Lesson 1: Getting Started

Here comes the most important statement of the workshop…

It’s my opinion that if you want to write for a line or publisher, you should read and analyze EVERY book put out by that line or publisher. EVERY BOOK. For at least six months…maybe even a year.

For those of you who write single titles, don’t gasp thinking about companies like Ballentine that publish more than romance. If you want to write single title romance you don’t need to read anything that falls outside the single title romance division. (Like John Grisham.) And, the romance section of these publishers can typically be divided between historical and contemporary. If you want to write contemporary you don’t have to read the historicals and visa versa.

So, my first theory in book analysis is … if you’re targeting Desire, you should be reading every Desire every month. If you’re targeting Avon, go to your romance section and pull out all the Avons that suit your choice of contemporary or historical and read them all.

That’s the first step to good analysis. Get all the data.

The next steps get a little more complicated. But stick with me. LOL. There’s a method to my madness.

On to Lesson 2!

Printable Lesson 1