This thread seems to have drifted into what one likes to read as opposed to what one is able to write.
Granted, it's a GOOD idea to read and enjoy the genre you're writing in--makes things less of a chore when you're at the keyboard.
Keep in mind that for all the flaws one may see in Harlequin that it is a big honking huge
business geared toward making profits. They buy books that fit into their marketing slots from writers who can meet the required word count and deliver on deadline. With a bit of practice that's not too terribly difficult to do.
They're the only publishing website I've found that actively tries to help writers improve their craft. They have excellent advice on writing, promote their own writers like crazy, and are highly supportive to the neos coming up. It is from that pool that the next generation of HQ writers will emerge.
They are after a specific product for each of their lines, and have been doing it for a long, long time. If you write oranges it won't fit into their apples slot. That's when you go elsewhere with your proposal.
We may mock them, but by golly their writers sell books
worldwide. If a writer gains readers, those readers may look for non-Harlequin books by the writer. Walk into any supermarket, mom & pop store, Wal*Mart, chain pharmacy, or regular bookstore and you'll find HQ books on the racks. Their distribution is staggering in scope.
One of my friends had two books in their now defunct Bombshell line, and after their release she noticed a clear jump in sales for her titles at another house. That sales jump led to her getting two new contracts with Roc Publishing. The time she spent writing for HQ was well spent. It was better than paying for advertising space in a trade magazine, better than doing a hundred signings.
My friend--who is as professional as they come--was impressed with the speed and efficiency of the edit job and the follow-up production of the HQ staff. I'd never seen anything that sharp and streamlined in operation at any other publishing house. Nor have I seen a galley-edit like theirs before. THEIR way of doing it made sense!
I've been to one of the big HQ parties when they were passing out sterling silver pins to select authors. These women were being honored for writing 25-50-150-200-250 titles for H. AND MORE.
Damn-- we may not like all their books, but you can't argue against the kind of money that they raked in for that volume of wordage.
Sitting at my table, proudly holding a lovely silver pin of the HQ logo set with a ruby was a an under-30 who'd written and sold at least 25 to them. Fast worker and dedicated.
She had my instant respect.
I've been writing professionally since 1986 and am
still 3 books short of cracking the 25-novel mark.
Readers are buying a specific product from them and have specific expectations from that product, which HQ faithfully delivers. If there is a deviation from the formula, sales go down.
When you go into a McDonalds for fries, you want fries, not mashed potatoes with gravy.
HQ is throwing out a remarkable supply of fries, and damn--readers are gobbling them up and asking for more.
Yes, mock them for selling the same story over and over again ad nauseum--but keep in mind that they ARE making whacking great gobs of moolah.
It ain't art, but people are buying.
Royalties may drop for the writers of the Presents line, but it's still better money than I'd get at any other job. There's damned-few jobs for which I am qualified that would allow me to sleep late, wear bathrobe and slippers to work, and take a day off any time I feel like it.
I am not calling it selling out so much as cashing in.
Susan Gable--THANK YOU for posting the notice about the Presents line. I've passed it on to others, and took a look at them myself.
While at Wal*Mart---they had racks of H titles there, most of them down to one copy since sales were clearly brisk.
The Presents line does not appeal to me in the least, but I DO like their Intrigues. Always have. So I picked up a copy I thought I'd enjoy to see their editors are buying.
It's about damned time I wrote one!
