Flipping the Script on Interracial Dynamics

I stumbled across this interesting article about how the White Boyfriend trope in romance has changed.

I wrote a handful of interracial romances 10-20 years ago. Today, if I tried, I'd probably get lambasted. Yet, Summer from the Seasons of Magick series is popular because it's an interracial romance of two non-white characters.

There are some who probably think I should take the story down because I overstepped as a white woman. If I did, I'd have to take down almost all my series because I do a hell of a lot of racial mixing in them. Frankly, it's probably accepted by the readers because most of them are fantasy.

But in Summer, the real trope is the girl-next-door finally noticing the boy-next-door in combination with a twist on the horror trope of dying because the teens had sex. (Before anyone throws a fit about underage characters, both Jamal and Shan are eighteen.) The story would be classified as sweet if I took out the sex and the kiang-shi.

On the other hand, I'm kind of glad to see more contemporary stories where the white guy is struggling with his privilege. It means the worldview is changing, I hope for the better. These stories show that communication is possible even if it's difficult as hell.

I've  already been accused of being woke and anti-white in some reviews. But we need to continue the hard work of understanding each other. I know I'm going to fuck up sometimes, but I work to do better. I hope everyone else does the same.

Mail, Mail, Mail

I ran out of stamps last night while I finished stuffing and labeling envelopes for the Kickstarter Stretch Goal magnets. So on my tea run this morning, I bought more stamps, and...

I obviously miscounted because I have one lonely little envelope with no stamps. LOL I'll stop by the post office again this afternoon when I go in for a much-needed haircut. But you don't to hear about that.

In other mail news, a reader asked if Invasion! is part of the Justice series.

Technically, sort of, but it's more of a one-off. Invasion! is my version of Crisis on Infinite Earths or Secret Wars. Blame DH. He asked what would Chief Justice Anthea do if she ever met Sam Ridgeway from the Bloodlines series. But anyway, a vague idea took shape and I added Aisha Franklin from 888-555-HERO and Shan Wong from Seasons of Magick...

And I'm have a damn good time writing it! Plus, I have an excuse to introduce the Grey Ladies from an upcoming series.

So, yeah, this will be a fun book of the heart. It will address the prophecy Reverend Mother Alara mentioned way back in A Question of Balance if you REALLY want to know about that, and Aisha ends up coaching Anthea on how to control her lightning.

But if you need something that's stupid fun while trapped in a vehicle of some sort during the winter holidays, Invasion! is the book for you.

It'll be up for pre-order once I get the cover!

Status Report - June 2017

I haven't done a status update in a while, so here's what's happened since I posted my April list of things to do:

1) No, I haven't started the edits on Ravaged yet.

2) The first draft of Sacrificed was completed on May 25.

3) I started back on Resurrected on May 26, and realized there were a couple of major issues that would turn into expositional crap if I dealt with them in this novel. So I plotted two short novels that will take place between Sacrificed and Resurrected, and started writing them. I post word count updates at my reader-oriented website www.suzanharden.com if you're curious.

4) The non-related short stories are done, but when they will be released is open to question with the new short novels for Bloodlines.

5) Proofing the Bloodlines paperbacks is taking an inordinate amount of time, far more than I anticipated. But I have to get them done because I will be at an author's signing event at our local library next month. More on the signing will be posted closer to the day of, which is July 20. In the meantime, they've essentially been moved to the top priority spot.

6) Needless to say, updating the Seasons of Magick series has been pushed back once again. It may be swapped with #7

7) I gotten more e-mails/PMs about A Modicum of Truth, so based on demand, it will need to take priority post-Bloodlines. It's good that a work is wanted, but it's a little nerve-wracking as well. I'm blaming the demand on the new Wonder Woman movie.

So that's what's happening in my world. Hope everyone has a great summer!

Status Report - April 2017

I'm finally past the SAD that's been plaguing me through the winter. Sun, open windows, and shorts temperatures have definitely helped in the productivity department.

I also took a page from Dean Wesley Smith's book, and I splurged on an 11-inch super lightweight  laptop. I've disabled the browser, the e-mail, and the wi-fi. The change has made a difference in my productivity. In the two weeks since Bali Blue arrived and I set her up, I've written 22K words.

