No, this post isn’t about Nicole Kidman, or designer gowns, or the Oscars (though I kinda wish it was! I can always talk fashion…) But it is about awards. Contests. Shiny trophies. Pretty medals. We here at Risky Regencies are on a mission to Save the Regency RITA category! With the loss of Signet and Zebra’s traditional lines, we may have to dig a little further, think outside the box, to find enough titles for the category to help it qualify. But we’re confident we can do it! The Regency is a more popular setting than ever before–the vast majority of historical romances feature the period, and readers love it. I know that the genre has a vital (if re-defined) future, and a great way to show that is to maintain the vitality of the Regency category.

Last year, our own Risky Diane won the Regency RITA with The Reputable Rake, a book that could easily have been slotted into the Short Historical category, yet fit well within the Regency niche thanks to its vivid, well-drawn setting (Diane will talk more about this on Monday!). I know that I’ve read several titles this year that would be great in the Regency category, and have also heard that some smaller publishers are starting their own Regency lines. So, if you have a 2006 Regency-set book of your own, or know someone who has, then please encourage them to enter. The deadline is November 30, and you can find all the info at RWA National.

One good point to make about a possible benefit to entering this category is that there may not be quite as much competition in a smaller category, therefore upping chances of being a finalist. There are so many great books out there, and we want them to be noticed! And, let me tell you, being a finalist is just plain fun. 🙂 I’ve been a Regency RITA finalist twice, and both times floated through conference pretending to be Gwyneth Paltrow on the red carpet! It gets your books a little extra attention, gives a small ego boost, and looks great on a resume or author bio. Of course, the day inevitably comes when conference is over, the ego deflates, and the next book has to be written, but that’s another post…

So, tell us about your contest experiences! Good, bad, ugly, we want to know. Any books or new authors you’ve discovered through contests? Let us know!

And join us to Save the Regency Category!

This week, I sent a proposal for a Regency-set historical to my agent. This book is about an opium-addicted Marquess who meets the illegitimate daughter of a vicar. They get married in a Marriage of Convenience, and spend a bunch of time traveling from the Scottish border to London.

So I titled it

Road To Passion* (although its high-concept log-line is Leaving Las Vegas meets Jane Eyre).

So now what? Keep writing, yes, but wait for feedback from my agent, too. Tom Petty had it right in this song “The Waiting” when he said “The waiting/Is the hardest part.” I have to wait to hear what she thinks, then revise, then send back, then hear what she thinks again, and then, and only then, hear what editors think.

It’s a lot of waiting.

So meanwhile, I’ll start writing another proposal, this one a contemporary about a Brooklyn mom who goes on the road with a revival of an ’80s new wave group (I know. Musicians in romances are forbidden. What can I say?).

And then another proposal. And another. Because, after all, what else am I going to do? Go get a real job or something?!?

Thanks for waiting with me! What do you do to pass the time?

Megan
www.meganframpton.com
*The cool drawing is an ancient Chinese picture titled “Road Of Passion.” Love Google!

Do you have a muse?
What is s/he like?

And what is a Muse, anyway?
For the family history and definition of who represents what (and to be honest I’m not sure who represents fiction, although poets have a choice of several), go here. The Muses are a group of Greek goddesses, the offspring of Zeus and Mnemosyne (“memory,” who may or may not have been another goddess, although Zeus had a tendency to get it on with anyone, or anything). They are the divinities who guide artists and scientists.

My personal Muse is a lady of a certain age. Wait, I’m a lady (or at least a woman) of a certain age. She’s even older than me. She favors cameo brooches, sensible shoes, and tweed skirts and is a cross between Miss Costello, the headmistress of the English all-girls school I attended (she never seemed to wash her hair; like boytoys who maintain a three-day stubble, she always had the same grease factor), and Geraldine McEwan as Miss Marples. She is, however, much less agreeable than Miss Marples, given to sarcasm and the delicate raising of a single eyebrow for emphasis. She is very prim, proper, and upper-class.

