There used to be a day when I was embarrassed to say that. As if writing a romance novel was something that needed to be tucked away out of shame, or because it’s somehow a lesser endeavor than writing “serious” fiction. I’ve even been in settings where, when asked what I write, my answer puts a complete halt to the conversation.
Books are books are books. Genre books are no less valid than any other type of book. Over the years I’ve learned so much about the heart and skill of writing, the artistry involved, the necessary steps to take.
For my novel publishing debut, I chose a romance-adjacent genre with my adventure sci-fi. Writing the Cosmic Coffee books was a complete, utter joy. A realization that writing for fun was as valid as writing for any other reason. Those books make me laugh; they make me happy. They’re beyond silly—ridiculous, really—and I don’t care what people call them. They were still an absolute blast to write.
Now I’m back squarely in the contemporary romance arena with ALL SONGS ARE LOVE SONGS, the first of four books in my Can’t Help It series. If you read the books, both the title and the series title will become self-explanatory.
A few promo images for your viewing pleasure
If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like behind the scenes on a major rock tour, you’ll get a small taste of it with All Songs are Love Songs. Life on the crew as an adjunct to the main event can be every bit as sparkly and fulfilling as life onstage. In fact, some people prefer to stay well out of the spotlight. They’re the ones that make the magic happen on a daily basis, and the ones I’ve chosen to write about in this book. But hold onto your hats. They may not be the ones in the spotlight, but the roller coaster ride is every bit as wild.
Available on Amazon. Free to read with Kindle Unlimited. Hope you enjoy the read as much as I enjoyed writing for you.
The end of August is a weird time to write a “my year in review” post, but it makes sense! I promise!
Last June, I had a germ of an idea for a book. To be perfectly transparent, I get germs of ideas for books all the time, but most of them flit out the exact same window they flitted in, and within moments. In June of 2022, I decided it would be really, really fun to write a quick, down-and-dirty alien romance. Other people were doing it with great success. Those books followed a pretty straightforward formula: Earth girl meets HOT DAMN hot alien boy, misunderstandings ensue, then lots of hot sex happens (don’t mind the anatomy). Earth girl and HOT DAMN hot alien boy fall passionately and forever in love, and usually end up on HOT DAMN hot alien boy’s planet, where they are able to reproduce biologically and save an entire society. Lots of these books are kitschy AF, because alien anatomy is often mind-bogglingly different/larger/more complex than human. There are tails, horns, more than one of the usual body parts, and so on.
Thinking that this would be an easy subgenre of romance to work with, I sat down to write my own quick, down-and-dirty alien romance. The first thing I got hung up on (no pun intended) was the implausibility factor. I’ve read some absolutely brilliant concepts on how Earth women and their alien counterparts get together, and I’ll leave you to explore the world of alien romance to pick your own favorites. I didn’t want my Earthling scooped up against her will, and while I hoped I could write a heroine open-minded enough to not spend 40,000 words gaping at her sweetheart’s anatomy, it seemed to me that I would have to spend a decent chunk of time exploring that aspect of their relationship. Because that’s the kind of writer I am–the differences are what’s most interesting, and far be it for me to take them for granted.
However, I didn’t want the novel to reek of speciesism. By definition, an alien lover is an exotic other (how can it be any different?). To be fair to those twelve-foot-tall furry brightly hued horned horny strongbeings, their anatomies and lifestyles would turn a quick, down-and-dirty alien romance into a socioeconomic exploration. I’m not the type of reader who finds that super sexy, although if you are, bonus points, tell me how you do it! So I decided on a humanoid alien. This put me squarely into Star Trek: The Original Series territory, where the aliens Captain Kirk & Co. played with were largely humanoid. It’s something I grew up with, and with which I’m absolutely comfortable. Score! One problem solved! Plus, my original germ of an idea started with the concept of an Earth woman meeting her One True Love at speed dating. Making that One True Love an alien being felt like icing on an already pretty good fresh-from-the-oven donut, so I ran with it.
I’ve long been a fan of Douglas Adams, and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is (to me) a nearly perfect book in so many ways. It’s interesting, it’s funny, it has great characters who are more complex than they seem on the surface, and it has a great deal of implausibility. If, as Samuel Taylor Coleridge posited, reading calls for “that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes poetic faith,” then Douglas Adams really nailed it for me. The thing I love most about Adams’s work is that it’s completely infused with irreverence. If I could pick one trait about his writing to emulate, it’s that.
