In your update you mentioned that editors had been let go recently and included a mildly celebratory “Yeah” at the end. I agree that many of the editors at HQ do need a shake, but those let go in the latest shuffle were not the ones responsible for the cowboys/babies/brides. From what I hear, they were new blood trying to change the status quo for the better. It’s really sad to see a company sacrifice the young and imaginative for the protection of the weak and entrenched.

Jas commented that Harlequin editors have tainted the flavor of the books for the worse, and there is some truth in that. There is more truth in the fact that Harlequin is a publisher run by its marketing department. At Harlequin, the art and power behind creative fiction editing has been ball-gagged and chained to an overbearing and meddlesome marketing executive team. For years, any innovative idea has been ignored or given a half-assed marketing push. Those given the push are often pushed off a cliff before the market can even find them. Oh wait! How could the market find them? They are still on a lowly rack in Kmart instead of gracing the aisles of the grand bookstores that span North America.

Even their riskiest endeavor of late has fallen far short of market expectations. Lacking in creativity and original works, it’s less than Spicy.

The recent changes at Harlequin save a bit of cash year over year, but the problem isn’t cash. The problem is a lagging product and lack of vision from a leadership team stuck in the past.

Now, on the other hand, I do like HQ’s Mira and Luna lines. I have bought more of the trade-sized Luna books in the last 2 years than I have bought of the category books in the last 20.

I hate to say this, but HQ has operated like the category lined were training ground for their rising star writers and many a writer like Nora Roberts, Linda Howard, Stephanie Bond, etc started as a category writer. They moved on to bigger and better. Too many of the writers don’t. They don’t grow.

Now their training ground is full of stagnant writers. Instead of giving the spots to fresher writers, they stand by their tried-and-true writers with a loyal following. Admirable… but how many of the tried-and-true are tired-and-trite? If they are content to stay with the same HQ category for a decade or more, I say they’ve had their run. Stop giving them 2-3 slots a year.

HQ should limit their category lines and expand on books that have a longer shelf life. It’s better for the writer and better for their bottom line. They are branching out into e-publishing, manga, etc, but they are too reliant on their old standby.

I do think HQ is making steps toward modernity. I’m not sure they’re wholly the right steps, but they are trying. I think a bigger problem is being mired in the golden age of ancillary royalty rates and confusing electronic editions with print editions. But that’s another post for another day.

I’ve been banging on to anyone who will listen that Harlequin/Mills & Boon need to enter the 20th Century, let alone the 21st.

There was a huge healthy debate over at Romantic Times’ Forum boards recently because one of the editors wanted to know whether women actually read male/male romance (although my skin crawled that she generalised that all RT’s readers are women, that’s like saying all video-game players are men) and the response was an overwhelming YES YES YES. There are four pages of letters in this month’s issue of that magazine also affirming that yes, women like it. They write it, they read it. – I don’t know the figures but it’s about 80 percent of gay fiction is written and read by women.

They certainly need to stop living in the 80′s and realise that romance is romance, no matter who is smooching who.