Opal Carew: Boxed sets, Single Titles, Series - Oh My!

First, I’d like to say congratulations to Judith and Sarah for the 5th Blog-O-Versary of Romancing The Genres, and to thank them for inviting me back to share with you what I’ve been up to.
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http://www.opalcarew.com/bookshelf/mb_masteredbytheceo.php

Before I get started, I would like to invite you to join my Reader Group. I give away a free story to everyone who signs up, and I will keep you informed as to new releases, special offers, and any interesting news I have. Plus there are cute pictures of cats! J Also, I will be offering exclusive material to those in my Reader Group periodically. I am working on a special collection that will be available soon, so don’t miss out! Just click here to sign up: OpalCarew.com/ReaderGroup

Now, on with my news. The last time I wrote a post, I had recently hit the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists. I accomplished this dream of mine by collaborating with other savvy authors in boxed sets. I have been in eight sets that have hit USA Today and four that hit New York Times.

I spent a lot of time working on these and other collaborative projects for about two years, but last year I decided I needed to bring my focus back to my own stories. During the boxed set fever, I had, by necessity, become extremely efficient with my time. The demands were high. Writing the stories was the easy part. The communications with a dozen or so other authors while coordinating our efforts was intense. My inbox already has high traffic, but that increased the volume tenfold. Life became absolutely frantic.

 http://www.opalcarew.com/newsletter-landing-page.php

Once I shifted away, I found that I now needed to work at a new and faster pace. Given the publishing market and the rapid decline in ebook sales across the market, it’s good that I had developed that ability. I’m the sole income earner for my family, so with income from ebooks dropping to less than half, I certainly had to hustle to make more money.

Before that, I had written self-published works when I could squeeze them in between my St. Martin’s releases. (I publish 3 books a year with them.) In January 2014, I realized that I needed to put a priority on getting out more self-published stories. I decided that I would start two series: one with a BDSM and the other with a ménage theme. Doing some quick calculations, I realized that my best plan would be to aim for 4 novellas in 2014 (in addition to my three St. Martin’s books.) Since I also decided that I wanted to chain the novellas—whenever one came out, the next one available for preorder—I knew I needed to stick with one series, so I decided to go with the BDSM series, which I called MASTERED BY. Each story is a stand-alone novella and they can be read in any order.

I more or less met my goal. I didn’t get four MASTERED BY novella written last year, but I did get three done and instead of the fourth, I wrote the next novelette (the 4^th) of The Office Slave series.

http://www.opalcarew.com/bookshelf/mb_playedbythemaster.php

That is another advantage to my decision to pay attention to my self-published projects. I am now able to finish a number of series I’ve been writing slowly over the years. I felt so bad for my readers because when I wrote the third story, I left them in a crazy place with a cliffhanger I hadn’t intended. That’s just where the story went. You see, I hadn’t intended this to be a series at first. I just found that at the end of each story, another episode drew me forward.

Buoyed by my productivity last year, and because St. Martin’s had to delay some of my releases so I only have one book out this year with them, I jumped into the new year with vigour and have pushed myself to write a lot more. I have finished all seven of The Office Slave novelettes (the final one just released on May 3^rd.) Many readers have told me they cried (in a good way) through the last story. (I did, too!)

I have paired the Office Slave novelettes in duets at a lower price

http://www.opalcarew.com/bookshelf/theofficeslave.php

http://www.opalcarew.com/bookshelf/tos_series.php

This year, I am also finishing my Red Hot Fantasies series, I hope to write another Ready To Ride biker book, and I will have at least four more MASTERED BY novellas.

http://www.opalcarew.com/bookshelf/mb_masteredbytheceo.php

In all, I will be doing at least 18 releases this year, including a couple of ebook-only novellas with St. Martin’s.

Oh, I almost forgot. Many of you may know that I am a nail polish fanatic. (Madelle interviewed me for a post called Holiday Nail Art & Polish Giveaway.) I love nail polish because of the delightful colours, textures, finishes, et cetera, that I can appreciate at all times. It’s also a fun way to bring out my creativity in a visual way.

http://www.opalcarew.com/bookshelf/upcoming.php

The reason I’m telling you this is because I was able to convince my editor at St. Martin’s Press that I should write a book where the heroine is starting her own  indie nail polish company. Of course, there’s intrigue, domination, a sexy man from her past, more domination, and a reluctant marriage of convenience. As part of the writing and the promoting, I am hoping to connect with nail polish bloggers and vloggers to talk about the book and... I’m so excited about this... Literary Lacquers is going to produce the nail polish collection from the book!  Squeee!!!! I’m absolutely thrilled! The book and the polish collection will be released on August 23^rd and I can hardly wait!!!