I decided my book needed to be exactly as irreverent as The Hitchhiker’s Guide, contain at least as much mortal peril, as many unexpected occurrences, as healthy a dose of moral ambiguity, and be in every possible way both as silly and brilliant. No pressure on me, though! I just wanted a lot more romance, because leaving those types of possibilities unexplored is not in my DNA. The same with pop culture references, because grounding the story in Earth experiences is key for my main character.
Grace the clumsy barista was born, then, along with a heaping fresh dose of Rhodes, my humanoid alien. Because geology is sexy in an underrated way Rhodes declared himself a rock hound, and became a galaxy-traversing crystal hunter. And because nothing about romance is ever smooth, he also declared himself on the run, for offenses both major and minor. I won’t spoil the books for you by telling you what those are, but that became a great impetus for both him and Grace to get the hell out of Dodge ASAP. To space they went.
Fast forward a year, almost exactly, and the entire three-book series was done. Writing friends, I hope you can find something to work on that brings you as much joy and satisfaction as these books have brought me. I’ve spent more time cackling over the concepts popping into my brain than I could ever have imagined. I couldn’t wait to sit down and write, because the ideas were overflowing. I kept lists of all the loose ends that needed tying up, and decided that unlike most alien romances where one book equals one couple’s story, I would make this a trilogy with all three books featuring both Grace and Rhodes, and their ever-evolving little family of beings coming along for the ride.
Today, I published the third and final book in the Cosmic Coffee series. I know I’m miserable at marketing, so finding them takes a minute (if you’re curious, there’s a buy link in my previous blog post). I’m also miserable at begging for reviews and recommendations, at running ads, at talking about my books so much that people start running away when they see me. But I’m really glad these books are out in the world, and that lovers of all things irreverent yet sexy, funny yet at least partially grounded in science fact, and adventurous yet comforting have the opportunity to find them. Read them. Enjoy them.
That’s what I’ve done this year. I’m happy about it, and beaming with a lot of pride. Thanks for reading!
Tomorrow, my sci-fi romance trilogy will be completed when book 3 (MAYBE…) releases.
For me, finishing things is always so bittersweet. I’ve been working on these silly, fun, romantic bits of escapism for the past year. In a world where things have so often gone horribly wrong, these books have been a balm to my soul.
I use a pen name since they are so different from the types of books I normally write. They not only border on the ridiculous but jump in feet first; the world they take place in is almost totally fabricated (but with just enough science to make it seem somewhat illogically logical). It’s a series that sprung nearly fully-formed from my imagination, and I’ve had so much fun writing these stories that it ought to be illegal. Fortunately, it isn’t.
Hopefully, that translates to a fun experience for my readers. So tomorrow, once the series is complete, all three books will be available on KU for those who don’t want to spend their hard-earned coffee money on ebooks. They’ll also be available to download for a few bucks each. You can find them here.
The Cosmic Coffee™ series in all its glory (and also in order)
If you’re in the mood for a silly, pretty sweet, all-up-in-the-wilds-of-space adventure with
a cinnamon roll male main character
a mouthy barista female main character
food with attitude
fun trans-galactic settings
lots and lots of romantic content
misadventures in space
pop culture references
finding the everyday in the impossible and the impossible in the everyday
rudely bright shades of pink, orange, and fuchsia
a completely ridiculous take on the universe
seeing a couple fall truly madly deeply and inevitably into their infinite forever after
Then Cosmic Coffee is for you.
Bringing you these sexy space romances has been my absolute pleasure.
The world is a frightening place these days. I’ve been alternately watching the news and occupying my time focusing on other things. Creativity hasn’t been a problem; I can find plenty of creative things to do. Most of them haven’t been writing this winter. Like a lot of people, my motivation has been low. Mine was pegged on a couple of hopeful things that didn’t pan out, but between being caregiver for my injured partner and the sole driver in this house, keeping everything going, making sure we’ve had enough supplies, taking care of the cats, and watching the eternal Seattle winterscape change slowly from gray to blue, my days have been pretty full. I’ve had a regular weekly Zoom writing date with a fellow writer, and during my burrowing in have finally finished a revision pass on an older book.
It’s a romance. Reworking it makes me happy right now. Rereading it makes me happy right now. Thinking about people being happy makes me happy right now. In these contentious times, it’s my firm belief that we need love more than ever.
I write more than romance. The last romance novel I finished was a year ago in December. I’m sure I have more of them in me, but I also have other genres I’m having fun exploring. Everything I write has love in it, though. Why? Because it’s a fundamental part of the human condition, something we recognize. Whether it’s love for a parent or a child or a partner or a pet, we’ve all experienced it to some degree, and we’ve also experienced its loss. Love is relatable. Maybe fairytale romance love less so, but we can all appreciate the pattern of it.
