What do you write?

I have four suspense novels out, commercially published through two CBA houses.

I've now switched focus, and with my next two, a science fiction novel and the first of a new suspense series, I'm going into the general (secular) market.

Wordcaster said:

Interesting, John -- is there a particular reason you're expanding into the general market? That's great you have four commercially published novels. I hope to get there at some point.

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For the SF work, my reason was easy: the CBA has very little room (or love) for spec-fic; the avenues the world offers are much more vast.

For the new suspense series, my MC has some personal baggage he's dealing with, and the stories are going into interweave that with some grim (but bleakly humorous) scenarios; again, not CBA-friendly.

I've long been a proponent of the adage, "write the story the story demands," with the subtext being, "and then do your best to place them with houses that are open to those ideas."

And unfortunately, no CBA house--to my knowledge--fits that.

I have 2 series:

1. YA traditional fantasy (which some folks will consider "high fantasy", some "epic fantasy", etc.). This one isn't blatantly Christian.

2. YA urban fantasy (no, not paranormal romance). This one's narrator is blatantly Christian, to the point that her conscience bothers her over the Ten Commandments even when she "kills" a creature that was already dead. She even goes to church.

Both have some dark topics. (Traditional fantasy one, the narrator has a sadistic and twisted family; her lineage is more of a rope than a tree. Urban fantasy one, the narrator is a runaway white slave.)

Despite that, both are quite clean.

Yeah… I'm self-publishing, here.

I write romance. Most of my stuff already out there is contemporary, but I'm finding historical more interesting right now. My period of interest is the Middle Ages, which CBA is not heart-thumped to hear about. So I'm sitting on a similar fence to John's -- I keep wondering if the stories I want to tell are just not for Christian publishers. I've warned my agent I may never sell to a CBA publisher, but that's okay with me, because the CBA is certainly not the entire industry. Not by a long shot. So mostly I lurk in my small press mode because they seem to be a lot friendlier to the types of stories I want to tell.

We'll see how that plays out as the industry goes through all these spastic changes--Christian fic two years behind the general market, as usual.

My baby is going to be a series from the looks of it. Think Screw Tape Letters. Mine is dark/humor from the demon side. Think....'the Devil made me do' it type exposed. It fun writing it and I can see no end to it. I plan on rolling up sleeves this summer and bumping out the second one.