Anyone have experience with submitting to Ellora's Cave short story collections?

[deliciously_naughty]

Hey all

I'm ready to start pushing my writing to the next level, which means getting paid. It seems to make sense to submit to short story collections of the better known publishing houses like Black Lace and Ellora's Cave. Both have calls out for submisssions for short story collections, although Ellora's has significantly more options and calls out.

So, my question is has anyone here submitted to them/been published by them? What was your experience like?

Thanks

 

[Selena_Kitt]

I know Dr_Mabeuse has... maybe he'll show up and talk about it

 

[deliciously_naughty]

I know Dr_Mabeuse has... maybe he'll show up and talk about it

Thanks...

Anyone else? I know y'all are talented and some of you are published.

 

[SesameStreet]

I tried them a couple of years ago and I was disturbed by the editing. The editor that I got tried to change my stories so much that I did not think they were really my stories anymore. I don't like that. So we negotiated a release from the contract that I had signed. But maybe you will have a much better experience.

 

[Boxlicker101]

Hey all

I'm ready to start pushing my writing to the next level, which means getting paid. It seems to make sense to submit to short story collections of the better known publishing houses like Black Lace and Ellora's Cave. Both have calls out for submisssions for short story collections, although Ellora's has significantly more options and calls out.

So, my question is has anyone here submitted to them/been published by them? What was your experience like?

Thanks

I have heard that they only accept stories from women. I don't know why that would be, and I don't know if it is legal that they have that restriction and I don't even know if that is true.

 

[deliciously_naughty]

I have heard that they only accept stories from women. I don't know why that would be, and I don't know if it is legal that they have that restriction and I don't even know if that is true.

Black Lace only accepts submissions from women-Ellora's accepts from men and women. BL is based out of London and their whole thing is that they're erotica for women by women.

 

[rgraham666]

Black Lace only accepts submissions from women-Ellora's accepts from men and women. BL is based out of London and their whole thing is that they're erotica for women by women.

Even if I get a sex change I won't submit stuff to Black Lace.

Can you imagine the furor if a publisher said they only accepted works by men?

 

[dr_mabeuse]

I have some books out with Ellora's Cave and don't have any complaints. To the best of my knowledge, they don't publish collections of short stories by a single author, though. They do publish anthologies of short fiction, but so far those have featured stories by their established authors.

I may be wrong and you should probably talk to them, because there've been a lot of changes at EC over the last year or so. Two years ago, the novels had to have strong romantic plots and characterization and meet two criteria: (1) the heroine could only have sex with one man in the course of the book, and (2) there had to be a happy ending (what they call HEA - happily ever after). Since then, the competition in the Romantica market has exploded and there's kind of been a race to the bottom, and EC is open to more purely pornographic stuff. They still have some weird rules, though. We just got a notice about a month or so ago saying that they wouldn't accept any more lesbian sex scenes whatsoever.

I've never had any trouble with them businesswise and they've always been fair and friendly with me. The best thing about EC is they have a big market presence, so their books get reviewed and publicized, which is 95% of the battle in publishing. If you sell so many copies in e-book format, they put you into the bookstores in paperback. The other publishers I've dealt were exclusively e-book format, and they just stick you up on their site and there you stay - no piblicity, no promotion.

EC doesn't give you the best deal in the business, and the money you make is strictly percentage of sales (no advances), but they're honest and reputable and were pioneers in the field of "Romantica" - graphically erotic romances. So far they're the only Romantica publisher who's been granted membership in the Romance Writers of America, which is a big outfit.

Anything else I can tell you, just PM. And if you find out that they do handle collections, let me know. I keep on asking my editor and she keeps on not answering.

---Zoot

 

[Selena_Kitt]

They still have some weird rules, though. We just got a notice about a month or so ago saying that they wouldn't accept any more lesbian sex scenes whatsoever.

WTF???
*scratching head*

That's bizarre...

 

[rgraham666]

Management. Don't try to make sense of it.

 

[racyli]

They still have some weird rules, though. We just got a notice about a month or so ago saying that they wouldn't accept any more lesbian sex scenes whatsoever.

Hi, yes I'm still new here

The rationale behind that is that lesbian sex scenes don't sell. Ellora's Cave is very targeted towards a particular audience.

 

[dr_mabeuse]

Hi, yes I'm still new here

The rationale behind that is that lesbian sex scenes don't sell. Ellora's Cave is very targeted towards a particular audience.

Yeah. I used to know the name of the woman who started EC, but I forget it now. She was a romance writer who realized that women today were looking for more graphic love scenes than what they could get from Harlequin and other mainstream romance, so she went and started her own company. What she wanted was your usual romance with the good parts included, but in a "tasteful" way. As far as I know, EC coined the word "Romantica" to describe what they wanted - erotic romance.

Romantica now is the fastest growing segment of the Romance market, and - believe it or not - Romance accounts for fully half of all the fiction sold in the USA

EC still has strict rules about which words are permissable and which aren't. You can't use the words dick or prick or cunt or tits, although cock and pussy are okay along with the usual euphemisms - shaft, manhood, etc. A man can call a woman a tease or a vixen but not a bitch or a slut or a whore, though a woman can call another woman a bitch. M/M scenes are okay, but not F/F.

But since EC's success, almost all Romance publishers have started Romantica lines of their own (I think Harelquin has 3) and their material all seems to be getting more and more frankly pornographic. The market is still overwhelmingly female, though, and they demand a decent story rather than just a string of sex scenes.

One of the best things about EC, though, is that they'll accept unsolicited manuscripts. In other words, you can just send them your book with a cover letter and they'll read it and maybe publish it. It's very hard to get any of the other name publishers to even look at your stuff unless you have an agent.

I just heard that one of the founders of EC has split off and started her own company called Samhain. I haven't checked it out yet though.

--Zoot

 

[deliciously_naughty]

Dr_Mab, good to see you again

Thanks for your input. I did misspeak-I meant their theme series for 07, which is tarot based. I'm having some trouble figuring out how I'm going to do that without falling into stereotype, and have some ideas.

I also appreciate the heads up on the word choice. Once I get started, I'll probably PM you with more specific questions.