So I will keep on writing, and keep pouring romance into my work. Every time we send love out into the world these days, that’s a good thing. We could all stand to have more of it.
2019 will be the last year Romance Writers of America runs the Golden Heart® contest for unpublished authors. Until I was a Pitch Wars mentee in 2016, I didn’t even know about the Golden Heart or whether I was eligible. It’s not advertised widely outside RWA circles (or even within RWA circles, honestly). It’s one of those things you either pay attention to or you don’t. One of those things that’s on your radar, or it isn’t.
It should be. In case you’re new here, I am a 2018 Golden Heart finalist.
On the surface, it looks like another bigger chapter contest. I’ve entered a lot of those, with varying results. This past year, when my manuscript Duet became a GH finalist, I was blessed or cursed with the most mixed results from all the other chapter contests I entered. I didn’t final in any of these. In fact, one piece of feedback I got was the worst (and rudest) judging I’ve ever received. Regardless, I still got the call early one morning late in March telling me that I was a Golden Heart finalist.
None of the rest of my contest feedback stuck with me after that. I had entered the Golden Heart on a whim–more or less oh, yeah, it’s GH time, I might as well. Then I promptly forgot about it until the morning finalists were announced and I started seeing social media blow up with excitement for a few of my friends. When I got my call, I assumed it was a telemarketer. But I answered the phone anyway, and all I remember are the words “Your novel Duet is a Golden Heart finalist. Congratulations!”
The rest of the phone call is a total blur.
That first rush of excitement, followed quickly by this can’t be right, surely someone made a mistake and they’re going to let me know they were only kidding, set my heart racing. All I really knew was that I was in the running for an award in the Contemporary Romance category for the Golden Hearts, which is really like the Oscars for unpublished romance writers (the RITA® is RWA’s equivalent for published romance writers). I had no real idea what else it meant, because while I knew other Golden Heart finalists from the previous year, I didn’t really get the low-down on what went along with being named a finalist.
It’s not a secret. That’s why I’m here to spill the beans on it all. So drum roll, please…
What You Get as a Golden Heart® Finalist
You get a phone call from an RWA board member congratulating you. Don’t be like me. Listen carefully when you answer the phone and pay attention to who’s calling you. It could be a NYT bestselling author!
Did you know there’s an RWA chapter for Golden Heart finalists? It’s called The Golden Network, and it’s one of the most positive, uplifting, and wonderful chapters I’ve ever joined. Imagine all the combined wisdom of previous finalists at your fingertips, managed with healthy doses of love, excitement, and unbridled enthusiasm.
If the RWA National hotel is sold out or rooms restricted, as an GH finalist, you’ll get help getting those rooms for the dates you want.
You are immediately part of a sisterhood. The beauty of this can’t be overstated. Face it, writing is a lonely task. We don’t always (or often) have people at the same stage in writing careers to meet, greet, talk to, share experiences with.
If you’re querying, you get to nudge everyone and let them know you’re a GH finalist. (This might have been my first favorite part of the whole deal.)
The Golden Heart award is a big deal. It’s peer-judged, so the novels that final are a fairly decent reflection of what readers want. Agents and publishers like Golden Heart novels, because they’ve been vetted and given approval. Speaking of agents and publishers, there was a reception this year with agents, publishers, editors, and Golden Heart finalists. Network, network, network.
Whether or not you win your category, you get a finalist’s certificate at a special private soiree at RWA National. Bonus: you don’t have to make a speech.
You get to sit up front at the Golden Heart luncheon, and get priority seating for the RITA reception. It might not seem like much, but it is a perk!
You will be congratulated by friends and strangers alike, because you get a special Golden Heart Finalist ribbon for your RWA badge. Oh, and bling. There will be bling.
I’m sure I’ve left out about half the perks. I will tell you that suddenly your experience at RWA National will make you feel a little like a celebrity, which is really fun. So since 2019 is the final year for the Golden Heart® contest, I personally think you should enter. There’s so much to love about this award. I’m sad that the RWA board decided the Golden Heart no longer served its members the way they wanted, but with your help (and entry), we can make 2019 the most fabulous year yet for this esteemed award. After that, we can look forward to whatever replacement contest the board puts into place.
One more thing–past Golden Heart finalists are the most selfless group of writers, I swear! In addition to holding our hands this past year through the process, a number of previous finalists are offering critiques on your Golden Heart submission.
For more information, click here. The giveaway opens October 1.