So as you can see, I’ve been pretty busy! And I must say, I am loving it!

As a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of erotic contemporary romance, Opal Carew writes about passion, love, and taking risks.  Her heroines follow their hearts and push past the fear that stops them from realizing their dreams… to the excitement and love of happily-ever-after.

Opal loves crystals, dragons, feathers, cats, pink hair, the occult, Manga artwork, Zentangle, and all that glitters. She earned a degree in Mathematics from the University of Waterloo, and spent 15 years as a software analyst before turning to her passion as a writer. She grew up in Toronto, and now lives in Ottawa with her husband, and three cats.  One of her sons just finished a Masters degree at Sussex University in the UK and is now pursuing a second Masters at Carleton University in Ottawa.  The other son just finished his undergraduate degree at Carleton University.  Yes, mom is proud!

Social Media Links:

Reader Group:         http://OpalCarew.com/ReaderGroup

Website:                   http://OpalCarew.com

Facebook:                 https://facebook.com/OpalCarewRomanceAuthor

Twitter:                    https://twitter.com/OpalCarew

Pinterest:                  http://pinterest.com/opalcarew

Blog:                         http://bit.ly/OpalsBlog

Tumbler:                  http://opalcarew.tumblr.com

Goodreads:               http://bit.ly/OC_Goodreads

Amazon:                   http://bit.ly/OpalCarewAmz

Smashwords:            http://bit.ly/OpalCarewSW

Contact Opal:           http://bit.ly/contactopal

Success! With A Little Help From Your Friends

By Opal Carew

  

Opal Carew

Life has been good to me lately!  I have recently become both a USA Today and New York Times bestselling author of erotic romance. I love seeing those shiny new credits beside my name!  And I know I will never get tired of them!

Being on a list like USA Today and, ultimately New York Times, has been a dream of mine for a long time, and I believe that’s true for most authors.  No matter how great a book you write, you still have to get it noticed by a huge audience before you’ll hit big lists like those.

How did I finally manage to do it?  The basic answer is, by collaborating with my network of awesome authors.  We all worked together to realize our dream of hitting the big lists!

Having a network is essential to success. Sometimes we all need a little help from our friends!  Using a network to bring together several authors to create a boxed set of books gives all the authors involved a huge boost.  Everyone benefits from the increased visibility. The dedicated followings of the featured authors provide new reach to every writer involved; bringing new readership as authors’ individual works are happily discovered. Putting the set out at 99 cents makes it very attractive to an even broader audience of readers.

Not only can the group achieve phenomenal sales through working together, they can also achieve further individual success as the added exposure increases backlist sales. It’s a win-win situation as the readers discover new books and new authors, and the authors bring in more readers and more sales.

But why stop there?  What if we continue this boxed set camaraderie past the one project? This is where you get the magic of on-going cross-promotion. You’ll be delightfully surprised at how many authors are open to the mutual benefits of this type of collaboration.

One of the best things an author can do is reach out and nurture a community of fellow authors.  Find other authors with similar genre and target audiences, whom you can comfortably email and chat with. Stay in touch by sharing each other’s success stories, posts, retweeting one another, offering lessons learned, sharing advice and answering questions.

When asking for cross-promotion from other authors, try to make their job as easy as possible.  Start by creating a list of Tweets, Facebook posts, and a quick 1-2 sentence newsletter write-up for your new releases and/or events that you can easily email to your network at release time. Ask them if they would be so kind as to share your news with their readership and make sure that they know that you are happy to do the same for them.

On-going collaboration is a wonderful thing and the hardest part is reaching out to other authors to get started. But do it. The wealth of ideas and shared success that will spring from working with these incredibly talented and creative individuals will excite and humble you.

Reach out and connect with another author today. Do it again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next... ;-)

It can be hard to keep afloat as an author. A writing career is a business and we all strive to achieve our ambitions. In this ever-evolving and rapidly expanding market, there are so many things to know, and just as many opportunities to take advantage of. Keeping close to your friends and contacts, and benefiting from their collaboration as they benefit from yours is an essential strategy for survival.

