SYTYCW 2014

It's closing day for the SYTYCW14 competition and I promised I would put up my top picks of what I've read so far. Most of these were read in the first few days so don't include later entries. And when it all comes down to it...it's a matter of personal taste.

Bear in mind I have read less than 100 chapters so I could be missing dozens of fabulous entries. I have also read less of imprints I don't usually read so there will be big holes in my choices.


My top picks consist of entries that have three things.

1. I like the story

2. I think the writing is of a high standard

3. The story is something I believe might appeal to the editors.

Please note: ..I...I...I...It's all subjective. (see graphic above)


So how did I do? 50% of my top ten made it into the Top 25 plus 2 of my recommended reads. I hadn't read 11 of the top 25 chapters. So of the 14 Top 25 chapters I had read, I picked 7. Additionally, one of my top picks was requested but withdrew due to time constraints. Just realised another of my top ten had to withdraw so I suppose if you don't count them it was 40% but if you do it's 60%.

Final List of Top 25 Picks

Leah Maser	Wanting the Detective
Tanya M. Burnstad	Remembrance
Alison French	Her Italian Man
Amanda Cinelli	Resisting the Sicilian Playboy
Traci Douglass	About That Night…
Chase Ewing	Love for Sale
R. Lynn Dewitt	Sophie’s Hart
T.R. McClure	A Perfect Match
Katherine Dane	Agent of Desire
Autumn Shelley	Fire and Iron
Carolyn Hector	Mistletoe Mischief
Ison Hill	Impulse
Karin Baine	Belfast Belle
Amy Jane	Learning To Love Again
Shelley Iñón	When the Bus Stopped
Thérèse Marie	A Foundation of Love
Jeannie Hall	Violation of Innocence
Analiesa Adams	In Desperate Search of Peace
Katie Meyer	Paradise Found
Sam(antha) Burns	Saving Greene Farm
Janet Lee Nye	Man Maid
Laura Brown	Perfect Together
Narelle Buxton	Changing Her Baby Plan
Darby Karchut	Stone’s Heart
Megan B Zehring	The Prodigal

Top 25 Picks So Far with Imprints

Paradise Found - Katie Meyer - (Special Edition) 
Belfast Belle - Karin Baine - (Medical)
Man Maid - Jan L Nye -  (Superrromance)
Perfect Together - Laura Brown -(Superromance)
About That Night - Traci Douglass - (Blaze)
Sophie's Hart - Gina DeWitt - (Heartwarming)
Mistletoe Mischief - Carolyn Hector - (Kimani)
Resisting the Sicilian Playboy - Amanda Cinelli - (Presents)
Violation of Innocence - Jeannie Hall - (Suspense)
Agent of Desire - Katherine Dane - (Historical)
Wanting The Detective - Leah Maser - (Intrigue) 
Faking It - Taryn Leigh Taylor - (Blaze) Withdrawn
Fire And Iron - Autumn Shelley - (Historical)
Twist of Fate - Susanah Loccarno - (American) Withdrawn
The Prodigal - Megan B Zehring - (Love Inspired)
Stone's Heart - Darby Karchut - (Love Inspired)
In Desperate Search of Peace - Analiesa Adams (Romantic Suspense)
Her Italian Man - Alison French - (Presents)
Saving Greene Farm - Samantha Burns - (Special Edition)
Impulse - Ison Hill - (Kimani)
Remembrance - Tanya M Burnstad - (Intrigue)
When the Bus Stopped - Shelly Inon - (Romance)
A Foundation of Love - Thérèse Marie - (Romance)
Changing Her Baby Plan - Narelle Buxton - (Superromance)
Love for Sale - Chase Ewing - (Desire)
A Perfect Match - T R McClure - (Heartwarming)
Learning to Love Again - Amy Jane - (Medical)

.


In no particular order - My top picks so far.

Presents

At His Disposal - Danielle Doolittle


Savage Pride - Maggie Jones - Requested


The Rinaldo Heir - Dora Bramden


Resisting the Sicilian Playboy - Amanda Cinelli - SYTYCW Top 25

Blaze

About That Night - Traci Douglass - SYTYCW Top 25

Faking It - Taryn Leigh Taylor - SYTYCW Top 25 - Withdrawn

Medical

Learning to Love Again - Amy Jane -  SYTYCW Top 25

SuperRomance

Man Maid - Janet Lee Nye - SYTYCW Top 25

Special Edition

Rescuing Riley - Carol Opalinsky

Little Hot Mess - Devon McKay

But wait...there's more.