Romance writers get a bad rap. We’re like the suspected drug dealers of the writing world–people talk about what we do in hushed voices. Pull us aside to ask if we really write romance. Ask when we’re going to give that up and do something serious, something of merit.
Other people, often those writing different genres, look at romance and romance sales, and see dollar signs. If I only wrote romance, I could share a piece of that pie, they say. Romance is so formulaic. That means it’s easy, they say. Romance is just fluff! Anyone can write that, they say.
Keep telling yourselves that. Writing good romance is hard, y’all.
I read a lot of books all across the genre spectrum. I love the variety, but I tell you that the one thing that keeps me interested is when there’s a strong emotional component to a story, whether it’s romance, mystery, young adult, fantasy…you get the picture. Emotions are key to me as a reader. Someone may have written the best plot in the world, but if I don’t care about the characters and their hearts, I won’t really give a good goddamn about that best plot in the world. Why did I spend a summer years ago devouring every Hercule Poirot mystery? Not because of the mysteries themselves (although I was and am a huge fan of Agatha Christie’s writing), but because of the nuances in Poirot’s character. Surely someone so tightly restrained was boiling over on the inside with emotion. Poirot was so controlled that he rarely if ever let anyone get a glimpse into his inner workings–and yet Dame Agatha managed to convey to the readers that he had a lot more going on inside that egg-shaped head of his than simple little grey cells.
For me, every Poirot mystery is a romance between the detective and murder (if you’ve read Curtain I dare you to disagree, and if you haven’t, go read it). I realized early on as a fledgling writer that all my stories had an element of love in them, whether they be YA, westerns, literary, mystery. As a writer, feeling that intensity of emotion and trying to convey it to readers is what made and makes writing a challenge I keep craving.
As a reader, I know when I feel what’s on the page. We talk about show, don’t tell. Show, don’t tell. I used to not really know what that meant, but as I keep writing, keep reading, and get more experience in this craft, I realize that simple directive really means “make me feel what the characters are feeling.”
That’s why I write romance. There’s nothing I’d rather explore more than the depth of passion that is love. I don’t just mean exploring the physical choreography–that’s its own challenge. I mean the emotional depth of passion. The one that makes readers cry and laugh along. The one that makes the typical romance arc so satisfying: we get it all. The blush of new love, the uncertainty of relationships, the rush of passion, the heartbreak of separation, and the relief when the characters prove their worthiness to each other and ride off into the sunset of a Happily Ever After.
And if I can put a little more love and happiness out there into the world, well…I’m all for that.
Will any of you be in Denver in July for the RWA National Conference? If so, please find me and say hello! I’ll be the one with the short hair [subtext: look for my badge] staying at the hotel.
Seriously, though, I would love to meet up with people. Those of us from All The Kissing are having an event (that makes it sound so formal! It’s a drop-in-and-say-hello thing) on Friday, July 20 at 8pm at 16Mix inside the downtown Denver Sheraton. There…um…might be some swag to give away too, if that’s a motivating factor for you. Here, have some details.
If you can’t be there, stop by and say hello at the Golden Heart® Ceremony luncheon on Thursday afternoon! The vegan option last year was very tasty, but I might be too filled with nerves to eat my lunch this time.
One thing is certain: I will be so delighted to put names with faces, faces with names, faces with voices and Twitter handles, share a few laughs, and enjoy every last moment.
Being brave means to know something is scary, difficult, and dangerous, and doing it anyway, because the possibility of winning the fight is worth the chance of losing it. –Emilie Autumn
Every author knows there are millions of reasons not to share our writing with the world. It’s not polished enough. Some people won’t like it. No one’s reading this kind of thing right now. I’m not sure I’m ready to share it. I might want to change it.
The list goes on and on.
When I first started writing, the very thought of letting other people actually read my words was chilling. In a way, it’s like opening your soul and letting others in. I think it’s the same for most creative pursuits, but since I’m a writer that’s the one I can best speak to. We really do pour our hearts out on the page. With romance in general and steamy scenes in particular, there’s always this moment where I have to disassociate the words on the page from the author doing the writing. I’m sure everyone wonders, especially at first, how much (or little) others will think of them when they read the intimacy between characters. How much does the author draw from their own lives? Where does the line between fiction and reality get drawn?
Just like everything else, we make up the reality of those steamy scenes. Just like everything else, there’s undoubtedly a basis in reality. Or at least a basis in imagination. That’s the key, that last bit: we imagine what it is like for our characters. We’re not transcribing our own lives on the pages any more than JK Rowling transcribed her own school experiences into Harry Potter or Robert Ludlum underwent secret government manipulation to write about Jason Bourne. We’re authors. We make things up.