Welcome to the fray! It’s actually pretty fun and successful here.

All for one and one for all, right?

Opal

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As a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of erotic contemporary romance, Opal Carew writes about passion, love, and taking risks.  Her heroines follow their hearts and push past the fear that stops them from realizing their dreams… to the excitement and love of happily-ever-after.

Opal’s New York Times bestselling story, Hot Ride, is now available.  You’ll see another example of the power of cross-promotion at work with included excerpts from authors such as Jayne Rylon, Mari Carr, and Suzanne Rock.

Hayley is looking for more excitement in her life, but doesn’t know how to find it.
Excitement finds Rip, a biker who’s seen more than his share of trouble.

When trouble finds Rip yet again and a bar brawl starts, both he and Hayley are thrown to the curb.

Hayley knows this is her chance to find the excitement she so craves, but Rip doesn’t want to be some good girl’s bad-boy experience, so he turns down her advances, leaving her feeling rejected.

But life is never that simple for Rip, and he soon finds himself in her bed and wanting more. When his three biker friends show up, Hayley’s love of numbers turns into an erotic adventure none of them will ever forget. 

But is there a chance for more than that between Hayley and Rip? Find out by taking a Hot Ride you’ll never forget.

Also watch for Opal’s upcoming release, His To Claim, on June 3rd. 

Rafe is a rock musician by night and head of a multi-million dollar family business during the day. Melanie is his former assistant, a wallflower who’s harbored a secret crush on him for years. Someone he'd never even consider sleeping with.  But when Melanie decides to leave behind her shy exterior and live out her own sexy bucket list, the two of them are thrown together in a whirlwind affair that pushes both their boundaries.

To keep up to date with Opal’s latest news, releases and special offers, sign up for her newsletter:

http://tinyurl.com/OpalCarewNews

Or connect with her on-line:

www.OpalCarew.com

facebook.com/OpalCarewRomanceAuthor

twitter.com/OpalCarew

http://www.pinterest.com/opalcarew/

Opal Carew's Holiday Nail Art & Polish Giveaway

by Madelle Morgan

My friend Opal Carew (a USA Today and New York Times bestselling author of steamy romance) has beautiful nails. I asked her to share some of her favorite nail design tips for the holidays. Perfect timing, right? She also has participated in A Naughty Little Christmas boxed set, but more about that later.

Opal, what attracted you to nail art?

I’ve always loved nail art, but there used to be such limited choices that I didn’t do too much with it. When I discovered Pinterest a couple of years ago, I saw the beautiful nail art posted and boom, I was hooked. I hadn’t realized how many stunning nail polishes were available!

Now my goal seems to be to own them all! (Lol) I have very little restraint when it comes to nail polish. I won’t tell you how many bottles I own, but I will tell you that my husband bought me special furniture just to house them! Now, really, how could I say no to these cute little faces??? :-D

Do you have any easy tips for creating beautiful holiday nails? Can you recommend some how-to web sites?

The easiest way to create lovely nails for the holiday season is to pick a beautiful nail polish that does the work for you.

There are a lot of elegant topcoats designed to be used over another polish to add a flash of elegance or a bit of glitzy fun. I’ll often layer two or three to achieve a custom look all my own. 

Another thing to do is a French manicure, but with holiday colours, and a bit of glitz!

This design below is the same idea, but I used a light, scattered touch of multi-colored glitter on the tips.

I ran across this guide to help you pick from the glamorous nail polishes available this season: Your Giant Holiday Nail Polish Guide 2013. I checked and found I have most of the China Glaze, Cult Nails, and Zoya polishes they have on the list. (Lol) 

If you want to do some nail art, I’ve included some suggestions below.

Santa Suit Nails

These can be as simple as painting your nails red and doing a white tip. You can make the tip fluffy by using a dotting tool to give puffy edges, or use a textured polish. Or why not go velvet? To do that, just add white flocking powder. Check it out here.

Another version I’ve seen is to extend the white up the middle of the nail and add a black belt.  You can even use gold or silver to create a buckle. Cutepolish has a simple video to show how to do these.

