BIG NEW CONTRACT!

Great news! I've just signed a 3-book contract with Montlake Romances! First, they're picking up my new book, FAERIE, a medieval romance that is in the same line as my highly successful medieval, FIRE DANCE.  But they're also acquiring both FIRE DANCE and LOKI'S DAUGHTERS, which I've self-published after having their rights reverted to me. Those two will be re-packaged and released tentatively in August, and FAERIE is tentatively scheduled for September. Tight deadlines!

Montlake is new. And different. They're the new Romance publishing house set up by Amazon, and they're causing a bit of a stir. I've had my eye on them since I first heard about them. And like a lot of Amazon's new endeavors, at first I asked why in the world they'd want to go in that direction. My first big question is, why, at a time when traditional publishing is having such a hard time staying afloat, and ebooks have become so profitable and successful, would anyone consider starting up a new publishing house in the traditional vein?

But it doesn't really take much objective observation to reach the conclusion that the idea is well thought out and backed by lots of data. And some of the things I'm seeing are efficiency, data-driven decision-making, strong promotion, and strong author involvement with excellent backing. When I saw how they mean to do business, I quickly reached the conclusion that this is the way I think publishing should be.

So I'm posting the covers I've been using for these books, which I admit still don't quite satisfy me. I love Montlake's covers so far, so I'm dying to see what they will do. And, as much as I can without violating confidential agreements, I'll share this different path in publishing with you as I go along.

I never have been very good at treading the main path, have I? Well, maybe I could have been richer, but I've done all right. And I couldn't have been happier. I wouldn't have been happy at all, in fact, if I'd had to write the stories that didn't feel right to me. I'm happy reading other authors' stories, and yes, I do love the traditional types of romances. But they aren't the stories I need to be telling.