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Selling Books with GLBTQ Characters
Why can't you sell your "gay" book into the mainstream? Here are some thoughts on it.
Why can't you sell your "gay" book into the mainstream? Here are some thoughts on it.
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Samhain isn't the only publisher out there that takes 'slash' fiction, there are actually lots of them.
Coyote Moon Publications, http://www.coyotemoonpublications.com, one of my publishers takes GLBT fiction and actively looks for stories with openly gay characters. They accept stories and novels in most genres (contemporary romance is one thing I know they don't accept) and they don't require erotic content or that the story even be a romance. All of my stories and novels with them are GLBT, as is their first erotica release. They take works from about 5000 words up. Coyote Moon also takes books directly to print that are over a certain word count with ebook and print released pretty much simultaneously. They also have one of the best author friendly contracts out there, it's based on the EPIC model contract, and they have some of the best cover art in small press, IMO.
I have friends with both Samhain and Loose-id http://loose-id.net and I hear good things about both publishers.
One of the bigger names in GLBT is Torquere Press but I don't know much about them really though people I've chatted with have books with them.
I like epublishing because in many of cases the author has a lot more input on things like book covers and some places pay monthly royalties, rather than quarterly to semi-annual as most publishers do.
Coyote Moon Publications, http://www.coyotemoonpublications.com, one of my publishers takes GLBT fiction and actively looks for stories with openly gay characters. They accept stories and novels in most genres (contemporary romance is one thing I know they don't accept) and they don't require erotic content or that the story even be a romance. All of my stories and novels with them are GLBT, as is their first erotica release. They take works from about 5000 words up. Coyote Moon also takes books directly to print that are over a certain word count with ebook and print released pretty much simultaneously. They also have one of the best author friendly contracts out there, it's based on the EPIC model contract, and they have some of the best cover art in small press, IMO.
I have friends with both Samhain and Loose-id http://loose-id.net and I hear good things about both publishers.
One of the bigger names in GLBT is Torquere Press but I don't know much about them really though people I've chatted with have books with them.
I like epublishing because in many of cases the author has a lot more input on things like book covers and some places pay monthly royalties, rather than quarterly to semi-annual as most publishers do.
Selling your GLBTQ sf novel as "sf with GLBTQ interest" is not homophobic--it expands the audience for your story, rather than contracting it.
Precisely the genre question I asked months ago. I'm planning on submitting to non-LBGT publishing houses first, because the audience is simply larger. It's a Contemporary Fantasy with some Gay principles.
Precisely the genre question I asked months ago. I'm planning on submitting to non-LBGT publishing houses first, because the audience is simply larger. It's a Contemporary Fantasy with some Gay principles.
I didn't make it--someone made it in a community for one of my books (it's a quote)--but I have no objection!
You are a terrific source of wisdom about and insight into the writing/publishing industry. Phaedra, a friend of mine who is also a writer, sent me a link to one of your essays months ago. That essay led to me "friending" you. Every time you post an essay like this one, I send her another "thank you" for introducing me to your Live Journal.
You told me a while back that part of the problem with selling "gay romance for women" is that the bookshops simply don't know where to file it -- and now that I have a print book out, I'm seeing this up close and personal... The m/f print books from Loose Id go in the romance section, mine seems to go in Gay Interest if they order it at all. :-(
The "original slash" thing came out of trying to say that here were books that gave the same emotional kick as slash but with original characters. Calling them gay romance tended to get, "oh, I've read gay porn, and I'd rather read slash." It's been picked up by the romance readers who weren't familiar with fanfic, and some of them now seem to think "slash"="gay romance for women" without realising what the term actually means in its original environment. One or two of them are going to get a shock the first time they wander into a slash archive and stumble across the stuff that doesn't conform to romance genre conventions. There's a reason I don't tell my profic fans where to find my Blake's 7 slash stories. :->
The "original slash" thing came out of trying to say that here were books that gave the same emotional kick as slash but with original characters. Calling them gay romance tended to get, "oh, I've read gay porn, and I'd rather read slash." It's been picked up by the romance readers who weren't familiar with fanfic, and some of them now seem to think "slash"="gay romance for women" without realising what the term actually means in its original environment. One or two of them are going to get a shock the first time they wander into a slash archive and stumble across the stuff that doesn't conform to romance genre conventions. There's a reason I don't tell my profic fans where to find my Blake's 7 slash stories. :->
Wait, are you the Jules Jones who co-wrote The Sydicate series from Loose Id? Because I freaking LOVE LOVE LOVE that and was just going to post here to mention to Anna that I recently purchased some stuff off Loose Id and it's fantastic and then I thought, oh, not the forum, and oh crap I'm babbling.
