Sydney Strand's Blog

Hi there _______ (Insert your name here to make it feel like we're sitting together having coffee and a pumpkin scone--you'll have to get your own because I don't share Things That Are Pumpkin):


So, I did it.


I published my fourth story in 10 months. It felt awesome.


When I was writing for a traditional publisher (now Penguin Random), it took three years for my first book to go from handed-in product to on-the-shelf product. (Even then, it never made it to the shelves--it was only on Amazon and BN.com!)


Three. YEARS. Just to be exactly where my indie books are today, and more of them!

So, yeah, the speed of independent publishing is awesome. As is total control over the cover. The title. The blurb. Tiny thorns that add up to a bed of nails after a while.

Now it's time to talk about this particular story. I decided that when I wrote Bad Mom Rents a Man, it would be divided into four parts, pretty much following the Four-Act Structure. (Which Three-Act Structure is, just more anally thought through.)

Act 1 was Bad Mom Rents a Man: Mother's Day. I wanted a Mother's Day story because I love that weekend. And I know all about having to share it, be it with my mom or mom-in-law, because my birthday is also around that time. So I knew I wanted to address that "Argh. At least my birthday isn't Christmas, right?" feeling. I also wanted to set it in a Gilmore Girls' kind of town, much like the town I'm living in now. (Fun fact: Stars Hollow is modeled after Washington Depot, Connecticut!)

Act 2 is my latest story, Bad Mom Rents a Man: Glampfest! It was originally subtitled Labor Day, but my September 1 deadline came and went and I didn't want to date myself or the book. So it turned into a focus on what was happening (glamorous + camping = glamping!). I've always thought glamping looked marvelous, especially after I saw a Real Housewives of Beverly Hills episode where they glamped in cabins. With furs. And champagne.

Well, there are no furs or champagnes in this telling. My Maggie is overseeing a sorority event, and the girls are the fictional Zeta Zeta Betas (ZeeBees). Their glamping adventure is on a beer keg budget. Sorority dues only go so far!

Talking about the ZeeBees...I was so happy that there wasn't a sorority with this killer name. I'm a Pi Beta Phi (go Pi Phi!) and so had fun revisiting my Greek roots.

Here's a teeny taste of Glampfest!, where my main character Maggie, a party planner, forgot the bug spray and she's being attacked left and right, up and down. An old acquaintance--the guy she rented in Book 1--just happens to be in the woods with a ton of mosquito-thwarting stuff. But it's the kind that isn't approved by the FDA:

Maggie eyed the bottle of experimental bug spray. “Is that stuff going to give me a third nipple or anything?”
Nipple. He looked at her shirt but played it off as if he were assessing how much of her needed to be sprayed.
Augustus had been to Africa. He had seen how West Nile and malaria had killed off entire villages. A third nipple hadn’t been reported as a side effect, but it wouldn’t be the worst thing that could happen.
He started to spray. “If you do get a supernumerary nipple, just think of how much you’ll delight in saying ‘I told you so.’”

Bad Mom Rents a Man: Glampfest! (http://tinyurl.com/pbtqjft)

I think that's about it. I'm already working on my next story, His Favorite Distraction. (Yes, another His Favorite story--woo to the hoo!) And remember to sign up for my newsletter if you'd like to know about release dates and/or to see if you're a winner in my I Heart My Readers! Monthly Giveaway. (http://www.sydneystrand.com/p/oh-good...)

Scribble, scribble, scribble...
Sydney

May is the best month of the year. It holds my birthday AND my Mother's Day. Like my newest character, Maggie Weston, I consider holidays as "mine." No one better infringe on them (I'm talking to you, Alex the Ex).

With Mother's Day comes flowers. I tell my husband never, ever buy me roses for Mother's Day (which is when a dozen skyrockets from about $10 to $25) or for my birthday (it's too close to Mother's Day). Instead, I'll take a bookstore gift card. Or, if he is utterly compelled to buy me flowers (since a small part of me still wants them--ahh, I'm such a contrarian!), he can go to Trader Joe's and get a handful of tulips for five bucks. (And then add the extra money to my giftcard.)

As I thought flowers, I also thought bugs. Warmer weather brings such beauty...and such pestilence! In the story-building world, you want to create yin and yang characters. And that's my Maggie and Augustus: she loves all things Mother's Day (beautiful things and children) and he's all things bugs as a college professor and researcher of entomology (harboring an obsession for mosquitoes and an apathy toward children).

I love science nerds (Sheldon Cooper from Big Bang Theory anyone?). And I love all those fun, labor-intensive party ideas on Pinterest (photo booth stations with props anyone?). And I absolutely adore when two complete opposites come together and try to co-exist on the same earthly plane.

Because that, in a nutshell, sums up my Curly and Bugs, aka, Maggie and Augustus.

Bad Mom Rents a Man: Mother's Day is out now on Amazon.

Spending the weekend wrapping a certain book-shaped object for my 10 Goodreads Giveaway Winners. Want a glimpse? http://instagram.com/p/kvet1RQtpk/

Coming along with it? A chocolate from a company with U.S. operations that are based in New Hampshire (Lindt).