I'm putting a list of recommended reads here without links. These are ones I would have liked to put in my tops but felt they needed a little something extra.

Presents

Proof of Love

Kate Francis

Playboy Sheikh, Forbidden Heir - Requested through slush

Emily Keeler His Gilded Trap Calida Ally Paying the Sheikh's Price Sue Child Traitor in the Sheikh's Bed Ros Clarke

And this is my hero...Pascal...who belongs in this section in my opinion.

Blaze

Strip for Me

Jem Lowe

Discreet Pleasures

Megan Ryder

Over Easy

Casey Wyatt

Homegrown Rockstar

Heather Hopkins At Her Service Mia Sosa

Romance

Beauty & the Recluse

Ellie Gray Falling Deep Tasha Taylor

Just because I love this.

Desire Love for Sale - SYTYCW Top 25 Chase Ewing Medical Emergency:Two Blue Lines Catherine Coles Special Edition How Not to be a Tabloid Cover Story CA Speakman Wake Me Up Inside Gina Hagedorn Intrigue Hunted by the Past Jayne Evans Love Inspired Love Thy Enemy Erica D Hearns American The Cowgirl's Lost Love Sophia Sasson Historical Fire and Iron - SYTYCW Top 25 Autumn Shelley SuperRomance Love at First Flight Maria Michaels And just a couple of ones that I'm not sure if they are quite right for the line but they made me laugh...in a good way. Blaze Seducing the Senator Elle Marlow Intrigue Birthday Disaster TN Payne

What A Lady Craves Blog Tour

This is the first time I've participated in a blog tour so forgive me if I get it wrong.

The book is as pictured. Very nicely pictured in fact. What A Lady Craves. Self explanatory really.

I used to read a lot of historical romance in my teens and the first books I wanted to write were historical. Usually Georgette Heyer fan fiction I suspect but it made a change from my Anne McCaffrey fan fiction. If only the internet had been invented back then.

I've recently started writing historical romance again and so I've taken to reading more historical as well. I was interested to see this line from LoveSwept.

I'm half way through this story and enjoying it thoroughly. Henrietta is engaging, the humour is fun without being tedious and Alexander...well you know...see the cover for details. Ashlyn has also created a nice set of supporting characters that have depth and personality and we've been introduced to one of the other men in this Eton boys series and hints about the third gentleman.

I'll be back later when I finish reading.

I'm back...and here is my review.

This is the sort of book you should read and enjoy without thinking too much about it. It is at first glance an enjoyable romp with humour, a touch of boys own adventure stories and a romance with some sizzle.

The reunion of Henrietta and Alexander was bound to be fraught. He left England to salvage his families fortune leaving his fiancée behind, promising to return. Instead he marries someone else in India and Henrietta is left to face the ridicule of London society forcing her to withdraw from all contacts and eventually, to take a position as companion to Alexander's great-aunt. Lady Epperley is an eccentric and quite well drawn and entertaining.

The story takes up when Alexander and his Indian servant are shipwrecked close to his aunt's house and he must recuperate from his injuries under the wary eye of Henrietta. Thrown together, their reunion is complicated by the arrival of his daughters and the matchmaking efforts of his great-aunt. 

Henrietta is disturbed by the news that he has recently been widowed and his daughters have lost their mother. She is tantalised by the might have beens...

The introduction of an element of mystery with dark strangers threatening locals and hints about the tragic deaths that follow Alexander is a plot device that brings that element of an adventure tale that is just slightly over the top. Even the Indian servant has an air of mystery about him adding to the faintly gothic overtones.

I have to say the romance lacked the emotional intensity I expected considering the history between these two. It didn't quite match the fairly explicit smex scenes. They were well done but overwhelmed the emotional elements. 

The characters were well drawn and the author did well with the secondary characters who each had quite distinct personalities. Now and then it reminded me of Heyer's extended casts of characters from a range of social spheres.

Henrietta had a very definite personality and I liked her little quirks and interior monologues when confronted by her eccentric employers behaviour.

Alexander...well he was a nice guy but by the end of the book I was a little disappointed.

All through the book I kept remembering this quote... "I could not love thee, dear, so much,: Lov'd I not Honour more" from the 17th century poet Richard Lovelace.

(view spoiler) I explain this in detail in a spoiler in my Goodreads Review.

