If it's a suspenseful book where I really like the characters, I'll sneak a look at the end to see if it "all comes out right." If a book is trending towards dull, I'll peek at the end to see if the end point is interesting enough that I want to see the trip. The dull normally kicks in about a third to halfway.

I'm having trouble with a current piece where I'm in the middle of crucial introduction of people and establishing initial reactions between characters. I'm finding it horribly boring to write because I know where it all ends, but I have to keep reminding myself that the reader will need this information. It's like pointing out the emergency exits and flotation devices that may be needed later in the flight when you really want to get to the takeoff.

oh my ... Mrs. Giggles reviewed J.R. Ward's black dagger brotherhood thing. She didn't like it ... said it read like information for fan fic Mary Sue stories. Not having read any of the books in the series (I have, I must admit) she's seriously put off by the way names are spelled (the author seems to be trying to do for the letter "H" what SG1 did for the apostrophe).

They used the phrase "glittery hoo-ha"??!! And neither the author nor publisher was 12?

I dunno Barb, I'd love to read a novel about real and ordinary people falling in love. Maybe you just need to find the right way to sell it. Maybe it'd sell as general fiction, not romance.

It'd probably be classified as chick-lit.

Actually, the term chick-lit isn't used any more, especially not within publishing houses. You only really see it used in media, because it became such a handy catch-all term.

And my problem really is that I do blur the genre lines pretty badly-- when I've tried selling it as mainstream or more commercial, it gets rejected for being "too romance" and when my work goes to romance editors, it gets the "wow, this really isn't romance." (Or in the latest case, it's too ordinary to be romance.)

They used the phrase "glittery hoo-ha"??!! And neither the author nor publisher was 12?

No, I'm the one using glittery hoo-ha-- it's become something of a joke among a lot of writers when the woman is so wondrous and everything about her so delicate and inviting, so completely desirable, that certainly, even her hoo-ha must glitter, because it's just so fabulous.

How f'ing annoying, Barb. It's gotta bug that you can't write the book you want and get it published in that form because no one knows what they're looking at.

It's frustrating, that's for sure, especially since the people-- the actual readers-- who've read the manuscripts all love them and say, "Why aren't there stories like this on the shelves?"

To which I have no answer, really.

Stylistically, I really do lean more towards a mainstream/commercial lit style, but I am a die hard sucker for a good love story/romance. One that's well-rounded and real part of the story and doesn't shy away from sensuality and deeper emotion. And unfortunately, the thing I see in a lot of mainstream novels is a real tendency to treat the love story, if there is one, in a very secondary, diminished fashion, as if actually exploring that aspect of a relationship would somehow devalue the book.

(Unless of course, you're a man writing those stories-- then you have great insight into the human heart and a depth of emotion that readers cry out for.)

< /bitter>

At any rate, the story I'm working on right now is much more solidly mainstream than anything else I've ever done before, but where my biggest challenge is going to be disciplining the romance writer who wants to go haywire. (As Amy well knows...)

Part of the problem is that there's no midlist* anymore. Mainstream fiction needs to be quirky as hell or (the dreaded) "literary" to get noticed. Unless it's for a program, and those have rules, much like genre. Even women's fictions programs (meaning a specific list or imprint put out by a specific publisher) look for a pretty narrow range of subject matter. For a while it was "chick lit." Then "hen lit" -- which was mostly older women facing divorce or widowhood, in a group of friends. "Mommy lit" didn't last very long, although you still see the occasional book.

What Barb said is, sadly, very true right now. For whatever reason, books about adults in relationships which aren't specifically "romance" are much better received (by publishers, anyway) when they're written by men.

• I should add that the reason for this is the bottom line, as ever. Book buyers for the chains have less money to spend, and they want sure things. So they're looking for the next big thing, the next word-of-mouth bestseller, or the authors with big readerships (which wouldn't be midlist anyway), or genre.

So they're looking for the next big thing, the next word-of-mouth bestseller, or the authors with big readerships (which wouldn't be midlist anyway), or genre.

All of which I try not to think about very much, because if I do I start freaking out. I mean, I'm cynical and self-aware enough to know that the publishing marketing machine is just waiting to promote me as Zany and Wacky Goth Lady!, and I'm determined to take advantage of as much as the silly marketing they're willing to give me. But it's still kind of freaky.

Barb, I honestly don't get why the stories you're telling aren't being snapped up by publishers. I'm one of those non-romance genre* reading people, and I've loved what I've seen of your work.

• Mostly because I want my love stories to be an accessory to the main plot of supernatural distruction, violence, and wacky hijinks. I know that I am not a Normal Reader.