So what's happened since my last release in December?

1) The first draft of Ravaged is done. I'm not going to start edits until the first draft of Sacrificed is done.

2) Sacrificed is approximately 73% done. I was hoping to have it done by the end of April, but it'll be done soon.

3) Resurrected is approximately 30% done.

4) I'm also working on some short stories that will come out between the end of the Bloodlines series and the next Justice novel.

5) Paperbacks for the Bloodlines series should all be out by the end of June.

6) New covers for the Seasons of Magick series are done. The files need to be reviewed before forwarding them to my formatter. Then a bundled edition will be released.

7) Once the first six actions items are done, I'll get back to work on A Modicum of Truth.

Status Update - June 2016

After I got over the Flu from Hell, May turned into an amazing and productive month! Here's the highlights:

- A short story called "Pig-Headed" will appear in Sword and Sorceress 31, which tentatively will be released in early November. This involves brand-new characters.

- The characters of my previous Sword and Sorceress stories now star in their first full-length novel, A Question of Balance. I'm planning on releasing it June 20th.

- Justice Anthea and Brother Luc's first stories are collected in a new volume, Justice: The Beginning. It also contains a brand new story about their first year together. Unless Murphy completely screws me, it should be out around June 30th.

- The first draft of Zombie Goddess is done! I hope to release it next month, depending on my Murphy-cursed life. I'll give everyone a specific date in July.

- For the rest of the summer, I'll hopefully get out the rest of the Bloodlines series with their new covers and in paperback format. If that goes well, the Seasons of Magick series will also get a facelift and a paperback version.

And then?

Well, I'll try to buckle down and finish writing the last three Bloodlines books. Next up will be Ravaged (it's currently sitting at 18,000 words).

Status Report - November 2014

The last eighteen months haven't been the greatest for me and my family. We had plans. Plans that would be best for each of us to fulfill our personal goals. And the great god Murphy laughed maniacally and did everything he could to fuck those plans up.

As I write this, I'm sitting in a hotel room hundreds of miles from our new home, waiting for my car to be repaired. Yep, Murphy has been so good to me lately. (If you couldn't tell by the dripping sarcasm.)

But all the problems doesn't mean I haven't been writing! However, it does mean that the 2014 production schedule has been officially shredded into more pieces than Iran-Contra documents.

So here's the 2015 plan:

The Bloodlines Series
I'm writing the last four books as we speak. In edition, I've re-proofed the first three books, and I'm half-way through re-proofing #4. I've already talked with someone about contracting her to format the entire series for both e-book and print starting in January. I'm also on the search for a new cover artist so there's a unified theme and style for the covers. The plan is to re-launch the entire series late winter/early spring. I'll post a chapter from the new books once a week over at the Blood Lines blog.

The Justice Series
I've thought long and hard about how I want to launch this series. There's a particular artist I want to hire for Justice Anthea's stories, but he's expensive which means I need to save my pennies. Also, I don't want leave readers hanging between books, so I plan to release the first three books, A Question of Balance, A Modicum of Truth, and A Matter of Death, hopefully around next Halloween.

Nnnnnnnnnnnn Series
I'm collaborating with another ex-attorney/fantasy writer, Xxxxx Yyyyyy. (P.S. I highly recommend her book, Aaaaaaaaaa!) This is my first time working with someone, and I'm really enjoying it! It's about a couple of attorneys who handle the legal problems of superheroes. Our projected release date for the first book is May 1st.

All the credit for the series tagline goes to Xxxxx:

Franklin & Winters, Attorneys at Law — You saved the world. Let us handle the cleanup. For a free consultation, call 888-555-HERO.

Seasons of Magick Series
If I have any spare time next year, I plan to do a collected edition of the Seasons of Magick series.

* * *

The money side
As far as sales go, they are down. We're talking the $200/month ballpark collectively across all platforms for all of 2014. I blame it on my lack of publishing. I've found the best marketing is releasing a new book every few months, and needless to say, my last releases under the Suzan Harden name were over Halloween week last year.

Ironically, the reason I'm selling anything at all is thanks to Nora Roberts. The title of the third book in her O'Dwyer trilogy is...Blood Magick. So my book of the same name is showing up on e-book searches, and people have been trying it out.