Overall this was an enjoyable read. It suffered a little from an identity crisis, not sure if it wanted to be an adventure story, a light-hearted romp or a sizzling ball of angst. The characters from the rest of the series were introduced and look interesting enough that I shall look out for them.

This was an ARC for review. I think you can tell I've been honest.

Why New Adult is inevitable and Necessary for the Romance Industry.

The "next big thing" in Romance is the New Adult sub-genre. By now, everyone knows it, but as little as three years ago people weren't talking about it.

Now it's everywhere and people are jumping on the bandwagon. Even Harlequin M&B tried to market to it within their category lines.

But why this sudden splurge of coming of age romances?

Because there was a big black hole in Romancelandia. It was like a small town where all the school leavers have left to go to the big city and didn't come back.

Young adult as a genre is stronger than ever with the ubiquitous trilogy plus stories being made into movies. These stories cater to the adolescent verging on adulthood market (and quite a few middle aged women) The young adult market is resistant to including more intense romances with young people experiencing sexual relationships or leading to marriage within a genre that is read by children from around nine years old. So where do you go next?

Once upon a time it would have been category romance edging out the Babysitters Club and Judy Bloom. But not any more.

Because mainstream romance is getting older. The bulk of heroines are late twenties and into the thirties. This is particularly true in the category lines with stories about successful professional women and their successful professional men. The medical lines, the good old fashioned doctor nurse romances, always tended a little older because to be a nurse or doctor you had to have spent years training and now we are seeing more heroines in that line nudging into the thirties. Where are the sweet stories about first year nurses falling for the hot doctors? Or vice versa.

When I was a fourteen year old, (yes I was once a teenager, don't tell my children), I read category romances with heroines mostly aged between eighteen to twenty-three. These were the mainstream romances and the heroines were mostly considered mature enough. Yes there were older heroines. Mostly in the medical profession, but in an era when a lot of girls had been in the workforce from sixteen, maturity was expected at that age. Most were virgins, most were in their first job or at most just left college. Sounds like New Adult to me.

So what does fourteen year old read in romance these days that would be the equivalent of a 1975 Harlequin Mills & Boon. Because a twenty-eight year old heroine is never really going to be someone a fourteen year old can identify with. OMG, that's almost as old as parents. Truly icky.

The expected answer, the Cherish/Sweet category line, isn't going to meet the needs because it is full of single mothers and more mature heroines. Even if the sweet, closed bedroom scenarios are approved by Mom for her teenager to read, the story lines are not going to appeal to a teenager. The glamorous increasingly explicit Sexy/Presents line is generally not going to be something Mom wants to find her tweenage daughter reading under the covers, even if the exotic nature of the story lines helped overcome the age barrier. (we won't mention the titillation factor *giggles*)

Girls always want to read ahead of themselves. It's a normal part of growing up and learning what it means to be a woman (of course we all think we are WOMEN at fourteen). It's not until later we stop calling ourselves "nearly sixteen" and mumble "shady side of forty".

The point is, that the romance industry had left a gaping great hole which means there is a generation of young women out there who never read a category romance. But now it's being filled with the influx of New Adult books flooding the market.

How is this working for the category lines? Not so good it appears. Because the closest thing Harlequin Mills & Boon managed to put forward was the KISS/Modern tempted line. It has younger heroines and heroes and is marketed as flirty and sexy. Maybe too sexy? Because the line is closing down, and it may be because the target market was that generation who never read a Harlequin Mills & Boon under the covers when they were fourteen. You have to catch them young.

So we have New Adult. And with a whole lot more publishers out there, the competition is fierce. Now that the market is identified, everyone wants to be a part of it. I don't think the genre is new. I think it was a core part of mainstream romance that was sadly neglected as publishers chased the holy grail of realistic romances that reflected the social mores of the present day.  More sex, later marriages, more single parent families, more second, third and fourth chance romances.

They forgot that teenage girls don't want that kind of reality. They still want to dream about finding their prince charming the first time round.

Diversity in Romancelandia

Towards a more diverse population in Romancelandia. An aspiring writer’s perspective.

Harlequin Mills & Boon are running a Historical Heroes tournament at present which is a wonderful thing and a great opportunity. But the limited range of heroes suggested by the competition opened up an interesting billy of worms. The question was asked - Where were the opportunities for ethnic heroes when the competition seemed to be asking for British Gentlemen, Knights and Tudor Lords, Vikings and Warriors? Warriors might encompass a broader demographic. But what of Chinese Scholars and Black Businessmen? Are they not heroic enough or are there supposedly none out there?