Candy Canes

What would the holiday be without candy canes? It’s easy to create a candy cane look by painting your nails with white and red diagonal stripes. Better yet, add some dark green stripes, too. When I look at these, I just want to lick my nails. 

Christmas Trees

For Christmas trees, you can paint a triangle shape on your nail (over whatever background polish you want to use), then decorate the tree by painting it with glitter. In my design below, for the star on top I fished a single star glitter from a bottle of special polish. See the bottle on the right.

Tip: To make the triangle for the tree, you can cut out the shape from a piece of tape and stick it down on your nail, then paint the tree and pull the tape off right away.

If you want to be more adventurous, there are some fabulous videos and blogs that have tutorials. I’ve pinned lots of fun holiday nails on two of my Pinterest boards: Lovely Nails and Nail-mani/how-to. 

Did you incorporate your passion for nail art into any of your books? If so, which ones?

Her heart, her body, her soul--are his to posses.

Yes, but just recently. In His to Possess, my new six part serial novel starting on December 24th, the heroine’s best friend is into nail art. In my own life at the time, my son was considering a university in the UK. It was such a big decision, I suggested he visit the campus to help make up his mind. Well, of course, since he was going to England, I needed him to bring back some nail polish I couldn’t get here. I checked out UK blogs to research polishes and I found one called Leopard Moth that twigged an idea in my head to have a polish with a special meaning in the book. Read the post I found if you’re interested.

My son is coming home for Christmas and I’ve asked him to bring back several bottles so I can use them for giveaways!

I also had a pet idea about having a series based on a woman starting her own indie nail polish company. My editor loved the idea and the first book will come out in October, 2014. It’s about the interesting events that happen when the heroine uses Kickstarter to raise the investment capital for her new venture. One of the books will take place in Las Vegas and there just happens to be a major cosmetic trade show in Las Vegas next summer, so I hope to attend and meet many of the indie nail polish entrepreneurs and bloggers I admire.

You recently became a USA Today and New York Times Bestselling Author. How exciting! Can you tell us which books made the list?

This has been a very exciting fall. I teamed up with several other authors to put together some boxed sets. The Love in Disguise boxed set was released in October, 2013 and hit the USA Today list after two weeks and stayed on the list for two weeks. That was my first time on the list!

Then in November, we released the Unraveled boxed set with all new material. It also hit the USA Today list on the second week. We were all hoping it would hit the New York Times list too and… Woo Hoo! It did! This is a lifetime dream of mine, so I am floating on air!

Also, in mid-November, I took part in A Naughty Little Christmas boxed set, which is doing very well. It hasn’t hit the USA Today list as of this post, but it’s gaining momentum so we have our fingers crossed!

What are your New Year's Resolutions for 2014? 

Rather than New Year’s resolutions, every year I come up with a set of goals for the year.  Some are small and easily accomplished and some are lifetime goals. I don’t put time requirements on myself to achieve them that year, because then I wouldn’t put the big stuff on there. With a goal list, I feel free to include the longer term goals, and focus on them. About four years ago, I added to my list to become a USA Today bestselling author, and to become a New York Times bestselling author. (Yeah, I know I said it was a lifetime goal, but I couldn’t bring myself to put goals that were that big on the list before that!) I didn’t know how long it would take to meet these goals, or even if I ever would, but I never dreamed I’d achieve both in the same year!

One of my goals next year is to get back to publishing three books a year with St. Martin’s Press, and to regularly self-publish stories. I’m on track with that, having just signed a six book deal with St. Martin’s, and by making a rigorous schedule for myself for my other writing. Add in a few more boxed sets and voila… an ambitious, crazy schedule that will keep me hopping, and feed my passion to write, write, write!

What new releases can your readers anticipate?

Three Happy Endings - a $0.99 boxed set of three stories involving handcuffs, hot tubs and honeymoons, will be released December 10, 2013. The above mentioned serial novel His to Possess, will be released over five weeks starting December 24, with the bundle coming out in March, 2014. A second, related book, His to Claim, will follow in June, with the bundle in September. Finally, the next serial comes out in October - I won’t tell you the title (heaven knows if it’ll change along the way) - but it’s the first book about the woman who starts her own indie nail polish company.

