The piece is 17,000 words or so--too long by at least 2 or 3K. I thought about cutting it back, but decided that taking out that many words would remove too much of the 'flavor' so I never submitted it for the contest. But I figured some of the folks here might enjoy reading it.

(BTW the name is G.Kay, not Kay sans G. People are always dropping my G. and then I have to pick it up off the floor, remove all the dust bunnies and tack it back on.(:-)

..what would YOU have done to edit the story down to below 15K words?
Knock off the beginning and ending?
Remove part of the plot?
Cut the long description of how to cope with an infestation of plague germs?
I considered these but decided against them for the sake of the story's savour.
What else might have been done if you were in charge of editing it?

Dear gkb, I have read Ruinous Love twice now, several weeks apart, and I love, love, love it, from the first sentence Pride and Prejudice twist to the jolly denouement. I have to say that the way you twist language to make it sit and stay and lie down and do all the tricks is nothing short of miraculous. The characters are all adorable and have their own flavours and there are no tiresome victims. Perfect. Now.. the tiny bit of bad news.. I don't think it will be only me that reads and rereads and reads again the first section trying in vain to work out what the heck is happening. I had to read a good half of the story before i could interpret that first introductory section. The words glitter so much that they are all but impenetrable. A plea here for a little more explanation... The good news is that it works if you already know what is happening.. but not everybody will read the story twice..
Barring that, I would love to see a bunch of similar novella-style stories all bundled into a collection. Love your style, would love to read more:)

Hi, thanks for the feedback. I really appreciate it. I am glad you got so much enjoyment from it and honored that you gave it a re-read. I wrote this piece in response to the call for Love in the Ruins. Since romance is not my usual metier, I went straight to the Source and stole Jane Austen's plot and many of her characters, disguising them in the garbs of a poky cowtown and an urbane mobile theatrical company with a real-life mission when push comes to shove.

Though my piece is not as long as P&P, it was too long for inclusion in the contest and not quite the sort of material suitable for Into the Ruins (which is to close this summer, boo-hoo!). So your suggestion regarding another venue in which to publish is most welcome.

If you know of other sources for standard tropes that recur in Romance, that would be useful for developing other post-industrial light-hearted takes on life, love, and money. I think G. Heyer's estate is still very protective of her works but some of her *themes* might be deployable without treading too hard on her plot heels or tearing the hem of her carefully crafted Regency ballgowns. Anyone else you recommend for catching the right tone of romantic souffles?

I take your point about the opening paragraphs. Since that part was a parodic ripoff of Austen pure and simple, I can only say what she once said: "I do not write for such dull elves as have not a great deal of ingenuity themselves." And then hope that I get the readers who make that little bit of extra effort and enjoy the opening after they get to the ending. But I will take under advisement that future openings should be more action-oriented and have a better 'hook'.

Since this is not my usual style, I wonder if there are other GWs who frequent this site whose writing styles are uplifting and entertaining even if they do not focus on romance per se. Would such a collection be of interest, do you think? Such as humor in the style of P.G. Wodehouse? Or must it be all romance to appeal to the intended audience? I am sure there would be a market for such a volume in either case.

I do have other 'plague' stories that I have been wishing to collect into a volume, but the 'tone' of those does not match the upbeat feel of this one. So I do not think they would be as fun to read, though they have a merit of another sort. And with people so very concerned about real-life issues, it might not be a good time to launch those stories either!

I am just completing a very long novel in the fantasy genre that has elements of sword-and-sorcery, but which does not follow the 'rules' of that genre either. So sales may be a problem no matter what!! Writing is one thing but the skill of marketing writing is another. So thanks again for your encouragement and suggestions.

Hi, Teresa, this is very helpful info for me and other writers. I already have you and Bill bookmarked somewhere because I have long enjoyed his footnotes to Dorothy L. Sayers’s Wimsey series. Now I know where to go to read your current output, so thanks for that.

The pleasure will have to wait just a bit because I am tearing my hair out at present over the unexpected issues I found during Content Editing of my Big Novel (1350 pgs at last est.) You never said a truer word about doing all the work a trad publisher does! I will have half a million questions to ask Joel when he sets up his Author website, and I will try to soak up some of your confidence and methods for outreach when I finally have the text whipped into shape.

My book design is crude but serviceable; my leading is tight and my plots are loose; but by crackey, I WILL get this thing into the public eye someday soon! Thanks so much for providing a handle to hold and blazing a trail for all of us in this wild new frontier that publishing has become.

Do you think any of your previous romance works could be re-printed in a collection of the sort Blueday Jo described? Or would your Press be interested in collating romance works that premiere here or on Wattpad, for a hefty percentage of the sale price? But there may be too many formating problems with a bewildering variety of digital platforms, etc. that make too much work when you are full up with your own projects already. Just trying to think of ways to meet a market 'demand' that already exists and at the same time get ideas into the world of how to cope with deindustrial decline in a loving way.

