Since I’ve been seeing this a lot more in my submission pile lately, and we have a pitch day coming up on Publishing Trove (h) on August 9, I wanted to take a few moments to address simultaneous submissions.

For those that don’t know, simultaneous submissions (or sim subs) are where an author plays Oprah and instead of handing out cars to her audience, hands out the same manuscript to multiple publishers. You can have a manuscript! You can have a manuscript! And you get a manuscript! Whoever responds first usually gets to publish the book.

And in an ideal world, where authors do the right thing and act up front and courteous all around, there’s nothing wrong with that. However, like most things, not everyone follows the rules. So, we have made a company decision that Pink Petal Books and Jupiter Gardens Press DOES NOT accept simultaneous submissions.

Here’s why…

When you submit a story to PPB/JGP our response time generally runs in the two to four week range. If you get me at the right moment, it can be close to immediate. So, you’re not waiting a long time like you are at other houses. In addition, even on your three chapters and a submission, we do more than read the story. We will read the story, the synopsis, and then we’ll do a bit of research. There may be editorial discussions, or your manuscript may get passed off to another editor. All of this takes up time. Our valuable time, and for an author to come back when we ask a question and say “oh, I’ve already placed this with another publisher” that author has shown that she does not value our time. As such, we wish her all the best of luck in placing her manuscript elsewhere.

There may be a bit of revision work, or notes, made on the manuscript. As in “when we receive the full here’s our areas of focus.” There might be editorial discussions as to whether the manuscript fits into our current line, how well sales for that particular genre, or style of writing, has done, and other facets. We may search out excerpts from the author online to see if we notice the same issues there, and whether they were either cleared up by the other publisher, or if the author was able to complete revisions on them.

It’s not just a “read a few lines and reject or accept” scenario when you submit to us. We want to make sure that the author, and her book, are a good fit, and that this will work out splendidly for all of us.

If you do sim sub, please follow these guidelines:

1. ONLY sim sub to houses who state that they are accepted, or have no position listed in their guidelines. If you sim sub to houses who state that they don’t, then alas, you’re proving yourself incapable of reading and following directions, and we’ll wish you best of luck at another publisher.
2. Please keep everyone up to date on the status.
3. And if you receive an offer from another house, please allow a week or two after informing the other publishers if any of them would like to offer, as well. Or, if you know that you are most definitely going with the first offer be prompt about pulling your manuscript from consideration.
4. Remember, other publishers may be investing their time and work into your manuscript. You want to be as honest and as courteous and as professional as possible.

Each author needs to do what’s best for her (or his) career, so I can’t tell you what to do, or not to do. But please, if you do simultaneous sub, make sure you follow the rules and keep everyone informed.

But I promise you, if you can give us two to four weeks, we’ll give your manuscript a thorough review and we really try not to send out form rejection letters, so you’ll know we went over your work as thoroughly as we can.

Best of luck and we can’t wait to see your submissions!

As part of our paranormal week, I asked the question, whether readers preferred the hero, the heroine, or all characters in a romance to be shifters. The overwhelming answer was that readers preferred the hero to be the shifter. And I can see why. After all, someone dark, a little rough around the edges, walks into a coffee shop or bar (or meets our heroine another way). He’s dangerous. He’s different from what she may have known, and while she is an “ordinary” woman, he’s something more. He’s a shifter.

It’s all a part of the fantasy. One of the reasons why I’ve always loved reading romance novels is for the escape. It doesn’t matter how crappy my day has been. I can slip into a book, become someone else, someone who might fall in love with a werewolf or weretiger, or some other type of paranormal creatures. We won’t meet these guys in our neighborhood. They exist only within the pages of a book.

There also was some talk about having our heroine be the shifter, and in fact, revealing this information at an crucial moment of the book. Maybe she scratches his back a bit too roughly during sex, or maybe he sees her slipping off naked into her back yard only to be confronted with a she-wolf or other creature. All of a sudden he’s not the big protector anymore. In fact, if he’s a mere human, she can probably kick his ass. That’s going to toss the relationship off-kilter, and the two individuals (or more if it’s a ménage) will have to come to grips with what that means.

