Ann Jacobs: My First Sale to Ellora's Cave

I had been suffering a two-year-long dry spell. Oh wait, it had been three years since my last sale to one of the revered New York publishers--but just two years since the last book had come out. I was tearing my hair out, wondering what I had to do to succeed in the crazy business of publishing!

At the 2002 RWA convention, I was grousing about getting turned every way but loose by editors who kept saying my sex scenes were too explicit for the delicate ears of readers. I'd gone through two agents who had tried and failed to sell my proposals. Now NY Times bestseller Angela Knight told me about Ellora's Cave, then a fledgling epublisher that actually wanted steamy, explicit romance they had dubbed Romantica (TM).

Having heard nightmares about ebooks earning their authors literally not enough to buy lunch at McDonald's, I had trouble believing Angela when she said she was earning more with EC books as with the novellas she'd published in Secrets. Since I, too, had been one of the authors who had an erotic novella published in one of the Secrets anthologies, I knew there was gold out there.

Being even more greedy than I was skeptical, I bundled up a complete novel that had made the rounds in New York with a contemporary erotic novella I had proposed for Secrets, and emailed them to Ellora's Cave. After all the rejections I'd been getting, I didn't have a lot of hope...but within two days an EC editor came back with offers for both projects!

I accepted, not expecting a lot in the form of actual money--no advance but a promise of 35% of the proceeds. After all, it had been all that time since I'd made a sale to one of the big six--and I couldn't quit writing even though the prospects seemed slim.

That was in October 2002. I immediately got into edits for the novella, Commitment--and commissioned to write another one about a magician (long story, for another time) that became Illusions. These two stories were originally published in late November 2002 in a collection entitled Love Magic.

My editor also wanted a Quickie--a short story meant to lead into what would be my first full-length EC novel, Firestorm. Love Slave also was released in late November, a few days after Love Magic--back then releases weren't scheduled a lot in advance or limited to one a month.

In early December I got my first royalty statement--and check. I could hardly believe my eyes. In less than a week those two projects had earned me royalties that were upwards of $500, and my editor actually apologized that the check wasn't bigger.

I was thrilled--sold on epublishing, Ellora's Cave and writing what I'd always loved. I no longer had to water down the sex scenes or write heroes' dialogue and narrative using euphemisms no self-respecting male would utter! I could indulge my dirty mind and write all manner of kink, from anal play to threesomes to improbable off-planet hot stuff with my first effort at futuristic later on--in 2003 (Gates of Hell).

Here I am, ten years later, still misbehaving at EC and loving it, celebrating the release earlier this month of SHOTGUN RELATIONS, book two in a brand-new, sizzling western contemporary series tweaked with BDSM and menage scenes I wouldn't have dared to write back in the day!

See you all again next month! Your comments (if you include your email address) may win you a download of your choice of any of my ebooks. I'll be checking them after Romanticon and picking a winner.

Ann Jacobs
http://annjacobs.net
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