Here's to the Pink Heart Society 2012

The editors would like to thank you for reading The Pink Heart Society blogzine in 2011. We had a great time putting it together and hope you enjoyed it.

Next year, there will be a slightly new look to The Pink Heart Society. Some of the best authors of series fiction have agreed to write columns for The Pink Heart Society, and even more have agreed to stop by with the occasional post. We've invited authors to share a picture of themselves when they post to make things more friendly.

With so much going on in their blossoming careers and personal lives, Donna Alward and Mira Lynn Kelly have had to opt for less editorial involvement, but after some arm twisting have agreed to stay on as columnists. Mira will write about the struggles of juggling  her various different roles author, mother, wife, chief bottlewasher and a few more besides. Donna will be checking in monthly and giving us her wisdom.

Medical author Scarlet Wilson has agreed to come aboard as an editor and will also write a column entitled the Learning Curve about what it like to be a new Harlequin author. Jenna Bayley-Burke and Michelle Styles are both very glad to have her. Jenna is trying her hand at the Fill the Well Friday column, while Michelle will be sharing what she has learnt about maintaining your weight in The Secrets of Being Fit and Fab.

We have a new feature planned on the weekends -- A Writer's Workspace which is a sneak peak into where various authors create the books we all love. Every month we will be featuring a debut author in our Call Story segment. First up is Kimani author Judy Lynn Hubbard and her story is great. And the very popular Male on Monday will be back.

Unpublished author Abbi Cantrell will be along every month to share her triumphs and trials on her individual road to publication. Fantastic cook and all around foodie, as well as being a multi-award winning author, Kate Hardy has agreed to write about food. Annie West and Anne MacAllister, both travellers par excellence, will be sharing places near and far that inspire them. Kate Walker will continue the very popular Date with Kate column and Heidi Rice will keep on with her film reviews. Fiona Harper has agreed to share her thoughts about writing and if you have ever attended one of her talks, you will know how much she knows about the craft of writing and how pleased the editors are that she agreed to do this. 

We have sneak peeks into upcoming series by some of your favourite authors and behind the scenes looks at various books along with a few giveaways and other treats.

In short, here at The Pink Heart Society we have a banner year planned. We hope you will continue to read and comment on The Pink Heart Society where we celebrate series romance and the series romance author!

Must Watch Friday: Tangled and Once Upon a Time

Beth Cornelison returns with our last Must Watch Friday of the year to chat about some recent fairy tales on the big and small screen!

What makes the must watch list for this romance writer? Happily ever afters of course! Or the pursuit of them...

Tangled is Disney's take on the Rapunzel story, complete with a handsome hero, great music and the sigh-worthy happily ever after. As a writer, I love analyzing the character development, motifs, character goals, motivations and conflicts in Disney films because the Disney writers are so good at crafting these story elements. Tangled didn't disappoint.

The premise of Tangled is pretty simple. The infant princess of a kingdom is kidnapped by a selfish old woman who wants control of the magic healing and youth-inducing powers of the princess' long hair. Rapunzel grows up trapped in a tower. Her only wish is to go to the kingdom on her birthday to see the awe-inspiring display of lights that fills the sky on that night each year. The old woman, whom she believes is her mother, refuses to let her go.

Enter Flynn, the hero, who stumbles across Rapunzel's tower as he is fleeing the kingdom's guards after stealing a valuable crown and then double-crosses the thugs he's working with. Rapunzel manages to tie up the intruder in her tower and strikes a deal with him. She'll release him if he promises to take her to see the magical lights. And off they go on an adventurous journey together with the old woman, bad guy thugs and the king's guards all in pursuit.

A thieving and conniving bad boy hero falls in love, learns to view the world differently and not be selfish, and ultimately makes a grand sacrifice for the heroine's sake. The heroine transforms from a naive, sheltered girl to a savvy young woman— a true coming of age story as Rapunzel learns who she is and finds her place in the world.

I was saddened to learn that Tangled is the last animated fairy tale Disney plans to make. I grew up watching Cinderella, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast were put on my keeper shelf as an adult. I believe Disney's adaptations of classic fairy tales are a big part of why I became a romance writer. For me, Tangled is a sweet, clever story with plenty of magic moments to make it Must See material.

