Quacking Alone

This post may be a bit brief (for me) because we’re editing the first part of Duke of Eden, the serialized novel I’m going to publish exclusively on Kindle for the amazingly low price of 99 cents per installment.  I’ve still got to write the product description but, Yes Virginia – the man tittie cover will hit Kindle next week.  Be sure to check out the book then!

The serialized publication/value price of Eden  actually relates to this post.  As I was working on edits yesterday, I clicked over to Google News – my home page for Internet Explorer.  I’ve customized my version to show certain types of stories, and yesterday up popped a Bloomberg Businessweek story of all things.  Naturally, I got distracted from my work and had to read the piece right away.  The romance genre meriting a piece on a prominant business site was worthy of notice, and its worthy of mention here.

The piece was titled:  Romance Fiction:  Getting Dirty In Dutch Country. It focused on how romance fiction is – even in this Friday the 13th of economies – on the rise.  The story mentioned the writer’s opinion that  the many and varied categories of romance, including Amish, knitting and paranormal specifically, helped keep romance climbing towards the top.  I don’t really disagree with the piece, I just don’t think the writer attributed the rise to all the right factors. 

  According to the article, publishers say that book sales declined by 1.9 percent in 2009 after a 3 percent drop the previous year and books appear to be “suffering a slow and rather boring death.”  The article doesn’t talk about ebooks, which have been undergoing dramatic growth. 

The piece notes that despite declining sales in books overall, one genre has been experiencing “steady and unusual growth.”  Yeah, that’s right, ROMANCE.  The Romance genre increased to $1.4 billion, up by $100 million, or 7.7% from the prior year.  In a down market and a down economy people are buying more romances than ever.  Well, duh.  When have we ever, ever needed to believe in happy endings more than today?

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I recently read an article by a psychology researcher who thought she could explain why women read Harlequin romance novels. Such articles often intrigue me and this one, in particular, drew me in because the author and I share the same name (Mary Anne) – albeit, she doesn’t spell hers the way my namesake Granny told me I had to spell mine.  Dr. Fisher concluded that women read romance because they’re looking for a cad who becomes the dad.

Most of the articles trying to “explain” women’s love of the romance genre make me want to throw something at my computer screen.   The other Mary Anne’s piece didn’t make me mad so much as it made me pity the author.  First of all, as a researcher, she should have known she couldn’t base an understanding of a vast and complex genre like romance on one atypical type of book of the genre.  It makes all her conclusions laughably wrong. For example, based on her study of Harlequins, Fisher decides that romance novels are too short and characters are therefore too underdeveloped.  Certain types of Harlequins are intended to be short fast reads that get the reader in and out fast.  But not all Harlequins are short – some of the publisher’s imprints are long, slow, luscious reads.  So Dr. Fisher bases her conclusions one type of one imprint from one publishing house.  I hope she does a better job with the psychological research she gets paid for.

Fisher concludes that romance novels are “candy for women’s brains.”   She concludes that they allow the reader to live vicariously through the heroine and fall in love with the hero but without any of the consequences.  Of course, she also thinks that the plots revolve around the woman trying to decide if the hero is “Mr. Right.” So, at least Fisher is consistently wrong.

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Well, the cover that Mary Anne wanted for one of her serialized e-books is done; I have finally completed it. Behold, the first man-titty cover from Quacking Alone Romances – click the thumbnail, look upon it, and despair:

Click for larger image

I feel soooooooooo dirty. I think I need to loofah my entire body with a Black & Decker belt sander now.

God knows, I understand that even in good times people need weekends to stay sane.  In my world of today, which is the polar opposite of “good times,” sanity is mostly a fond memory, but I still need my weekends.  My family and that little two-day break from work are the only things keeping me from jumping. 

So I rarely hope anybody else has their tailhook at their desk over a weekend, especially a holiday weekend.  Rarely.  But this weekend is an exception.   This weekend every darned programmer and web guru in the Amazonian Kingdom best be chained to their desks – including the fathers in the group.   At least one of ‘em deserves to be chained, and with a big new system change-over coming at the end of June where the whole staff is most likely working on bits and pieces of the new system, someone supervising the chain-deserving code monkey didn’t do his or her job.  Somebody screwed up royally. 

Amazon’s DTP Platform publishes Kindle pieces from indie authors and includes a dashboard to monitor sales.  The numbers don’t go backwards unless there was a return or two OR unless a code monkey didn’t do his job right.  Early Thursday evening (June 17th) over about a two hour span, the DTP numbers of indie authors went backwards without any returns.  Sales disappeared. 

