Jordan Summers

I’m back, but I’m buried in work. I’ll catch you guys later this week. Happy Belated Birthday Wishes to Laura and Allie!!!

Catch you guys later. Have a good week. Ciao!

I finished my first round of edits on RED. I am getting ready to print out the book, so that I can take it with me. (Dh and I are heading out for a few.) I’m actually looking forward to the change of scenery. Even resort areas get old, if you’ve been there too long. Not sure how much blogging I’ll get done while I’m away. (Won’t have regular access to a computer.) Normally, that would bum me out, but I’m kind of looking forward to it.

Now of course comes the real hard part…which books do I pack to read??? I have so many on my TBR pile that I’m just not sure. Will I be in the mood for a paranormal? Historical? Graphic Novel? Contemporary? UGH! I just don’t know. I’ve been jumping all over the place lately. I know I won’t have time to read more than two novels because I don’t read fast enough. Did I mention that I also have a ton of magazines that I haven’t gotten around to reading yet? At last count, I was four RWR (Romance Writer’s of America mags), five Novelist Inc. newsletters, and two Romantic Times Magazines behind. (Stop staring at that stack of seven Discover magazines in the corner. *g*) This is what happens when editing takes over ones world.

I realized something else that’s kind of sad. I won’t actually get to work on a new book until the end of July, if all the edits I have due come in on time. That’s just not right.

As you can tell, I have nothing to really say. If you have some suggestions for books I should take, shout them out. In all likelihood, I own them. (wg) I would like to congratulate my girl, Catherine. She entered and completed her first triathlon. Mega cool news. Please stop by and congratulate her.

This is what happens when I think out loud. *ggg* I should know better by now.

I’m so glad that there’s nothing else going on in the world right now. I’d hate to think that the coverage of Paris Hilton would be interrupted by something silly like war or famine. No wonder the rest of the world thinks that we’re idiots. Sigh.

Yesterday’s post made me realize exactly how different everyone’s priorities are when it comes to publishing. Some people just want to be published by a N.Y. publisher. They don’t care about the fine print or the long-term consequences. Other people prefer the ‘wait and see’ approach, before dipping their toes into the mire. While still others know the possible pitfalls and either choose to be proactive or choose to leave the arena. I could go the latter route, but I’m not sure it’s worth bringing my agent into the game. I suppose if I planned to write a ton of ebooks, I’d be more inclined to do that. As it stands, I’d only planned two or three more novellas. That was all I had time to do. And even those would probably be spread out over a couple of years due to my current deadlines.

I’m just not sure the hassle of fighting over a contract is worth it. Yes, it’s good money. Yes, I enjoy writing for the epubs. But after a while you have to ask yourself if your time would be better spent working on something else. At this stage of the game, I think my time would be better spent shopping my work to New York. Everyone who writes for the epubs or who plans to write for them in the future has to make this decision for themselves. All I can say is ‘READ THE FINE PRINT’.

I’ve been thinking about the Samhain announcement over at Dear Author. I’m genuinely happy for them, but it does make me wonder how this news will change the face of epublishing. On the one side, I see it as a wonderful opportunity for new authors to break into N.Y. publishing. On the other side, I see a lot of N.Y. (previously epubbed authors) having fewer places to put work that wouldn’t normally fit in the N.Y. market. What do I mean by that last statement?

Here’s the thing about signing with N.Y.: When you sign a publishing contract, you give that publisher certain rights to your work. Some of those rights include future rights. For example, if I write a contemporary novella, I have to send it to Kensington Brava first, since they have right of first refusal for all my contemporary novellas. If they reject it, then I can take that work elsewhere. Each contract you have with N.Y. asks for different rights, which is why it’s so important to have a good agent narrow those rights down. The same holds true for epubs, since a lot of them are making rights grabs that would make S & S’s contractual changes look like child’s play.

It used to be that you could write stories and send them to the epubs for consideration. With luck, you’d get them published and make a nice steady montly check. There was a lot of freedom, when it came to the types of stories that you could write. That was before the epublishers started joining forces with N.Y. publishers. Nowadays if you’re a N.Y. and epublished author, you have to tread carefully so that you don’t violate any of your contracts.

What does this all mean for people like me, who started with the epubs and moved into the N.Y. market? It means that I’m probably not going to be able to sell much (if any) work to the epubs any more, since they could turn around and sell it to the N.Y. pubs. (Potentially violating my contracts, since I write paranormals for the epubs.) It kind of feels like the end of an era. I knew there would come a day, when I’d have to move on. I guess I’d just hoped that day was down the road.

What do you guys think about the epub joint venture with N.Y. trend? Good? Bad? Don’t care?


UPDATE: This news comes via Dear Author. Looks like the game just got a whole lot more interesting.


On a completely different thought train, you all must read Ryan Reynolds’ blog entry. It gives you ‘food for thought’. He’s smart and hot. Quite a deadly combination. (wg)

Lots of news beginning to hit the ‘blogsphere’ about BEA. The consensus seems to be that it was VERY hot. *g* No, everyone seems to have had a good time. Lots of business conducted. Good contacts made. I’m looking forward to hearing more reports.

The big announcement of the day comes from Dear Author. Congratulations goes out to Samhain. Yay Crissy! Good luck in your new enterprise.

I wasn’t going to get into the Romance Writer’s of America kerfuffle, but it just doesn’t seem to be dying down. What afoot, you ask? (It’s that thing connected to your ankle. *g*) Yeah, I know it wasn’t funny, but I couldn’t resist. (wg) Back to the clusterf*ck. Apparently, the RWA board has suggested making changes to the two major contests that RWA holds every year. One change that’s caused the biggest controversy is the fact that there isn’t going to be an Erotic Romance Category. Shocker. They’ve also suggested making changes to qualification standards, when it comes to joining the Published Authors Network (PAN). If the changes are adopted, you’d need to be able to prove that you’ve earned $2000.00 on one book in a 24 month period of time. (For the record, I could qualify using one of my ebooks or any of my N.Y. paperbacks.)


Now let me say up front that I’ve been a member of PAN for a few years and it’s meant exactly JACK to my career. I have gotten NOTHING out of being a member. So it kind of cracks me up to see people fighting to get in. At one time, qualifying for PAN was probably a very prestigeous accomplishment (kinda like joining SFWA), but I believe that day is long gone.

I also think it’s sad that $2K would eliminate a lot of PAN members from the group. What does that say about PAN’s ability to help authors, if a large portion of their membership w/couldn’t qualify within two years? It’s not a lot of money folks. All I can say is there are a lot of authors out there getting taken advantage of and that they should be concerned with more than their PAN membership, if they can’t come up with $2K for one book. :/

Am I being too harsh? What do you all think of this latest storm?