Sad News at Inara Press

I have sad news for my blogs today. My publisher, Inara Press is closing its doors, as of June 30, 2006. All of the remaining episodes of the Inara serials will be released at that time, and can be downloaded to customers’ computers. After that, the rights revert to me. Dawn Seewer, who was both the publisher and cover artist, will also sign over the rights to the cover art, provided she receives proper credit for it. I can’t even begin to express my feelings on this turn of events.

The good news is that I am considering other opportunities in both the editorial realm and in terms of re-working Rock Bound and shopping it around to other publishers. In fact, I’ve been contacted by a publisher directly, and I am definitely considering this offer. I’ve reached the conclusion that it is more hard-core sci-fi than romance and that I might do better to offer it to a sci-fi publisher. Nonetheless, I think it needs more polishing before it goes out again.

I attended another science fiction convention. I went to DucKon in Chicago (Naperville, actually) and spoke on two panels. One was on getting published and the other was called “Where Does Your Romance Belong?” There seems to be a lot of crossover among genres these days—especially in the romance world. This was the second such panel I’ve seen. MARCon had a similar one and I caught the end of it.

I’ve reached the conclusion that in order to be sold successfully as a romance, even if it is a sci-fi, fantasy, or paranormal romance—a book has to follow a certain formula. It may not have to be quite as rigid is the Harlequin formula, but certain elements must be there. Boy meets girl and they fall in love, but something stands in their way until the very end when they finally fall into each other’s arms and live happily ever after. In Rock Bound, the couple doesn’t even speak until halfway through the book. So I don’t think romance reviewers quite knew what to do with it. Every review said that science fiction fans would love it, but none said it was a good romance.

So, I don’t plan to sell Rock Bound as a romance any longer. Which means I need to change a few blurbs and such. I felt that I rushed to finish it while I was trying to edit and proof other Inara Manuscripts. I will be able to do that more easily than I originally thought. The VA took another set of x-rays of my wrist and it is not broken. The pain is gone and I can type again. Woo Hoo!

So, watch my blog and join my Yahoo group at riw_author@yahoogroups.com for updates on Rock Bound when it reaches its new home and is re-released.

Well, that’s it for this week.