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Is having breakfast for supper a Southern thing? 

Last night I decided that I wanted breakfast for supper.  Okay, maybe recalling that IHOP has those cheesecake stacker pancakes right now had something to do with it.  The other factor – if one needs more than the idea of cheesecake as an incentive – was that at suppertime we could get into IHOP.  You’ve got to remember that the family Graham resides in Myrtle Beach which is a tourist town. 

Tourists, God love ‘em, come down on vacation talking a good game.  You’ll hear them in line at the grocery store or passing by at the mall talking about how stupid folks are to travel to somewhere different and still eat at the chain restaurants.  Like I said, they talk a good game.  Anybody who lives in Myrtle and has tried to get into an Olive Garden for supper or an IHOP for breakfast knows that it’s all talk.  Locals will drive up to those places, see the throngs crowding around, and leave and go somewhere else.

So there was a stroke of genius in my madness last night.  It occurred to me that maybe breakfast for supper was a Southern thing and maybe IHOP wouldn’t be crowded.  And EUREKA!!  Once in a great while – I’m right.  It was so not crowded that my kids, seeing the nearly empty parking lot, wondered if it was open.  But it was and not only did I get my cheesecake stackers (strawberry), but we were seated in a nearly empty section that allowed the family to have a loud and raucous debate.  (Apologies to the one smart diner – a single man – who decided to leave and likely swore off the ideas of marriage and children for life.)

Mr. Quack brought up a debate we’d been having at home as he is in the throes of designing the man tittie cover for the serialization of my WIP, a regency historical.  He doesn’t get my reference to “Eden Without The Apple.”  He’s also convinced that readers wouldn’t get it either and would be confused by theological implications.  I replied that women drawn in by  man titties wouldn’t be thinking about the Bible at the time. 

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Many famous novels have appeared in serial form but, perhaps the most famous serial wasn’t a novel at all.  In 1914 the motion picture serial, The Perils of Pauline, was shown in installments.  The title character is the archetype for “damsels in distress” as each episode featured her getting embroiled in various life-threatening situations – like being tied to the railroad tracks.  The heroine, of course, was inevitably rescued or escaped certain death – only to get herself into trouble again next time. 

Pauline aside, a host of acclaimed books have been serialized. One of the first was One Thousand And One Nights which introduced famous characters like Sinbad the Sailor and Aladdin.  One of the most famous serial authors was Charles Dickens who published each chapter as a serialized piece.  That’s why most of his work is so long - more chapters equal more money.  Dickens’ left off each piece with a cliffhanger.  Famously, for his chase story The Old Curiosity Shop,  American fans waiting at the docks to meet the ships bringing in the next installment shouted at the ships’ crew demanding to be told whether Little Nell was dead.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle created his Sherlock Holmes  tales as serial pieces for a magazine.  Thomas Hardy created many pieces via serialization, including Tess Of The D’Urbervilles.  More recent writers have also returned to the format.  Stephen King has dabbled in the genre.  King began offering “The Plant” in serial form on his website, charging $1.00 for each of the 6 chapters that he’d written.  However, in late 2000 he abruptly halted the project, leaving readers without an ending.  Tom Wolfe’s Bonfire of the Vanities was serialized by Rolling Stone magazine, and Douglas Clegg got a 5 figure advance for serialization of his novel, Nightmare House. (more…)

Writers have lots of ideas.  We have great, immense, goobledegobs of ideas. Most of them are destined to be born and die within the disturbed realms of our fertile little brains.  Most, but not all.  A few of those notions do grow up to be books. 

I germinate ideas or script scenarios in my head all the time.  My imagination is where I go to escape when the job is too sad or demanding or when reality bites too hard.  But it’s not only stress or sadness that sends me to Mary Anne World.  Sometimes a great TV show will send me there.  I’ve written alternate scripts for many a Grey’s Anatomy episode, and I’ve made up whole romances that only lived in my head (Cristina and Webber, anyone? And I always thought Izzie belonged with Dr. Burke)  Like I said, my head is a strange place. 

Of course, it’s not just Grey’s that gives birth to ideas.  I’ve gotten romance ideas for Dr. House and Cuddy or Gordon Ramsey and a Hell’s Kitchen contestant.  So far, none of those has grown up to be a book, but in the future, you never know.  Griffin’s Law came to be after I imagined Grey’s in a law school. 