Alter Ego has been doing slightly better in sales because the last novel of a trilogy was released in May and she participated in a charity anthology over the summer.

I'm hoping all of this will improve once I start releasing books from both of us this winter. Keeping my fingers crossed anyway.

As always, your mileage may vary.

Lessons Learned: Return on Investment - Part I

In all the hubbaloo over The Passive Voice, Steven Zacharius of Kensington, Barry Eisler, Robert Gottlieb of Trident Media Group and the infamous Writers Digest poll, people are trying to frame the issue as traditional publishing versus indie publishing.

People are asking the wrong damn question. If you are writer who wants to be published, you should be asking, "What's the return on my investment?"

The return on an investment is when you divide the gain of the investment minus the cost of the investment by the cost of the investment. Or

ROI = (GOI - COI)/COI

I'm going to walk through two examples: one to show my ignorance as a indie publisher in the beginning and one to show how I did it right. I'm going to simplify a few numbers for math clarity.

Example 1
Seasons of Magick: Spring was the first book I put up as an indie author.

It's approximately 20K words. At the time, I wrote about 500 words per hour, so it took me 40 hours to write the story. Let's say I, the publisher, paid me, the writer, $10 an hour.

I paid a friend's teen daughter $25 to create a Photoshop file for my cover.

A friend and I edited each other's novellas over coffee, so throw in $10 for my Starbucks card.

I know just enough HTML to be dangerous so I formatted this myself using freeware.

My costs of investment? $400 + $25 + $10 + $0 = $435.

I priced the book at $0.99. 99 copies sold the first year it was on the market. Again, for simplicity's sake, let's say I made Amazon's rate of $0.35 for all the copies (which really isn't far from the truth). My gain on investment in Year 1? 99 X $0.35 = $34.65

Therefore, my ROI for this book is ($34.65 - $435)/$435 = - $0.92

Now the nice thing is this book will be available (hopefully) for the rest of my life plus seventy years. Odds are it will eventually earn a positive ROI.

Example 2
A year after I started indie publishing I wrote a BDSM erotic romance. Since I'm not ready to reveal Alter Ego, we'll call it Sluts in the City #1.

Again, this novella was 20K words so my costs as a writer remained the same. So did my editing costs.

By now, I'd learned my lesson about having a decent cover. I'd bought the picture to the left for $8 with the intention of using it for the cover until I saw how many covers, both indie and trad, used it. So I bought a different cover at Romance Novel Covers for $15.

I used freeware to tweak the picture and add the title and author's name by myself. (I had a lot of fun experimenting, too!) Again, I did my own formatting.

My costs of investment? $400 + $10 + $23 + $0 = $433

I priced the book at $2.99. My income per copy ranges from $1.05 to $2.68, so once again, let's use $2.00 for ease of math. The first year I sold 1,481 copies so my gain on investment was 1481 X $2.00 = $2962.00.

Therefore, my ROI for Sluts in the City #1 is ($2962 - $433)/$433 = $5.84

$5.84 versus -$0.92. See the difference?

Two erotica novellas. Same length. Same amount of time they were on sale. Little to no marketing.

The two big differences were the covers and the price. Both had a significant impact on my income.

On Monday, I'll talk about determining ROI for an indie published project, an assisted publishing project, and a trad published project.

On Wednesday, I'll talk about why using a picture like the Handcuffed Girl above will hurt more than help you thanks to the Kernel Pornocalypse.

Until then, stay toasty this weekend!

Season of Magick: Winter Is Live!

Finally! The last book of the Seasons of Magick series, Winter, is available!

Blurb
The worst thing Tom Laoch ever did in his previous life was to turn down the advances of a goddess. And not just any goddess, but Morrigan, the goddess of war, magick and death.

Now, the gods have sent Tom back to Earth to save a Greenwich Village shop owner from a sorcerer, who plans to use her powers to destroy the human race. But Rain Bean isn’t just any businesswoman, she’s the mortal incarnation of Morrigan. Once she finds out Tom’s true identity, unhappy will be an understatement because everyone knows Hell hath no fury like a goddess scorned…

Novella, approximately 22,000 words or 80 printed pages

Many thanks to my readers for their patience!!