“My dear. Surely you do not really wish to scrub beneath the kitchen sink rather than write?”

“Another look at the email? So soon? I think not.”

And, this is the killer, comments made in reference to other writers:

“As the dear Count said to me the other day…oh yes, that Count; he didn’t finish War and Peace by frolicking online during valuable writing time, you know. Dear Nikolai, dead but still writing…”

Well, you get the picture. That’s my Muse. Tell us about yours.

Meanwhile, over at the Wet Noodle Posse I’m blogging today on what I like doing in bed.

Janet

Enter my contest all this month at roadtoromance.ca
DEDICATION~Winner, 2006 Golden Leaf Contest (Regency)

This week, I’m participating in a challenge with several writer friends. My goal is to finally finish the rough draft of mess-in-progress, which, incidentally, looks about as good right now as the embryo pictured here.

I know better than to worry about it. My first drafts are always incredibly clunky and they always clean up nicely by the fourth round of revisions or so.

But just because I know better doesn’t mean I don’t hate this part of the process. And I really shouldn’t. Anna DeStefano taught a workshop at the NJRW conference where she likened drafting a novel to dumpster-diving. You have to sift through a lot of garbage to find the pearls.

And it should be fun.

But I have a lot of trouble cutting loose and having fun. Maybe it’s the Catholic upbringing. Maybe it’s the lack of childhood pets! 🙂 In any case, I’d like to get over this. I’m frankly tired of the fear and self loathing. Why should I feel guilty about writing bad first draft?

An idea I’m toying with right now is taking part in the National Novel Writing Month challenge. NaNoWriMo is, accordingly to the website, “a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing. Participants begin writing November 1. The goal is to write a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30.”

So if I do this, I would put the completed draft of m-i-p on the backburner and try to blast through another story that’s been niggling at me. Maybe the break from m-i-p will help me approach the rewrites with a fresh mindset. Maybe I’ll end up with a good chunk of a new story.

Is it my muse talking or the procrastination devil? My inner critic (who rather alarmingly speaks with the voice of my elementary school principal) says this is a creative way to procrastinate on the rewrites for m-i-p. She thinks I’m just going to waste time hanging out on the message boards at NaNoWriMo. But I wouldn’t do that. Would I?

My friends at Writer Unboxed are mulling similar questions. (Also, there’s a lovely essay on the Death of the Muse by the winner of their Alphasmart contest.)

Am I nuts to think about doing this? Readers, what do you think of writers churning out 50,000+ words in a month? Writers, any of you planning to take the challenge?

The good thing is apparently they will take scrambled manuscripts for the wordcount verification. So if I do this, no one has to read my drecky draft!

Elena, who prefers not to die of shame

LADY DEARING’S MASQUERADE, RT Reviewers’ Choice, Best Regency Romance of 2005
www.elenagreene.com

What is it about cats and books? Why do cats love books so much? Are they really the most comfortable beds around? Or are the cats actually reading on the sly?

Or do cats perhaps grow jealous of the attention we pay our books, and conspire to stop us from reading them? (Or, in a related theory, do they see where our attention is focused, and opt to lie there?)

Why do I ask? Well, after Lois won the biography of the Prince Regent here a couple weeks ago, she found she had to share the book with her cat — as you can see in the above picture!

Very cute cat. I love cats. And books.

Hmm… Is there a link somewhere here?

Is it possible that we’re dealing with more than just the love cats have for books?

Might it be possible that book people tend to be cat people? (Or is that a lie perpetuated by cat-lovers to bolster their own egos?)

What do you think? Are you a cat person? do you think readers tend to be cat people? If so, why? Or are all those cats in bookstores merely a coincidence, or evidence of yet another cat conspiracy?

And what’s your theory about why cats love to lie on books???

All opinions welcome!

Cara
Cara King — author of MY LADY GAMESTER, in which there is a brief mention of a kitten, but sadly little else in the feline line