Crane Dance

grimmalkin and I got to snarking about poetry one early morning when she had a bad head cold and I was sleep-depped beyond understanding, and ( this is what emerged. )

Start taking writing seriously. Write regularly. Finish stories.

Take part in more writing and reading communities.

Read more ebook erotica and erotic romance, because it's just not the same as what you buy in the "relationships" section of the bookstore.

Both start and finish my writing website.

Remember that follow-through is more important than inspiration.

Do better at keeping in touch with friends both online and off.

Answer comments. Make more comments.

Read more. Watch more. Play more. Give more.

Practice debauchery. Backhand still needs work.

As I search erotic romance sites for more books to read, I keep running into one major obstacle:

The hero.

The hero is strong. He's manly. He's built like a Greek god. His muscles make the heroine salivate. His chest makes the heroine have three-page fantasies during their first meeting. Did we mention he's manly? Oh, and he radiates toughness. Or strength combined with vulnerability. We like the word "masterful" to describe him, too, but really, "manly" is our favorite. Because he's manly. He's a man. He's a man's man. He rumbles, he flexes, he wears tight, revealing clothes in a peculiarly manly way. He even smells manly. Eau de Ball Sweat, that's our man. Man. MAN.

I'm starting to sense I'm not the intended audience.

I like men. This is not a man. This is a molecule of testosterone blown up six feet tall. It's not even multiple molecules of testosterone, because as far as I can tell, there is only one Hero. There he stands in his cookie-cutter glory, monochrome, the Alpha Male at his finest.

Whatever happened to all the other possibilities? The trickster. The rogue. The willowy, refined Chinese scholar. The witty courtier. The fussy librarian, so much fun to offend! The saint, even more fun to corrupt. The mad scientist and his oh-so-entertaining minions. The poet in his ruffly shirt, wifting about like an 18th-century vampire. The mystic, bewildered because his god has been sending him new and strange revelations re: girl parts. Not a loom or a flex or a lovingly described bicep among them. If they leap into the fray to defend the heroine, it won't be with their fists. And every single one of them has a reason for being other than--

This rant deserves its own paragraph.

Every single one of them has a reason for being other than protecting the heroine. The Alpha Male lives to protect the heroine. Because readers, as far as I can tell, cannot get their warm and fuzzy feelings on until the hero is abending over their literary alter egoes, murmuring, "I'll protect you." Why? Is life really that hard? Do we live in a windswept Conanesque landscape ravaged by mobs of Mongols who will drag us off to the salt mines if we don't have someone buff, blond, and covered in fur to defend us? Do werewolves and vampires really walk the mean streets of Cleveland, threatening to turn us into chow if a tall broody guy in a leather coat doesn't wave a silver-loaded gun around for us? Can we really envision no role for our man-candy other than bodyguard?

It's a nice fantasy, but why is it THE fantasy? Where did all the other fantasies go?

Sometimes when I leaf through erotica ebook sites, I'm stunned by the inventiveness and good writing out there.

And sometimes I wonder why anyone bothers posting stories for free when publishers will buy any old crap.

I don't mean to keep harping on the theme, but I can't avoid it. It's so very there. Multiply published authors with popular blogs who can't use the word "said." Infodumps so big that there's no story left to tell when the author's done. Plots I saw in Smurf porn back in 1991. No one has unleashed limpid amethyst orbs on the world yet, but no doubt that's just lack of research on my part.

( Now let's talk about me. )

As of today, I have:

- One prince, who is exactly unlike I expected. He promises to be interesting, but first I have to keep him from being manly all over everything. Ew.

- One princely castle complete with entertaining room descriptions. Room descriptions are very important, I find. Also food and clothing descriptions. The food and clothing descriptions shall flow out of the castle descriptions because the castle is cool that way. I am, yes, a total girl.

- One mage, who is much as I expected but a little more amorphous than I would like. Okay, a lot more amorphous than I would like. Also a lot more uke than I would like.

- One fallen angel, whom I can picture very clearly, what with having a picture and all, but who doesn't have a personality beyond "wisely snarky."

- One king, one queen, one crown prince, and a passel of princesses, plus an idea for a sequel provided the readers don't mind there being no sex in book two.

- Kind of a plot.

- Not nearly enough sex.

Booyah.

Starting Sunday, I try to turn this mess into a novella.

If I cried out, who would hear me up there, among the angelic orders?
and even if one of them pressed me suddenly against his heart:
I would be consumed in that overwhelming existence.
For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror, which we are still just able to endure,
and we are so awed because it serenely disdains to annihilate us.
Every angel is terrifying.


