Please help me welcome author Shannon K. Butcher to Romance University. Shannon’s best known for her enthralling
romantic suspense books: No Escape, No Control and No Regrets. However, in May 2009, Book One of her The Sentinel War series, Burning Alive, debuted with resounding success.
Without further ado, here’s Shannon…
Tracey: What factors played a role in your decision to write in a different subgenre?
Shannon: I grew up reading fantasy books, so I’ve always loved a bit of the supernatural in my fiction. In fact, several of my first awful practice books were paranormals romances. I hadn’t quite gotten the hang of balancing world building and storytelling at that point, so I moved on to romantic suspenses, which I also love. Once I felt like I had some of the basics of writing craft down well enough to give paranormals another shot, I decided to dive back in to all that otherworldly goodness. The fact that paranormal romances are so popular now gave me the opportunity to try my hand at something I’ve always enjoyed.
Tracey: Will we see any more romantic suspense books?
Shannon: Absolutely. I have a romantic suspense coming out in October of this year titled LOVE YOU TO DEATH, and I’m currently working on a new series centered around a mercenary company. It’s still too early to go into too much detail, but I plan to continue writing them for as long as there are folks wanting to read them.
Tracey: Did you break into romantic suspense by writing category or single titles? Did you have an agent when you finally broke through?
Shannon: I started writing single titles since that’s mostly what I read, and I am one of those people who strongly believe in getting an agent first and letting them sell the work. I’d seen my husband’s 10-year struggle to do it the other way (try to sell his work directly to an editor, which never panned out) and I knew I wouldn’t last 10 years before giving up and moving on to a different line of work, so I went for the agent first.
Tracey: What do you love best about your agent? Your editor?
Shannon: I think the thing I love most about Nephele Tempest is how she balances personality and professionalism. She’s caring and funny, and I love to hang out with her, but at the same time she can take care of all of the business stuff-making deals and helping grow my career-without breaking a sweat. She’s a mix of sweet and ruthless and I love it!
My suspense editor is she’s really great to make sure to point out what she loves about the book. So, even when she’s asking for changes, the sting of not having done it right the first time is lessened by a bunch of glowing praise. And although I haven’t been working with my paranormal romance editor long, so far I really appreciate how she gives me the creative space to tell the stories I want to tell. She trusts that I have an idea where the overarching story is headed and gives me the creative room to let that unfold.
Tracey: What can you tell us about your newest release, Burning Alive?
Shannon: BURNING ALIVE is the first book in my paranormal romance series, The Sentinel Wars. There are three races of Sentinels, and they were put here to fight off the growing number of evil Synestryn, who want to break through the only gateway into another world. That gateway is here on Earth, and despite their dwindling numbers and a heaping helping of suffering, the Sentinels do their best to protect the gate and any humans who happen to fall victim to the Synestryn.
The first book in The Sentinel War series is about Helen, who sees visions of her own death. The man who watches her die comes into her life and she knows her time is up. She tries to run, but gets caught up in a world where magic is real and she’s the key to helping a dying race survive.
The rest of the books feature different couples, but all of them are filled with hot, tattooed, sword-wielding warriors and the women who have them wrapped around their fingers.
Tracey: When did you go from writing “great piles of suckfulness” to writing great piles of publishable romance?
Shannon: I had started 36 bad books and finished 8 of them before I’d finally gotten enough writing craft through my head to be good enough to show my work to any professionals. I got a recommendation for The Knight Agency and, about a year after submitting to them, got an offer for representation. Once I’d cleaned up NO REGRETS enough that it was sellable, Nephele took it out, sold it and I’ve been writing ever since.
Tracey: You mention on your website that your husband, Jim Butcher, played a key role in your success. Can you tell us how?
