Inspie writer

[julesjones]

Snagged from the Smart Bitches, in a post that may or may not disappear in the near future, because it relays material posted in a non-public area of the RWA site:


Best Inspirational Romance -

Old Definition: Romantic novels in which one or more characters’ religious or spiritual beliefs (in the context of any religion or spiritual belief system) are a major part of their developing relationship, not merely a minor element or subplot. All inspirational books, set in any place or era, shall be eligible for this category. The word count for these novels is a minimum of 40,000 words.

Judging guidelines: In this category, one or more characters’ religious or spiritual beliefs (in the context of any religion or spiritual belief system) are blended with and form a significant and substantial part of the love story, and the end of the book is emotionally satisfying.

Recommended Changes: “romantic novels in which one or more characters’ religious or spiritual beliefs (in the context of any religion or spiritual belief system) are a major part of their the developing relationship between the hero/heroine. These books may be set in any time period or setting. The level of sexuality is usually non-explicit but may range from sweet to extremely hot.”

(To Which Sarah Said Out Loud: AWWWW YEAH BABY INSPIE HOT SEXX0RING! WOOT!)

Judging Guideline Recommendation: “In this category, one or more characters’ religious or spiritual beliefs (in the context of any religion or spiritual belief system) are integral to the hero/heroine relationship. The end of the book is emotionally satisfying. These novels may or may not contain a high level of sexuality.”



And my interest in this?

Going by those rules, the third volume of The Syndicate is an inspirational romance. Yes, predatrix and I have written an erotic m/m inspirational romance.

Comments

[shana.livejournal.com]

Ooh, send it in!

That will teach them to write clearer guidelines. :)

[julesjones]

Can't -- it was published a couple of years ago, so it's not eligible because it's too old. But it would be tempting...

It's actually borderline, but you *could* make a serious case for it being an inspirational, because a lot of the plot in the book revolves around Allard being an Anglican and Vaughan a Welsh Methodist, complete with a lot of British religious jokes about the ensuing culture clash. And some of this was about my views on where the Anglican Church might and should go on marriage in a culture where fidelity is defined as getting your partner's permission before having sex with someone else.

[shana.livejournal.com]

Shucks.

[tharain.livejournal.com]

I'ms sensing a M/M pagan romance novel burbling up from under the permafrost of my soul...

[julesjones]

And it might not be the m/m that causes the need for smelling salts. As far as I can tell from the sidelines, there has been grumbling over the last few years because "inspirational" is *supposed* to be non-specific with regard to religion, but has somehow turned into code for "Christian" -- and not just any Christian either. Pagans get shunted into the paranormal category. God knows how some of the inspirational fans would react to my brand of militant liberal Anglicanism.

Link to the full post:
http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/index.php/weblog/rwa_rita_and_golden_heart_board_recommendations/
This is actually about revising all the categories for RWA's two big competitions, the RITAs for published authors, and the Golden Heart for unpublished authors. (For definitions of published and unpublished that don't necessarily mean what you think they mean.)

[tharain.livejournal.com]

But only Jesus is inspirational, didn't you know?

and not just any Christian either.

Some Christians being more equal than others?

Maybe a Pagan/Christian M/M story in which one learns not to be a bigot...and I'll let you decide which one is the bigot.

[julesjones]

I'm fairly sure from comments I've seen online that the Syndicate book annoyed one or two pagans, because it didn't pander to their prejudices about all Christians being evil homophobes. My rant last year on the subject of hating for Jesus would have probably blown their minds.

[tharain.livejournal.com]

PreCISELY. I'm a (sorta) former baptist who participates in a pagan circle, and gets a little annoyed at folks who treat my deity with FAR more disrespect than I do theirs.

I may just choose a new one.

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

So I suppose, technically, that novel I should really start shopping counts as 'inspirational' if not necessarily 'romance', since the hero prays to both sets of his deities (The Holy Trinity and the Lord and Lady -- roughly High Church Anglican and rural pagan mishmash) before going off to face down the bad guys.

*snerk*

[julesjones]

Quite possibly. But it's not a romance, from what you've said about it. :-)

[pinkdormouse.livejournal.com]

Not a romance, no. Even though the hero does show signs of settling down by the end of the story.

[were-lemur.livejournal.com]

Pagans get shunted into the paranormal category.

Am I the only one who'd like to see a Pagan romance that was not all about casting teh spells and fighting ebol whatevars? But was actually about Paganism as a religion?

[julesjones]

I can't suggest stuff, because my tastes in romance run to cross-genre, and the sort of books I want to read are mostly published under other genres or in ebooks -- and I'm one of the people who Does Not Get On with ebooks, in spite of being published that way myself. There are almost certainly some out there, but I can't suggest any of the top of my head. The problem is that you need a plot, and fighting Teh Ebol is a convenient plot hook, even when the book's written by a pagan.

However, if you're okay with erotic romance and ebooks I'd suggest having a browse through my publisher's catalogue; judging by some of the "Get it *right* if you're going to talk about pagan religion" emails that occasionally appear on the admin list, the pagans on staff keep an eye on this. So there may be something to your taste in the catalogue. Also keep an eye on the discussion thread at Smart Bitches, because someone may mention something that might be to your taste.

[julesjones]

Oh, and to be fair to the inspirational writers, while some of them are bigots, some of them were very much "WTF?" about being used by the RWA head honcho a couple of years back as an excuse for trying to push the erotic romance writers out of the organisation.

[tharain.livejournal.com]

“romantic novels in which one or more characters’ religious or spiritual beliefs (in the context of any religion or spiritual belief system) are a major part of their the developing relationship between the hero/heroine.

There's a lot of the hero/heroine language. M/M is written right out of the picture.

How...typical.