I’ll also be part of a biker boxed set in February, and possibly another boxed set in March (if I can find the time!) Both sets will have all new material. In between all these things, I’ll be working on and releasing short stories for three series I have on the go. You can see all the newest releases on my website.  (Note from Madelle: sign up for Opal's newsletter if you'd like to be informed of Opal's new releases.)

Thank you so much, Opal. Anything else you'd like to add?

Thanks for inviting me to do this interview!  It was fun!  And in the spirit of the season, I will send one lucky commenter a special nail polish. The winner may choose either a bottle of the Leopard Moth nail polish from the UK, or one of the cute snowmen polishes shown earlier. (Note from Madelle: The winner will be announced here in the Comments list on Friday, Dec 13.)

Have a great holiday season, everyone!

Opal

About Opal:

As a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of steamy contemporary romance, Opal Carew writes about passion, love, and taking risks. Her heroines follow their hearts and push past the fear that stops them from realizing their dreams… to the excitement and love of happily-ever-after.

You can find Opal on-line at:

http://www.OpalCarew.com

http://www.facebook.com/OpalCarewRomanceAuthor

http://www.facebook.com/OpalCarew

http://twitter.com/OpalCarew

http://www.pinterest.com/opalcarew/

Romantic Fantasy versus Reality

by Madelle Morgan

How do authors create those romantic fantasies we all enjoy so much?

The advice given to newbie writers is ‘write what you know’. I hear the collective moan from aspiring romance writers out there: Yeah, if that’s the path to success, then I’m doomed. No one would want to read about my life.  

Avid fans of romance certainly don’t want to read about an author’s real love life unless it could be convincingly portrayed on a cover like this:

Today I will let you in on a Trade Secret. Romance authors actually do draw inspiration from their real lives. I’ve created a short day-in-the-life-of-a-romance-author scenario to demonstrate how it works...

 Real life at the checkout:

“Ma’am, is this purchase a gift?” asks the pretty blond cashier with a metal post through one eyebrow.

“No,” Romance Author (RA) responds.

“Ma’am, the chart on the pantyhose package says this product is for women up to 5’6” in height and 150 pounds.”

“I’m 5’4” and it’s the last pair of Gossamer Silk.” But I weigh more than 150 pounds. At least I did the last time I dared step on a scale three years ago, RA admits to herself. Her shoulders slump under a faded sweatshirt. 

“Fine,” RA says through gritted teeth. “I’ll put it back on the shelf. Thank you for noticing.”

Later at the computer, Romance Author taps away on a work-in-progress:

Samantha dipped her head to slip one gossamer silk-sheathed foot into a Manolo Blahnik stiletto pump. Soft natural blond curls concealed cheeks flushed from her date’s heated gaze.

“Joe, can you zip my size 4 little black dress?"

Joe languidly quirked a dark brow. “Sweetheart, if I touch you I guarantee we’ll never make the reservation at Le Ritz,” he drawled in a deep, sexy voice that whetted her appetite. But not for food.

Real Life at the dinner table:

“You know I hate vegetables,” says Hubby, grimacing at the spinach RA tried to hide in a layer of lasagna.

Later at the computer, RA types the following:

The white-gloved waiter hovered, ready to take their order for appetizers. Samantha selected the spring salad. 

Joe dragged his attention to the menu, the first time he’d taken his eyes off her the entire evening. “The Oysters Rockefeller here are made with spinach?” Joe inquired.

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll have a double portion.” When the waiter moved away, Joe leaned in, his ocean blue eyes locked on lips she’d moistened with champagne. “I’ll need the energy later.”

And so it goes...

Here’s a bonus Trade Secret revealed: No matter how difficult romance authors pretend it is to craft their stories, we enjoy the fantasy escape from real life when writing them as much as you do reading them! 

www.madellemorgan.com

What’s New?

By Opal Carew

It’s a new year and that’s always a good time to try something new.    I’m jumping right in on that one.  First up, I have a serial novel, called His To Command, coming out starting on January 8th—one of the newest trends.  (Yeah, I know they were popular years ago, but they’re back.)

A serial novel is a book that comes out in pieces.  His To Command is coming out in six parts.  Part 1 and 2, The Chase and The Capture, both come out on January 8th (today!) then the other parts come out a week at a time.  Each part is equivalent to about 2-3 chapters.  (I write short chapters, so for mine it would be three chapters.)

