Paranormal Romance

I consider myself just a writer Actually I like paranormal romance--I find it utterly Romantic in some strange way. That's just how I feel.

My paranormal romance is genre romance first but is also fantasy. I also write non-romance fantasy, paranromal erotica and many other combos.

But within romance it seems to go:

.....romance
../.............. \
fantasy paranormal

so calling para-romance fantasy may confuse a few people

Well, if you have two people falling in love as one of two PRIMARY goals of the book, then you probably do have a paranormal romance. Urban fantasy can have romance IN the book, but it's not normally a goal of the plot to get the people together. I think of myself as a paranormal romance author. That's sort of a separate subset of both fantasy and romance, because books might be shelved in either romance or in the SF/Fantasy section of the bookstore -- depending on the store. I've found our books in either place, or sometimes BOTH. This is a good thing for the author, because you might well pick up fans who don't normally read romances, and vice-versa.

Don't worry Jax, it happens to the best of us. I thought I'd written a clever urban fantasy as well, with a modern-day heroine and lots of sarcastic jibes.

Turns out that I'd actually written a paranormal chick-lit. Who knew? Not to fret, though -- the boundaries between one market and the next is growing softer by the day, and fans of one will usually pick up the others. When I shop for books I browse through both fantasy AND romance looking for the elusive paranormals (which are usually shelved in both).

Is it a paranormal romance?

Hi,
I wrote a novel that I thought was paranormal romance. The 2 main characters are in love, they knew each other in another life. There is time travel and telepathy in the story. I submitted it to several publishers and they said basically that it wasn't really a romance novel because, a), the male lead in the present uses a psychotropic mushrooms to enhance the telepathy. This is a no-no in romance novels, the characters has to be very likeable and sympathertic. B), my story didn't follow the formula for romance novels, I leave it open at the end. You know the man and woman will see each other again but you don't see them ride off into the sunset together.
I published it POD (see my thread in Bewares about Heliographica.) I now am going to get my rights back and void the contract. I wonder if I have any chance of getting my novel published with a legit company like Harlequin?
Ellen

Harlequin will REQUIRE an HEA (Happily Ever After) so yes, they must ride off into the sunset. However, their new Luna imprint is fantasy without that requirement (so the books are NOT shelved in romance). In fact, they don't WANT the romance to take up more than 50% of the book. This might work better for your goals if you don't want to re-write the ending. Otherwise, quite a few of the romance publishers will have a problem with lack of HEA.


Don't know about the mushroom aspect. I've certainly seen stranger things in romance. Susan, care to comment on that from the perspective of category lines?

paranormal romance

Thanks Cathy. I checked out Luna, they want a story with a strong female POV. That's not mine either, as I go back and forth but do spend mroe time with the man's POV.
I am thinking maybe HQL. Or maybe none of the above. I wish books could sometimes just be called 'fiction' without so many genres and sub-genres.
Thanks again,
Ellen

How about Tor paranormal--they want romance.

Tor must have an HEA. I tried, but got stomped on...