I sent KISMET’S KISS to a friend who reads fantasy and asked her to check for typos before I plunge into my final formatting for the Kindle platform. This morning she sent me a note: “Just finished! I loved it! I couldn’t wait to find out how it was going to end. And I have to say… the accounts of their lovemaking were very… evocative. I’m very impressed with your descriptive abilities ;)”

Heh heh. This is the beauty of combining fantasy and romance–getting to create an otherworld story with magic and adventure…AND great sex.  :-D

Several NY publishers had a tough time with KISMET’S KISS because it didn’t fit neatly into the marketing boxes for either fantasy or romance. That’s important to them because bookstores need to know where to shelve the book, and usually it will only be shelved in one place. So bookstores need to know where it goes and the publisher’s marketing department needs to know where it will fit so they can tailor the marketing plan.

But online selling is different. Instead of a book needing to fit into one compartment, it can fit into many simultaneously. At Amazon.com, for example, books can be placed in more than one category (fantasy and romance, for example) and readers can also “tag” books with more specific descriptions (such as these for Kristen Painter’s HEART OF FIRE: fantasy adventure, elves, magic, fire magic, golden heart finalist, etc.).

Selling books online will allow me the freedom to write cross-genre and not worry about those marketing boxes, and I’m grateful for that.

Don’t get me wrong, I hope we’ll have local bookstores and libraries far into the future, since they’re some of my favorite places and have given me many wonderful memories. To do that, they’ll only need to adjust to readers’ changing needs. (Espresso Book Machines, for example?)

On the KISMET’S KISS schedule for today: polishing up the front and back matter–the bio, quotes/reviews page, acknowledgments, author’s note, etc. Wheeee!

I’m going Indie and I couldn’t be more thrilled!

KISMET’S KISS will be coming out by the end of this month on the Amazon Kindle ebook platform, so the book will be available for any PC, Mac, smartphone, or iPad, as well as on a Kindle itself. (And psst…the third-generation Kindle will be coming out around the same time!)

2010 has been a bit odd for me. I got an offer from a respected small press to publish KISMET’S KISS and thought things were going to work out, but the publisher and I parted ways and I needed to decide what do with this novel. It didn’t take me long to know.

KISMET’S KISS had three agent offers, two publishing contract offers, two Golden Heart nominations, eight contest finals total, and three wins. And I’ve been eager to try publishing on the Kindle platform. I’ve had a Kindle since early 2008, and it has shifted my perspective on many things.

I am completely excited about going DIY with this book!

I’m not making any decisions about my other novels just yet, but meanwhile readers will be able to actually read my work. (That’s quite a concept, after a decade of waiting, LOL.) And I have the joy of creating the cover art and being responsible for the final look and feel of this book. As the author who has lived with this story and its characters for more than four years AND as a perfectionist, I love that!

Life is good. :)

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(UPDATE: I’ll leave this post up, but because I’ve chosen to take a different path with this book, I’ve redacted the publisher’s name.)

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Yep, that’s right!

KISMET’S KISS will be published this year.

(Holy schnikeys, that’s fast–and lucky!) [Publisher] specializes in fantasy and science fiction.

KISMET’S KISS has been through the war and lived to tell the tale. It got me three agent offers. It’s an eight-time contest finalist (including twice in the prestigious Romance Writers of America Golden Heart®) and a three-time contest winner. And I love it like hot and damn.

Here’s part of the description I used to pique [publisher's] interest last summer:

On a faraway world in the medieval, Middle Easternesque realm of Kad, a deadly epidemic strikes the royal house of Sultan Kuramos. Only a magical healer from an enemy land may have the skill to save them. He doesn’t expect that healer to be a woman.

Varene, too, finds surprises in Kad. The feisty healer anticipates the sultan’s arrogance, but not his courage or his selfless care of the ill–or the possibility that the epidemic is the curse of a vengeful goddess.

Varene’s mystical talents are condemned by Kuramos’s culture and her presence triggers a plot to overthrow the sultan. Yet as he and the healer toil for the cure, he loses his heart to her. She falls for him as well, but how can she relinquish her homeland and her principles for the sultan—especially when he already has six beautiful wives and his family may be cursed?

My head is still spinning about the release date. Only a few months to go before KISMET’S KISS is out. Wow, so much left to do… I’d better get cracking!

Must pass along this hilarious music video geekdom on fonts. (I love Gill Sans!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xHCu28bfxSI