But its not just TV that brings ideas.  Sometimes they grow from reading an interesting legend on the Internet (the MacLeods of Skye and their famed faerie flag became my – so far – three part Forever Series).  The idea for E-mail Enticement came during a CLE seminar.  The first book I ever wrote , Brotherly Love, came from the most unique place.  Usually the characters create the story but with my first book, the message created the story.  I got to thinking about how big and broad love is and I wondered why we create boxes and rules to try to limit and define what we should only celebrate.  The characters in Brotherly are more “real” than in most romance novels, because they were intended to be more like us – flaws and all – and the story was written to make the reader think instead of just experience.

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I will not eat it with a spoon.  I will not ponder it all through June.  I do not want heartache stew. Sunshine, Sunshine how could you? 

‘Tis said that one of the real deal couples on the show will be calling it quits this season.  The cause of the breakup is “a very serious issue” that they can’t get past.  ‘Tis also said that there’s gonna be a new hook up on the show.  And the new hook-up allegedly involves McSteamy reconnecting with his man whore roots. People are speculating that the break up will not involve the dream team (Mer/Der).  But the grist for everyone’s mill has been the same as the grist churning around in mine – Sunshine says the finale will be a game changer for every single character; see links above and this one. 

So, Grey’s fans, this Thursday’s episode – “Hook Line & Sinner” – will be the first new one in several weeks and it will begin the march to the finale.  Now’s the time for all Grey’s fans to strap on the swami hat and commence speculating.  I’ve got mine on and I’m reaching under the sofa for my crystal ball – man that thing is dusty.  

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Giving a digital reading device to a devoted and addicted long time romance reader is a lot like giving a kid a lifetime pass to Disneyworld.  It’s also like giving the reader’s family a new lease on life.  My house has romance novels in nearly every nook and cranny.  See, I don’t just read the books – I save them.  

If I get a yen to read a particular book, the search through the stacks will first send books flying around a couple of different parts of the family room. Then it’ll send them headed out the door of my youngest son’s walk-in closet.  Finally, in desperation, it’ll even cover the macho floor of the male holy land – our garage.   I haven’t touched one of the paper books since Christmas – but I haven’t replaced them all (yet) with digital versions, so one day it’ll happen again, I’m sure.  But it’ll happen a lot less often.

My very first ebook purchase was of a single title.  It helped me try out the device.  I have a Sony Pocket Reader which is an excellent way to enter the market.  It doesn’t have wi-fi or a 3G wireless function so I can’t surf the web or check my email.  All it does is display ebooks but it does that very well.  One thing I adore is that it is sized so that it fits right in my purse.  One day, I may upgrade to a wi-fi or 3G enabled device, but that market is shaking out so much now that it constantly reminds me of how smart my hubby is.  My computer guy spouse says never adopt a new platform or technology (or software) until the kinks have been worked out and the price settles down.

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Everyone I know is flawed. All of the people I love and adore have blemishes. Each of my co-workers, from the boss on down, has defects. And me? If there were a country called Flawed, I’d be its Queen.

I’m working on a new book. Actually, I’m juggling two – a historical and a contemporary. I was working on the historical yesterday when it struck me that the hero was pretty damned tarnished.  My mind flipped over to the contemporary and realized that yep, sho ’nuff, the hero has potholes in his character big enough to drive an 18-wheeler through.  

My personal creative process starts with the characters and builds from there.  From the characters flows the story.  When its going well, one of them will often lead me down a path I never intended to travel, he or she will change the direction of the whole bloomin’ book in a way that’s gonna cause me no end of re-writes.  Those characters, the ones whose tale I’m telling?  They’re never the good guys in the white hats from stable backgrounds earnestly seeking only a permanent committed relationship. 

Invariably, my hero will be the spoiled rascal who’s always lived life on his terms, by his rules.  And those rules, like everything else in his world, tend to favor allowances rather than limits.  His background may have been more or less stable, but it’ll have enough instability, enough challenges, that it’s made him tough, wily, and smart.  My heroes are always smart.  But he won’t be looking to right the world’s wrongs.  Heck, he won’t even be looking to right his own. 

My hero will never walk into the story as the guy avoiding the tawdry, temporary pleasure of sex without strings.  He surely won’t be seeking a committed relationship.  My hero will embrace the tawdry and wallow in the sex whilst avoiding good girls like they were one of those diseases he might pick up in his favorite brothel. 

Yes, you guessed it.  My heroes have always been varmits. 

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