I have a book out today. In paper or digital.
It’s the prettiest.
This is Book 3 in my Can’t Help It contemporary rockstar romance series, written as Ophelia Leigh. It’s a modern-day reimagining of the Lancelot-Guinevere-Arthur story, and I had more fun writing it than ought to be allowed.
Please enjoy!
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.
If you’re in the mood for a silly, pretty sweet, all-up-in-the-wilds-of-space adventure with
Then Cosmic Coffee is for you.
Bringing you these sexy space romances has been my absolute pleasure.
A year ago I crafted a WordPress goodbye post, based on the idea that my time of online blogging was at an end. It’s still sitting here in my draft folder. My personal reality is that I’m not one to make grand statements about “oh, this phase of my life is over, I won’t be using it anymore” or “I’m quitting writing forever” or any of those things. Because who knows what life will bring?
In my case, it brought a pen name and a new (to me) genre: humorous adventure sci-fi–think Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, but with romance and even more romance. Over the course of the past year, I’ve written the Cosmic Coffee series of three novels, two of which are published with the third available in just under a month. So rather than blogging, I’ve been drafting and editing books, researching the ins and outs of getting them published, and basically enjoying myself as a writer in ways that I haven’t in a long, long time.
To me, enjoying the process is what it’s all about. I’ve laughed, cackled, giggled, rolled my eyes at my own words, and had more fun this past year than I can remember as a writer. My hope is that the joy I’ve had writing translates to an equal amount of joy for readers. But carving out an audience is no simple thing, and growing the audience is even more difficult. Marketing has become nearly a full-time job. Like many writers, it’s one I’m not very good at.
I am willing to use all the exposure I can get, though. So here I am, dusting off my trusty blog which, for reasons absolutely unknown to me, still gets some traffic despite my two-year gap in posting, for promo purposes. I’d like to direct you to my other site, ophelialeigh.com, where you can find links to all my books, play a cute make-your-own-adventure game, and find out more about the mysterious author Ophelia Leigh and what makes her tick.
Clicking the image below will take you to the series page on Amazon. Thank you in advance for giving these books a try–and if you like them, even better!
I write romance.
I also do a fair amount of critiquing for other writers. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen people talk about genre-straddling, or that they’re writing something that doesn’t fit into any particular genre. There is a time in every author’s life when they decide they either don’t need to fit into a genre category or have written something that defies genre categorization.
Trust me. Your work fits into a genre, and it can be categorized.
For the longest time, I didn’t know I was a romance writer. I knew I liked writing about relationships. The messier, the better. Newbie that I was, I threw everything at my characters. Romantic relationship? Yes! Dragons? Angels? Skateboards? Why not! Mystery and intrigue? Sure. A healthy dose of literary-style navel gazing? Absolutely. Bring it. I’d mash everything together, pour in all the things I could think of. Thankfully, my starter novels are lost to time. Like all starter novels, they were hot messes of inconsistency. No plot? No problem: I called it literary. No happily ever after? No problem, it was mainstream fiction with a strong romantic element and also spaceships.
Like a lot of beginning writers, I scoffed at the romance arc because I felt it constricted the entire genre. Why go into reading something, living through all that heartbreak and turmoil, if you know it’s all going to be all right in the end? I figured I could upend it with a non-traditional ending and call it a non-romance. (Note to past me: there’s a word for that type of story, and the word isn’t “romance.”) I read plenty of romance, but with the arrogance that comes from not understanding and definitely not appreciating the intricacies of the romance arc. Yes, at its core it’s A meets B. A and B fall in love, and it’s a love like no other. Then something happens, and A and B either break up or are torn apart by some terrible external circumstance. But eventually they overcome the terrible circumstance, learn to trust each other again, and live happily ever after. I thought, “how trivial. How dull. How expected.”
Being the sort of person who likes to buck tradition, I decided not to follow the romance arc at all. Which was fine. But what that really meant was that I wasn’t writing romance. I was writing something different–women’s fiction, or literary fiction, or a coming-of-age story. All of those genres already exist. Why try to warp them into something they’re not?
Now, as I sit toward the end of this year’s NaNoWriMo first draft (another romance! Score!), I can tell you that learning to work within the constraints of the romance arc is the best, most disciplined thing I have done as a writer. Yes, the arc is there because readers expect it. Beyond that, the romance arc is actually quite beautiful and quite complex. When I think of all the romances I’ve read, no two are exactly alike, even though the romance arc is the uniting factor in all these books. I have yet to see two authors independently pen the same book. Learning to work within the arc takes patience, understanding, and no small amount of skill. After all, nobody’s going to buy a book that treats the romance as a flat, boring, done deal. Even though we know the characters will be all right in the end, we read romance to live through the emotion of the arc with the characters. We get to experience them falling in love, losing that love, and working hard to get it back. In the meantime, if the author has done their job, the characters become so real to us that we root for them. We find ourselves yelling at them when they make some boneheaded move, or cheering for them when they get things right. Good romance novels are packed to the gills with emotion, so charged that readers often can’t put them down. We become invested in the characters, their lives, and their well-being.