Seasons of Magick: Winter is currently available at the following e-book retailers:

Amazon UK
Amazon US
Barnes & Noble
Smashwords

A Day Late and a Dollar Short

I've been able to keep ahead of blogging because of the gigantic list of ideas I have next to me and because I often write them 2-3 weeks in advance. But I've ignored that list in a desperate attempt to catch up on my writing the last two weeks. So when I logged on this morning, it was, like, OOPS!

The reason for the scramble was to finish Seasons of Magick: Winter and my Alter Ego's December release. I'd planned plenty of time when a virus kicked me to the curb on October 2nd. This was the deep chest cold that forced me to resort to Grandpa's whiskey, lemon juice and honey solution.

I was finally starting to recover from that when I contracted a head cold. Add in stress from some personal matters and my health took a rapid nose-dive. DH offered to help multiple times, but when it's the actual writing, there's not much he can do. He did get groceries and cooked several times, which aided me immensely.

On the plus side, Seasons of Magick: Winter is in the hands of my beta readers now. I said I'd have it up by Halloween, so I pray my readers aren't too disappointed in my tardiness.

Now, off to finish up Blood Sacrifice...

Houston, We Have Lift Off!

I swear the lag time between 'upload' and 'live' gets longer and longer, but I can say that Seasons of Magick: Autumn has been officially released before the end of March!

It's available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Smashwords. [NOTE: If there's no link to the retailer, then the 'buy' link isn't live yet.]

I had a lot of fun writing this one. Hope y'all enjoy it!

Blurb
Welcome to Morrigan’s Cauldron! But be careful what you ask for because this little Greenwich Village shop can deliver your heart’s desire. Or your greatest nightmare.

Phylicia Johnson knew going to a Halloween party with a bunch of college kids was a bad idea. But her son’s R.A. has her feeling things she hadn’t felt in eighteen years.

Dante Jones survived the worst that Afghanistan could throw at him. He wants to earn his degree and settle down. And damn, if the universe didn’t dump the most perfect woman in front of him. But evil has other plans for the party guests, and a demon-induced orgy is one threat the Marines never trained him to deal with.

Can he believe Phylicia when she says she can stop the hellion and save the guests? Or are they all doomed to become sex batteries for the demon’s plans?

More Thoughts on Covers

Yesterday, Tess St. John and Savannah Rose had some interesting thought on covers in the comments. Like half-naked guys, yea or nay?

So I'm going to ask the rest of my audience the same thing I asked them:

1) Do different styles of cover in a series drive you crazy as a reader?

2) How do you feel when a book you previously bought is issued with a new title and/or cover?

This very discussion has been an ongoing topic between me, DH, my marketing guru and my cover artist. Particularly over the cover of Seasons of Magick: Summer (aka Die for Me).

Seasons of Magick: Spring is my best-selling title, though Zombie Love is catching up for other marketing reasons. When I released Summer on October 11, 2011, the sales were so-so. After much deliberation, we experimented with a new cover and a new title, which was released November 11, 2011. Sales started sliding south. Over the last three weeks, Die for Me was my only fiction title NOT SELLING AT ALL.

I took a hard, hard look. There was nothing to connect Spring with Die for Me. From the way readers are gobbling up the Bloodlines series, I know they love related books. So I decided to go back to the original title and cover. A few sales was better than no sales, right? The reversion to the old title and cover was implemented Sunday while I watched the Texans-Ravens game (gotta love multi-tasking).

I decided to leave the Seasons of Magick series alone. Write Autumn and Winter, and stick with the original cover concepts. I love the grimoire/tarot look. But I do understand that this is a business, and I have to take readers reactions into consideration. In the end though, I wonder how much a cover really means?

Thoughts? Opinions?

[Edit to add: Apparently this subject hasn't just been on my mind. Joel Friedlander has a pretty good write-up over at The Book Designer on the dangers of symbolism when you're the author.]

Summer is here!

I wanted to make sure all my links were live before I made the official announcement, but Seasons of Magick: Summer is out!

The Blurb
Welcome to Morrigan’s Cauldron! But be careful what you ask for because this little Greenwich Village shop can deliver your heart’s desire. Or your greatest nightmare.

Shan Wong thought when she broke up with her boyfriend Mark, he couldn’t hurt her anymore…until she discovers he’s planned his revenge on her by committing suicide and turning himself into a kiang shi—a zombie with super-human powers.

