HelenKay Dimon

1. Sybil pointed this little nugget out to me. I laughed all day. According to the Books-A-Million website – my new favorite website, by the way – the authors of When Good Things Happen To Bad Boys are: “New York Times bestselling author Lori Foster is joined by USA Today bestselling author Erin McCarthy and top romance writer Helenkay Dimon for this sexy collection of romantic stories. ”

Forgetting for a second the fact my name is spelled wrong, let’s examine this “top romance writer” title. While I love it – and I really, really do – I can only assume “top” in this context actually means “we have no idea who she is and hope she knows the difference between a verb and a noun.” Whatever. I’m sticking with “top romance writer” and think I should use the title in all of my upcoming promo…or not.

2. I saw this book deal announcement:

FICTION: WOMEN’S/ROMANCE
Maureen Child’s untitled paranormal romance, about a demon who was Jack the Ripper in a former life, to Melissa Jeglinski at Harlequin, in a nice deal, by Pamela Harty at The Knight Agency.

Intrigued, I then went to Maureen Child’s website . In her news section, she says: “Also just signed a contract with Silhouette to do a paranormal story for their new line, Nocturne. I’m really looking forward to it and the book should be out this November.”

I’m thinking these are the same book. I still don’t get what it’s about. You don’t often see Jack The ripper at Silhouette. Paranormal isn’t usually my first choice, but I want to check this one out.

Tess Gerritsen made a guest appearance on the blog Murder She Writes and gave some writing advice on the difference between thinking your way through a book and feeling your way.

It’s not the first time I’ve given this advice to a writer: “Stop thinking and start feeling.” The writers who most often need to hear it are, oddly enough, highly educated, logical, cerebral men like my friend. Well-read, accomplished people who think that writing a novel is going to be a snap for them because they’re so intelligent, so logical, such deep thinkers.

But deep thinking is what gets them into trouble. They work so hard trying to get across their philosophical or political points, they forget that novels are really about people. They’re about love and anger and grief. They’re about marrying and having children and being terrified of losing them. They’re about standing over your wife’s coffin and knowing that you’ll never again feel her hair brush against your face, never again hear her footsteps on the stairs.

They’re not about “self-actualization” and “personal journeys.”

Now, I think a lot of people would say they’re writing about those personal journeys. Those folks might take issue with Gerritsen. I’d say writing is about thinking and feeling your way through. But, really, what I think she’s talking about is the need for conflict, emotions and the famous Dark Moment. Or, as my cp keeps reminding me, it’s kind of tough to have an interesting novel without an escalation in conflict and an emotional connection between the reader and the characters. For Gerritsen it works like this:

When I write my own novels, I don’t think my way through them; I feel my way. I’m always stopping to test my gut reaction. Does a scene move me in some way? Am I upset or scared or excited or angry? No? Then I need to dig deeper to find the emotion. Maybe I haven’t layered in enough conflict, or I haven’t given my hero a stake in the scene’s outcome. Or maybe I’ve chosen to send the plot in a direction that leads nowhere interesting – to no crisis, no conflict.

For a different kind of Valentine’s Day book…

Controversy seems to find author Ayelet Waldman. Frankly, I think she courts it, but whatever works for her. I’ve written about her before here. Yeah, she’s an author. Yeah, she’s married to Michael Chabon. Yeah, she caused a brouhaha awhile back when she talked about how she could live without her kids but not without her husband. Yeah, she had a mental breakdown of sorts and her hubby only found out when he checked in on her website. But, in good news, she has a new book out.

Both the Washington Post and the NYT reviewed the book – Love and Other Impossible Pursuits - this weekend. Both liked it. The Post describes it as: “…the story of a woman forced by loss to re-evaluate her past and choices, even her desires.” The review emphasizes the journey of heroine Emilia and talks only briefly about Emilia purposely breaking up a marriage and family, and then not being able to bond with her new husband’s son from the previous destroyed marriage.

The NYT review went a different way. The title of the review is Atom Bomb Of Desire. This comes from a part of the book where Emilia says:

“I pushed away the idea of the devastation I wrought on his wife and child,” Emilia explains. “I was the atom bomb of desire, and they were Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I could not spare time for mercy. I had a war to win.”

The NYT review sums the book up like this:

“Love and Other Impossible Pursuits” is clearly out to irritate some Mommy groups. It may also be the first chick-lit novel (it features, after all, a young career woman who falls in love with her boss, shops and worries about her relationships) that in addition to being a romantic, shocking and sometimes painful page-turner does the unthinkable: it actually says something new and interesting about women, families and love.

