interest in making published books available in an electronic state. How does this differ from what Amazon is doing with the kindle you ask? Well, the very nature of Pirate Bay is that users upload movies (including new releases), music, television shows, previously aired events to a central site and others can download them free of charge. Nonetheless, this article on Pirate Bay owners e-book interest, leads us to think that if the owners of a site such as this have expressed an interest in electronically publishing books, traditional publishers should take notice and beware.

As a publisher, if you haven’t engaged a team of new media analysts to execute your electronic publishing branch of your business, you need to do so now. As a writer, if you have been fighting the rise of e-readership you need to consider how this movement will affect your ability to stay current. Consider widening your publisher relationships and employing another if your current publisher does not have a strong e-publishing brand.

Whether you choose to take action now or later the market continues to evolve around us. I encourage you to read this blog post written by Martin J. Thörnkvist for another perspective on your industry.

Tools to Help Your Web Presence

Beverly — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 22:37:52 GMT

This, I hope, will be a fun and educational blog post for those of you who are looking at hosting a blog or your own personal site with WordPress.

These days, the Web itself makes it easy for even lay persons to build their own presence online and more and more writers at all stages have recognized this and are running with the concept all the way through to the finish line. Well, if you are one of those writers we have a treat for you. Below we have listed Palin Ningthoujam Top 12 WordPress themes - Enjoy and I hope you find something you like!

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Top 12 WordPress Themes

Though there are dozens of top lists of WordPress themes available online, we never seem to get enough. So after scrolling through hundreds of themes across the Web, we decided to come up with another of our lists of top themes that are a class apart in terms of uniqueness in design and visual appeal.

This is a collection of our top 12 in no particular order. Check them out. While most are free, there are few that are not, though they are too good to miss. Tell us about your favorite WordPress themes in the comments.

Infinity

Infinity makes you think you are looking at ultimate creativity in WordPress theme design. This three column theme has been put together beautifully with thumbnails, header and footer graphics, and a picture scroll. The color play is impressive. A great theme for designers and photo bloggers.

Red Passion

Red Passion has exquisite red floral graphics in the header area and one more in the background, and the combination of the two makes this theme a treat for sore eyes. The search box is located just below the blog title and description. There is also an RSS icon in the header area next to the search box.

F8 is a magazine-like theme for photo bloggers who wish to also have their pictures do the talking. The clean white background gels with the black lines and the picture grid that run across the homepage. The theme can double as a portfolio site for designers and multimedia professionals. Note: F8 is not a free theme.

WP Coda

WP Coda is one of the most professional-looking themes in this collection. The color combination is fantastic. One thing that differentiates the theme from the rest is the sliding posts. The author says he had made this theme by modifying lots of existing code and using them with his design. The theme mimics the functionality of the popular coda website. Worth a look.

TV.Elements

TV. Elements is a neat Wordpress theme for video bloggers. There is a main video display and series of video scrolls on the right hand side. On the left side, there are ShareThis, subscribe, and comment links. Below the video window, you can add your post. The dark background gives it a necessary mystic look. Like F8, TV.ELements is not a free theme.

Wood World

Wood World is a neatly designed theme. I like how every post has been separated from each other. Each and every part of the theme, including a scrapedRSS icon and a search box with a wooden-look background, has been given detailed attention.

Notepad Chaos

Notepad Chaos is a vibrant, colorful, and floral theme with one of the most intricate designs. The sidebar elements have been done up with different post-it note designs, while the main posts are nestled in a white notepad design. The theme also has a handwritten search box, navigational links in the header, and sidebar headlines.

Agregado

Agregado is a another radical take on how a WordPress theme can be constructed. This theme suits your normal blogging requirements, as well as your lifestreaming requirements, served in a sidebar capsule. It has the snippet of the latest post shown on the home page, along with just the headlines of the older posts. The subcategories, pages, archives, search, etc. are tucked away so that the reader focuses on the latest content.

Intrablog

Intrablog is a theme with a very clean and fresh look. This is a result of the white and silver colors in the post and sidebar areas. It’s another unique take on WordPress theme design and suitable for personal blogs.

Hot Orange

Hot Orange has a red header with a neat floral design, a post area with a black background, and a silver color area that bridges the header and post area. Another good color combination and unique design.

Rainbow Feather

Rainbow Feather has shades of sky blue, yellow, blue, and pink colors joined together in horizontal blocks to form the header navigation area, main header, post area, and footer. This is one of the most striking themes that we have come across.

Motion is for those who are daring and can opt for a one column theme. There are three blocks of content that expand on a single click and contract when another is opened. There is a link to the older entries below these content blocks. The color combination of orange, silver, and black is attractive.