The second Must See show I recommend is Once Upon A Time, ABC television's new Sunday night offering. In this modern twist on all the old classic tales, the evil queen has cast a dark spell on the magic kingdom where all the characters of fairy tales lived long ago. Snow White, Prince Charming, Jiminy Cricket, Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, and the evil queen herself are all living in Storybrook, Maine, in current day.

None of the characters, save the evil queen and her adopted son, know who they really are or why they are in modern times. The only person who can break the spell and help the character's find their HEAs is Snow White's and Prince Charming's daughter, Emma. Emma, now an adult, grew up in modern times without her real parents, not knowing who she was. She was summoned to Storybrook by the little boy to break the spell and give all the character's their happy endings. Emma stays in the little town but isn't convinced of her role in changing fate. And of course the evil queen, a.k.a. the witchy mayor of Storybrook, is always thwarting any progress toward breaking the spell. The dastardly Rumpelstiltskin is around, as well, to lure unwitting innocents into deals with the devil. Each week we get another little peek into the past lives of the fairy tale characters and see the ripple effects in modern times as Emma and mayor's adopted son work toward breaking the dark spell... in pursuit of the lost happily ever afters!

Once Upon A Time is a surprisingly good saga with adventure, star-crossed lovers, and magic. Check it out! If you haven't been watching, you'll want to catch up on episodes online, then tune in for the next new episode on January 8th.

Wishing you all happy endings,

Beth Cornelison

Rita Award finalist Beth Cornelison made her first sale to Silhouette Intimate Moments in June 2004 and has gone on to publish many more books with Harlequin/Silhouette as well as other publishers. Cornelison has presented writing workshops across the United States, and she currently lives in Louisiana with her husband and son. For more information about all of Beth’s books visit www.bethcornelison.com. Check out her latest release, Trust in Me.

Kevin Fuller believes he must rescue damsels in distress, and Claire is decidedly out of her element in small town South Carolina. When trouble inevitably finds Claire, Kevin's white knight protection and heroics are exactly what Claire doesn’t want. But his kisses...that's another matter. Available as Kindle, Nook and other ebook formats

Pink Heart Picks: Hotly Bedded, Conveniently Wedded

For the final Pink Heart Picks book review, PHS editor Donna Alward curled up with a glass of wine and Kate Hardy's Hotly Bedded, Conveniently Wedded
...

One of the great things about Christmas break is more reading time, and on Boxing Day I settled in with a glass of pinot noir and one of Kate's backlist - Hotly Bedded, Conveniently Wedded. It was ten o'clock, I figured I'd get a start on it and and finish it on the 27th.

Instead I turned the last page at just a hair past midnight, only breaking to refill my glass.

Alex and Bel are some of the most likeable characters I've ever had the pleasure to "meet".  It's very hard to make a marriage of convenience plausible in this day and age and so Kate bolstered the initial reason with family involvement - both families were very behind the marriage and with Alex's mom being ill, neither of them wanted to disappoint everyone by confessing it wasn't "real".

Alex's reasons for not wanting to fall in love aren't perhaps the strongest - but the reader doesn't care so much because it's so obvious that despite his assurances, Alex is ready to settle down and start a family. He's a workaholic who's getting clucky and it's pretty adorable - and he's also pretty good to Bel, too. He treats her so well - they don't just say they are best friends but they ACT like best friends. They share interests, and their professions were different enough that it gave the book a very fresh feel and made it interesting.

Bel's reasons for being afraid are much stronger and I really felt for her...at first it's easy to believe that she's focused on her work because she's dedicated but as the layers are peeled back we see how wrecked she is every time she sees babies and happy families. When Alex promises to try to give her everything she dreams of, that was it. I think *I* wanted to marry him. And when he ends up starting his new job and working late and travelling, I really felt Bel's loneliness, because at this point she knows she loves him and is fairly sure he'll never be in love with her the same way.

Without giving more spoilers, I will say that the black moment had me in tears but Alex showed what a good man he was and the ending was lovely.

