This week, I’m hosting the neighborhood book club meeting. Instead of reviewing a novel, however, we are having “cookbook night.” Everyone brings a dish from their favorite cookbook and shares. Such a great idea. But it got me thinking…I rarely look at cookbooks anymore. When I want a new recipe, I look for one on the Internet. ( usually at  FoodNetwork.com) You can find pretty much any kind of recipe on there so why buy a 30 dollar book, right? (more…)

Tags: book club, cookbooks, ebooks
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As you can see by the stats below, it doesn’t mean that you will sell. But it says a couple of things about you. It says that you can finish a manuscript. It says that you can write a great first 50 pages and a synopsis. It gets the attention of agents and publishers. No doubt about it. I think any finalist would say the same.

So, for those of you wanting to be published in Romance and wondering if the RWA Golden Heart@ contest for unpublished authors is worth the entry fee, my answer is YES! Not only will your finaling ms be read by an editor, but when you attend RWA Nationals you will get tons of attention, meet important people, and get first pick at editor and agent appointments. Below I’ve copied the current stats put together by Keli Gwyn, a finalist in the inspy category. I actually have heard finalists from other years saying that our numbers are low. I don’t know if this is true but we did hit the scene right when the economy was crashing so this may account for some discrepancy. In any case, many (maybe most) of the finalists who have not yet published have had at least one or two requests for a partial or a full. And of those winners now published almost every story received a 4 or 4 1/2 star rating from RT.

Stats Summary

# of Authors Who Sold Full-length Novels – 22 of 64 (34%)

# of 2008 GH Winning Manuscripts Sold – 7 of 10 (70%)

# of 2008 GH Finaling (Includes Winning) Manuscripts Sold – 18 of 70
(26%)

# of Full-length Novels Sold – 48

# of Shorts/Novellas Sold – 7

# of 2008 Category Finalists Sold

(Double finalists in the same category counted as one, team writers as
two.

Double finalists in different categories show in each of their
categories.)

2 of 8 (25%) in Contemporary Series

3 of 4 (75%) in Contemporary Series: Suspense/Adventure

1 of 7 (14%) in Contemporary Single Title

4 of 8 (50%) in Historical

1 of 4 (25%) in Inspirational

3 of 10 (30%) in Novel with Strong Romantic Elements

5 of 8 (63%) in Paranormal

2 of 6 (33%) in Regency Historical

2 of 8 (25%) in Romantic Suspense

2 of 4 (50%) in Young Adult

Tags: contests, Golden Heart, RWA
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On Saturday, I drove up to Waynesboro, VA, to take part in a literacy signing called BookEm. The Book ‘Em Foundation’s purpose is to raise awareness of the link that exists between high illiteracy rates and high crime rates, increase literacy rates, and decrease crime rates. The event is hosted by Mark Kearney and the Waynesboro Police Department.

So, I probably should have blogged about this BEFORE it took place but I since I’d never been before I wasn’t really sure what to expect. Actually, there were dozens of authors participating, several of which I knew. Not much of a shopping crowd for romance novels BUT the childrens’ books and middle grade books seemed to do well. The event was handled well, organized, although a bit long. (Honestly, I couldn’t stay the entire time due to another personal commitment but seems to me it could be a shorter day–9-4 for signing books is a bit long.)

Anyway, I enjoyed meeting some new people and was happy to have participated. I hope the event was a great success. I think the biggest draw of the day was the author next to me, Alan Krugel and his bomb squad dog, Leida–both from the LAPD. Here’s a picture of the lovely Leida.

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