This week we’ve been graced with a visit from the lovely Kathryn Barrett, author of contemporary romance. Kathryn and I met in person at the Love Between The Covers romance conference, and I’m delighted we’ve continued our acquaintance online in the time since.
Here she shares with us answers to three writerly-related questions, and tells us about her newest release.
Name one interesting thing you learned in researching/writing your last book.
For my last book, Redemption, I had to learn about the two careers of my main characters. Claire worked in a department store and Matt was a film actor/director. So I finally put my business degree to good work as I imagined what those board meetings would be like, with talk of same-store sales, marketing campaigns, etc. (and yes, much of it was left on the cutting room floor, so to speak!). I also learned about the film industry and the technical details of filming. It was fun figuring out how this beautiful, fictitious department store in Philadelphia could be utilized as a film location!
What one piece of advice do you wish you’d had when first starting out?
I wish I’d known that knowing grammar and basic writing skills wasn’t enough. I’d written loads of non-fiction: articles, essays, and I totally kicked butt writing papers in college. But when I tried to write fiction, I had to learn a whole new way of writing, and just knowing how to construct a sentence didn’t cut it. Plotting, characterization, scene structure, and so much more goes into writing a novel—but fortunately I found many books on the craft of writing fiction that helped.
What’s your favorite romance novel of all time, and why?
I would have to say Paradise by Judith McNaught. I picked it up in the base exchange when my husband was serving overseas and I had two toddlers at home. I stayed up all night reading it, laughing, crying, and then laughing again. I was so emotionally affected by that book that I was determined I would write a book that would touch someone else the same way.
Kathryn’s Latest release:
Redemption is the story of a relationship that re-blossoms ten years after it ends in disaster—a disaster that was filmed in Technicolor, as it unfolded on a movie set. Now Claire Porter has just started a new job as CFO of a Philadelphia department store chain when she learns that a film company wants to use the flagship store as a location for their new film. She is determined to keep this from happening, and to keep the star of the film, Matt Grayson, out of her—and her son’s—life.
I recently had the privilege of attending the advance screening of Laurie Kahn’s Love Between The Covers documentary (which chronicles the romance community), as well as the day-long What Is Love?: Romance Fiction in the Digital Age conference. Both were sponsored by the Library of Congress and the Popular Romance Project. Both were free. Both were absolutely fantastic.
As a writer working toward publication, nothing feels more encouraging, more energizing, more inspiring, than sitting in a room full of people who are as enthusiastic about romance as I am – if not more so.
The Q&A panel at the screening of the documentary, Love Between the Covers. L to R: Laurie Kahn, William Anderson, Elizabeth Essex, Joanne Lockyer, Beverly Jenkins, Len Barot/Radclyffe, Eloisa James, and Kim Castillo
The documentary was amazing – I learned so much, and just delighted in seeing the community, authors, and books I love so well-represented on the screen. A Q&A with director Laurie Kahn and a number of the film’s featured personalities, including Eloisa James, Beverly Jenkins (who is a HOOT, y’all), Radclyffe, Elizabeth Essex, Joann Lockyer, and Kim Castillo followed the screening. The film was warmly received, and listening to the speakers afterward, fantastic. (Yes, I’m full of adjectives, but really, I cannot describe how immensely enjoyable this all was.) Please consider donating to the film; it needs more money for final production, so that it can be shared with the world.
The day-long conference featured four panels focusing on different questions/issues facing the romance community. Each panel had five to six commentators. The caliber of the conversation, both from the intelligent, erudite, and often hilarious commentators, as well as the insightful questions posed by the audience, was top-notch.
I note here my own limited take-away observations from the four panels. Luckily, each panel was filmed and will be available at the Library of Congress. I, like many others, tweeted salient, informational, or humorous (or all three!) points throughout the day under the hashtag #PopRom. Kiersten Krum storified these tweets (all 1100+ of them!), and you may find them here.
1st Panel Members, L to R: Susan Ostrov Weisser, Eric Selinger, Nicole Peeler, Beverly Jenkins, Radclyffe
There are perhaps three basic romance canons: the historical canon, the academic/literary canon, and the reader’s canon.
Gay/lesbian romance and African-American romance are relative newcomers.
Eloisa James posited “Perhaps there is no canon,” that romance changes very fast and reflects the cultural moment in which it’s written.
The HEA (Happily Ever After) is the defining aspect of romance. Beverly Jenkins said, “If you’re going to kill somebody at the end, get out of our category.”
Women’s sexual empowerment is a key aspect of romance.
Modern depictions of love do NOT reflect thousands-of-years old archetypes, as the understanding of romantic love today is a recent construction, stemming from the end of the 19th century.
Words are not transhistoric, so can we use modern terminology to address the past?
The 12th century marked the beginning of the idea that love makes one stronger, not weaker, and is seen as a pushback against the church, especially since many love stories of the period were written in the vernacular.
People look to assuage anxieties and needs through different kinds of novels; for many, it’s romance.
