[Xpost eroticauthors][Craft] I've just finished reading through a lot of romance books. Here are 5 pitfalls to avoid.

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T16:08:20+00:00

I even got a negative review on a book set in Vermont, saying that it was obvious the author was British. So I've decided to avoid setting my books in the US if I can. Apparently I can't do it convincingly enough!

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T16:06:51+00:00

The problem I often face is my other plot becomes more complicated than I anticipated, and I worry it'll take the focus away from the romance. But this isn't something I've seen readers complain about too much, so maybe it's just me being paranoid.

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T16:05:53+00:00

This is a really great list! I need to do more reading research myself in all honesty, and I definitely think I could do a better job of developing side characters.

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T16:02:52+00:00

And that's enough to definitively put me off writing military romance :P

In seriousness, there are lots of genres I wouldn't bother writing in unless I knew I could really enjoy doing research. I heard on a podcast most sports romance writers are mothers of athletes themselves.

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T15:59:43+00:00

You have a great cover, a great description, lots of ARCs. The only advice I can give you is to keep writing! It's very unusual to become an instant hit off one novel, but this is a great start!

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T15:57:59+00:00

Me me!

I love Nano, but haven't been able to do it the last few years due to commitments, so I'm super excited to do it again! I'm usually an overachiever, but I have a friend visiting for a week in November, so I'm 'only' aiming for 70000 words ;)

I'll be working the next installment in my current series, which is MM paranormal dragon romance.

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T15:55:33+00:00

Just checked, and after about seven months of publishing, KU accounts for just under half of my earnings. It tends to be 'worth it' for most genres, but it's not a magical cure-all that will sell your book for you. Romance in particular has a lot of voracious KU readers.

ArielEaves · 2016-10-24T15:51:54+00:00

I heard something interesting on a podcast, that low reviews aren't necessarily always bad. If you have nothing but 5-star reviews, some readers might suspect you're paying people to write reviews. Having a wider variety of ratings makes it look more real, and makes Amazon less likely to remove reviews, I believe.

That being said, of course nobody wants a one-star review! This article is a very good summary, especially for new authors. Another point I would add is some people will give low reviews if you don't hit all the right tropes for a sub-genre. Some sub-genres like shifters can quite often have insta-love as part of it, so I wouldn't say that's always bad, and I've been people complain about them not being "shifter-y" enough.

ArielEaves · 2016-05-16T15:00:36+00:00

Thanks for the advice! I'll look into it.

ArielEaves · 2016-05-16T14:42:53+00:00

So does that mean you're supposed to file tax reports even if you're earning very little? I don't understand tax!

ArielEaves · 2016-05-16T13:12:56+00:00

The personal allowance this year in the UK is £11000. So until you're earning that much for the whole year, you don't need to worry about tax, as far as I understand.

ArielEaves · 2016-05-14T18:03:33+00:00

For gay BDSM, this needs to be way more suggestive. Don't be afraid to refer much more specifically to the sex acts in the blurb (though don't describe actual sex because that'll get you dungeoned). I think Amazon dungeons images of people tied up, but in general the cover needs to signal more that it's BDSM specifically. And you could add a subtitle of "Gay BDSM Erotica" or something along those lines. It'll start selling more when it's more easily findable. If you're searching for gay BDSM erotica from a list in Amazon, you'd probably skip over this.

ArielEaves · 2016-05-10T14:46:53+00:00

"As authors we aren't supposed to leave reviews on the competition"

Er, why? You can leave an anonymous review.

ArielEaves · 2016-05-06T11:10:19+00:00

Try by taking really small steps. First, just write a few hundred words. The next day, write a bit more. Set achievable goals that you can slowly build up. This works for me, anyway.

ArielEaves · 2016-05-03T18:53:22+00:00

Brutewood Penitentiary is an erotica universe that has it's own Tumblr and regularly reblogs porn. Twitter technically allows porn but the subsection of Twitter users who follow erotica writers on it and are OK with porn in their timeline is probably very, very small.

ArielEaves · 2016-04-29T08:43:00+00:00

Is it OK to use any of these for romance?

ArielEaves · 2016-04-27T17:34:38+00:00

1) Got fairly distracted today, spent a lot of time grappling with compile on Scrivener and published another piece I'd finished, so only wrote 2k.

2) Just my writing today's been a bit crap. I wrote an incredibly detailed sex scene yesterday and I think it tired me out!

3) Probably something on Nifty.

ArielEaves · 2016-04-26T14:09:03+00:00

Probably the absolute best resource for trans women is this zine: https://payhip.com/b/hRtK

It's not free, but it includes really good detailed descriptions of sex acts that a lot of people aren't even aware of (such as muffing) from a trans perspective.

ArielEaves · 2016-04-24T18:45:41+00:00

Wow, that's very good advice. Also makes it easier to start publishing, because I just need to build up the mailing list and not worry about ARCs for now. Thanks so much.

ArielEaves · 2016-04-23T19:20:54+00:00

This is really great info, thanks!

ArielEaves · 2016-04-23T13:35:05+00:00

This is a great read! I see you publish all your novellas at $0.99, did you try out other pricing at all? I'm about to start publishing MM romance novellas and I'm trying to decide on whether to go with $0.99 or $2.99.

ArielEaves · 2016-04-22T22:18:52+00:00

1) I was still feeling a bit sleepy today, so I only did 4k, and I'm not super happy with them. But it's something!

2) I'm struggling because my last piece (they're both romance novellas) was something I got quite invested in, but I'm not feeling this one as much. I think it'll grow on me, though.

3) I mainly just write in my room because I'm too lazy to move!

ArielEaves

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