Scripps Selling Ad Spots Around Short Stories

Beverly — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 18:09:52 GMT

Short story publishing is not just for the traditional sources anymore as we hear today that newspaper publisher Scripps has started using a “short story” spin to engage readers and increase advertising dollars.

The New eReader

Beverly — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 05:44:35 GMT

Although this product has not formally been launched, it seems to be all that anyone can talk about. Yesterday belonged to Kindle, today belongs to Plastic Logic -

Life in Iraq

Beverly — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 05:16:39 GMT

A non-fiction account from a WSJ correspondent

Usually, our blog content is of a lighter flavor, but this post is just the opposite. In a release from the Wall Street Journal yesterday, we read that their Iraqi correspondent, Farnaz Fassihi, has taken the experiences she has gathered up over two years of covering the war in Iraq and has published it all in her new book entitled "Waiting for an Ordinary Day: The Unraveling of Life in Iraq."

Fassihi’s coverage of the war in Iraq is her most recognizable piece to date, but don’t let that fool you, critics have said only positive things about this, her non-fiction debut.

In one of Farnaz Fassihi’s emails to family, while still in Iraq she wrote, “Little by little, day-by-day, being based in Iraq has defied all those reasons. I am house bound. I leave when I have a very good reason to and a scheduled interview. I avoid going to people's homes and never walk in the streets. I can't go grocery shopping any more, can't eat in restaurants, can't strike a conversation with strangers, can't look for stories, can't drive in anything but a full armored car, can't go to scenes of breaking news stories, can't be stuck in traffic, can't speak English outside, can't take a road trip, can't say I'm an American, can't linger at checkpoints, can't be curious about what people are saying, doing, feeling.” If Fassihi’s novel is as eye opening and telling as the email excerpt above, the critics must be right – this is a must read.

Rachelle Chase and Single Minded Women

Beverly — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 01:04:04 GMT

One of our StoryBank.com featured authors, Rachelle Chase, has filled us in on some good news! She has been approached by Josie Brown to host the upcoming radio talk show Single Minded Women and lucky for us, she has accepted.

The show is scheduled to go live on September 15 at 9:00 pm and it is an actual spin off a Web site that is truly dedicated to today's single woman. The female targeted site gives single women a place to support and honor their lifestyle choice, with a mission to provide a trusted community where single women can come together to share their views.

Rachelle Chase's radio talk show version of SingleMindedWomen.com is promised to be just as fascinating as the site itself. Rachelle already has a line up dynamic guests scheduled that are sure to captivate, educate and entertain.

The Single Minded Women talk show will utilize and online phenomenon called blog talk radio - very similar to a podcast with all the fixings of a radio talk show you would listen to in your cars.

Tune in for the shows debut. You won't want to miss it!

Barnes & Noble Steps Up in New Media

Beverly — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 03:04:25 GMT

Barnes & Noble has stepped up its digital game on the “Barnes & Noble Studio” section of their site. The digital area of the site was originally set up to show video interviews, book trailers, and other common forms of new media entertainment. Now however, site visitors to BarnesandNoble.com will notice something new – something the bookstore giant is calling “moving paragraphs”. As of three weeks ago, Barnes & Noble started to post paragraphs of well know novels, voiced my acclaimed writers. See below, their first installment of moving paragraphs - Mark Twain's "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn", voiced by Pulitzer Prize winning author Richard Russo.

IF WRITERS COMPETED IN THE OLYMPICS:

Aphrodite — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 16:14:12 GMT

IF WRITERS COMPETED IN THE OLYMPICS: A HORROR STORY

August 21, 2008 by ruthpennebaker

BOB: Chris, what can you tell me about today’s competitors from Team USA for the writers’ marathon?

CHRIS: Well, Bob — right here, you’ll see one of our contenders from Austin, Texas. Of course, she’s never won anything before. Not even a Pulitzer. Not even nominated for a Pulitzer! And she’s 58. But you don’t have to be young to be a writer. In fact, you don’t even have to be sober.

BOB: Fifty-eight? But she looks … older.

CHRIS (sagely): That’s what years of rejection will do. Also, lack of Vitamin D. Writers stay indoors all the time. That’s why she’s so pale.

BOB: Can you tell me what she’s doing now?

CHRIS: Well, she’s just sitting at the computer and making faces.

BOB: Oh, yeah. I see. So, is she … sane?

CHRIS: For a writer, yes.

BOB: Huh. She seems to spend a lot of time on the Internet. How many times a day does she check her email, anyway?

CHRIS (chuckling): You think that’s bad? Wait till she starts talking to her cat.