If you're looking for a sexy, feel-good, emotional read that's like a breath of fresh air - snag this one for your e-reader (or find a rare print copy online).

This is the first time I'm not announcing a new pick for the next month. Thanks for hanging out with me the last few years as I read and reviewed some fanastic category romances.

In 2012 my role here at the PHS is changing - after several years as editor I'm stepping into a columnist role - and a brand new monthly column called ON WRITE SUPPORT: DONNA'S MONTHLY CHECKUP. Each month I'll be popping in and sharing what's going well, what's not, what I'm working on....it should be fun! And maybe along the way I'll find ways of refining my process...

In the meantime, Happy New Year to you all, and see you in January!

You can catch up with Donna at her website: http://www.donnaalward.com/

Call Story :: Tina Beckett

The Pink Heart Society is happy to welcome three-time Golden Heart finalist and new Mills & Boon Medicals author, Tina Beckett.

If you’d asked me a year ago what the craziest thing I’d ever done in life was, I’d have said taking barrel racing lessons in a foreign language. Dashing around a trio of fifty-five gallon drums at breakneck speed—on the back of a horse, no less—seems pretty adventurous, right? Yep, I thought so too. Until May 19, 2011, when I received a telephone call that would change my life.

We want to buy your book.

I think I may have screamed. Or cried. Everything about that moment is a bit foggy. You see, I’d hit the send button on my computer just one day earlier, emailing my manuscript to the lovely editor who’d requested it.

Oops, did I say manuscript? Make that revised manuscript...times two.

That’s right. My call story didn’t happen overnight, although things moved pretty fast there at the end. Kind of like my barrel racing days. During those lessons, my instructor taught me in stages. First I took those barrels at a walk that seemed to take forever. Then I graduated to a trot. Next came an unhurried canter. And then the day I’d both longed for and feared arrived: pulling together everything I’d learned and taking those barrels at an all-out gallop. It was awesome. Fantastic. There’s no feeling quite like it in the world. But without those early baby steps, I’d have careened off my horse before I finished that first turn.

My call story is a lot like barrel racing. Each step took time. A long time. Six years, in fact—much longer than it took me to reach that final gallop. And with every step, I longed to race like the wind, to join the ranks of other authors I’d admired through the years. But I wasn’t ready.

My final lap took less than a year from start to finish. Here’s an abbreviated version:

·         July 2010--Mills & Boon announces they’re looking for new Medical Romance authors and offers a Fast Track opportunity: send them a chapter, partial, or full manuscript and you’d receive a response by the end of August. I decided to be conservative and sent a single chapter.

·         August 2010—The editors ask for a partial (which means the first three chapters). I sent those in September.

·         November 2010—my future editor, Lucy Gilmour, emailed me, saying she loved the partial and could I send her the full. Oops. The book was only halfway done, and I was in the middle of moving from the United States to Brazil that very month. I wrote like crazy while shoving all my worldly belongings into boxes, kept writing as I flew across the Atlantic Ocean, and was still writing while boxes lined the walls of my new living room.

·         January 2011—Lucy nudged me. Had I received her request for the full manuscript? Yikes. Luckily I’d finished the book by that time and was giving it a final polish. I sent it to her at the end of the month.

·         March 2011—An email from Lucy arrived. In the subject line were three small words: Matt and Stevie. The names of my hero and heroine. My eyes watered, and I stared at those two names for several minutes before opening the email. It was a revision letter. Suddenly this felt very real. And very scary. I asked for a month to complete the changes. I sent the revised manuscript to her on April 13^th.

·         May 6, 2011—A second revision letter arrived. These felt less like major changes and more like tightening and refining. I asked for two to three weeks to make the changes. Lucy asked if I could get them back to her any sooner. One of my critique partners immediately emailed me and said, “This is the one!”

·         I finally get to gallop—I turned those revisions in on May 18^th. Lucy called me the next day to offer me a two book contract. I’d made it! Those two books, Doctor's Guide to Dating in the Jungleand Doctor’s Mile-High Fling, both come out in 2012, and I couldn’t be happier.