People tend to love them or hate them.  I’ve watched the reviews on some of the other novels that have come out in serial form over the past few months and many readers seem unhappy about the format.  I find it funny, though, that many readers still complain about the format on later parts.  You’d think they would have stopped buying them once they realized the nature of the serialization.  (At least that must mean that they are enjoying the story!

For any of my readers who feel they may not like a serial novel, the entire novel will be released in book form in April, in both print and eBook.  I wish it could be sooner, but the publisher can produce an ebook much faster than a full length book that is going to print.

The other new thing I’m trying with respect to publishing is being acquiring editor of an anthology.  I’m a Canadian author and I was asked by a Canadian literary publisher if I would be interested in working on an anthology of Canadian erotic romance.  I’ve never been an editor before, but I love trying new things, and I really liked the idea of being involved in a project working with other Canadians.  I love the fact that a literary publisher—who has worked with authors like Margaret Atwood and Alice Munro—wants to feature Canadian genre authors.

The anthology is called Northern Heat and you’ll probably recognize many of the authors, even though you probably didn’t realize (why would you even think about it?) that they are Canadian.  Authors like Sharon Page and Kayla Perrin.  And me!  The publisher wanted me to include a story, too!

The anthology will be coming out in time for Valentine’s Day, so I hope you’ll watch for it!

The publisher asked me to suggest some images for the cover and I did a couple of mockups and they chose one of them for the book.  They had their artist streamline it and make it more artistic, but it’s fun that they used my idea.  Doing cover art isn’t brand new for me, since I’ve done several of the covers for my self-published works, but it was inspiring that a publisher and their art department felt my idea was good enough to use!

Well, I’m not all work and no play—though I have to work at that (lol).  In my private life, I’ve launched a blog about nail polish.  “What’s so interesting about nail polish?” you might ask.  I just love combining colours and textures and nails are such easy little canvases on which to express myself.  Also, the special nail polishes available today are awe inspiring (to me, anyway).

I am obsessive about my hobbies and I’ve had to put them all on hold because writing consumes most of my time, but with nail polish, I can do a quick coat, write a bit, put on another coat, write, etc.  Sometimes I take an hour out to do something special, like water marbling or stamping, but in general, I can indulge without losing much writing time, thus it’s a guilt-free hobby.  Also, I find I love the flash of a duochrome polish (shows multiple colours) or of a fabulous glitter while I’m typing.  It feeds my artistic soul!


Speaking of hobbies, now that I’ve opened the door to allow myself some, I’ve just started a new artistic endeavour: zentangle.  These are a meditative form of ink drawing done on a 3.5 inch square piece of paper with repetitive patterns.  It allows the mind to focus, thus the meditative aspect.

|I bought a book that teaches Zentangles and these are my first two exercises..

There are lots of other new things in my life, too.  Both my sons have moved out, so now it’s just me and my husband at home.  It’s taking a little time to adapt, but it does mean I’ll have more time to write (and do my new hobbies!)

What new things do you have going on in your life now, or do you plan to try soon?

---

His To Command, #1: The Chase
His To Command, #2: The Capture

Release Date: January 8, 2013

Strong, independent, smart, Kate is a modern business woman who knows exactly how to run her well organized world. But underneath her professional exterior lurks a secret she's been running from for years...a secret desire to be dominated that both exhilarates her and terrifies her. When an old lover, Matt Pearce, unexpectedly shows up, Kate is bombarded by sensual memories of their affair. Matt was the first and only man to give her a taste of domination, and she's never been able to forget. But though she's spent years trying to forget him, this time she may not be able to get away.

Northern Heat
Release date:  February 14, 2013

Ever since the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy started topping the bestseller charts, people have taken an interest in this new phenomenon of erotic romance books.  Only it’s not new.  There are many of us who have been writing in this genre for years.

Featuring some of the best examples of Canadian erotic romance, this anthology includes authors such as Sharon Page (USA Today bestselling author) and Kayla Perrin (USA Today and Essence bestselling author, and one of the inaugural authors of the Harlequin Spice line).

These delightful stories show the broad range of eroticism and romance in stories that publishers label as "erotic romance". Some focus on the burgeoning romance between a couple, whereas others focus more on the erotic situation that hints at a romance to build in the future. Yet others are simply a celebration of sexual intimacy. In all, however, the characters are challenged by some aspect of their sexual desire for each other.


http://www.OpalCarew.com

http://www.facebook.com/OpalCarewRomanceAuthor

Wow!!!