BOB: And what’s she wearing? Doesn’t the writers’ team have uniforms? That looks like a dirty sweatsuit she’s wearing.

CHRIS: Trust me, Bob. It’s better than what they usually wear. Some of them spend the day in pajamas.

BOB (excitedly): Wait a minute! I think she’s starting to write.

CHRIS: You’re right, Bob! She’s definitely beginning something. Look at her fingers fly!

BOB: Oh, wow! She’s off to a really great start.

CHRIS: There’s a muse around here somewhere! Have you ever seen anything like it?

(DRAMATIC PAUSE)

BOB: She just stopped, Chris. She’s back on the Internet.

CHRIS (wearily): I know. She had a really strong start in that first paragraph. Then she just quit. Did you see that last sentence she wrote?

BOB (shaking his head, sadly): Yeah, it was pretty bad. Her head’s just not into it. And her posture! It’s kind of like she has a “Kick me!” sign on her back.

CHRIS: That’s a writer’s posture, Bob. It’s pretty typical. They’re a sad, bitter bunch.

BOB: But, wait. Where’s she going now?

CHRIS: To the kitchen. To heat up her coffee in the microwave. She’ll probably load the dishwasher while she’s in there, too. She always does that when she’s blocked. It’s funny. She’s blocked a lot. But her kitchen’s still a pretty big mess. Go figure.

BOB: You know, Chris, I’ve added it up in my head again and again. I just can’t see her pulling this off. Have you seen that Chinese writer? She’s already written a novel in 20 minutes. She looks confident. She looks like a winner. She –

CHRIS: Hold on! Team USA is just coming back from the kitchen! She’s –

BOB (horrified): She’s deleting everything she’s written. Now she’s banging her head against the computer. Screaming and crying and –

CHRIS: That’s a warm-up, Bob. She may still have a chance in this race.

BOB: But … what if she doesn’t medal? What will she do then? Bang her head some more?

CHRIS: Nope. She’ll just write about it. These people love to write about suffering and rejection.

BOB: Kind of sad, isn’t it? Let’s get back to gymnastics.

http://geezersisters.wordpress.com/2008/08/21/if-writers-competed-in-the-olympics-a-horror-story/

Word of Mouth Effective for Kindle Sales

Beverly — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 04:07:44 GMT

Amazon Relies on Customers to Pimp the Kindle, Courtesy of: Wired Media

Mike Pfeffer, a 26-year-old IT professional, was thinking about buying a Kindle, Amazon's pricey new digital book reader, but he wanted to look at the screen and touch the buttons before shelling out $359 for it.

So he went to the Amazon site and, through the See a Kindle in Your City message board, found a current Kindle owner in Manhattan who was willing to meet up. The woman worked in the building across the street from him and enthusiastically showed him everything from how the screen looked to how to turn pages on the device.

"I told her she should go work for Amazon," says Pfeffer, who wound up buying a Kindle the very next day.

To help sell its high-priced digital reading device, Amazon is relying more than ever on its tried-and-true sales strategies of word of mouth and customer reviews, and it appears to be working, although the total market for the device is questionable.

In August, Citigroup analyst Mark Mahaney projected that Amazon would sell 380,000 Kindles this year, up from an earlier estimate of 190,000, adding in a report that "Kindle is becoming the iPod of the book world" since its release in November 2007. (However, Mahaney's estimate, based on a TechCrunch article that said 240,000 Kindles have been sold so far this year, was, by his own admission, based on fuzzy numbers. Amazon hasn't released any sales numbers for the Kindle, and Amazon has reportedly sought to distance itself from those numbers.) Another analyst, Tim Bueneman from McAdams Wright Ragen, reported last week that several new versions of the device are in development, including a textbook model.

Amazon says its approach to selling the Kindle—no outside advertising and just relying on the Kindle community and stumping by Jeff Bezos to drive sales—is deliberate. The Kindle currently has over 4,200 customer reviews on the Amazon website, more than for any other top-selling item in Amazon's electronics category, and the vast majority are positive.

"Customer reviews of Kindle have been terrific—that tends to help sell the product," says Ian Freed, the Amazon executive in charge of the Kindle. More than three quarters of the reviewers give the Kindle at least four stars out of five, with many using words like fabulous, must-have, and changed my life.

The See a Kindle in Your City program, which was started in May, is just another extension of that idea. Freed and members of his group saw that people were especially curious when they saw one in public and decided to capitalize on the phenomenon.

"We tapped right into that, allowing customers to create a space where potential customers could physically meet, like at a coffee shop or a restaurant, and show each other Kindles," says Freed. Since the Kindle is an expensive new technology, selling the device at retail outlets where customers could see and touch it would seem to make sense, but Freed says that would diminish the community-based marketing that's propelling sales. But there may be another reason for See a Kindle in Your City—it could be that stores just don't want to carry the device.