Seriously, I am completely and utterly in love with Allard and Vaughn and now know bits of the stories off by heart. Honestly. I'm lame that way. But I've read each "book" about three times each and get warm fuzzies when I even think about these boys and their snarky awesome love. And scorchingly hot sex.
(omg sorry anna for jamming your journal with my fannish squeeing!)
Seriously, I am completely and utterly in love with Allard and Vaughn and now know bits of the stories off by heart. Honestly. I'm lame that way. But I've read each "book" about three times each and get warm fuzzies when I even think about these boys and their snarky awesome love. And scorchingly hot sex.
(omg sorry anna for jamming your journal with my fannish squeeing!)
He he, finally, the entry I've been waiting for. I've been trying to classify what I write, and the best I can come up with is "character-driven fantasy novels featuring alternative lifestyles" (which is on my business card) or just "queer fantasy," which I'm a bit more leery about. I have a couple LGBT books finished, one erotic and one not so much, and am waiting on a response from Ellora's Cave and may submit to Coyote Moon's erotic LGBT friendly division Silver Moon. There's also www.chippewapublishing.com who will take LGBT short stories and novels (I just got a contract from them for a gay fantasy short) but that's still a fledgling operation compared to E.C.
It strikes me, though, that even through a small press, if you're creative enough you can still sell LGBT books to a market. Depends on how many road trips you want to take during pride festivals and LGBT centers and such, but there's ways to get more than 500-1000 copies off only a small press, and there's always the hope someone bigger will pick it up someday. A niche market for sure, but it's still there for the determined writer.
I'm in the middle of a writing residency at Seton Hill, and one of the classes we had today concerned mixing genres; it depends on who you query as to what you market it as. Could my book be paranormal romance? If I send it to you, that's what I'd try and make it look like. To someone else, it might be just fantasy. If it gets published, there's got to be a creative way to market it to an audience who wouldn't normally read anything like it. (I know I've repeated things you said, but that's just because I believe strongly in it.)
But, darn, I'm not going to give up on what I write and say it's only worth being published online (though the money seems better that way) because like you said, somebody has to push the boundaries, and I'm trying my darndest to do it.
It strikes me, though, that even through a small press, if you're creative enough you can still sell LGBT books to a market. Depends on how many road trips you want to take during pride festivals and LGBT centers and such, but there's ways to get more than 500-1000 copies off only a small press, and there's always the hope someone bigger will pick it up someday. A niche market for sure, but it's still there for the determined writer.
I'm in the middle of a writing residency at Seton Hill, and one of the classes we had today concerned mixing genres; it depends on who you query as to what you market it as. Could my book be paranormal romance? If I send it to you, that's what I'd try and make it look like. To someone else, it might be just fantasy. If it gets published, there's got to be a creative way to market it to an audience who wouldn't normally read anything like it. (I know I've repeated things you said, but that's just because I believe strongly in it.)
But, darn, I'm not going to give up on what I write and say it's only worth being published online (though the money seems better that way) because like you said, somebody has to push the boundaries, and I'm trying my darndest to do it.
In print publishing, too, there's a niche market for gay romance. I think, though, that any of these "original slash" writers would probably want to study the gay romance genre before submitting: it has rules too. Gay Romance is lighthearted, more or less, -- no, I mean it has a lot of humor running through it, is usually deeply set in the gay community for at least part of the story, and has a happy ending. The dimensions of angst are different -- gay romances are really worried about appearance, coolness, getting ahead in conventional ways.
There is a difference in how sex writing is approached in Gay Romance v. "original slash." (it's a stupid title, I think, but we're probably stuck with it, and it's clearly its own genre with its own following and its own conventions: it reads quite differently from the sort of romantic writing you find on the gay authors' archives, and from the sort of writing you find in the gay mens' shelves in the bookstore)I wish I could describe the difference. But you'd know which genre you were reading if you picked up just a couple of paragraphs of sex writing.
There's another genre of Heavy Gay Relationship books which usually ends quite ambivalently, and often disastrously. They're shelved in the bookstore on the same shelves as the gay romances, but you can tell which is which: the gay romances come packaged in covers that look like Old Navy ads, featuring a well-dressed (or exquisitely swimsuited) handsome young man, or two of them. The heavy relationship books have arty covers, not always gloomy, but always with important typography (as opposed to the romping typography of the gay romances).
