Archive for July, 2007
This Skeeves Me
RWA Changes Good and Bad, Pt 3
Seressia July 28th, 2007
On July 25th, the board of Romance Writers of America revisited their definitions for subsidy and vanity publishers. The membership let their voices be heard, both during and after the AGM. Their definitions for these two types of publishers are now aligned with industry accepted explanations, to wit:
“Subsidy Publisher” means any publisher that publishes books in which the author participates in the costs of production in any manner, including publisher assessment of a fee or other costs for editing and/or distribution. This definition includes publishers who withhold or seek full or partial payment or reimbursement of publication or distribution costs before paying royalties, including payment of paper, printing, binding, production, sales or marketing costs.
“Vanity Publisher” means any publisher whose authors exclusively promote and/or sell their own books and publishers whose business model and methods of publishing and distribution are primarily directed toward sales to the author, his/her relatives and/or associates.
I can now state that, with this rectification, I’m now completely satisfied with the changes to PAN and PRO eligibility, Publisher eligibility, and the contest. And while it would have been nice to see an Erotic Romance or Multicultural category in the awards–because the industry has made these distinctions and the awards claim to be a reflection of the industry and market–I say that people who write those genres should flood the contest with their products. The only way to get one of these books to win, besides writing a good book, is to increase the odds. The odds will increase if more books are entered.
Who’s a Maggie Finalist?
Seressia July 28th, 2007
I am!
So there I was, at the seafood counter at my local Publix, getting a chunk of salmon skinned. (I’ve tried to do it before and it wasn’t pretty, much like the gross-out when I attempted to cut up a whole chicken for the first–and last–time.) My cell phone rings.
“Hi, Seressia, it’s Pam Montovani from GRW.” (Georgia Romance Writers.)
“Oh, hi, Pam.” I’m trying to come up with a good reason why I haven’t paid the conference fee yet. Like the $420 I had to spend last Saturday to keep my car from thinking I was stealing it. (I’m not lying.)
“How’s your weekend so far?” She asks.
“Good, good,” I say, wondering if she’s instead going to take me to task for missing last week’s meeting. It was a signing opportunity at the Black Arts Festival. I think they understood.
“Well, how about I make the weekend a little bit better for you?”
I swear, I had no clue at this point. She wasn’t yelling at me, or chastising me. Maybe she needed me to pinch-hit on a panel for Moonlight and Magnolias, our conference happening September 28-30. “O-kay.”
“You’re a Maggie finalist.”
I blinked. I stared at the lady holding a chunk of salmon out to me. Then I took a deep breath, and when I spoke, my voice climbed several octaves. I think I cracked the lobster tank.
“Are you %^$#! kidding me?” I shriek. “Really?”
She said the magic words again and added “congratulations” to the mix. I think I ran up the wine aisle, and I lost my buggy, and then remembered that I’d ordered a piece of salmon. Pam graciously let me get back to my shopping, no doubt so that she could rest her eardrums before calling the next finalist.
I lost my buggy again and walked past the 2% milk twice while calling my friend Emily Sewell with the news and more shriekage. I called another writer friend out in California, Jackie Hamilton, who “clutched the pearls” in glee for me.
So I’m a Maggie finalist in Long Contemporary for my book, Through the Fire. To quote the GRW website:
The purpose of the Maggie Awards for Published Novelists is to recognize RWA authors from Region 3 who have published outstanding books in the romance genre during 2006. The Maggie Award is a symbol of achievement given by Georgia Romance Writers to bring special attention to these writers, and the Maggie, a silver medallion commissioned by GRW, receives national attention. Books will be scored and ranked by a panel of booksellers from chain and independent bookstores. The names and categories of Maggie recipients and finalists will appear in the Romance Writers Report.
So to say I am delighted to be a finalist is definitely an understatement. The fact that the contest is judged by booksellers is a definite plus to me. I’m so thrilled to be nominated. I don’t know who my fellow finalists are, but when I do, I’ll post here!
Registration is still open for the 25th Annual Moonlight and Magnolias conference, featuring Linda Howard, Rita Herron, Sherrilyn Kenyon, and bunches more. There will be a booksigning on Saturday afternoon 4:00-5:30 PM that’s FREE to the public, as is Linda Howard’s chat just prior to the signing. Hope to see you there!
Geeky Gushiness
Seressia July 27th, 2007
Can I just say that I love Mike Rowe?
Also, I just saw the commercial that the DVD for 300 hits the stores on Tuesday. Yea!
Promo venues
Seressia July 20th, 2007
Over on Blogging in Black, I posted about different promotional venues for writers of color. As I said there:
I’ve just realized belatedly that E. Lynn Harris and Terry McMillian and Tyler Perry didn’t hit best sellerdom by going to RWA or RT. Not that I’m giving either of those up, but I go with the knowledge that, based on my experiences, I’m not going to find a large pool of eligible readers at either event.
But if I can do the out-of-the-box marketing and promoting and be successful at it, then maybe sending out an email blast that I’m at either event WILL draw my readers there.
Perhaps instead of “eligible” readers, I should say, ready-to-purchase-my-books readers there. There are a few, do not get me wrong. But the odds are not in my favor at those events. So I’m spreading m wings, trying a different flight plan. I have no idea if it’ll work, since it requires me to be less reticent than I’m used to when not playing off my friends.
Still go over to BiB and check out my ideas. And if you know of other events that would be good for a writer of paranormal, interracial and African-American romance, let me know.