Jamal Washington has loved Shan since they were children. When he thinks he finally has a chance with her, her ex comes back from the dead to kill her…and anyone who gets in the way. Is the ancient sword the magick shop owner gave him enough to stop Zombie Mark? And is Jamal brave enough to win Shan’s love as well as save her life?

Novella, approximately 25,000 words or 90 printed pages

“This story somehow combines hot sex, young love, and some startling zombie moments that still make me shudder!” –Author Nina Cordoba

Available at the following retailers:
Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Smashwords

Summer is DONE!

Okay, I typed that title and realized today is Mabon, the Autumn Equinox, the first day of Fall.

So, Happy Mabon, everyone!

What I meant was that I'm done with the initial editing of Seasons of Magick: Summer. Finally! And it's been sent to critique partners and a beta reader for review.

In the meantime, the first 2500 words of Seasons of Magick: Autumn have been banged out on Isabella the laptop.  I'm keeping my fingers crossed that no other incidents or family traumas will interfere. And I'm doing a pretty good job of saying "No!" lately to a lot of requests for my time.

All-in-all, I think I'm back on track.  Yea, me!

Status Update - August 2011

Currently reading - Heartless by Gail Carriger (MMPB)

Here's the numbers for all three of my books available for the month of July:

Amazon - 24
Barnes & Noble - 5
Smashwords - 1
XinXii - 0

Total books for July: 30
Total books for 2011: 85

For monthly comparisons, I listed previous months numbers in the July Status Update.

Except for June's hiccup, I've seen an increase each month. I already know August's numbers will be slightly skewed thanks to the free business plan guide I put out as a companion to the blog series I did at Indie U last week. (Go to Pitch University for the exclusive coupon code to get the business plan guide free from Smashwords.)

In the meantime, back to work on Seasons of Magick: Summer because I want to get this story published before, well, the end of summer. Click here for a sneak peek at the first chapter.

Well, Crappola!

[Editor's Note:  Thursday's post is back!  Yah!  I've already got posts scheduled through Tuesday, so Lessons Learned will continue on Wednesday.  Thanks for finding my old posts, Google Folks!]

In case you've been visiting relatives under a rock, Blogger's attempt at maintenance late Wednesday night brought down the system yesterday.

This means my Lessons Learned posts for Thursday and today were eaten by the Blogger gremlin.  *sigh*

I'll have them up next week.

In the meantime, Seasons of Magick: Spring is now available at Smashwords.

I'm Officially a Writer on My Own!!

Wow!  I can't believe I finally have something I wrote for sale.  It's only taken three months between business analysis, research, editing and figuring out the vagaries for formatting.  But I also took my time because I wanted to do this right.  Or as right as I possibly could.

Anyway, no fancy introductions.  It's available at Amazon for only $0.99.  For the Nook fanatics, it'll be up on Barnes and Noble sometime later this week.

[Edit to Add:  It's now available at Barnes and Noble, Smashwords and XinXii.]

BLURB
Welcome to Morrigan’s Cauldron! But be careful what you ask for because this little Greenwich Village shop can deliver your heart’s desire. Or your greatest nightmare.

Tessa McClain's life has spun out of control. Thanks to her con artist ex, she's lost her job, her money and her reputation. Desperate, she talks her way into job at a local New Age shop. There's just one problem—Adrian Holloway, the hunky store manager. The last thing she needs is another bad boy in her life. But her body hungers to break her brain’s ‘no men’ rule.

After the death of his wife, Adrian abandoned his Wall Street world and found peace in the quirky Greenwich shop, Morrigan’s Cauldron. Or he did until an April wind blew smart-mouthed Tessa McClain through the front door. While he’s ready to take another crack at love, convincing Tessa may be more trouble than he bargained.

[Edit to add:  Serious *facepalm* here.  Seasons of Magick: Spring will be up on Smashwords as well later this week.  I meant to say that in the original post.

I am not shooting for the Smashwords Premium catalog though (which allows distribution to other e-tailers like Kobo) until after all four stories have been released.  At that point, I'll bundle them for distribution through other channels and available in print through CreateSpace.  It's all a matter of managing time and resources.]