Shannon: If it weren’t for Jim I still wouldn’t be published. In fact, I never would have even tried to write since I never would have believed I could. He taught me the craft of writing, showing me that anyone can learn to write a decent book if they’re willing to put in the work (in my case, lots and lots of work). I went from being an engineer who couldn’t spell her way out of a paper bag and thought conflict was icky, to being able to write publishable work because of his lessons (Some of which he’s posted for whoever wants to read them on his Live Journal. There’s a link to it from my website.). Not only that, but I also watched his loooong struggle to become published and learned what worked and what didn’t. Namely, I realized that once your work is of publishable quality, getting out and meeting people is one of the best ways to go from a name on a query letter to a real person who is much more likely to hear a yes. I also learned that having an agent greatly speeds up the process of getting editors from big publishing houses to consider one’s work.
Tracey: When you’re not writing, what do you do for fun?
Shannon: I love to play with beads. I think I must be part magpie, because if it sparkles, it must be mine. I have a whole room dedicated to crafting and often use my engineering skills to find new ways of storing all those fabulous tiny bits of colored glass.
I also like to play Rock Band and City of Heroes, though I have to be careful not to get sucked into the video game vortex where time ceases to exist and no work gets done.
Thanks for inviting me. It was fun! I wish you all the best!
Shannon
Thanks, Shannon! We really enjoyed having you here.
After spending too many years as an Industrial Engineer, Shannon learned to write from her husband, bestselling author Jim Butcher. She learned writing craft in order to help him with his stories, but found the idea of writing her own too compelling to resist. She lives in Missouri with her husband and son, where conversations at the dinner table are more often about things someone made up than about anything that’s actually happened. Feel free to contact Shannon via her website: www.ShannonKButcher.com
Please be sure to join Kelsey on Wednesday when she talks to our latest male victim, er, guest blogger about Looking for the “One”…or Not.
Carrie Spencer, writing romantic comedy and goofy middle-grade, personifies her alter-ego - 
Hi Shannon,
Welcome to Romance University! I’m curious about your comment regarding the Knight Agency offering representation a year after you submitted. Is this their normal response time, or did a lot more happen during that time frame?
Tracey
Posted by TraceyDevlyn | June 22, 2009, 6:08 amHi Tracey,
Let me clarify that it didn’t take TKA a year for the initial response. That I got within a week or two of my first submission. The problem was that submission wasn’t quite ready to sell yet, so I got feedback on what to fix. I fixed it, but went too far, stripping out what was good about the work. That was the second round of feedback I got, so I went back and fixed it again. This time the changes worked. Basically, it took about a year for two agents to read three different versions of the work, which is pretty good, considering their schedules. Plus there was the time it took me to actually do the revisions in there, too.
Shannon
Posted by Shannon K. Butcher | June 22, 2009, 9:52 amGood morning, Shannon!
So glad to have you with us. You talk about your husband, agent and editors as being integral parts of your support system. Who else do you include in that all-important base? I’ve found that since I began writing, I have an entirely new “world” of friends, and although some of my non-writing friends wholeheartedly support me, many of them have no idea how hard I work. Any words of wisdom for having non-writers understand and support you as a writer?
Thanks!
Kelsey
Posted by KelseyBrowning | June 22, 2009, 6:30 amHi Kelsey,
Boy, that’s a tough one. There are some things about writing that a non-writer will simply never get. I know this because there were things about Jim’s career I never got (no matter how hard I tried) until I started the process myself. Even now there are moments when it’s like a light bulb comes on and I finally *get* something new.
I think the way I’ve handled this is to add on new writer friends rather than trying to make the old ones get it. I still hang out with the old friends and tell them what’s going on, but I don’t expect them to understand my job any more than I expected them to get the engineering thing. But you’re right that there’s a difference in the perception people have of how hard you work. I never had anyone question that I had to be at my engineering job, but now I hear things like “You don’t work, so would you mind…” I’m not sure there’s anything I can do to change that, but it has gotten better by gently telling them that I can’t do whatever because I have to work. Call me next weekend. I treat it like a job, so they’ve slowly started doing so as well. But let me tell you, this transition has taken years, so be patient.