Only some gay romances are put out by specialty houses (Alyson, Gay Men's Press, etc). Others are put out by mainstream houses in mainstream light fiction imprints, but they get these particular covers.
Somebody who knows about the small-but-not-too-small publishers should explain how they function.
There is a difference in how sex writing is approached in Gay Romance v. "original slash." (it's a stupid title, I think, but we're probably stuck with it, and it's clearly its own genre with its own following and its own conventions: it reads quite differently from the sort of romantic writing you find on the gay authors' archives, and from the sort of writing you find in the gay mens' shelves in the bookstore)I wish I could describe the difference. But you'd know which genre you were reading if you picked up just a couple of paragraphs of sex writing.
There's another genre of Heavy Gay Relationship books which usually ends quite ambivalently, and often disastrously. They're shelved in the bookstore on the same shelves as the gay romances, but you can tell which is which: the gay romances come packaged in covers that look like Old Navy ads, featuring a well-dressed (or exquisitely swimsuited) handsome young man, or two of them. The heavy relationship books have arty covers, not always gloomy, but always with important typography (as opposed to the romping typography of the gay romances).
Only some gay romances are put out by specialty houses (Alyson, Gay Men's Press, etc). Others are put out by mainstream houses in mainstream light fiction imprints, but they get these particular covers.
Somebody who knows about the small-but-not-too-small publishers should explain how they function.
Actually original slash is only talked about when you are in a Slash contex.. in order to tap into what people are used to hearing in that arena. So, at a slash con you identify as Original Slash (and many of us got our start in the FanFic slash arena btw). Depending on the context it is also referred to it as Homoerotic Romance - which has its own buttons. Many of the e-publishers are adding Homoerotic romance to thier lineups. Phaze, Venus, Loose-Id, Samahine, Extasy, Liquid Silver, Coyote Moon. Then there's Torquere and Iris Press who survive exclusively on it.
Putting the Queer back into Query... since... for a while now.
Great Essay.
Great Essay.
Word and word and word again. Because everything you said is spot on.
t's just a larger minority than you're used to, which is why it doesn't feel like a minority - I always laugh when I hear things like "but there are so many of us" - yeah, but in the business world of a major publisher - a couple of thousand - not so much.
I said this to you Saturday and I'll say it again - kudos for telling the unvarnished truth. It may not be what people want to hear, but reality is what it is.
Write the best damned book you can.
Be professional.
Don't be an idiot.
A-freakin'-men.
Oh, and yeah - I give thanks every day to folks like Laurell Hamilton, Tanya Huff, Barbara Hambly and Charlaine Harris, who broke ground so I didn't have to.
t's just a larger minority than you're used to, which is why it doesn't feel like a minority - I always laugh when I hear things like "but there are so many of us" - yeah, but in the business world of a major publisher - a couple of thousand - not so much.
I said this to you Saturday and I'll say it again - kudos for telling the unvarnished truth. It may not be what people want to hear, but reality is what it is.
Write the best damned book you can.
Be professional.
Don't be an idiot.
A-freakin'-men.
Oh, and yeah - I give thanks every day to folks like Laurell Hamilton, Tanya Huff, Barbara Hambly and Charlaine Harris, who broke ground so I didn't have to.
Changeling Press (http://changelingpress.com/) also publishes some very nice M/M romance, including my Dark Callings (http://changelingpress.com/product.php?&upt=book&ubid=21) series. In spite of recent rumors, they're very much alive and well. And they're also very nice to work for, and even writing in a mid-selling genre with them, the royalties are decent--actually for e-pub they're damn good.
I'm a little weirded out by the "original slash" term, too, though I do get what it means and why it has come into usage. My own books came out of my love of writing slash fic, and I wanted to write something that gave me that same kind of emotional punch.
Thanks for the extensive info--I've been following this market, though rather casually, and the growth over the past couple of years has been both gratifying and fascinating.
I'm a little weirded out by the "original slash" term, too, though I do get what it means and why it has come into usage. My own books came out of my love of writing slash fic, and I wanted to write something that gave me that same kind of emotional punch.
Thanks for the extensive info--I've been following this market, though rather casually, and the growth over the past couple of years has been both gratifying and fascinating.
