Thursday, February 14, 2019

BOOK CLUB FRIDAY--AUTHOR LOIS WINSTON ON MEETING READERS' EXPECTATIONS


Meeting Readers’ Expectations—Or Not
In a few weeks I’ll be celebrating the thirteenth anniversary of the release of Talk Gertie To Me, the first novel I ever sold. Shortly after the book came out someone posted a review on Amazon that she titled “Talk Disappointing To Me.” Why? I hadn’t met her expectations as a reader. “Contemporary Romance” was printed on the spine of the book. The back cover copy emphasized the romance that takes place between one of the main characters and what is actually a secondary character in the book. The reader expected a book that fell squarely into the romance genre. What she got was women’s fiction with a chick lit edge to it. She was disappointed, and although I was unhappy to see a negative review of my baby, I understood her disappointment.
The original cover
from the book's release in 2006

In a romance the two main characters are the hero and heroine. In Talk Gertie To Me the two main characters are a mother and daughter. There is romance in the book. Actually, there are two romances, one that involves the mother and the other that involves the daughter, but the romances are subplots. The main story is about the relationship between the mother and daughter. It’s a comical tale of the tug-of-war that ensues when a daughter severs the apron strings and her mother is faced with empty nest syndrome.

So why was Talk Gertie To Me being sold as a romance? I can’t answer that. Authors, especially first time authors, have no control over the business decisions made by their publishers. Given that at the time my publisher also had a chick lit line, chick lit was the genre du jour, and they even featured a quote on the cover from another chick lit author, it never made any sense to me to market my book as a contemporary romance. I was totally shocked by their decision. Whether it hurt sales of the book, I’ll never know. The majority of reviews the book has received are positive, but there were other readers whose expectations I didn’t meet. They wanted more Nori and Mac, less of Connie and her adventures in New York. However, most did like other aspects of the book. Even the author of “Talk Disappointing To Me” gave the book 3 out of 5 stars.

Three-and-a-half years and a romantic suspense later, I sold Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun, the first book in my Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery series. I wrote the book as a humorous amateur sleuth mystery, not a cozy mystery, because the Mafia loan shark in the book uses language appropriate to a Mafia loan shark. My editor didn’t ask me to refrain from using colorful language or employ euphemisms. So imagine my surprise when a year later I saw the book previewed on their website, not in the Amateur Sleuth category but in the Cozy Mystery category! It was déjà vu all over again, as Yogi Berra would say.

When I asked my editor why the book was listed as a cozy, she replied that cozies sell better. The problem, though, is that cozy readers have certain expectations, and one of them is that they won’t find any foul language in cozy books. So once again, I received some negative reviews, this time concerning a character’s limited use of words generally not uttered in polite company.

There are now seven Anastasia Pollack Crafting Mystery novels and three novellas with an eighth novel in the works. I’ve always been of the mind that a word is just a word; it’s the meaning that’s important. But not everyone feels that way, and as an author I don’t want to alienate a segment of my readership. So I eventually decided to bow to the pressure placed on me by some of my readers and now employ euphemisms. I learned a long time ago that in life it’s best to choose your battles, and this was one that wasn’t worth fighting.

Talk Gertie To Me
Two years ago Nori Stedworth fled the conservative mentality of both her parents and Ten Commandments, Iowa, for Manhattan. She loves her new life -- until one devastating afternoon that culminates with the arrival of her mother. Mom is suffering from middle-age meltdown. Her only identity is as a wife and mother, but her husband is a workaholic, and her daughter is halfway across the country. Grandchildren would give her life new purpose. If only Nori would come to her senses and marry town mortician and most eligible bachelor Eugene Draymore.

To that end, Mom sets off to bring Nori home. But when she meets Nori’s neighbor, her plans take an unexpected twist, and she’s thrust headfirst into a career as the next Martha Stewart. Suddenly, she’s a somebody in her own right and reconsiders returning to her old life.

As a coping mechanism, Nori resurrects Gertie, her adolescent imaginary friend. A laptop mix-up lands her musings in the hands of Mackenzie Randolph, a talk-radio station manager on deadline to boost sagging ratings or lose his job. He knows he’s found the answer to his prayers when he reads Nori’s make-believe correspondence.

And maybe he’s found much more.

Meanwhile Dad, with Eugene in tow, comes in search of his AWOL wife. Tempers flare when Mom refuses to return home. However, when she and Dad hear Nori on the radio, they unite to “save” her from the corruption of both Mac and Manhattan.

And that’s when things really get interesting.

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7 comments:

  1. Lois, I can't believe it's been that long since you asked some of us what title we liked best for your upcoming book, and we all loved Talk Gertie to Me. Amazing!

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  2. You have so many enlightening things to say about genre. Thanks for sharing.

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  3. June, I can't believe it, either! Seems the older we get, the faster the years fly by.

    Vickie, you're welcome! Thanks for stopping by.

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  4. Very interesting subject, Lois. A similar problem can occur with the book's cover. I recently was given a cover design for one of my cozy mysteries that's very humorous, and when it was first proposed I thought it would skew readers' expectations the wrong way. The two murder victims are likeable characters and their deaths are treated seriously, so anyone expecting a light spoof might be sorely disappointed. Still, I've got to admit it catches peoples' eyes and probably has helped sales. As you've found, these decisions can be made strictly on the basis of marketing.

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  5. Epona, I also had cover issues with Assault With a Deadly Glue Gun. The cover chosen by the publisher would have been perfect if my protagonist worked as a cake decorator instead of a magazine crafts editor. I fought like crazy to get them to change it. They finally showed me a cover that the committee had rejected. It was absolutely perfect for the book! By some publishing miracle I was able to convince them that their rejected cover was a much better fit. However, authors rarely win these battles. Most of the time publishers aren't interested in authors' opinions. I've often wondered why authors are asked to fill out pages of information specifically for cover artists and marketing to use when no one ever bothers to read them.

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  6. This is so true. Readers pick up a book with a certain style cover and expect the type of read they're going to get. It's similar to a Hallmark romantic comedy. You know the basic plot, and it's what you want every time. That's why book covers are so important to convey the genre.

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  7. So true, Nancy! If only we could get publishers to realize this. Just about every author I know has had at least one battle with their publisher over cover art.

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