"Kindle is actually a tough product to sell at retail," says Michael Gartenberg, vice president of mobile strategy at Jupitermedia. Sony's e-book reader, a similar product, may have set the tone. It was released earlier than the Kindle in September 2006 and uses the same E Ink technology for its screen—and doesn't seem to have sold particularly well as a retail product at either Sony's own stores or at Borders, although Sony, like Amazon, has not released any kind of sales figures for its device. "It's going to take a fair amount of evangelizing to explain the product, and the best people to evangelize are the users of the products," says Gartenberg of the Kindle.

Among the features that Kindle users have been most enthusiastic about is the wireless-downloading feature that differentiates it from Sony's reader, which requires a computer to first receive the books. Digital books can be delivered almost anywhere to users in less than a minute using Sprint's nationwide high-speed wireless network, fulfilling users' desires for instant gratification. Indeed, instead of cannibalizing sales of physical books, Freed says Amazon's statistics show that Kindle owners more than doubled their overall number of book purchases after getting the device, and that they still bought just as many physical books after getting one as they had before.

Those avid Kindle users have become effective proselytizers, often talking up the device with the zeal of religious converts. Citigroup's Mahaney raves about the ease of taking e-books with him when he travels, and one journalist (who wished to remain anonymous) says that he was initially skeptical about the whole notion of e-books and only got a review copy of it to trash it. "But I love it," he says. "I couldn't find anything bad about it. I use it all the time."

Though the idea of Kindle get-togethers may sound suspiciously like Tupperware parties, Gartenberg thinks Amazon's strategy is different.

"There's a difference between selling and evangelizing," he explains. "Amazon is not asking its customers to sell, it's asking its fans to sell. And they're not making any commission on those sales."

To be sure, Amazon's call to Kindle fans to push the product has had its detractors.

"What an outrageous request from Amazon!" one respondent wrote when Amazon introduced its See a Kindle in Your City message forum. "Take your time, go out in public with your Kindle, and help us sell more Kindles and make more money. I appreciate the offer to become an unpaid pimp for the Kindle, but no thanks, Amazon."

A New Perspective on the Amazon-Shelfari Venture

Beverly — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 04:03:06 GMT

I came across an interesting blog post from Tim O'Rielly, which I just had to share. It covers the Amazon purchase of Shelfari in a whole new way.

Social Networking for Books: One Ring, or Loosely Joined?

I have to confess that one of the social networking tools I find most valuable is Goodreads. (It's a close second to Twitter, and way ahead of Facebook, Friendfeed, or Dopplr.) Unlike twitter, where I follow hundreds of people (possible because of twitter's minimalism) and am followed by thousands, on Goodreads, I follow and am followed by a small circle of friends and people whose taste in books I trust. As someone who loves books, it is the pinnacle of private social networking for me.

So it was with some interest that I read about Amazon's acquisition of Shelfari. Much of the resulting commentary has focused on the problems this poses for LibraryThing, in which Amazon also has an invesment (via their recent purchase of Abebooks.) I'm a bit surprised that the articles have seemingly ignored the fact that Goodreads appears to be the market leader, at least based on data from compete.com.

Of course, that could change quickly if Amazon throws their muscle behind Shelfari and integrates it into their overall service. And there's the rub: we're entering a period of Web 2.0 consolidation. After all, web 2.0 is all about network effects in applications that get better the more people use them. And that means that companies with dominant share tend to get more dominant over time; that dominance need not be organic to start with (though it helps.) Over time, I expect to see companies who've achieved dominant market share in one market segment to use it to dominate a related segment.

The Pillars of the Earth

Beverly — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 22:01:26 GMT

I just finished a fantastic book and had to share it with my StoryBook.com friends. If you like historical period pieces filled with battles, the struggle between church and state and of course, loves and missed loves, then you too will love Ken Follett’s “The Pillars of the Earth”.

First, let me say that the book was a recommendation from a colleague of mine. This is important to note because I am not in the habit of purchasing 1,000 page books. (Between my RSS feeds, online articles and the other work related journals I read, I am more like a "300-pager" type of girl). Nonetheless, from beginning to end, Ken Follett had me at the edge of my seat as I followed the life’s transgressions of his characters. The book was filled with multiple compelling story lines, making it easy for anyone to fall in love with it and be carried away in their own fantasy, mirroring their personal likes.

I never thought I could be this passionate about a "1,000 pager" with multiple plot lines, but Ken Follett makes it easy for you to follow along and stay engaged.

The Pillars of the Earth is a must read!

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