Next giveaway planned for June 2014 for another FAVORITE book! Keep in touch here or Twitter or Facebook or my newsletter (www.sydneystrand.com) so you know when it comes out.

All the best of the best,
Sydney

I started this story in Summer 2013, when I brainstormed the idea for a contest Nicola Marsh was holding on her Facebook page. (I needed a kick in the pants. Consider this the foot.) She said that the best ideas would go on to her editor at Harlequin. I submitted three ideas,and two were chosen: His Favorite Regret and my next novel, coming out later this year, His Favorite Scandal.


I've been traditionally published in young adult, so I knew the process to go from idea kernel to an actual book could be two years, sometimes longer. As I worked on His Favorite Regret, I realized this slow timetable no longer appealed to me. I love Harlequin (I grew up reading Harlequins from age 10 on!), but I needed to love myself more.


And so I embraced the idea of independent publishing.


As this book was being edited, I wrote a companion novella, His Favorite Inconvenience, about Cadie’s little sister, Sera. It is set in Vegas, it has a Swedish hunk, and there is a big splash in a Venetian (Hotel) canal.That story was edited and ready for publication in December 2013.


By the way, that third idea Harlequin passed on? I’m putting it up as a serial on Wattpad. It’s called His Favorite Distraction and features Harrison Black, the bleeding venture capitalist from His Favorite Inconvenience, and Jillian Wade, the girl who doesn’t understand nor participates in monogamous relationships. They’re shipwrecked on an island off the coast of Maine and held “hostage” by a very stubborn bull seal. You can read that story starting February14 at http://www.wattpad.com/user/sydneystr... will get a new chapter twice a month, and yes, I’ll be accepting reader feedback regarding where the story should go. Crazy, right?


The best things usually are.

-Sydney

When I decided to be a fiction writer in 2003, I hadn't fully embraced the idea of being a paid career novelist.

Back in 2003, I was just a tired reporter looking to jazz up my Wednesday nights. Being the school nerd I've always been, I signed up for my first fiction writing class at a local community college around the corner from the skyscraper I worked in. On the 22nd floor of this skyscraper, I was a production editor for a group of trade magazines covering the dietary supplement, organic food, and gourmet food industry.

Yaaaaaaaaawn.

So on a lark, I signed up for Romance Writing 101. Literally, that was the name. I didn't necessarily want to write a romance, but I wanted to write fiction.

The romance writing class was an eye-opener in unusual ways. They included:

1) Having only one male in the class, and he came to class with a backpack of at least 30 Harlequin novels each Wednesday night. And each week, he came with 30 new ones. For all 15 weeks.

2) Learning about the Hero's Journey. Connie Flynn, a Phoenix-based romance writer and RWA member, helmed the class and talked about this mythic structure with such passion and reverence, I listened.

3) Finding out I could write articles about cancer and soy and ephedra deaths with my eyes closed. Fiction? I had a lot to learn.

Now fast forward 10 years. I have gone to where a lot of traditionally published romance writers have turned: epublishing. Why?

1) I choose the covers.

2) I choose which genre to write in, whether or not it's "selling."

3) I choose how to start the book (boy, how I fought my editor over the first line in my very first traditionally published book!).

4) And I choose not to let these books stay on a publisher's desk for the next six months, waiting for my "break." I've had my break that others controlled. Now I'm creating my own break.

So in 2013, I created my first two books. The novella came out in December, and the novel (the prequel, really) comes out in January.

And I've never been so happy in my career as I am right at this moment.

Best,
Sydney

The very first romance novel I read was Wuthering Heights.

My second romance novel was The Thorn Birds.

Wow. Those are two very different books on opposite sides of the spectrum, aren't they?

I picked up both books at age 8. Wuthering Heights came from Starline Elementary School in my hometown of Lake Havasu, Arizona. It was a wonderful school, with a wonderful library filled with wonderful librarians (Mrs. Bush! Mrs. Quill!).

When I checked out Wuthering Heights, I didn't realize it was the abridged version, and I was confused by the narrator. Up to that point in my reading career of Beatrix Potter and Little Miss books, first-person narrators were the protagonists in a book. So I didn't quite understand why Heathcliff was going after this "Cathy" chick when the narrator was free for the picking!

The Thorn Birds, on the other hand, came from my parents' stash of books kept in the laundry room cupboards. It resided next to Sidney Sheldon novels, and I instantly understood this story better and immediately fell in love with Maggie and Father Ralph. (In fact, they have a son named Dane, who is my character's name in HIS FAVORITE INCONVENIENCE. A little nod to my romance-book-loving roots.)

I love romances, and these two books started my path down that road. That road wound past Harlequins and Loveswepts and into the titillating territory of Fabio covers (e.g., Johanna Lindsey) and then into the more risque Bertrice Small sagas (think of her as the trailblazer for authors like E.L. James).

Almost 30 years later, I can't envision a life without romance novels. I can't read a book or watch a movie unless I know it will have a romance in it, no matter how small.

And now I can't envision NOT being a writer for this rather fabulous genre.

-Sydney