All that endless walking, trotting and cantering finally paid off. And as exciting as it is to reach this stage, I know it doesn’t end here. Not by a long shot. Because just like barrel racing, I need to keep growing and honing my skills, hopefully making each book a little better than the previous one. I’ll be forever grateful to Harlequin, Mills & Boon for giving me the opportunity to write for them. I also have to give a big shout out to my barrel racing instructor. His insistence on perfecting each stage (before allowing me to move on to the next one) taught me skills that go far beyond the realm of horses and barrel racing. I’ve learned that a solid foundation is crucial, whether it’s in horsemanship, writing...or life.

For more on Tina, be sure to check out her website and her latest release, Doctor's Guide to Dating in the Jungle.

Deadline Recipes: Formulaic, Cookie-Cutter Books?

Laura Vivanco joins the Pink Heart Society to talk about a favorite romance "sweet", it's packaging and production...

Since I’ve been given the slot usually occupied by the Deadline Recipe, I thought I’d talk about biscuits/cookies.

One of the common misperceptions of romances, and particularly category romances, is that they’re written to a very specific formula, churned out as though onto an assembly-line, shaped by cookie-cutter guidelines and packaged as a cheap, escapist product. As a reader of category romances, I knew that wasn’t true: I could tell the difference between the various Harlequin Mills & Boon lines and I also had favourite authors whose writing styles and characters particularly appealed to me. As an academic, I set out to demonstrate precisely why it wasn’t true, and the result is For Love and Money: The Literary Art of the Harlequin Mills & Boon Romance (Tirril, Penrith: Humanities Ebooks, 2011).

The literary theorist Northrop Frye managed to divide all of literature into just five different literary “modes.” It’s proof of category romances’ diversity that they exist in four out of five of them. They range from the dark-chocolate fantasy romances of the LUNA and Nocturne lines, through the sugar-rush inducing lifestyles of many of the heroes and heroines of the Presents/Modern/Sexy line, to the everyday oat-based settings of many of the Superromances and on to others which have the ironic citrus-peel tang of chick-lit. Some may be “escapist” but many Harlequin Mills & Boon romances have dealt with very serious issues, sometimes even very directly, like Sally Wentworth’s Broken Destiny (1990) whose heroine is diagnosed with breast cancer: its sales helped raise funds for the Imperial Cancer Research Fund. Marion Lennox’s The Doctor's Rescue Mission (2005) depicts a remote island community hit by an earthquake and a tsunami: the back cover of my copy has been hastily altered by the addition of a sticker reading “On behalf of the publisher and the author of this book (written prior to recent events) a donation has been made in support of the Tsunami relief operation in Asia.”

Of course all category romances focus on a love story which ends well and it’s also true that category romances often return again and again to story-types derived from myths, legends, fairy tales and chivalric romances. They may also allude to a wide range of literary texts and works of popular culture. The range of basic ingredients from which authors choose can therefore vary widely, and even novels which have basically the same flavour can demonstrate significant amounts of variation. The IT consultant heroine of Fiona Harper’s Invitation to the Boss's Ball (2009), for example, may be a Cinderella-type heroine, but she’s very different from put-upon Bertha in Betty Neels’s A Christmas Proposal (1996), and neither actively pursues her hero like the heroine of Constance M. Evans’s Second-Hand Cinderella (1937). These are not authors who slavishly drag out an overworked heroine, a wicked stepmother, two ugly stepsisters, a fairy godmother, a prince and a special pair of shoes. Rather, they carefully select and rework particular motifs and themes from the fairy tale. The end results may all be Cinderella romances, but they’re not made to exactly the same recipe.

Dr Laura Vivanco usually blogs about romance at Teach Me Tonight. Her For Love and Money: The Literary Art of the Harlequin Mills & Boon Romance is available from the publisher as a pdf. A Kindle edition is available at Amazon .at .com .de .es .fr .it and .uk . HEB has teamed up with Lulu so that paper copies can be printed on demand.

The biscuit-making images are the property of Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums, who have made them available via Wikimedia Commons. The first shows “One of the workers topping up the mixture for the production of Wright's Biscuits” and the second is of workers on one of the production lines at the same factory.