S.E.’s Comments (group member since Jan 16, 2013)

S.E.’s comments from the S. E. Lund - Author group.

Wendy wrote: "Good news about Book 4! I found that I was slightly confused about the Dominion/SCU/Blackstone axis and I think that this needs to be set out really clearly for "bears of little brain" like me ear..."

That is absolutely the kind of thing I want to hear. I am providing more background on the SCU and Blackstone in Book one. I was always trying to balance how much romance, sex and backstory to put in the first book so getting feedback on these issues really helps

Thanks!

Bleumoon wrote: "Just finished. Superb! I sent an email with all the questions you asked answered. I love the changes you put in and think they make the first chapters work much better! <3 this 5 stars easy!!!"

YAY! 5 Stars? *does the happy dance*

Michelle (Angelique Beau Pre) wrote: "First, I gotta say, I love it! I laughed, I cried. I didn't want it to end! Still in that state of not wanting to leave the world created for us!

To address issues posted above, yes, the title and..."

Glad you enjoyed!

I can use artist names and song / poem titles but no excerpts. No problemo. Have already revised and now I've added Kate's interpretation so I can include her own words describing the songs / poem. Can't quote lyrics or literary works in a novel although I think it's cray .... It can only garner more interest in the original and thus more sales ...

As to hints about what's happening with Drake and his role / performance as Dominant, the blurb will be key to set the tone for the book but as you point out on the Blurb thread, it can't be too spoiler ish!

Paris (kerbytejas) wrote: "S.E. wrote: "Charlene wrote: "Paris (kerbytejas) wrote: "Charlene wrote: "Paris (kerbytejas) wrote: "well I missed the boat - I was still on the dock..so maybe i'm not so smart
I expe..."

The great thing about a literary boyfriend is that no one owns him, not even the writer! The whole purpose of writing a romance is to share the hunky hero with others! I'm such a generous woman, I tell you what!

Charlene wrote: "Paris (kerbytejas) wrote: "Charlene wrote: "Paris (kerbytejas) wrote: "well I missed the boat - I was still on the dock..so maybe i'm not so smart
I expected dark and found it was rea..."

The great thing about literary boyfriends? You can share without jealousy! Coz, he's mine, ladies. ;)

Paris (kerbytejas) wrote: "well I missed the boat - I was still on the dock..so maybe i'm not so smart
I expected dark and found it was really light - that may have been because I just assumed what the contecnt would be?
may..."


To be honest there was no blurb so you were going in blind and had only your knowledge of my previous work - very dark - to go on.

Thank you for your honesty! It helped identify a real weakness in the novel and what I need in the blurb to make sure readers don't go in expecting MoS kind of experience.

Charlene wrote: "Without giving anything away (and I'll email you later on E with more detail), I'll just say that I understand where Paris is coming from. I may have had the thought in my head that we were headed ..."

No he doesn't! At first he fools himself, thinking he can do this but then he just goes through the motions because he thinks that is how he can keep her. Later, he doesn't even care, happy to just go wherever she lets him go.

My main concern is making sure readers DON'T expect a MoS kind of read. That is not my intention with this novel. The last thing I want is BDSM afficianados complaining that Drake is a bad Dom and I don't know what the hell I'm writing about!

This is why I need a full month to revise and address any weaknesses in the book and why all my first readers are so important - you help me know if I've been successful or not!

So a kazillion thanks to Paris and everyone for beta reading and being honest! <3

I think I will end up going with Option 3:



S. E. Lund (to leverage existing readership and name recognition)

The Agreement (because it is her crutch and links in to the contract on the cover and pen)

Can love be restrained? (because it refers to love, which is the real focus of the novel, and uses the word restrained, to refer to bondage and keeping love in check, which is what Drake was all about until Kate turned out to be the submissive he was expecting to teach about D/s).

I know it's not the most popular choice among those who have commented, but I have to look at this from a marketing perspective. Right from the start, i was going to title this "The Arrangement" but "The Agreement" is really more accurate since it refers to the agreement for research services that Kate draws up for Drake in the start.

The Colonel thinks I'd be cray not to try to capitalize on my existing name, however small. Hard to argue with The Colonel...

Edited to remove.

Paris has raised a very critical issue about the novel and I wanted to raise it here and ask for feedback.

The whole point of the novel is not to be a Master of Shadowlands kind of depiction of a Dom establishing a D/s relationship with a sub. It's about a failed D/s relationship that is essentially vanilla.