I’m not convinced this qualifies as chick lit, but I’m oddly intrigued.

The Sunday edition of The Washington Post Book World was dedicated to Love and Heartbreak (their title, not mine). In addition to the regular love books – you know, the one about Castro and the other about Bin Laden – Book World reviewed a few actual romances. All except one had a Biggie author. Of the listings, the reviewer said:

Every Breath You Take by Judith McNaught – “The romance comes with a convoluted yet oddly compelling mystery as its backdrop, its power diminished somewhat by a surfeit of coincidences that would choke even Charles Dickens.” She lost me at “surfeit”…

All Night Long by Jayne Ann Krentz – “The plot is ridiculous but fun, while the prose, when you are able to notice, is flabby and slows down the action.” Never heard of “flabby” prose before, but okay.

The Instant When Everything Is Perfect by Jessica Barksdale Inclan – The storylines seem to include adultery and breast cancer. The review also says: “The air-brushed perfection of the main characters that is requisite for the genre is mitigated by the more realistic portrayal of bearing witness to a loved one’s battle with cancer.” No one told me I’m supposed to be writing about perfect people.

Heart Divided an anthology by Debbie Macomber, Katherine Stone and Lois Faye Dyer – “The characters tend to be two-dimensional, but the structure of the linked stories is clever.” That’s kind of positive.

Just Rewards by Barbara Taylor Bradford – I loved this part: “It’s the sort of novel where the women are apt to be named India, the men Gideon, and the houses Pennistone Royal.”

The only one I own is All Night Long. It’s probably the only one of these I’ll ever own or read.

The general rule goes like this: self-publishing is not the same as being published. The bottom line is that publishers pay authors and not the other way around. If you’re self-published, I’m not saying you’re not a writer. I’m not saying you lack talent. I’m just saying you’re not published (yet).

For some reason, this is a controversial point. It shouldn’t be. It’s not an insult. It’s a fact of the publishing world. It’s also a fact that some self-published folks – by that I mean a few and probably not as many as the self-publishers want you to believe – get picked up by NY publishing houses. Some, like this lady, get huge deals:

FICTION: THRILLER
Kathleen McGowan’s The Magdalene Line, three thrillers that fictionalize her two decades of research into a gospel written by Mary Magdalene, beginning with her originally self-published THE EXPECTED ONE for publication in August 2006, to Trish Todd at Touchstone Fireside, in a major deal, for seven figures, on an exclusive submission, by Larry Kirshbaum of LJK Literary Management (world). Film producer Michael Grais brought the project to Kirshbaum, and is attached to produce when the movie rights are sold.

Rights have been sold Bruna in Holland (in a pre-empt), Editions XO in France, Piemme in Italy, and Damm in Sweden, reaching into high six-figures already.

Count up that advance money. Not too shabby. Also not the norm. Keep submitting.

I enjoy the show Lost for many reasons. It’s sharp and clever. The diverse cast is a tad more representative of real life than, say, the cast of Friends. It features at least one gigantic polar bear, life-like black smoke and a guy who was hidden in an underground shelter for years without ever running out of supplies – all of which I accept as possible. It’s filmed right near where my mother-in-law works which means the actors live somewhere near my in-laws which means I could actually run into the guy who plays Sawyer one day.

Sure, the writers appear to be flying by the seat of their collective pants, but I have faith that the entire series will not end like that episode of Dallas where the writers wiped out an entire dumb season by saying it was another character’s dream….or so I’ve heard. I, of course, did not watch the show because I was young and impressionable and studying.

Lost also has the power to make even the smartest among us look stupid. When I am feeling particularly pleased with my brain power, I remember that I can’t even follow along and figure out what’s happening on a television show. For example, in a flashback last season, Hurley was at home with mom and drinking out of a milk carton. Did I notice Walt’s photo on the milk carton – well, sure, after someone told me and I used the Tivo slow motion feature. The photo jumped right out at me on the second rewind.

Knowing all this, I still was a bit shocked when I stumbled across this article on Lost titled More Literary Clues Soon to Be Discovered on ‘Lost’ – ummm, more? Sure, I got that Hurley found a manuscript this week, but I would not have been able to tell you the title or author if someone’s life (hopefully not mine) depended on it. In case you missed it, the manuscript was for Bad Twin by Gary Troup. According to the publisher, Troup is a real person and died on fake Oceanic Flight 815. Uh-huh. The book actually comes out in May. Also featured on the show were An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce (Locke had that one) and Flann O’Brien’s The Third Policeman. Time to break out the Tivo again…

So, if my book or a book by anyone I know appears on the show, please email me. Clearly, I will miss it.

