Marketing News — March Recap

I’ve been remiss in keeping you all up-to-date on my lunches and meetings with editors and I apologize. I feel like I’m spinning my wheels over here lately. It’s conference season, which pretty much guarantees at least two missed office days a month. Add in lunches, client meetings, etc., and I wonder when I’m ever at my desk (and I imagine some of my clients do too).

So, since I’m so far behind I’m going to do a bit of a recap on what I learned in March and then I’m going to try to keep you updated more regularly. I don’t think you need to hear about every meeting, since not every meeting is worth reporting on, but here are some highlights.

When talking with an editor at Kensington I learned more details about what is working in their erotic Aphrodisia line. When it comes to erotica and erotic romance they are seeing the greatest success with paranormal and historical stories. Futuristic and fantasy is also starting to move ahead, while SF is not. Interestingly enough, contemporary seems to be working, but it’s on an author-by-author basis. In other words, they haven’t really pinpointed specifics, but it does seem to depend on the appeal of certain authors. Sadly, multicultural isn’t working as well for them as they would have hoped. They also find that fetish or fantasy books seem to work. In other words, you cowboy lovers are gravitating toward erotic cowboy collections, and the same holds true for firefighters, etc.

As all of you mystery writers probably know by now, NAL is planning to launch a new mystery imprint, Obsidian. They are looking for all types of commercial thrillers, cozies, and more traditional mysteries. Keep in mind, they have always published mysteries, so they are not building a list from scratch; they are, however, going to use this new line to highlight their mysteries in a different way.

One romance editor at St. Martin’s Press is actively looking for romantic suspense and paranormal romance. Interestingly enough, this desire to add more romantic suspense to a list seems to be universal (me too, me too). The key, I think, is to make sure your hook is there and your suspense is strong, and a little scary. Think Allison Brennan, one of the newest stars in this genre. If she’s the hottest new thing then that’s what everyone else is looking for. Okay, back to St. Martin’s . . . they have a lot of werewolves and vampires and this editor would rather see something fresh. She’s not a fan of futuristic or fantasy titles, but likes beasts and creatures and especially demons. She wants a new twist on vampires and werewolves. She would also like to see (like everyone else) heartwarming women’s fiction that could cross over into romance. Think Debbie Macomber.

Lunch with an editor at HQN was actually very enlightening for me. I had no idea that they were only looking for contemporary romance. No paranormal, no historical. Of course, they have exceptions on their list, which is why I had assumed they were also open to more. See, even I can learn something shockingly new from these lunches.

So, this is today’s wish list from editors. Trust me when I say it will all change tomorrow. I promise to keep marketing news coming at a faster clip.

—Jessica