Alison Kent’s blog featured some watercooler articles.

Anybody else get the impression that Edward Wyatt of the NYTimes doesn’t like romance novels all that much?

“Romance is not dead, but it may be suffering a slow death.“

“…traditional romance novels, those formulaic bodice-rippers stocked with hunky heroes and love-conquers-all endings.“

“Sold under the Harlequin and Silhouette imprints, the series have names - like Desire, Temptation, Bombshell and Blaze - that leave little about their content to the imagination.”

“The unfortunately named genre of chick lit often employs characters that are as stock as those in traditional romance: single women in their 20’s or 30’s, usually in an unpromising job and with a litany of relationship problems.“

Ouch, Mr. Wyatt.

I refuse to believe the romance genre is suffering a slow death. Period. :plain:

Well, according to the Lori Foster Message Board and the venerable Walt Stone there were over 200 entries in the Lori Foster/Brava contest. That is much less than the thousand or more I imagined, meaning better odds for all entrants!

The best of luck to everyone!

I just want to state for the record:

Record:

I think word count sucks. :angry:

End Record.

Have you ever set aside a ms, for whatever reason, and then go back to it later and surprise yourself with how much you like it?

I have nothing to say.

Truly.

I have worked like a mad woman on my stories all day (except for a brief trip to the gym and picking up my son from school) From the time I got up this morning until hours from now, I have been/will be working. This should help make up for all the days I spend goofing around on the web. :blush:

The Lori Foster/Brava Contest is drawing to a close. I’ve been surprised by how many people I’ve read about entering the contest on Lori’s message board. I can’t imagine how many entries there must have been! No wonder Lori asked for help this year.

The number of entries has prompted me to wonder: Are there that many aspiring and published authors that want to break into romantica? Or is it the lure of the contest and a possible editor read that pushes authors to submit to a genre that they don’t intend to spend their careers writing in? Or perhaps it’s the short 750 word limit that draws submissions? After all, 750 words takes only a couple of hours to write. (Of course polishing and tweaking would take up far more time, but better to polish and tweak 750 words than say 30-35 pages.) Or perhaps there are actually hundreds of authors who write romantica and also want to write for Brava. We’ve actually been discussing this for the last few weeks on the message board. (You can veiw the thread here.)

Considering that published authors were also permitted to submit, the competition must be fierce. I wish I could be a judge! I bet the entries would be so awesome to go through. The good ones would just excite you endlessly and the bad ones would be like an episode of the best of the worst on American Idol. Either way. What fun!

I am thrilled to say that I’m finally a member of a critique group. Finally! Finally! :hehe: I have been looking for cp’s for months now. I’m so excited!

I’d also like to ask more of you writers with blogs to consider joining the webring. It’s really a “no lose” bit of promotion. You can personally use the ring to surf author blogs and in the process gain some added visitors for your own blog. The link is really small and can be placed anywhere in your blog sidebar:

« ? Writer Blogs # »

(I admit it’s not “attractive”, but hey, I didn’t design the darn thing. It’s the univeral design for blog rings!). The more members, the better the ring. (click on the “#” above to see the list of existing members.) Please consider it. You can join here.

I am happy to say that the webring seems to have taken off. The message board was also busy today.

Now I must settle down and get another few pages of review done, so I can sit down to Miss Wonderful without fear of guilt.

Yep, I feel guilty when I don’t get just the right amount of work done. The quantity of work I have to accomplish to feel productive varies from day to day, but always there is some internal slavedriver that forces me to continue until it is satisfied. :satisfied: But, truly, I don’t mind. I love to write!