We have to be aware of how race/class/gender affect sexual expression and culture.
3rd Panel Members, L to R: Sarah Wendell, Candy Lyons, Anne Jamison, Brenda Jackson, Robyn Carr, Kim Castillo
24% of all e-book sales are romance sales; romance readers are voracious readers.
Readers are transforming publishing, and digital publishing has given us this power.
The RWA was the first professional organization to accept indie publishing.
Women’s genres shape more of current culture than any other media.
Three Digital Elements to watch: DIY media, social media, visual/multimedia.
Discoverability – This is becoming harder with the deluge of books; the key is to write more books, write more books, write more books.
You need to know who/where your readers are, and what they want.
New technologies are changing the way stories are told.
I attended this conference with my best friend, fellow writer Annika Keswick, so the nerves I might have had if I had attended solo were gone. But I needn’t have worried; at the documentary screening, we met several other women and struck up immediate conversations, even walking back to the metro with a fellow romance junkie, sharing stories along the way. The next morning at the conference, after choosing seats near the front (I wanted to see and hear well, and gawk at the romance celebrities, people), we met Regency author Elizabeth Johns, whom I learned also utilizes the enormously talented Tessa Shapcott for editing purposes. Ms. Johns also introduced me to Julie Cupp of Formatting Fairies, and offered other helpful advice regarding indie publishing. “A lot of people helped me,” she said as a reason behind her friendly, pay-it-forward attitude, an attitude discussed in the panels later on as a rather unique hallmark of the romance community.
At lunch, my friend Annika and I scoured the cafeteria for an empty table. No luck. We asked to sit with a woman who was on her own, and again, immediately struck up a friendly conversation, discovering much in common and talking as if we’d known each other longer than a few minutes. Turns out we’d found Kathryn Barrett, a contemporary romance author. She, Annika, and I continued discussing the joys and challenges of writing as we briefly visited the painting of Romance and saw the Great Reading Room of the Library of Congress. When we returned to the meeting room for the second half of the day, we discovered she’d been sitting right behind us!
The ever-charming historical romance author Eloisa James and me.
I also managed to work up the courage to ask Eloisa James for a photo with me. She was nothing but gracious, folks, a warm and welcoming lady who spoke so insightfully on many of the topics of the day (not that I was surprised). Spoke to the room, I mean, not to me – I was too star-struck to do more than grin like an idiot.
All in all, it was a spectacular day, chock full of great discussions, useful information, and wonderful people. Thank you so much to the Library of Congress and to the Popular Romance Project for putting on this program and hosting us all. Well done, and thank you to all who helped put on this marvelous production.
Just a mock-up cover: a graphic designer will do the real one, but it was fun to make!
That’s right. According to the Chinese calendar, we may be entering the Year of the Sheep, but I’m declaring it my personal Year of the Book.
What does this mean? It means by gosh, by golly, by gum, I’m going to publishA Man of Character by summer. It means I’m going to edit and revise both A Matter of Time and The Demon Duke to the point where I feel comfortable entering them into contests and, heck, maybe I’ll even publish them, too!
It meansI’m going to read. And read. And read some more. The Goodreads goal is 50 books, the same as last year (I missed it by ONE!), but I’m actually hoping to devour many more – whether romances, research, classics, or something else that catches my fancy.
It means I’m going to write. I’m going to write for Flash Fiction, I’m going to write on Book FOUR. Yes, yes, yes. I’m going to write.
This is the year. This is MY year. In 2015, I. Will. Become. A. Published. Author.
This is huge for an anxiety-ridden scaredy cat like me, people. Others throw themselves into these ventures, ready for every twist and turn, certain they can conquer whatever the publishing industry, readers, reviewers, and/or social media can throw at them. (OK, I hear rumors that there exists at least one author who feels that way.) Not me.
OK, I overcame SOME of that scaredy-cat-itis last year. I started a local critique group. I queried nearly seventy agents. I got three requests for a partial, three requests for the full MS, and one small e-press publication offer (which I turned down after realizing just how badly I want to hold my own book in print). No instant success, but not entirely bad, right? I even finaled in a writing contest.
But still, to actually PUBLISH the book? Brave New World. And one that I’m determined to enter.
I NaNoWriMo’ed my little heart out, people. Not only did I write the entire first rough (very rough) draft of The Demon Duke (69,000+ words), but I also served as unofficial co-ML and ran all sorts of online write-ins, as well as attended a number of in-person events. It was exhilarating! It was awesome! It was exhausting!
At the beginning of November, I promised a friend the fun wouldn’t end come November 30th, that I’d run a DeNoWriMo event for the month of December so that we wouldn’t lose our momentum, that we’d leap right into more writing or begin the editing process, so that these novels would get whipped into shape in lightning speed!
It’s December 5th. I’ve done nothing.
I haven’t opened my novel, much less started editing it. I haven’t run any online write-ins on Facebook, nor have I even thought about what sort of in-person events I could do. I have three books from other people I’ve committed to read and provide feedback on as soon as possible, and I ain’t started that, either.
