Dear Author: Romance Book Reviews, Author Interviews, and Commentary

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We had a previous post and poll regarding our favorite tropes and now I wonder what your least favorite tropes are.

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Welcome to First Page Saturday. Individual authors anonymously send a first page read and critiqued by the Dear Author community of authors, readers and industry others. Anyone is welcome to comment. You may comment anonymously.
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Serena was pacing around her hotel room for the second time when her cell phone rang. She picked up on the third ring.

“Miss Chirk?”

“Yes.” What a stupid question. Only Jones knew where to find her. But if she didn’t answer, he might send someone to this faceless hotel to check on her.

“Not good enough,” the male voice snapped. “Ms, not Miss. Remember your persona. Young, sassy, independent. Get it right every time, you hear me?”

She sighed. “Sure.”

Jones continued to harass her, as he always did, treating her like a child. “You can speak freely if you wish, but only on this phone. You understand?”

“Yes.” She was new to this business, not stupid. But she knew if she tried to tell him that, he’d only repeat what he’d told her a thousand times before and make her recite it back to him so she didn’t think it …

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I’m pretty much a sucker for the friends to lovers theme as well as the marriage of convenience one. I hate the virgin widow trope and generally dislike the secret baby one, but can let that one slide under the right circumstances. Oh, I also like the reunited lovers trope. Must add that to the poll.

more animals

This is the second in a three part series about the author as a consumable part of the book. It’s a look at how readers respond to current marketing tecniques and why.  This series is more a reflection of the reader and the reader’s mindset and not meant to be a criticism of the authors themselves.  (As an aside, I find it interesting that no matter how many times I say this, some authors still take this as a personal attack.  It’s not, I swear.)

Off the top of my head, I can think of three authors whose publicity photos differ according to their pen name:

Jessica Bird v JR Ward
Nora Roberts v. JD Robb
Eve Silver v. Eve Kenin

In these six publicity photos, a reader is being sent a different message. Essentially, in the first set, the authors are warm and friendly. In the second set, they all have an edge to them. Presumably the message here is …

We are starting a new series called “If You Like” which will be hosted by various readers, authors and bloggers of Dear Author. The purpose of the post and the comments is to explore what we like about a particular iconic author and what other authors have books like the iconic author. Elizabeth penned this awesome entry regarding Lois McMaster Bujold.

If you would like to host an “If You Like” post, please email me at Jane at dearauthor.com
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If you like Lois McMaster Bujold …

Lois McMaster Bujold is one of the most acclaimed authors in speculative fiction still writing today. Her first book Warrior’s Apprentice was published in 1986 and she’s published 20 more books since then. Her latest book,The Sharing Knife, Volume Four: Horizon comes out the beginning of next year. (I can’t wait!) She’s been nominated and won scads of awards- multiple Hugos, Nebulas and one World Fantasy Award for best novel. With her large and diverse backlist Prolific is her middle name.

Warning: There are spoilers in this post

Lois McMaster Bujold currently has three ongoing series:

Vorkosigan Saga is an extensive SF epic primarily …

Welcome to First Page Saturday. Individual authors anonymously send a first page read and critiqued by the Dear Author community of authors, readers and industry others. Anyone is welcome to comment. You may comment anonymously.
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I first saw him when he was probably in the eighth grade, the Shoppette had a program for kids where they’d bag your purchases and you felt obligated to drop money in a box for them. He was a kid with brown hair and round glasses, and a sweet smile, and I think I stuffed a buck in the box and walked out. It was early summer, my family planned traveling over Europe - living in Germany had its advantages, the great cities were only a few hours away. At the end of that summer, the phone rang, and it was Steve, known universally as Coach, reminding Will that cross country practice began in a few days.

Will was a sophomore now, his first year of competing had been somewhat frustrating for him, but he’d found a mentor and a hero in Coach, he had the worst case of hero worship I ever saw. We went to the base exchange and …

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I was reading two Harlequin Presents published in the 1980s. One was by Susan Napier and the other by Charlotte Lamb. In both books, the heroine slaps the hero in a rage and the hero hits her back. I think Jo Beverly had a very controversial book wherein the hero hits the heroine. It sparked a huge debate on AAR on the issue of whether physical violence by the hero should ever be considered acceptable in romance books. Even if slapping is not considered kosher these days, plenty of books contain spanking (both sexual and non sexual) and the threats of spanking. Why is hitting someone on the ass more acceptable than on the face?

In any event, I was kind of shocked reading those scenes in the books. I prefer my heroes to be non violent but is there ever a place for physical reaction? Is it wrong to call the slapping “violent”? Should heroines who slap at the heroes expect the same in return? The following is the hero poll. We’ll see how the results shake out.

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It’s hard to believe that election day is finally here.  For months, nothing has been more prominent in my mind and my reading than this election.  I feel so blessed to not only  have the opportunity to vote, but to have cast my ballot for Obama via mail two weeks ago.  I hope that if you have the right to vote, you exercise it no matter who your candidate is.  Don’t stand on the sidelines this time.  It’s too important.  Please drop a comment below and tell us about your voting experience.  I’ve loved reading those anecdotes on other sites, particularly if you had to wait in line.

We are starting a new series called “If You Like” which will be hosted by various readers, authors and bloggers of Dear Author. The purpose of the post and the comments is to explore what we like about a particular iconic author and what other authors have books like the iconic author. Val Kovalin who writes about fantasy fiction at ValKovalin.com and m/m fiction at Obsidian Bookshelf is hosting this If You Like entry on Jacqueline Carey’s Kushiel series. Val Kavolin did a great piece on Julia Spencer Fleming, a favorite of author of mine.
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If you like Jacqueline Carey …

Jacqueline Carey writes the Kushiel’s Legacy epic fantasy series (six books: Kushiel’s Dart, Kushiel’s Chosen, Kushiel’s Avatar , Kushiel’s Justice , Kushiel’s Scion , Kushiel’s Mercy), which may appeal to fans of historical romance and fantasy romance. To see why, please read on and rest assured that I don’t include any plot-spoilers.

Setting (era): Medieval.

Setting (geographic): Action takes place in Terre d’Ange (Land of the Angels), loosely based upon medieval France. The epic plotlines range across recognizable equivalents to …

Joe Esposito, a very smart mind in the publishing and epublishing world, argued a week or so ago that the Kindle and its “kin” would reduce overall book sales. I admire Esposito and his thoughts about publishing but in this case, I find his argument to be, well spotty at best.  His argument is thus:
because the architecture and business model for the Kindle support a “buy only when you need it” frame of mind, aka “just in time” inventory management. In the hardcopy world, where many books (no one knows how many) are bought “just in case,” the number of books purchased exceeds the number of books read. The Kindle will remove the excess, adding to the legions of misfortunes of publishers and authors.
The gravamen of this argument is that digital purchasers are less susceptible to the impulse buy. I would argue that the nature of the instant gratification of digital books actually makes the impulse buy occur at more frequent rates.

Esposito argues that a brick and mortar shopper will browse for a specific title that brought him to the store but may also …