Wendy knows my fascination – one could even say obsession without being accused of embellishment – with book covers. She pointed out these now-you-see-it/now-you-see-it-again covers:

The hearts. The titles. The overall look. The concept. These are a bit too similar for comfort. A possible coincidence but – yowza – these are close.

Last week, instead of running home to hide at the end of a long mid-week workday, I dragged my lazy butt into D.C. to hear Jennifer Crusie give a talk at the Smithsonian. The list of authors for whom I would ride the metro is very short. I tend to get, shall we say, a bit sick on the metro. Not every metro – just the one here. No idea why.

Crusie gives her version of the evening here. She was what you would expect – funny and charming. I admire and adore her for many reasons, including: her terrific books; her insistence that romance novels receive respect; her dedication to craft; and her continued assistance to all writers and specifically to unpublished writers.

Her honest talk about her struggles with writing solo projects post Bet Me was interesting and inspirational. Her willingness to be vulnerable and tell the darker side of the creative process isn’t something you see everyday.

The bottom line is that she’s cool. For the two of you out there who didn’t plan to buy her new book Don’t Look Down by Bob Mayer, go pre-order it anyway.

The “he” in that sentence being Stephen King. Admittedly, I haven’t read a Stephen King book (except On Writing) since The Stand. According to BookScan, King’s newest Cell debuted at #1 for the week ending January 29, 2006. The rest of the top 15 looks like this:

1 CELL, Stephen King Jan 2006
2 NIGHT (OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB), Elie Wiesel Jan 2006
3 A MILLION LITTLE PIECES, James Frey Sep 2005
4 MARLEY & ME, John Grogan Nov 2005
5 MEMORY IN DEATH, J.D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts) Jan 2006
6 HONEYMOON, James Patterson & Howard Roughan Jan 2006
7 THE BROKER, John Grisham Nov 2005
8 THE WORLD IS FLAT, Thomas L. Friedman May 2005
9 MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA, Arthur Golden Nov 2005
10 THE DA VINCI CODE, Dan Brown Mar 2003
11 NIGHT (OPRAH’S BOOK CLUB), Elie Wiesel Jan 2006
12 RACHAEL RAY 365: NO REPEATS, Rachael Ray Nov 2005
13 THE KITE RUNNER, Khaled Hosseini Apr 2004
14 DOUBLE TAP, Steve Martini Jan 2006
15 ENTOMBED, Linda Fairstein Jan 2006

The Wiesel version in #2 is a $9.00 paperback. The Wiesel in #11 is a $19.95 hardcover. The mass market version comes in at #34 for $5.99. That should cover everyone’s budget. More than likely the audio and large print versions are in there somewhere and I missed them.

Notice Nora coming in at #5. She’s also #21 (Red Lilly) and #46 (Cordina’s Royal Family). I stopped looking for her after that. She’s likely on there a few more times. Trust me.

I missed this book when it came out: Diamonds Take Forever by Jessica Jiji. Jiji works at the United Nations. After a tough day of international politics, she liked to come home and escape into magazines and books. She started writing chick lit because, basically, she thought she could do a bit better than what she was reading:

At first she scoffed, but soon Jiji found herself writing. In the grand tradition of writing what you know, Jiji did just that. Her chick lit book, “Diamonds Take Forever,” follows the basic formula for the genre: heartbreak, the struggle to get over it and the quest for a new man.

However, Jiji’s book has a twist. Between the tales of woe and the encouragement from the ubiquitous gay friend are Arabic phrases and references to arranged marriages within an Arab and Jewish family.

It appears Avon wanted her because of her multicultural voice:

Jiji sent her manuscript to 120 agents and was surprised at the response she got from agents and editors. She eventually signed with Avon Trade, which was looking for more ethnic stories in its line of novels geared at women. This amused Jiji, who is half Iraqi, half American and a practicing Buddhist.

“Exotic for me was the blue-eyed blond girl — the Protestant whose parents didn’t have funny names,” she says.

Lyssa Keusch, Jiji’s editor, said that “Diamonds Take Forever” was a great find to round out the rest of Avon’s catalog, which include novels with Latina, Chinese and Indian themes.

The only gripe I have is that this came out in November and I only found it now by accident (ie, while procrastinating and checking my Amazon ranking). Did Avon market this?