H eidi Rice's career began, as every romantic novelist's does, with a happy ending. I'd spend years playing with it, and then get bored and lose the flow. Once her sons were settled into school, Rice finally managed to complete a book. So she sent it to the Romantic Novelists' Association , whose new writers' scheme she had joined. But by now she was past discouragement. Soon, she had completed a second novel, and sent this one to the RNA, as well.
This time they contacted her by phone. But no, the reader loved it. Rice said she would. Later, the editor of Modern Heat rang. It was a truly happy moment. But, as she soon found out, it was not an ending. First there was the edit. Then, once the book was finished, there was the matter of her next one. So I thought, 'I've got to write another one in six months!
My mind just went completely blank. She laughs very loudly, in the way that frightened people do. Because remember, we both published in the non-fiction sector. In that niche, sales usually don't happen like that.
It's more of a slower build — especially for no-name authors like us. Not bad for a first-time author, right? In fact, I thought it was pretty much like hitting the friggin' lotto!
After seeing my sister's success, of course I had to give it a try. So I wrote and uploaded my first romance 3 Weeks til Forever in May of … and it promptly bombed. I was deflated, but shook it off and went back to writing and self-publishing my how-to, non-fiction ebooks. Since , over half my earnings as a writer have come from my self-publishing efforts.
You see, there are so many ways to make a living writing. But obviously, that wasn't the end of my romance writing career. This section is very detailed, going from what you need to do before you actually start writing eg, building a character profile and creating an outline , to actually writing the story. It also explains why you shouldn't spend so much time marketing in the beginning of your romance writing career.
In fact, sales should be the last thing on your mind when you first start out. In the course, there's an actual formula that details what percentage of your time you should spend marketing, and at what stage of your career. In this section, I relay my experiences and give some guidelines to follow if you decide to go this route. There's a step-by-step plan that tells you exactly how to set up your own publishing company. FYI, it's not necessary, but if your romance writing career reaches a certain point, you might consider it.
While Amazon remains the behemoth, there are new outlets popping up all the time where self-published authors can publish their works. And this is yet another reason I like writing romance, by the way. Once a book is written, as new outlets open up, you just publish there and start earning. In the course, I cover where I publish; which earn me the most; and some outlets to stay away from.
You can see the entire course syllabus, and even get a free preview here. One thing I want to stress is that anyone who's willing to put in the writing time can earn money writing romance novels. Again, this is with no previous fiction writing experience.
And I'm small, small potatoes. With that being said though, I want to stress that writing romance is NOT a get-rich-quick scheme. Writing is hard work, and you must be disciplined about it. You must constantly put out new titles, learn which genres work, find your audience, and build your own mailing list. She maintains several blogs on travel, music, food and more. She is also a contributing writer for Suite and has articles published on eHow and Answerbag.
Pink heart in a book image by LisaInspired from Fotolia. Share It. She fell into depression for two years. It was the act of writing romance, and discovering the romance community, that she says transformed and revived her career. As she entered the romance world, she created the persona of Madeline Iva, whom she views as less angsty and less complicated than her real self. Having an alter ego allowed her energetic and enthusiastic side room to grow. And Iva liked the romance community she found, comprising women who she says are warm and outgoing, vibrant and middle class, who reminded her of the women she grew up with.
The literary world is much more introverted, and much more bitter, cynical, and weary to some degree.
Experienced authors and peers will tell you how it works, repeat what they told you, then take you by the hand and show you. Adult contemporary author Jamie Brenner , who also writes erotic romance as Logan Belle, noticed the same thing about the community, especially in her former career as an agent. When she published her debut Logan Belle novel, Blue Angel , in , she immediately felt welcomed.
However, Brenner has noticed some changes lately that have caused her to pull back on writing as Logan Belle. You have to be louder and louder and louder. You have to be really comfortable shipping things out. Brenner says the other aspects of maintaining a genre career are growing more burdensome. Genre writers also participate in more anthology work, so in between the several novels per year, they often contribute stories to collections. I also have mad writing chops from going to a really good grad school.
Barbara Palmer is the pseudonym of a Canadian bestselling novelist who is also in her romance startup period, trying on the genre for the first time. Her erotic novel, Claudine , was released by Penguin Canada last year. So far, Palmer says she will keep her identities entirely separate: bestselling historical novelist who refuses to be named here and Barbara Palmer, who will not be making any TV or visual appearances to promote her romance book.
Because she realized she was starting from zero—without any knowledge of the field at all—Palmer spent an intense period reading all the erotic literature she could, including the classics.
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