There has long been a perception that romance is dominated by “white” sensibilities. Looking back over my decades of Harlequin Mills & Boon reading, I have to say they are not entirely wrong. The most exotic of reading might bring a sheikh or even a Turk. But often this alien culture was softened by a French or British mother and frequently an education received at a fine British institution.

Modern contemporary romances are stretching the boundaries. We have Indian heroes and heroines and even a black Frenchman in the Presents lines. Brenda Jackson, a long established author and also a POC (Person of Colour-this is the term being used in the on-line discussion) has a series of romances in the Desire line featuring African-American protagonists but they seem to be a niche even within the mainstream. Sarah M. Anderson is writing Desire romances and others featuring First Nation heroes (Please excuse me if I get the current designation wrong). Special Edition have a few interracial romances. Harlequin even have a dedicated line for interracial and POC romance. I’ve read the Kimani line and as a Aussi with minimal daily contact with American POC I did notice differences in language but otherwise, not much different.

I’ve been puzzling about interracial romance for some time. Because I’m white and I want to write about POC in my romances. Not deliberately as some kind of crusade, but because characters just come that way. The hero in the romance I put up for the Harlequin Sold Blog first page critique is not entirely white. But he isn’t entirely a POC either. With an unknown black father and brought up by a white mother in Australia, his experience would be different to a POC brought up in a family in the US or even England. I feel comfortable in writing about him because his experience is not so far from my own.

What I didn’t feel sure about was where he could be published as he doesn’t fit standard category lines. I looked at a range of digital publishers, mostly US based, wondering if I should try submitting the story to one of them. But when I look at their offerings I noticed something that made me as an Australian, very uncomfortable. Several of the digital publishers have a category “Interracial Romance”. I hadn’t ever considered it as a “thing”.  Without being aware of it, I wrote an interracial romance. In fact I have written several. I have written a story about a Chinese-Australian girl who falls in love with an Italian-Australian boy.

Now I’m worried. Because I wonder if people will look at my stories as some kind of statement. Will they look at my Chinese-Australian girl and see racial stereotypes. Am I a racist because my heroine does Martial Arts? Should I have made her a surfing groupie or something typically “white” just to prove I don’t see her as “different”? Should I not make my Chinese-Australian hero so enigmatic in case it plays into the stereotype of the “inscrutable Oriental”? Should my Italian avoid Pizza and Pasta? Where do I draw the line?

I recently went to see the Georgian era romance “Belle” at the cinemas. (Twice actually, cos I loved it so much.) It is a beautiful romance with such a positive heroine, the illegitimate daughter of a well-born sea captain and a black slave. The slave trade was in the background through her guardian, Lord Mansfield, who as Lord Justice had to pronounce on a significant legal issue with a slave ship, but it was not the primary story. The romance came first and it was lovely, if a little enhanced for the sake of the story. But at that time, in 1783, Lord Mansfield estimated there were 15,000 POC in England, slaves and free in a population of 7.5 million. I suspect many people would say that constitutes only a handful.

Where is the Black Hero?

In the Castonbury Park series published in 2012, Marguerite Kaye, a historical author has written a romance between a white woman and a black former slave set in 1816. I have come across the odd historical romance with a half Indian heroine, but they are rare. Jeannie Lin has a fascinating series of Chinese historical romances in the Harlequin line. In the broader romance community, Beverley Jenkins writes romances with African-American protagonists and First Nation heroes are found more often in American historical romances. I’m sure there are others but they seem to be very much a niche market.

I suppose to be truly diverse, no-one should feel the need to comment when there is a hero or heroine of a difference ethnicity in a mainstream romance. Somehow I can’t see that happening for a while.

I haven't been very opinionated lately. Must be the Christmas Season...all that good will. To tide you over I'll post a short I did for the Writing Challenge on the Harlequin Boards. The theme was...it had to start with "This past year hadn't been what he'd expected. If only" and there had to be a kiss.  This was my entry which scraped into the winning spot by .4 of a point.

I like to think it is a Presents story told in 1000 words.

Sunset over Princess Royal Harbour, Albany, WA where I attended a wedding last week.

Coming Home

This past year hadn't been what he'd expected. If only he hadn’t walked away, leaving Lily alone. At the time, with his anger threatening to overthrow his control it had been the obvious thing to do. Go away and cool down. Then go back and sort things out with Lily.

