Guest blog: Patricia Green -Make it shiny

I am a member of the Science Fiction Romance Brigade. If you aren't familiar with the Brigade, there is a link on my website. Check us out! This week, I have opened up my blog to fellow Brigader, Patricia Green.
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Making it Shiny,

Earlier this year, I reclaimed my rights to three of my bestselling SF romance books. I plan to revise them over the course of the next two years. Although these books were set 150 or more years in the future, tech has changed enough to make me uncomfortable with the old stuff in these 10 year old books. For example, I set a colony on the moon Io (orbiting Jupiter). Thanks to some spiffy satellites, we now know that Io is extremely geologically unstable. Putting a domed colony there would be suicide. So out goes Io and in comes… I don’t know yet. I'll find out in June when I begin working on the rewrite.

The second and third books I'll be revising are a pair of serial novels. They portray a dystopian future, but in a hopeful way with an examination of virtual reality technology. With the advent of Google Glass and new virtual reality systems, the books are outdated and the tech needs to be "modernized." More accurately, the tech needs to catch up with the future. But am I wasting my time with all of this? What about these books made them bestsellers?

There are a lot of classic books set in the future, where some very talented and forward-thinking authors have prognosticated tech for the space age. Consider Edgar Rice Burroughs' Barsoom series, which includes John Carter of Mars. These days, we know there are no men of any stripe on Mars, so his Green Men of Mars could never exist, except in our imaginations.

Updating classics to new tech tends to mess up the plots. Should we change Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, which, although we might consider it horror today, was really intended to be science fiction? We know now that reanimation of humans via electrical stimulus is impossible. There would be no way one could fit pieces of various humans together and come up with a cohesive whole. And yet, we do have transplants of a variety of organs and limbs today. Nevertheless, for current readers the idea of making a monster in the way of Frankenstein is so outlandish as to not be a wonder—unless the tech changes.

Do readers gloss over the old tech to enjoy the storyline of these classic books? I think they do, because these books are still popular. Robert Heinlein's books, for example, were bestsellers in their time, and remain bestsellers today. Their plots and characters are timeless, and that appears to be what readers want to focus on, rather than the technology.

I think the take-away from this is that, although many of us "small fry" authors believe that staying relevant in the marketplace requires updating tech in our older books, maybe that isn't so. Perhaps we should focus on the important aspects of our work—plot development, action, adventure, character growth—and not kill ourselves imagining the technology of the future. Write a good book, and they will come.

Here's some of Patricia's work:

Charlotte & the Pirate: Romantek Book 2 is my latest SF romance book. Another Romantek book, Eddie, My Love,  is due out May 30, 2014.

Blurb for Charlotte & the Pirate

Charlotte Darrell desperately needs to buy a Romantek dream vacation in the hope that their rejuvenation process can heal her horrid facial scar and restore her life back to what it was before her accident. But her virtual reality dream isn't all she expected.

Rex Boyd is a counter cyber-terrorism expert, working for Romantek. The company is aware that someone is trying to break into their operations and terrorize paying customers. Rex hopes to protect one of the most vulnerable, the rich and influential Marie Carthage.

Once in the dream, fighting the terrorist who has gotten access to Romantek's system, Rex finds the situation confounded by Charlotte's presence. Is she a paying customer like Marie, or is she part of the terrorist's network, there to do harm to Marie and start a firestorm of lawsuits that would bankrupt Romantek? And how will he ever reconcile his feelings for her with his suspicions?

Charlotte finds herself in love and in danger. The dream has become a nightmare, and there doesn't seem to be a path toward happiness.

Links to Charlotte & the Pirate:

Blushing Books

Amazon.com

Amazon UK

 

Patricia Green is a full-time fiction writer specializing in erotic romance. She provides the reader with love stories that emphasize fun characters with quirky personalities. Patricia is the author of more than 20 published novels and novellas.

In her personal life, Patricia is married and the mother of twins. When she’s not being the angel of domestic harmony and a semi-crazed creator of fictional friends, she loves to read, crochet, knit and watch hockey and baseball.

Social Media:

You can reach Patricia Green in the following ways:

Email: pig (at) patriciagreenbooks (dot) com

Website/Blog

Facebook

Twitter: @PatriciaIGreen

Google+

Amazon Author Page 

Goodreads Author Page

 

 

IWA

My usual Friday Blog Friday is over at http://iwassociation.com/?p=2128. Come back Monday for a guest post by Patricia Green!

Distinguished Press

This may sound like a woman towing the company line, but it's not.

I am proud to be a Distinguished Press author. I am proud to be a part of a wonderful support system of authors working together to accomplish a goal of producing the best books we can. We are a team to promote each other and try to improve our skills.

I can't remember if I found Distinguished Press or if it found me. I remember seeing a post on twitter about a company who works only with book series and I couldn't wait to submit Mirror Image after reading the website. Someone struck up a conversation with me from one of my tweets and I started talking about submitting my book and some of the other works I was in the middle of. The next day I get an email from the publisher! Loved the book and if I was still interested, wanted to send me a contract. I was ecstatic. I was doing something I shouldn't have done and was reading the email from my phone while driving (but I was at a stoplight) and kept reading. Imagine my surprise when I kept reading the email and it told me how much she enjoyed talking to me on Twitter, she loved my enthusiasm, and couldn't wait to work with me. I had unknowingly undergone an interview with the owner and had passed.

I was such a baby author, still cutting my teeth even though I had been working on the project for a long time. There were a lot of things I didn't know when it came time to edit Mirror Image and I'm sure I drove my terrific editor, Jen, crazy with some of my inane questions. Still, she never brushed me off and always made me feel safe with whatever I was asking. These women helped improve me as a writer.

Not too toot my own horn (but this is my blog so I'm going to) I feel like under Jen and Catrina, I've really stopped a lot of my bad habits and grown. Reading works from Ashley and Karyn really was insightful, too. They are always there to give advice, show me what did and didn't work and why, and always for support. I'm proud to be a member of this family.

If you are writing a book series, Distinguished Press is accepting Submissions. I encourage you to send your manuscript in and get on board as this company begins to expand.

Mirror Image is the first in a sci-fi romance series. In a sense, I feel like it was my freshman year. Under the learning tree, my next series Amethyst Chronicles feels like a senior project. My writing has greatly improved (tooting my horn again) in the last few months since I signed with them. Mirror Shattered will be even better than the first and we will keep improving and growing.

I've had bad experiences with some publishing companies to the point I almost gave up and self-published but I am glad I kept at it. Not every house is created equal. Submit your queries today.