Wendy and Mollie's Books

Size Does Matter (But Is Bigger Better?)

Hello everyone! It’s a pleasure and an honor to be posting her today. I’m sure most of you don’t know me, since I’m still a new author. My name is Kendall McKenna and I write M/M erotic romance novels.

My first novel, Brothers In Arms, was release this past April. My second novel, Waves Break My Fall was released at the end of July. The print version of Brothers In Arms was released this last Tuesday. My specialty is writing realistic enlisted Marines in realistic situations. But that’s an entirely different blog post! Today, I want to talk about size.

Or, more accurately, the preferred length of a romance novel. Specifically, e-books.

I repeatedly receive the same to comments on Brothers In Arms. One of those comments is that it needed to be a longer story. It’s not that I did a poor job of developing the story and characters, and should have drawn it all out more. It’s that everyone enjoyed it enough and saw enough potential in the characters and plot that they wish it was a longer story.

As soon as Waves Break My Fall was released, I began to receive the same comment! In this case, readers seem to feel the ending shouldn’t have been the end, but should have been the middle. They want to know how the relationship between my characters develops, not just how they met and fell in love.

And I agree. I love long stories. I’m frustrated by the current flood of romance e-books that are 10,000 to 30,000 words. I want a good, meaty, 50,000 to 100,000 words that will take me several days to read and will fully engage me as a reader.

And I won’t pay more for the e-book than I would pay for the paperback.

And therein is the rub.

But I got a little ahead of myself. Many of the indie presses that lead with an e-book release don’t accept manuscripts from unpublished authors over a certain word count. Which is why Brothers In Arms is 32,000 words. When I asked the Executive Editors-In-Charge of several presses, I got several different answers as to why this is. That tells me it’s some combination of all of those reasons that’s driving the industry. But word count caps on first time authors is reason #1 the number of long stories out there is lower.

I submitted Waves Break My Fall to my publisher for a special submission request. All the presses have these, they’re easy to find on their websites. They call for submissions for anthologies or groups of books that follow a certain theme. They also have word count requirements! Usually, they are capped somewhere around 25,000 words. Reason #2 for the low number of long stories available.

Now that I have two successful novels under my belt, I have some very long stories in various stages of development. I have a 90,000 word Marine werewolf/shifter story in beta. The sequel to Brothers In Arms is at 40,000 words and is about halfway complete. My follow-up paranormal story will also be around 80,000 words. My publisher has already expressed interest in them all, especially because they are longer stories.

As a reader, I am constantly in search of long e-book novels. And I can find them, but there are a great many of them I won’t purchase because the price point is too high. Long before I was a published author, I was a reader and a Kindle power user. Despite the New York legacy presses treating us like insignificant annoyances at best, and criminals at worst, we firmly established what price points we would accept for e-books. Despite competitive devices and the legacy presses attempting to collude for price fixing, we as readers have made it known what we will pay for e-books.

Unfortunately, I keep finding e-books that are priced much higher than is reasonable. While we (as readers) will pay more for 100,000 words than we will for 70,000 words, we will not pay the same for 40,000 words that we pay for 80,000 to 100,000 words. And we won’t pay more for the e-book than we would have to pay for the paperback. And the price of a paperback is long and well established.

Believe me, writing these stories takes a lot of time, effort, sweat and tears. From that perspective, I’d love to charge $25.00 per e-book. I have to remind myself that I’m working in an industry that is revolutionizing itself. I lead with e-book and follow up with print. It’s the new way of doing things. It’s the modern way. It all balances in the end and everyone is happy and that’s what matters.

Another thing the Editors-In-Charge mentioned when I asked about longer stories, was that not a whole lot of writers are submitting them. It could be that some writers are going for quantity over quality. Some might just write stronger stories at lower word counts. Others might think the presses don’t want long stories. None of the Editors were sure.

So, I lay all of this information at your feet and ask; what do you think? Do you like longer or shorter stories? Would you like to see more long stories released? Do you find longer stories tend to be over priced in e-book format? Do you think writers are cutting corners with their stories just to rush them to press, instead of taking the time to fully develop characters and plot?

And now, thank you all for stopping by to visit, today! To show my appreciation, I’m offering FREE STUFF.

COMMENT FOR A CHANCE TO WIN!

Leave me a comment for a chance to win a $15.00 book credit to Silver Publishing AND an e-book copy of either of my titles, Brothers In Arms or Waves Break My Fall.

Biography:
Kendall McKenna’s first work of fiction was written at the worldly age of nine, and was a transformative work that expanded on the story told in a popular song of the time. She tried her hand at vampire and cowboy fiction, winning high school poetry and short story contests along the way. It wasn’t until she discovered the world of m/m erotic fiction and found her stride with cops, Marines and muscle cars, that she felt inspired to share her stories with readers who enjoy the same things. Kendall was born and raised in Southern California, where she still lives and works. A non-conventional relationship has kept her happy for the last decade. Her four dogs enjoy it when she writes, as she sits still long enough for them to curl up around her.

Brothers In Arms

Jonah Carver is a Marine. He experiences a scorching night with former commander, Kellan Reynolds, but then they lose touch—to Jonah’s regret. When a V.I.P. is killed on Jonah’s watch, the FBI arrives; including Kellan! Once reunited, sparks fly.

Waves Break My Fall

Kage is a Marine, newly returned from Afghanistan and having difficulty adjusting to being home. He tries to decompress with a quiet trip to Puerto Vallarta. Zach is a new college graduate, facing the realities of adulthood. Will their hot summer fling grow into something more?

All of Kendall’s titles are available through Silver Publishing, Amazon, and Are.
https://spsilverpublishing.com/index/book_authors_id/188/typefilter/book_authors/?zenid=15bd26a77034e4efd47945c8a22e93cc
https://www.facebook.com/kendallmckenna