It's meant to explore how two people who think they're getting one thing (a subbie to train, a Dominant to interview and experience D/s with) get instead a vanilla romance. She uses the ruse of being a writer to explore her real interest in D/s. He uses his position as a Dom to initiate a romantic relationship with her, the woman he's been secretly fascinated with but has never met due to her overly-protective father.

She never fully submits and he doesn't care. He breaks all his own rules for her, breaking down all the barriers he usually constructs to protect him, to act as armour to keep him 'safe' from being hurt again as he was because of his divorce.

She's afraid of falling in love with him because she thinks he doesn't do love. He doesn't -- until her. She, the famed and beloved "Katherine", is the one exception.

Their hopes of a D/s relationship are doomed from the start and their first 'encounter' after the concert and Russian Tea Room visit is supposed to be foreshadowing of this.

Does that come through to you and if not, what are some ideas as to how I can make that clearer? I don't want readers to be expecting a Master of Shadowlands D/s depiction.

Please DM me or email me with your thoughts. Might be too spoilerish if you post them here, but certainly that is my intention for this novel and I want to ensure that is the message the reader gets before they read the novel and as they are reading it.

When I said a contemporary romance with a bit of kink, I really mean that -- a bit of kink. It's mostly a romance.

Paris (kerbytejas) wrote: "I'm sorry all - I didn't mean to mess it up - but I did suggest further reseach by SE to make sure what I sent to her was valid....any copywrite lawyers in the group?
if so please jump in and help out"

No, don't apologize -- thank you so much! I don't think it detracts too much removing the quoted passages. If people are interested, they can always google the songs, lyrics etc. I had a wrong notion of "fair use" in operation, which was taken from academic work, and not applicable to commercial fiction that is not meant as parody or review.

You are right to point this out and probably have saved me a lot of headache!

I may adapt another book's blurb to fit mine. Will look at a few and see what I can come up with.

I like that but I think it would have to be from her POV since the novel is told from her POV. But yes -- they bump into each other in a bar and that is the start. Writing a blurb is so hard!

Crap - I can't even quote the Dylan Thomas poem because it's still covered by copyright... I could quote the name of the poem and author and reference the first line and last line.

Yes, you can talk about the meaning of the song, but not quote the lyrics. I can leave it up to the reader to search if they want to see what they lyrics are.

Hey folks, I have just discovered, thanks to Paris, that I have to remove the song lyrics from the novel so say good bye to them. I can reference real people and band names as well as titles, but song lyrics are gone. Protected by copyright. There is some questionable language in the law around "parody" and use in "review" but obviously the novel is not a parody or a review.

So a million thanks to Paris for her eagle eye on the details. I thought fair use covered the quoting of lyrics, but not in this case.

So, to help me write the blurb, can you tell me in one sentence what the novel is about -- those of you who have read it?

If you can't manage one sentence, two or three will be great. If you were to tell a friend about the novel, what would you say to them?

Here's a question - if an author you liked wrote a novel that was out of the genre you first read him or her in, would you read it because you liked the novels you read? So if EL James wrote a vampire romance, would you read even though it's not Contemp Romance?

Here's your chance to help me improve Dominion. I'm doing a wholesale revision to Dominion, addressing some of the criticisms of the novel and would appreciate any help I can get. There are a few major tweaks suggested by the editor who contacted me about Dominion that I want to make but also some smaller tweaks. I expect to do this over the next couple of weeks and relaunch it in April along with my CR. So, if you are interested in helping out, please re-read and think about what could be improved from your perspective as a reader.

I got lots of useful feedback when my book was featured at Gotta Have Paranormal Romance with a Kick - especially points of confusion that need to be cleaned up.

If you want to take part, please send me an email and we can discuss. I would prefer to keep most of the specific details private but larger ideas can be posted here.

By larger ideas I mean -- "Have their first sexual encounter later so Eve doesn't look like a total sleezebag."

Or "Make her less wimpy."

Or "More Julien! Sooner! Develop the triangle more in Dominion."

Thanks in advance for any help!

Oh, and for those who are interested, I intend to start on Book 4 on April 1 and have it finished July 4 to be published August 5 or thereabouts.

Wendy wrote: "Hi E, I've finished and I'll get over some comments to you tomorrow night as I'm out tonight, but I enjoyed it a great deal. Thanks for the opportunity to be a Beta Reader!"

Thank you for reading and i look forward to your comments!