Project Gutenberg is offering a self-publishing option on similar terms as they release books out of print. I think it might be accessible to a wider legience (my silly term for an 'audience' that reads silently) like Wattpad but without all the commercials. They suggested attaching a Creative Commons (copyleft) notice to the free version.

I wonder if you Teresa, can advise the most conservative course of action. Did you put a copyleft on the draft release of White Elephant? Did you wait a year to register it with the LofCongress before the Wattpad release? Or apply for a serial publication copyright status? Or did you carry out that step only when you were ready to release the revised version for sale?

If none of the above, what happened to your work's formal copyright status when you released a draft version of White Elephant for free on Wattpad? Inquiring minds wish to know.

I wouldn't release anything through Project Gutenberg. Even us, with our tiny press specializing in annotated, vintage Sherlock Holmes fan fiction have problems with pirates. Yes, I've seen (as has Bill) forums where people ask for copyright free downloads of our books BY NAME so they don't have to pay $4.99 for the ebook. Why make it easier for pirates?

Project Gutenberg makes it very easy to pirate books. If your book is out of copyright because, you, author, have been dead for 70 years, I don't have a problem. You got paid and your heirs got paid for another 70 years. However, if you, author, are still alive and paying bills, I do have a problem.

As for Wattpad, I'm releasing a chapter a week. If someone wanted to scrape the site to get all the words, they'd have to scrape each individual chapter from Wattpad (and AO3) and then compile them into one, bigger file. I don't know if anyone would be that ambitious for so little return.

My chapters on Wattpad (and AO3) are first draft material. I write everything down in the order in which it happens (using a very rough, minimalist outline) and when I get to the end, I stop.

What that means in practice is that if something or someone shows up later on in the text (like Sajag Burgess or how important Simon Bradwell really is), then I go back and revise chapters as needed.

Yes, I have to keep the entire book (all 250,000 words) in my head so I can make my changes. I edit as I write, which isn't recommended but I can't do it any other way. It also makes me slower. A good day is 1000 words, because I keep having to go back and fix things. Some days I do more. Most days about 750 words or so. Some days I write only 500 words. As I get better at the process, I write more. The Vanished Pearls of Orlov is moving faster than the White Elephant of Panschin did. I only count new words, by the way. Rereading five chapters to fix one paragraph doesn't count.

Wattpad and AO3 get the rough version, chapter by chapter. They do not get the revised version. I've gone back all the way to chapter one to fix something. Wattpad never sees that correction. Their version contains typos, grammatical errors, and continuity errors, especially compared to the published book.

Writing the way I do makes for a cleaner manuscript, when I am finally finished.

The finished manuscript is edited by my two beta readers (Thanks Angel for pointing out that massive continuity error that I totally missed!). I make Anne and Angel's changes and corrections. Next, Bill (my dear husband, editor, layout artist, formatter, and publisher) gets the manuscript. He makes more changes and editorial suggestions. We argue and I often (but not always) accept the changes. More rewriting occurs, but not much.

Then he puts the book together. First he lays out the trade paperback as it allows him to catch more errors. The ebook version comes next.

That last iteration is the version we copyright and publish. It is NOT the same as Wattpad's version. It's cleaner, it's shorter, it's more coherent and it is almost error free. There are character lists, table of contents, fleurons, drop caps, a built-in bookplate which I design, along with art elements throughout. None of that stuff is on Wattpad.

The book's publication date does not correspond to my publishing the last chapter on Wattpad. I'm usually writing about 15 chapters ahead, but not always. As you can imagine, having Angel and Anne read the manuscript takes time, it takes time to insert their suggestions, and then Bill takes more time to edit, re-edit, and format both trade and ebook.

Once the book is laid out as a trade, Bill adds the ISBN (we bought a block of 100), applies for the copyright, and does the paperwork. When we have the finished trade paperbacks in hand, we mail copies to the Library of Congress (another set of forms) and to the copyright office.

COPYRIGHT MUST BE FILED AND PROCESSED WITHIN THREE MONTHS OF PUBLICATION. You can't wait a year. Do it right away.

I give my writing away for free via Wattpad and AO3 but in a very restricted and limited manner. It's like advertising. If someone wants the coherent, finished book, with all the frills and flourishes, I'd like to be paid.

Please do NOT rely on people 'wanting to do the right thing and pay the author'. They'll steal your books and resell them if you make it easy. 'Copyleft' sounds like an excuse for fraud.

Just to let folks know that Weebly has made some change that makes it impossible for me to enter my website and make changes. All I get is a blank screen. I was just over there a few days ago, now suddenly, without warning "poof" it all goes awaaaay....I was just about to make the announcement that I have completed the process of page imposition to make my Big Novel available in print (i.e.phototocopy) form, and my first customer to buy it--when this happened. Advice to the writers among us: Always have a Website B to back up your A. Sheesh.