Again, this might feed into the fantasy aspect of romance. In our daily lives we deal with our jobs, our chores, our children, and you know, it would feel wonderful to shift into a wolf and have people tremble in fear of us. Okay, maybe that’s just me (grins), but being a shifter would lend us an additional dimension of power that we may not have in our daily lives.

I don’t want to go all psychology and analytical here. Really, we read what we read, and we like what we like, and the reasons for that are many. But I do think it’s fun to speculate, and to imagine, what would happen if the woman was the shifter and he wasn’t. And, vice versa, what would happen if he were a shifter, and there really was a reason why he appealed to our love of “bad boys.”

What do you think? Should he shift? Should she? Or maybe both of them?

It’s an exciting month at Pink Petal Books with the release of the next installment in Lex Valentine’s Tales of the Darkworld series. We also have the next book in Mary Winter’s Nanook
Warriors series, and a full length paranormal novel from Karenna Colcroft.

Common Ground by Lex Valentine
Tales of the Darkworld Book 5
erotic
shape shifter romance (M/F/F/M, Menage a quatre)
novel length price
$4.95

Werewolf Sair McCallan escapes the confines of her brother’s pack with the help of a mated werewolf couple who believe in open sexuality and relationships. With Weylyn and Keir Randall, Sair experiences freedom in all things for the first time in her life. When she meets her mate, she’s shocked to find he’s a boring, broody vampire. Uptight Marius Granville has his staid and orderly life completely shattered by the arrival of his bloodmate, a beautiful werewolf who steals his heart and expects him to join in her kinky play with the Randalls. Marius is forced out of his hum drum existence and opens himself to new sexual experiences to please Sair. As her new mate strives to give her everything she needs, Sair battles internal demons that threaten their fragile new relationship.

Warning: This book includes sex on a washing machine, a make out session ala From Here to Eternity, sex between best friends (F/F), double penetration of a female (oh, baby!), and the best blowjob in the world (M/M) all within the confines of the hottest ménage a quatre the Darkworld has ever seen.

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Twin Spirits by Mary Winter
Book #3 in the Nanook Warriors
Series
erotic shape shifter menage romance (polar bear shifters)
Length:
novel (about 64K words) $4.95

BLURB:

Biologist Louhi Virtanen came to the remote EU outpost to combine her shamanic skills with her scientific ones. Her ability to work within the world of the Spirits, the creatures the men call Night Demons, might foster an alliance, and help avoid war within the spiritual realms. As a biologist, she can assist Sigrid in the lab documenting pollution levels and the illegal dumping activities they’d discovered. She never imagined having to balance two men as well.

Twins Marc and Hans Svetter were as different in personality as the two halves of Louhi’s world. In body, both men were more than six-foot of masculine hotness, and her body craved to devour, and be devoured by both men. Except their secrets run deeper than hers, and when she pulls them into the spirit world, she discovers that these men, and their inner beasts, might be the key she needs.

First, she’s going to have to help the team gather the evidence it needs, broker a truce, and also come to grips with her dual-life and the two men who make her desire to bring them all into balance…and into love.

This book contains two brothers loving the same woman. While the brothers are twins, there is not any m/m action in this book. You’ll have to wait for the final book in the series. (And if you read this one, you can guess who will be starring in the last book.)

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Eternal Love by Karenna Colcroft
sensual paranormal romance
length:
long novel (100K+ words) $5.70

BLURB:
For over 900 years, immortal Rhys Trevellian has been in love with the soul of the same woman– his childhood love Gwen. Unfortunately, Gwen is mortal, and Rhys is unable to keep her with him. When he meets Gwen Davies in a coffee shop in his newest hometown, he immediately recognizes his lost love.

Gwen Davies has had a rough life, most recently having to run from her hometown to a small town in Maine to escape her abusive ex. In Rhys Trevellian, she recognizes something that strikes a chord in her. Although she has no memory of the lifetimes he claims she’s shared with him, she knows he’s her true match.

To remain together forever, Rhys and Gwen must escape those who seek to murder Gwen before Rhys can transmute her to immortality, and those who seek to execute Rhys for crimes he didn’t commit.

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Pink Petal Books…because love is a beautiful thing!

https://pinkpetalbooks.com