As alway, Anna, this is a great post. I'll admit to being a reader who usually prefers to stay within the confines of the HEA in a romance. I once picked up a romance that had a contemporary spin on the Beauty/Beast tale. I flipped to the end (~~sigh~~, yes I do that) and found out the heroine dies. I quickly put the book back. No matter how well written it might have been, or how much I like the premise of the tale, that ending blew it for me, and I passed on buying it. I don't mind more ambiguous or tragic endings in other genres, but always prefer the HEA in the romance I read. As you say, it's a more constrained genre.
I have a book that's SF/F but the main plot is a gay romance, and the action plot is really secondary; is that worth trying to sell as SF/F?
For what it's worth, I'd suggest you do a rewrite and flip the focus so that the action plot becomes primary. SF/F has no problem with gay romance secondary plots.
For what it's worth, I'd suggest you do a rewrite and flip the focus so that the action plot becomes primary. SF/F has no problem with gay romance secondary plots.
The print book I was talking about is the omnibus paperback of volumes 1 & 2 of The Syndicate. :-) And yes, it's Anna's LJ but she'll probably be understanding when I say that I welcome any and all fannish squeeing about the geekpr0n. It's still a novelty for me to be on this side of the squee. :-)
If you want to squee at Alex, she's![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
predatrix. And yes, that's the fanfic Predatrix of various fandoms - she never bothered getting a seperate LJ for her profic persona.
If you want to squee at Alex, she's
predatrix. And yes, that's the fanfic Predatrix of various fandoms - she never bothered getting a seperate LJ for her profic persona.Yup, but because we also talk about it in mixed venues online, some of the romance folk who aren't familiar with fanfic have picked up the term, and are using it without really understanding where it comes from or that it's not identical to "gay romance" or "homoerotic romance". (A lot of my slash stories are *not* romance in the way a romance fan understands the term.) I suppose I should rethink using it in my LibraryThing profile, but I subconsciously expect the majority of people reading that to understand the context.
M/m has been part of the Loose Id lineup since the beginning. I don't normally talk about this in public because it Sets A Bad Example To Young Writers, but I was actively recruited by one of the editors who was looking for material for the LGBT section of the catalogue before they opened their doors.
(Don't try this at home, kids. Not all approaches from strange agents/editors are scams, but a lot of them are. I knew how to run a basic sanity check.)
M/m has been part of the Loose Id lineup since the beginning. I don't normally talk about this in public because it Sets A Bad Example To Young Writers, but I was actively recruited by one of the editors who was looking for material for the LGBT section of the catalogue before they opened their doors.
(Don't try this at home, kids. Not all approaches from strange agents/editors are scams, but a lot of them are. I knew how to run a basic sanity check.)
Loose Id is also doing lots of them.
I write for an e-publisher (Changeling Press) and while some folks may look down on it as not "real" writing, I can honestly say it has been a great experience for me.
I've had the chance to write the stories I want to write, and have received a lot of good advice, encouragement and good natured pushing to improve my craft and stretch myself as an author.
I've had the chance to write the stories I want to write, and have received a lot of good advice, encouragement and good natured pushing to improve my craft and stretch myself as an author.
"Want some candy little author..."
Basically, there isn't a good name for it. Gay Romance is not the same as Romances written for women featurning gay characters. And homoerotic is misleading as some of it is as tame as a 70's era romance novel.
Basically, there isn't a good name for it. Gay Romance is not the same as Romances written for women featurning gay characters. And homoerotic is misleading as some of it is as tame as a 70's era romance novel.
Awesome post, Anna. I agree with most everything you've said. :)
I do have a question, though.
"And romance novels, the ones stocked in the romance section of your bookstore, pretty much have to have (a) a heterosexual couple in the foreground and (b) a happy ending."
Is this general observation, or does this affect the guidelines of Tor's Paranormal Romance line?
Thanks :)
I do have a question, though.
"And romance novels, the ones stocked in the romance section of your bookstore, pretty much have to have (a) a heterosexual couple in the foreground and (b) a happy ending."
Is this general observation, or does this affect the guidelines of Tor's Paranormal Romance line?
Thanks :)
Samhain also takes "odd" smexy yaoi-like stories in general that do not contain romance or happy endings.
A book which turned out to have a much larger readership than expected: The Bridges of Madison County. It ends with the two lovers having their memories of each other -- but not having to live with each other. Apparently, there were many people for whom "They lived together ever after" wasn't their kind of happy ending.
I have asked a number of gay men and none of them tend to read the romances released by these e-pubs.
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