In 1998, I’d been writing eight years, and my writing buddy Maddie James had just sold to Kensington’s
new line Precious Gems. These little paperback romances were only sold at
Walmart, but hey, it was a start. Maddie told me to shorten my 85,000-word
romantic suspense to 50,000 words and submit it. I did. I became a published
author!
Kensington titled my book Reunited and sold it for $1.96. I was a happy camper.
After my rights were reverted, I sold the little paperback
to a company called Five Star. The $1.96 book became a $25 hardback book sold
to libraries.
To sell the book to Kensington, I had cut out 35,000 words
and the suspense element. When my rights came back from Five Star, I put the
words and suspense back into the manuscript. I changed the names of the major
characters. By this time, eBooks were making an appearance. I sold the restored
book that I now called Kentucky Flame to a
small eBook publisher in 2009.
In 2018, I reclaimed my rights for all of my Bluegrass Reunion Series
books. Slowly, I self-published them. With each book, I polished them and
updated them. I sent them to the editor, and each book made several passes
through her sharp eye and pen. I rebranded the books with new covers.
The moral of the story is books you love don’t have to go
away and die. Breathe new life into them. Kentucky Flame was the first
book I ever wrote, the first book I sold, and truly the book of my heart.
You can grab an eBook copy of Kentucky Flame until June
16 for 99 cents! Here is a link to
all the eBook retail sites where you can buy it.
YOU ARE CORDIALLY INVITED
Our June Wedding promotion, is open. Watch our Wedding video, You Are Cordially Invited. You find it on our Movie Theater page: https://romancegems.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_14.html and also on YouTube: https://youtu.be/Afw8-IuApeI .
To see the gorgeous prizes and to enter our June Rafflecopter, visit our Monthly Giveaway Page: https://romancegems.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_28.html .
Or you can click this short link if you wish: http://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/21df08a224/.
I've read a few of these. Will have to make sure to get the rest!! Excellent story of how these books have survived over the years.
ReplyDeleteI love breathing new life into an earlier book! I'll never get tired of reading romances!
ReplyDeleteYou just proved a good romance is timeless.
ReplyDeleteBooks can never die! What a lovely post! Thank you for sharing and your series sounds great!
ReplyDeleteI'm reading this one right now! It's lovely.
ReplyDeleteI remember reading the original version, Jan. Love the way you've rebranded it. Have the new version on my TBR mountain. Good luck with it.
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