The only other suggestion I have would be to involve them in your writing. Ask them to beta read for you, and if they’re not already able to do that, try to teach them something to look for, even if it’s just grammar or continuity errors (the hero’s eyes used to be blue and now they’re green). And then, when you write the dedication and acknowledgments, make sure to include them so they can see their name in black and white. People love that.
Shannon
Posted by Shannon K. Butcher | June 22, 2009, 10:07 amI must applaud your transition. My sweetheart is an engineer, and although he is my biggest fan, he still doesn’t get it. I see a silver bird winging to adventure, he sees a plane–even after all these years using that same tired analogy. *g* Funny thing, he was pubbed before me–in an industry journal. I still get to hear about that.
Posted by Pat | June 22, 2009, 11:43 amHi Shannon and welcome to RU. Thank you for being with us today. I’m curous how long it took you to find an agent. I’ve written two romantic suspense books and, although I’m getting great feedback from the agents I’ve queried, I’m hearing that the RS market is so tight they don’t think they could sell them. I’ve just finished a contemporary, but I’m still hopeful about the romantic suspense books. Any words of wisdom?
Posted by Adrienne Giordano | June 22, 2009, 12:23 pmHi Adrienne,
TKA was the first and only agency I submitted to (they were #1 on my list), so that search for an agent took about a year from initial submission to signing with them.
RS *is* a tight market right now. It seems to me that publishing slots for RS are evaporating, making the competition for those slots a lot more difficult. But keep in mind that it wasn’t long ago that the same was true for historical romance, and now those appear to be selling well again. Everything goes in cycles, and there are still some slots open if you’re willing to be patient and keep submitting your work.
My own personal feeling is that some of this tightness in the market will loosen up as the economy improves. We’re all tightening our belts, and I think it’s natural for this kind of thing to spill over from our personal lives into our business as well. Even though books are selling well and historically do fine during bad economic times, there’s still a lot of fear and hesitation when it comes to freeing up funds for the purchase of new work.
The bottom line is to not give up and try not to chase the market. Books coming out today could have been purchased two or three years ago (maybe more if it was a multi-book deal), so there’s no way for you to keep up with what editors are buying based on what’s on the shelf at the store. What you *can* do is outlast those who surrender, keep improving your craft, and eventually things will fall in place for you. If you keep writing new work you love, then once the market does open up again, you’ll have a backlog you may be able to sell. Who knows, you might even be able to get one of those sweet back-to-back release date deals!
Shannon
Posted by Shannon K. Butcher | June 22, 2009, 12:53 pmHi Shannon! Great article – thanks! I too am a magpie, but my bead collection has taken over the living room, parts of the kitchen and the entire spare bedroom. =) I can’t help myself!
My question is, if you watched your hubby struggle for so many years, and already had your engineering job and no desire to write really, what was the turning point when you actually sat down in front of the keyboard and said “Charge!” Were you a big fan of romance novels on the side?
carrie
Posted by carrie | June 22, 2009, 5:17 pmHi Carrie. Nice to know there are other addicts out there.
The turning point for me was that moment when all the craft lessons Jim had been teaching me over the years finally sunk in and I wanted to see whether or not I could write a book. For me, the challenge was enough to entice me. Once I’d actually written a book, I was hooked. I wasn’t sure I’d ever actually let anyone read my work at that point, but eventually that became something I was willing to do.
Thanks so much for letting me visit today! It’s been fun.
Shannon
Posted by Shannon K. Butcher | June 22, 2009, 6:27 pmYeah i noticed it was buggy also, the pages here load very slowly. I guess it happens from time to time with sites
Posted by ReikiTech | November 27, 2009, 5:58 pmIll can he rule the great that cannot reach the small.
Posted by Kaylee%9Nathan | November 29, 2009, 4:43 amvery informative thank you
Posted by Thomas | December 9, 2009, 6:55 am