Every angel is terrifying. And yet, alas,
I invoke you, almost deadly birds of the soul,
knowing about you. Where are the days of Tobias,
when one of you, veiling his radiance, stood at the front door,
slightly disguised for the journey, no longer appalling;
(a young man like the one who curiously peeked through the window).
But if the archangel now, perilous, from behind the stars
took even one step down toward us: our own heart, beating
higher and higher, would beat us to death. Who are you?

Early successes, Creation's pampered favorites,
mountain-ranges, peaks growing red in the dawn
of all Beginning, -- pollen of the flowering godhead,
joints of pure light, corridors, stairways, thrones,
space formed from essence, shields made of ecstasy, storms
of emotion whirled into rapture, and suddenly, alone,
mirrors: which scoop up the beauty that has streamed from their face
and gather it back, into themselves, entire.

-- From the Duino Elegies, by Rainier Maria Rilke

Number of people whom I have asked, "Would you read BDSM erotica about incestuous demon brothers?": 6

Number of people who have said, "Hell, yes!": 6

I'm hanging out with the wrong crowd.

Or the right crowd. Am still making up my mind on that point.

In any case, my current project is a series of novellas about a pair of demon* brothers who contend for the throne of their region of the Makai** with fervor and cock. I plan to publish it, the question being where to do that. Only one house, Torquere, accepts incest, and they want romantically written incest. Personally, I think that serving up your younger brother to the assembled demon lords on a silver platter for their entertainment and delectation is intensely romantic, but one cannot expect Torquere to agree.

So I'll be comparing e-publishers in an attempt to find a taker while I write. Even if you're not interested in the novellas, stick around for the publisher comparisons.


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* Youkai, actually.

** Like the spirit world, the city of Dis, and Where the Wild Things Are all rolled into one. In Japanese quasi-mythology, it's where greeblies go when they're not terrorizing humans.

I've been hanging around forums for a very short time, but I've spotted a few trends:

Hot is good. The hotter a book is, the better it sells.

Paranormal/fantasy/what have you sells better than contemporary. Vampires are king. There's also at least one publisher with a call out for elf romances, which are one of their bestsellers.

M/M sells very well indeed. Traditional romance and erotica publishers have been slow in waking up to women's massive interest in mansex, and erotic romance and women's erotica e-publishers have filled in the gap.

Short sells better than long. One person noted that the 25,000-word to 50,000-word length was the biggest seller. Most e-publishers have a hefty line in this range. Even Changeling Press, which tops out at 30,000 words, falls into this range.

Crack is juuuuust fine. I don't know how well it sells, but e-publishers buy it by the bushel.

Writing quality is not as important to erotic romance and erotica as it is to other genres. Someone noted that storyline and the intensity of the romance mattered more than the quality of the writing. A poke into the samples on Ellora's Cave confirmed it. The average quality was just... fecal. Romance writers bridle when people use their genre as a syonym for bad writing, but... but.... I just can't get past it. Much of the writing is just BAD.

This poses a special challenge for writers coming in from other genres. We're used to good writing carrying a story. We'll even forgive cliched ideas and trite themes if the writing is good enough. Entering a genre where writing quality counts for little and all these other ignored qualities are paramount is like learning to speak a foreign language--while gagged. So spend time in forums, read lots of erotic romances, figure out what the real signs of good erotic romance are. Don't be yet another out-of-genre author who thinks she can toss off a quick romance for quick cash because the writing is crap.


I've also noted a couple of other things that are different from traditional publishing:

In traditional publishing, switching publishers is a Big Deal. You don't do it unless you're willing to risk burning a few bridges. Also, you don't publish with more than one house unless you write in a second genre that your main house doesn't publish. In erotic romance e-publishing, publishing simultaneously with several publishers is standard. Some authors even count the number of their publishers like notches on their belt. I don't know why that is, but it's a hopeful sign.

(ETA: A forum thread here says that erotic romance e-publishers encourage authors to publish with several houses because each house has dedicated readers who don't normally go anywhere else, but will follow favorite authors to another house. Each time an author publishes at a new house, they open a pathway between that house and all the other houses they've published with. It's good for the author and good for the publisher.)

In traditional publishing, one book a year is standard, two is prolific, and three is questionable. In erotic romance, quantity is key. Not only are the books far shorter, so authors can push more out, but readers are voracious. Giving them more, more, more is fantastic. This knits nicely with the old publishing saying that the best way to promote your first book is to write a second. On top of that, e-publishers put out more books per month than comparable traditional publishers, and if your first-pick house is full you're free to go to another house with open slots in their schedule, so it's infinitely easier to find a home for your books than it is in traditional publishing. Write as much as you can as fast as you can without compromising quality, and your fanbase will love you for it.