Tag: Authors

Romance Novels

Down the Rabbit Hole: Avoiding the Slippery Slope

It seems as if, like Alice, we’ve all slipped down the rabbit hole into a world that is less Wonderland and more WTF-land. In the year 2012, politicians are on TV actually discussing the legalities of birth control, even as banks are telling legal adults what we can and can’t sell and buy for our own personal use. It’s surreal. It’s frightening. It’s angering (if that is even a word). It’s a slippery slope I don’t want to go down. So what can we do? Mark Coker, the owner of Smashwords, explains the situation better than I can in his email to indie publishers, which I have pasted below. He outlines steps we can all take to make sure we don’t go down that rabbit hole and find ourselves in a place we don’t want to be….     PAYPAL CENSORSHIP UPDATE ________________________________________ In case you haven’t heard, about two weeks ago, PayPal contacted Smashwords and  gave us a surprise ultimatum: Remove all titles containing bestiality, rape  or incest, otherwise they threatened to deactivate our PayPal account. We engaged  them in discussions and on Monday they gave us a temporary reprieve as we continue  to work in good faith to […]

Romance Novels, writing romance

The ABCs of an Erotic Romance Writer

Ever wonder what all the acronyms and terms mean that we romance authors throw around? Here is a quick primer in the ABCs of Erotic Romance. ARC– Advanced Review Copy (sometimes Advanced Reader Copy). It’s a copy of the book given prior to release usually to book reviewers. HEA– Happily Ever After. Think fairy tales. It’s required by many of today’s romance publishers HFN– Happy For Now. The hero and heroine don’t have to declare their undying love and get married, but there is a promise that they are at least happy…for now. M/M – Male/Male gay-themed romance (or F/F would represent 2 women) M/F/M – a heterosexual threesome where the Male/Female/Male characters all have sex together however there is no direct same-sex sexual interaction between the men. M/M/F– a threesome where the Male/Male/Female character all have sex together during which the men also interact sexually with each other. GBLT – a genre in romance incorporating Gay/Bisexual/Lesbian/Transexual themes. BDSM – a genre in romance with Bondage and Discipline/Dominance and Submission/Sadism and Masochism elements. D/s or D/S  D usually stands for the dominant partner (or Dom/ dom) in the BDSM.  S (or s) usually stands for the submissive partner in BDSM Galley – […]

Writers' Tools of the Trade

TOOLS OF MY TRADE: #5 PHOTOSHOP

I’m too cheap sometimes to invest even in my own career, especially when it’s for something I believe I can do myself. Now sometimes you have to go to a pro, and sometimes you don’t. I suppose you have to trust your own instincts or trust that your friends will tell you when that is the case. So far no one has said to me, “Cat, you ever think of hiring a cover artist?” so I’m going to make the assumption I’m doing at least okay on my own. The tool I use to create banners out of the bookcovers done for me by the talented cover artists paid by my publishers, as well as the actual covers I create myself for my self-pubbed titles is Photoshop. Here are 2 banners I created from my Samhain bookcovers. I will be totally honest, when I first purchased Photoshop it was an exercise in frustration. I was totally lost. Even now I know the program is capable of doing so much more and I am barely scratching the service with my incredibly basic, novice skills. What I do know how to do I learned thanks to an old video author Mandy Roth made […]