Not every genre can make that same claim.
Once I’m finished with the mostly-finished books on my writing plate, I’m going to go back to a mystery I started during NaNoWriMo a few years ago. That, too, is an exercise in discipline, although writing a mystery is a challenge far different from the romance writing challenge. Will I be successful? I don’t know. But what I do know is that I’ve learned my lesson about bucking the trend. Will my mystery have romance elements? Probably, because I’m a sucker for the human experience and believe that love is one of the most interesting topics a writer can tackle. Does it need a HEA/HFN (Happily Ever After/Happy For Now) ending? No. But the mystery has to make sense, and it has to be solved. If I didn’t do that, it wouldn’t actually be a mystery.
Know your genre. Read widely in your category. You’ll learn to recognize what makes a book a romance, what makes it chick lit, and what makes it women’s fiction. Yes, sometimes the lines get blurry, but there’s no shortage of information out there on how to find your genre. Probably the best thing you can do is find a group of other writers who happen to be working on the same type of story you are, and compare notes. Read for each other. Listen to their suggestions. Take their suggestions to heart.
After all this, if you find yourself writing a romance that doesn’t end happily, trust me: you’re not writing a romance. Go back and try categorizing it again.
Today’s the second birthday for Untold Press, those lovely folks who’ve been kind enough to publish two of my stories in their anthologies.
By way of celebrating, the nicest people in publishing are holding a giveaway. The grand prize is a $50 Amazon gift certificate. You can enter right here, and I hope you do! While you’re at the site, take a moment to peruse their book catalog and see if there isn’t something there to tickle your fancy.
While I’m on book business, fellow Untold author Angela McPherson (Hope’s Decree) is looking for reviewers for the first book in her Fated series. You can read all about it on Angela’s blog.
One more time, happy birthday, Untold. Here’s to many more!
Happy birthday!
I’ve been thinking a lot about the world of writers and writing. I know there’s a lot of competition in the world and a lot of spite and jealousy between authors, a lot of backstabbing, a lot of griping and sniping. Maybe I’m naive, but I’ve always believed that there’s enough room out there for everyone who wants to write to just go ahead and do it. There are readers for everything: every style, every genre, every piece of work.
There are people who enjoy my writing and people who don’t. Some people appreciate it while others fail to see what’s good about it… and that’s just fine. No one’s work will be universally loved; if that’s what we’re looking for as writers we’re bound to be disappointed. Of course we don’t love the rejection letters as much as we love the acceptances, but we have to take them for what they are and learn from them. The same rule holds for critiques. Everybody’s got an opinion, and who am I to say one is less valid than another just because I might not like it?
Maybe I feel this way because I’m new as a published author. Ask me in a couple years if I still feel the same way, but right now there are people who’ll read my work, people who won’t, people who might some day but for whatever reason say not right now. All of that’s okay by me. What I really want is for everyone who has a story in their heart to go out there and tell it. You will find a reader for it! Don’t worry about comparing yourself or your style to anybody else. Be your own unique voice and write the stories you love to write, and there will be readers who love to read them.
Some stories, I believe, deserve to be finished. I have stacks and stacks of what I lovingly call UFOs, my favorite unfinished objects. As any writer knows, going through old works can be the very definition of mixed blessing. Sometimes we uncover gems. More often than not, we uncover pieces of writing that make us cringe in a lot of places. But shake the dust off those pieces, and there are kernels of good work hiding.
I recently dusted off something I started four years ago. Wanting to see if it still held any merit, I sat down to read. Aside from some grammatical conventions that really made me shudder, I realized it wasn’t bad. I spent the bulk of the day yesterday rereading (and changing all those annoying punctuation quirks) before deciding to sleep on things. Is the story salvageable? I think so. Knowing more than I knew then, I can see where changes need to be made, where antagonists need to be introduced, and where the meat of things needs to be plumped up. It feels like a go to me, and I believe with these modifications I can almost double the length and make it workable. The bigger question is whether or not I can recapture the mood and the intent from the past and make it work with what I’ve become in the present.
I know what I’ll be working on this January!
In the meantime, as a first-time published author, I can’t go without mentioning a few things here.
There we have it. Happy 2013! May your year be filled with creativity!
I’m so pleased to be a contributing author to the latest anthology offering from Untold Press, Dragonthology, due in January 2013.
Dreaming in Character 