What gives?
I’m calling it the NaNo hangover; November was so intense that all I want to do now is sit back and play Words With Friends. Or maybe Candy Crush, since there aren’t even words in that game. December is intense, too, of course, only in different ways; now I’m on the hook for carpooling kids to various Christmas performances, baking cookies for fundraising bazaars and Christmas class parties, shopping for and wrapping Christmas gifts, etc., etc, etc. It feels as if the writing/editing SHOULD go on the back burner in the face of all of this holiday hubbub. Eek!
So tell me, what do YOU do to haul yourself out of a writing/editing rut when you fall into one? Because I really need a swift kick to the derriere, an injection of writer-itis, to get back to it.
As a teenager, I swore I was going to write romance novels when I grew up. I didn’t necessarily see myself as a full-time novelist, but I was convinced that at some point in my life, I would pen love stories.
It took me twenty-five years to make good on that promise, even though I occasionally scribbled down ideas about characters and plots. Why?
Fear.
When I did start writing that first book, I stopped after I was about a third of the way in and put it down for over a year. Why?
Fear.
Fear kept me from joining a critique group for some time, even though I’d long known about it. And fear had me quaking in my boots the first time I ever submitted chapters to that group, though everyone was kind and the response was largely positive.
I remember my veins singing with anxiety and my heart pounding the first time I hit the “Send” button and sent a query to an agent. What had me literally shaking?
Fear.
Sense a pattern? Oh, I know I’m not alone. I know fear is an emotion that dogs most of us at some point or other in our lives. I know fear is often a topic of conversation at writer’s conventions or in writing books, or blogs, or what have you. I know I am not unique.
I am, however, frustrated. All of the things mentioned above I did. I did them. In spite of fear. And I’m still alive. So why can’t my brain accept that and let go of this paralyzing anxiety response whenever I am faced with something new?
Last weekend I attended my first ever Virginia Romance Writers meeting, where speaker, writer, and editor Cathy Yardley presented on time management and balance in one’s writing life. One of the topics she addressed? Fear.
I was particularly impressed when she suggested that rather than decrying fear, rather than denying it, or begrudging it, we should look at it for what it is. We should thank it. We should thank our fear, because fear’s basic purpose is that of protection. Fear keeps us from making stupid decisions, whether chasing that wooly mammoth or challenging the MMA fighter who took our parking space. Fear was given to us for a reason.
But thank my fear? Me, who’s always wrestled with far too much of it? I don’t know if I’m there yet. I do know I left that meeting pumped up by both the message and the company; I’d met other romance writers who are seriously pursuing their craft, and I couldn’t wait to solidify my connection with them, to get to know them, to share this journey with them.
Or so I thought. Once home, I felt the confidence start to dissipate. Instead of focusing on all the positives and putting into practice the wisdom I’d received, I started to feel scared. A lot of the women in that room were published authors. Many more had finaled or won contests.
Not me.
When I got an email from fellow VRW members looking to form a critique group, an idea we’d bandied about at lunch, I immediately felt overwhelmed. “I can’t take that on,” my brain screamed. “I’m already leading a critique group here, plus working with several close writing friends, and I’m trying to finish this second novel and start the third, plus I’m querying agents.” Blah blah blah. Within five minutes I’d convinced myself I shouldn’t join the new critique group.
It was only yesterday that I admitted it wasn’t lack of time. It was fear. Fear of not being good enough, fear that maybe these bright women with so much more experience under their belts, with so many more successes, would read my writing and instantly recognize me as a fraud. (My inner Nervous Nelly has a Drama Queen complex.)
Today I wrote to the group and confessed my fear, and said I would still like to be a part.
The good news is, I’m doing stuff anyway. I’m doing it in spite of the fear.
The bad news is, fear still lays me low far too often. Yesterday I received three rejections, including one from an agent who’d liked my query and had requested a manuscript partial. I won’t lie; I got very down on myself. I spent the day feeling miserable, convincing myself landing an agent was never going to happen. I then freaked out thinking about what could happen if an agent did want to represent me (considering I do have a couple fulls out).
See, that’s the funny thing about me. I don’t just fear failure; I fear success.
Am I the only one?
Regardless, I sit here today, proud to say (type) that I’m still doing it anyway. I’m still pushing forward. I’m still writing (7500 words in the last three days alone). I’m still hoping an agent will at some point love my work, and still planning what comes next in case they don’t.
Welcome to Writer Wednesday! 
Redemption is the story of a relationship that re-blossoms ten years after it ends in disaster—a disaster that was filmed in Technicolor, as it unfolded on a movie set. Now Claire Porter has just started a new job as CFO of a Philadelphia department store chain when she learns that a film company wants to use the flagship store as a location for their new film. She is determined to keep this from happening, and to keep the star of the film, Matt Grayson, out of her—and her son’s—life. 