National Black Arts Festival Signing
Seressia July 19th, 2007
The National Black Arts Festival kicks off tomorrow for a week full of music, drama, art, and literature. I’ll be signing at Medu Bookstore on Saturday 2-4 PM with Kimani author Lisa Harrison Jackson. If you’re in Atlanta, please stop by and say hi!
Here’s a flyer of all the signings happening during the festival.
I’ll have plenty of promo on hand so I hope to see you there. And no, I won’t be dressed as one of my characters, unless you count my ankh!
Who Says Romance is Dead?
Seressia July 16th, 2007
When you see this very true story, you realize that romance is not dead.
No modest proposal
As proposals go, the engagement of Robert Gray Jr. and Keisha Williams was a breathtaking affair: An eight-hour surprise journey for the bride-to-be through 10 rooms and suites at the Buckhead Ritz-Carlton, each room filled with dozens of roses, dozens of candles, gospel music and scores of family and friends praying for the couple and wishing them well.
Over the top, perhaps. But it wasn’t feigned. Gray, 28, is a CPA for General Electric. Williams, 29, works in public affairs at Kaiser Permanente. They are indeed real and live in Atlanta.
Gray secretly began designing his proposal. He drew on his Christian faith to come up with his vision: a version of Solomon’s golden temple as described in the Old Testament, filled with candles, roses, and the prayers of their parents and 50 family members and friends. Then he used his experience as an accountant to figure out how to pay for it all.
Should warm the cockles of the most jaded heart.
If you want to see the slideshow that crashed a thousand servers, visit the website It will probably crash seeing as how it’s had some several million hits in the past week.
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Dream of Shadows available for Preorder
Seressia July 15th, 2007
Dream of Shadows is now available for preorder on Amazon
Amazon is offering Dream of Shadows for $8.76, twenty percent off the regular cover price. Amazon is also showing that DoS will be available on August 17. I don’t think that’s accurate, but hey–order it anyway!
Dream of Shadows is my first full length foray into paranormal romance. Here’s a bit of background on the story:
Nicolette Legère’s family possesses unique psychic gifts, called the Legacy, passed down through generations of women. Her mother is the gifted current matriarch, an oppressive burden for thirty-one-year-old Nicole, First Daughter and presumed heir. It’s a burden because Nicole’s gift of dreaming didn’t kick in until after puberty and has been sporadic ever since, making the extended family doubt her ability to step into her mother’s petite stilettos.
Nicole fights this familial rejection by trying to live as normal a life as possible. This led her into a disastrous marriage that left her widowed and pregnant. She took her infant daughter to Atlanta, far away from the obligation of her name, Nicole built a normal life for herself.
She is successful for nearly seven years. Just when she thinks she can put the burden and failure of being a Legère behind her, she Dreams of murder. After she Dreams a second time she decides to inform the police, hoping they can find the killer before her third dream. This is when she meets the very sexy, very skeptical Detective Carter “Jax” Jackson.
Jax doesn’t believe in psychics, ghosts, or fairies. The only truth is what he can see and what his gut tells him. He dismisses Nicole’s claims until a body is discovered, murdered exactly as she predicted. Now he has two choices: believe Nicole’s gifts, or believe her guilty. Investigating her yields more questions than answers. Yet despite instinct saying that she’s innocent, he firmly believes she’s hiding something from him.
This story has a lot: a woman coming to grips with herself and her destiny, a man struggling with duty and survivor’s guilt. They doubt themselves, and they doubt each other–with near fatal consequences.
I hope you enjoy this introductory story. There are twin sisters, Mala and Malita, and brothers, Derek and Darien, twins who are also magicians. Their parents’ story is interesting as well, considering Arielle became head of the family at 18 and Stefan is a Romanian parapsychologist who kidnapped her to break a family curse. I’m looking forward to delving more into this world and the history of this family.
Click here, to read the first chapter!
Click to pre-order from Amazon 
Epiphany Time: A Blog a Day Means I’m Not Writing
Seressia July 14th, 2007
So as I sat there pulling braids from my hair and dying for a deep condition, it hit me.
A blog a day means I’m not writing.
Some stores shelve my book differently; some don’t.
Some readers love my interracials but not my regular AA romance
Some readers love my AA romance, but not my interracials
Some readers love my paranormals but not my contemporaries
Some readers love my contemporaries but not my paranormal.
Some people are going to read what they want to read, think what they want to think, and do what they want to do, and nothing I can do or say or write will change that.
All I can control or change is me. Nothing is going to stop me from doing what I want to do, which is write books that I enjoy writing. Not RWA, not bookstores, not readers, not the blogosphere, not other writers.
Focusing on all this stuff with RWA and shelving policies and racism in romance has made me lose sight of other things. My stories. My deadlines. My freakin’ website expiring (apologies to all who tried to access it yesterday.)
Well screw that noise. My writing career is far more important than anything going on in Romancelandia and the blogosphere. RWA can advocate and educate, but they can’t decide who I sell to or what makes me a writer. And honestly, my readers don’t go to RWA and could care less about what they call a novel or a publisher or an author.
Where I’m shelved isn’t going to change the prime directive of any writer: writing good books. Nor will it stop me from focusing on my first action objective: getting more readers. Do I think I can do it without the internet? Of course. When was the last time you saw Linda Howard responding to a blog post? Or Brenda Jackson? Or Terry McMillan?
That freakin’ word count meter on the right has been sitting on the same number for two days. That concerns me more than anything else in the world right now.
I’m done with pulling my hair out. Time for the deep condition.
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