So, I sold my first romance novel! To Evernight Publishing, which publishes primarily e-books; if mine someday sell enough, they might get a print run, too. We’ve not fixed on a release date, but it might be as soon as May. While many of Evernight’s offerings are erotic and mine’s only “heat level 2,” I’d heard good things about their editing and their cover designs, and they “adored” my story. Win-win.

I’ll be revising these web-pages over the next few weeks, getting ready, so stay tuned. I’m also starting an Author page on Facebook, so you could “like” that instead and keep up-to-date that way. Below is the rough draft of the back-cover copy. Let the great publishing experiment begin!

What’s the harm in a little white lie?
Especially when it could carry so much good: a new life for a wounded soldier, catharsis after long years of war—and an opportunity for lady composer Olivia Delancey to finally hear her music played in public.

Depends on whom you tell it to.
Newspaper publisher Will Marsh refuses to compound the sins of his father’s generation by taking money to print propaganda. But with the end of the wars in France and America, he needs something new to drive Londoners to grab his paper first. Why not publish the score of the “Tune That Took Waterloo,” by a wounded vet, no less?

As Olivia struggles to keep her secrets from this unsuitably alluring publisher, and Will fights to find the truth without losing his hold on this bright-eyed angel who has descended into his life, both discover another sort of truth.

Being the talk of London can be bad—or very, very good.

PROTECT IP / SOPA Breaks The Internet from Fight for the Future on Vimeo.

I was inspired by talks by Kristan Higgins (“What are you prepared to do?”), Cathy Maxwell (“You’ve got talent!”), and especially Sherrilyn Kenyon — whose story I am still chewing over. As she said, I had no idea of her or her life, and how much can I know of anybody else’s, either?

I got good reactions during my pitch-to-agent sessions, and another reminder that I need to Always Be Marketing. That includes using a real photo, not my beloved anime mug, as my avatar. But the camera is traditionally indifferent or hostile to me, really, just no love at all. It’s so bad that sometimes at relatives’ houses I secretly steal their worst pictures of me and trash them (sorry, grandma). Just thinking of getting photos taken makes my smile turn grimacy and my face break out.

BUT marvelous planners that they are, the retreat organizers had invited a photographer who has a magic about her that set me so at ease. After another member raved about her photo session, I went and signed up for the very next session so I couldn’t back out and had no time to worry about it. And we did it — and found 4-5 images that look pretty good! She’s tweaking them, so I won’t get them for a few weeks, but that’s one giant to-do item checked off the list. All because I went to retreat. Thank you Barbara Woodard, photographic designer.

Story-wise, I seem to be building another set-of-three structure, with three pairs of protagonists-antagonists and interlocking stories. Maybe it’s too much Dickens in my diet, but I seem to want to explore many angles of a subject, be it second-chance love, duty vs. family, or whatever. Unfortunately, this is what got last year’s story rejected — too many subplots and not enough focus on the main romantic couple (one editor suggested I cut every subplot out). Am I treading down that same (reject, reject) path again? What could I do differently?

Career-wise, I am very tempted by the idea of e-publishing/self-publishing. Advantages: quicker potential payday; I can “be an author” now; I have more control over my content. Disadvantages: I’d need to spend money on my own editor, cover designer, and text-coder; I’d need to spend time now on marketing; I worry that if the story isn’t “good enough” to find a publisher, what makes me think it’s good enough to publish any other way?

One twist: I could write the interlocking stories as standalone novellas, and sell those as e-versions, and then gauge the interest in my weaving them together into a longer tale. The more successful current e-pub authors have a lot of content to sell, while my books are long and intricate and take a year or more to finish so I have not so much to sell. And if a 30k-word novella and a 120k novel both sell at 99 cents, what is the advantage to making it a novel? The pool of e-authors is relatively small now, but surely will explode; maybe now is the time to take advantage of a smaller market?

Or is this all jumping the gun? Maybe I should just keep writing the novels, and when I have five or six good ones, and when I have exhausted the query-submit-agent-publisher route, then turn to e-pub. But I want to be an author now. But I want to be a good author more. And while I want to make money from my writing, I can wait another few years to do it: If our current economy holds steady, I won’t need to get a more-immediately-lucrative second job until the end of 2012.

All this mental buzz (plus my bad reaction to the tree pollen) has cut into my writing time this week. That won’t get me anywhere. Weekend of writing coming up (with a break for the DC science writers’ workshop). And — great timing — the next weekend is the Washington Romance Writers annual retreat; maybe my fellow scribes have found some answers.

Plus, this one has tracks for readers as well as writers, booksellers, and librarians. For readers, there are lots of chances to see many favorite authors and meet new ones. For me as a writer, this is a great chance to hear what die-hard readers like and dislike and what they’d like to read more of — here’s hoping it’s long historical fiction with romantic elements!

I’ll ride the reader track for a day or two, but I’m also looking forward to two business panels, one of editors and one of agents, on what kinds of stories they’re looking for right now. There are a lot of seminars on how e-books are changing how we sell our stories, too. Plus the Mr. Romance contest!

You can follow the goings-on via Twitter, hashtag #RT11.

Manchester, 1819 — After a broken engagement and rushed marriage, Madeline Wetherby struggles to adapt to her new role as a merchant’s wife and to a new style of town, changing rapidly as machines displace skilled workers. As whispers of rebellion grow, a mill is set on fire, and Manchester starts to roil in the summer heat, she discovers her birth father is one of the weavers her husband is putting out of work—and a radical leader. Now she must decide whether the family she longs for can be made of the man of her heart or the people of her blood.

I see this as the sort of book chatty book clubs would enjoy. It’s not a “straight romance,” but it has more romance than a “straight historical.” It’s a cross-over, mashup, reading delight!

Here’s about half of the floor. Sales totaled more than $60,000, all for charity.

OMG – How can my little stories compete?

Next day starts the marathon of workshops, mixers, luncheon speakers and happy mayhem culminating in an awards ceremony for published and unpublished authors at the top of their game. Don’t know if my feet can hold out for that one (there’s often dancing after–and during); a sorry attempt at wearing fancy shoes has left me with double back-of-the-heel blisters. But there’s nothing wrong with my hands, and I’ll be taking notes and taking names for the next four days.