Finding That Elusive Thing Called "Voice"
Thank you for having me here today on Magical Musings! I’m so excited to celebrate the release of my debut ancient historical romance, FORBIDDEN, set in AD 50 during the Roman invasion of Britannia.
I’d like to chat a little today about how long it took me to find my “voice”, that elusive thing agents and editors search for in their slush piles. Truth is, I never quite knew what they meant – I was positive I’d found my voice years ago!
Hmm. Maybe not!
Ten years ago I submitted a story to Mills and Boon in London. The heroine was suffering from amnesia – but there was a mystery as to whether she was, in fact, a fallen angel. Exactly the type of plot HM&B published!
After a polite rejection, I submitted my second story. This heroine possessed spiritualist gifts and while I got excellent feedback on the writing, again the story was rejected.
Undeterred, I scrubbed all paranormal elements from my imagination and tried again. And again. Because I was convinced my voice fit category romance and I was determined to be published by M&B.
Eventually it occurred to me I should try other publishers and so I lengthened my stories and unleashed my secondary characters, who’d always wanted more page space in which to misbehave.
I loved the longer word count and flexibility for more interaction with my other characters. Yes! At last I’d found my voice. But even as the “encouraging” rejections rolled in, somewhere in the back of my mind was a dark discontent. I couldn’t quite place it, just knew in a vague unformed way that I wanted my heroes to be somehow more.
Not more sexy. They were hot and I lusted after them. It took a while to realize what I wanted for them was an impossible love, a seemingly insurmountable conflict dividing hero and heroine in a life-and-death dilemma.
And so I tried writing a single title paranormal romance. Suddenly I discovered I could write a tough alpha male without wanting to kick his ass – something that had eluded me up until then! Yes! Finally I had found my voice! I loved writing those heroes. But still I couldn’t sell them.
Then came the turning point in my writing. Urged on by my supportive CPs, I wrote my very first erotic romance. It was very short – I found it very exhausting to write! It was also a paranormal and much darker than anything I’d attempted before. But wow, did I love writing it. And it sold to a small e-pub.
Hugely encouraged by this, I decided to write my very first historical romance. Just to make it more interesting I wrote it as an erotic romance with paranormal elements threaded throughout. But what really thrilled me was my warrior hero. Here, at last, I could explore all the elements I’d always wanted to – but had never been able to pull together in my contemporaries.
Maximus is a tough alpha, used to giving orders and not having his word questioned. The Roman Empire ruled half the world and his heroine is a spoil of war. She is also a druid – and Maximus’s emperor had decreed all druids should die.
I had my impossible love, a seemingly insurmountable conflict and a life-and-death dilemma. And this is the book that hooked my agent’s interest and sold to Berkley Heat.
It took a long time before everything came together, but when it eventually did those ten long years of struggle were worth every second!
This article was first published online at Magical Musings