But making things up still provides a window into our souls, even though it might be shuttered rather than wide open. And that means that one of the hardest things for most writers to do, especially in the early stages of their writing, is to share their work.
Writing is an isolationist sport. We do it alone. We even have the term “writing cave,” as if we need to prove that it’s a solitary pursuit. We spend so much time living in our minds, pouring thoughts out onto the paper or screen. The thought of inviting someone else in to share what we’ve created can be so scary.
As Emilie Autumn says, it’s scary but we do it anyway. We have to: if we want to succeed in the world of publishing, people will be reading our words. The sooner we get used to the idea that others, sometimes countless others, will read our words is a good thing. Does that make it any less frightening?
No. But we have to suck it up and share, because a novel sitting on a hard drive where no one can see it is one less novel out there in the world. It might be the best thing ever written, but if no one reads it, no one will ever know.
Lucille Ball said I’m not funny. What I am is brave. She also said ability is of little account without opportunity.
All I can say is take the opportunities as they come by. If I hadn’t taken the opportunity to enter Pitch Wars back in 2016, I wouldn’t be where I am today. If I hadn’t taken a leap of faith and entered the Golden Heart® contest this year, I wouldn’t be a finalist. Does it get easier? Of course. We writers have to have thick skins. Suits of armor sometime. Still, I hope I never get to the point where I read something I wrote, sit back and rub my hands together, and say yeah, that’s great. I want to always hold onto a modicum of humility, because I’d be nowhere without the people who were kind enough to read for me once I finally got brave enough to start putting my words out there. They’re the ones who encourage me. They’re the ones who give me the confidence to reach for the stars. And they’re the same ones who are there to pick me up and dust me off every time I fall.
I usually approach National Novel Writing Month with a combination of excitement and dread. I’m never sure which is more appropriate but one thing is certain: it’s always exhilarating.
Last year I worked on a novel right on the heels of Pitch Wars. To say I was burnt out is an understatement. Reworking a novel in a couple of months is no mean feat, much less preparing for the agent round, which always coincides with the start of NaNoWriMo. This isn’t a complaint, though. I learned so much from Pitch Wars, particularly about my weaknesses as a writer. For one thing, I’m not much of an on-paper plotter. I know where a story is going in my brain, after a vague fashion, but putting it down in an organized fashion makes me want to tear out my hair. I had to do it for Pitch Wars, but now that I’m on my own I’m free to own my bad habits, as long as I recognize them.
We hear a lot about the two main types of writers (plotters vs. pantsers). At this point I’m a hybrid between the two. I know where a story starts, where it wants to end, and a few of the most important plot points in between. I’ve also written (and rewritten) enough romances to have a fairly decent feel for where I am in the story at any given moment.
I’m also a bit of a rebel, and like to break the rules. Not all of them, because romance novels need to have a certain reliable emotional sequence in order to work. Just because standard wisdom says the characters shouldn’t have sex before the 50% mark doesn’t mean that works with all characters in all settings.
I’m proud to announce that today, on Day 1 of NaNoWriMo, I managed to get an intimate scene in there. To be fair, I wrote the first chapter of this book previously (don’t worry, I’m not cheating by including that chapter in my word count), so I have a small idea about my characters and their emotional makeup. Also to be fair, this is the third book set in a specific world. That also goes a long way toward making the words flow more easily–I don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Most of the characters are new, which is fun. One is an old favorite who’s evolved so much over the course of the first two books that he’s a pleasure to write, even if he’s only really evolved in my brain. But that’s why we write! To get the stories out of our brains and onto the page.
I’ve also just begun querying my last book (not last year’s NaNo novel, that got scrapped but served as good groundwork for the one I’m shopping, which I wrote in a personal May-June version of NaNo, then edited to the ground). I see November as three things: writing every day (something I learned how to do from my very first NaNo experience), researching agents and sending query letters (something I got really good at after Pitch Wars), and getting into the groove with the website a bunch of us have been working on (All The Kissing – by romance writers, for romance writers). Ultimately, that means it’s shaping up to look like a normal month.
But I have my NaNoWriMo buddies to cheer on, and to cheer me on. It’s so much fun!
Tell me, how are all of you? What are you working on? How’s autumn treating you?
Hi there, fellow writers. Are you writing romance? Getting ready to query, or not sure about the query you’re sending out? Would you like a little feedback?
If the answer to any of them is yes, here’s a query critique giveaway for you. It’s open until October 22. If you have any questions, ask away.
Dreaming in Character 