Only Lily had been gone. Their room, usually so immaculate, looked like a bomb exploded. There were clothes everywhere. The contents of her jewellery box scattered over the bed. She hadn’t taken a single thing he’d given her.

Twelve months later and he was no nearer finding her. The bedroom was immaculate once more, all her things restored to cupboards and drawers. Her scent had faded, only a whisper of lavender and vanilla when he stirred the clothes in the walk in robe. Soon it would be as if she’d never been a part of his life.

Lily halted the car at the entrance of the Belliconi mansion. Would Nick have changed the codes? Winding down the window, she pressed the keys of the security panel. With a buzz the heavy gates parted. Odd that security conscious Nick hadn’t ordered new codes after she left.

The paved driveway curved up to the portico, the pillars faintly reminiscent of an antebellum plantation house. The double doors loomed impressively and she hesitated. She owed this to Nick…and to Lucas who looked so like his father.  Even if Nick didn’t believe her.

The past year hadn’t been what she expected. If only… She shook her head. When Nick asked her to move in with him eighteen months ago, the only fly in the ointment was his spoiled younger brother. Danny, who Nick felt responsible for, so he had him living with him in the ocean front property he called home. He had been in rehab when she and Nick first met at her gallery. It had only taken six weeks for him to destroy everything.

The door chime echoed through the empty rooms, pulling Nick out of his absorption. The latest reports from the private detective were promising. He had tracked Lily to Adelaide, Melbourne and then Sydney through the gallery’s that showed her paintings. Post Office boxes weren’t much help, but they indicated the direction she was moving. Closer to home. He allowed himself to hope.

Striding across the foyer to the door, he quashed it. There was still the issue of the child. How would she explain that small aberration? Dragging open the heavy door, he froze, his heart stopping and then thumping hard. Lily…and the child. A boy, all black curls and bright blue eyes. A Belliconi through and through. It should have been his. Would have been if fate had not thrown his charming brother in Lily’s path just when he needed to be out of the country on business.

“Lily. What can I do for you?” Just the right tone, he congratulated himself. Cool and a little distant.

“I’ve come to see you about Lucas. My son.” Her son. Well the boy was as good as fatherless with Danny back in rehab.

“I suppose you want some financial arrangement. Unfortunate that Danny is unavailable. Perhaps you could come back another time.” In about six months, going on his brother’s usual pattern.

“I know he’s not here. I wouldn’t set foot in this house if he was here.”

“That’s a different story from the last time you were here.”

She sighed, adjusting the child on her hip. He was a solid child and she was so slightly built. Skinny, she called it. Not his usual type certainly. His past women had been tall blondes with plenty up top, and he didn’t mean above the neck. She looked tired.

“You’d better come inside.”

She should have known better than to come back. Nick wasn’t interested in his son. He’d barely glanced at Lucas and his voice, usually so warm, was putting off arctic chill. Seems like he’d believed Danny’s drunken ramblings. Well either way, he would believe Lucas was a Belliconi and that meant he was entitled.

Following Nick to his study, she had an opportunity to study him. He seemed thinner but it was hard to remember after a year apart. The Tee and jeans clung lovingly to his muscular torso and hugged his butt. What was wrong with her?

She was glad to sit down, resting Lucas on her knees while Nick fiddled with papers on his desk.

“I want you to move back in.”

Not quite believing her ears she stared at him.

“I said I want you back. Danny will never be a father to the boy. I can offer that at least. The child will need a father. A proper family.”

“You want me back? Even though you believe I had an affair with your brother, had a child by him?”

He looked uncomfortable, his eyes lowered, avoiding hers. “Yes.”

“What if I said no?”

That brought his face up, the intense blue eyes wide. “Why would you refuse? It’s a good deal. We were good together.”

Lily stood up, letting the anger out. “Because I couldn’t be with someone who doesn’t trust me. Who believes his lying brother before he believes me. I can’t live like that. All I want is financial assistance for Lucas. He should have the chance for a good education.”

“I didn’t believe it once I had a moment to think. But you didn’t come back, so I thought it must be true. I thought you were afraid to come back. I’ve been searching for you all year.”

“Even though you believed that of me?”

“Don’t you know I would forgive you anything? I need you.”

“You never said. I thought it was just about the sex.”

“It was never just that.” He smiled crookedly. “Though it helped.”

He was around the desk in an instant. “My son?”

“Our son.”

His arms wrapped around them both. “I love you, Lily.” His lips met hers, soft and tender. She was home.

The End