Judith Ashley

The latest issue of RT Book Reviews arrived in my mailbox on Friday. Saturday I took a few minutes to look over the Historical and Contemporary list of reviewed books because that is what I most enjoy reading. However, as I was leafing through the pages I caught sight of Delilah Marvelle’s picture and a few pages later, an ad featuring Opal Carew. My curiosity piqued I started at the beginning and read every article and looked at every ad as well as skimmed down the list of names being reviewed. What was I looking for?

If you are reading this post, you know about Romancing The Genres. If you are new to RTG, you may not know that two years ago in February, Sarah Raplee and I conceived the idea of a group blog featuring romance authors from a variety of genres. We’d each blog on a particular day of the month (I’m the first Friday). Having guests would be an added value to our readers and we thought Saturday would be a good day to schedule them.

Even in the beginning we thought of having a time and place where the Genre-istas could post short stories. We launched Free ReadsFrom The Genre-istas in February, 2011.

You can click on the links above and scroll down to see who our guests have been and what our Genre-istas are writing about.

Back to RT…

Delilah Marvelle, who has been our guest in August and September 2010 and December 2012, is featured in an article on clothing from the early 1800’s which is where her stories are set. She’s also listed as a Top Pick with 4.5 Stars for Forever a Lord, book three in her latest series.

If you look on page 21, you’ll see an ad placed by St. Martin’s press touting six books coming from Genre-ista, Opal Carew. Because her career is shooting into the stratosphere with demands for more works, deadlines, etc., Opal’s January post will be her last with us.
Madelle Morgan will be joining us in February on the 2^nd Tuesday of the month.

Matt Buchman (M.L. Buchman) our 12/08/2012 guest is listed in the Series Rap Sheet. Matt was also featured in Eloisa James’ NPR column. Matt’s book Wait Until Dark was given a 4 Star rating. Reviewer writes “…this book has it all. The only thing you’ll ask yourself is “When does the next one come out?” the full review is on Page 70.

Genre-ista, Paty Jager’s The Secret of an Aztec Temple is included in the All Romance e-book advertisement on Page 28. Paty writes our 1st Monday post.

Genre-ista, Bronwen Evans’ To Challenge The Earl of Cravenswood which is self-published, was given a 4 Star rating. Bron, who has been a Genre-ista from the beginning, also won the 2012 RomCon Reader's Crown for her Invitation to Ruin. Bron's regular post time is the 1st Thursday of the month.

But that’s not all! The 2013 Romantic Times Convention also has familiar names.

Genre-ista Kris Tualla is a presenter in two workshops on Self-Publishing. Kris’s regular RTG post time is the 1^st Tuesday of the month. She also was a December guest because of her knowledge about Self and Indie Publishing. If you are interested in a great book on the subject, check out her Becoming an Authorpreneur: Navigating A Career in 21st Century Publishing.

Other RTG Guests are presenters at the Self-Publishing Program during the Convention. You can attend workshops with Theresa Ragan and Bob Mayer. Bob, who we see as a generous supporter of RTG, has shared his insights on self-publishing. He and Jen Talty co-authored The Shelfless Book and she is also co-presenting the workshops with him.

Check out Theresa's inspiring self-publishing story.

While we certainly had hopes and dreams about the success of Romancing The Genres, neither of us would have predicted how much we’ve grown.

This month we will pass 50,000 page views!

December 31, 2012 marked our 560^th post.

December 30, 2012 we had 41,112 comments on those 560 posts.

Free Reads From The Genre-istas should pass 3,000 page views late in January or early in February. Each post is a short, short story. Romance Genres included are Western, Romantic Suspense, Contemporary, Steampunk, Paranormal, Fantasy and Historical.

December 31, 2012 marks 31 posted stories.

And we’ve had 107 comments on those 31 short stories.

All I can say is “Wow!” We did it and then some. Thanks to each and every one of the Genre-istas and to each and every one of you for making an idea flourish into a growing, living labor of love (well, most days it’s a labor of love).

And, if you ‘follow’ us, you don’t have to click around or remember to check us out. We’ll show up most days on our own.

www.JudithAshleyRomance.com