The Romantic Novel of the Year Awards: The judges are...

It’s just three weeks until the RNA announces the books that have been shortlisted for the RoNAs – the Romantic Novel of the Year Awards - and we are now unveiling the judges who will decide on the Goldsboro Books Romantic Novel of the Year 2017.

The RNA gives seven awards for different types of romantic novels. The categories are: Contemporary, Epic, Historical, Paranormal or Speculative Fiction, Romantic Comedy, the RoNA Rose for a shorter romantic novel and Young Adult. In the first two rounds of the contest the entries are judged by a panel of readers who choose the winner in each category.  These seven winners then go forward into the overall Romantic Novel of the Year Award for excellence in romantic fiction.

The four independent judges who will read each of the category winners to decide the overall winner are:

Matt Bates, the Fiction Buyer for WH Smith Travel, writer and journalist Fanny Blake, bookseller and publisher Ron Johns and Caroline Sanderson, writer and books journalist.

 RNA Vice-Chair and Award Organiser, Nicola Cornick said:  ‘We are thrilled to have such an enthusiastic and knowledgeable panel of judges with such a commitment to the romantic fiction genre.”

Matt Bates is the Fiction Buyer for WH Smith Travel. In 2013 he judged the HNS International Award and has contributed to book-related articles in Daily Telegraph, Daily Express, The Bookseller and Writers Forum magazine. In 2015 he was named Bookseller of the Year by the RNA.

Fanny Blake was a publisher for many years before becoming a freelance journalist and writer. She is books editor of Woman & Home and has written five novels including Women of a Dangerous Age and House of Dreams. Her new novel Our Summer Together will be published in in July 2017.

Ron Johns opened his first bookshop in 1974 aged 20. He now owns several bookshops and also created Mabecron Publishing, which publishes books with a West Country flavour and to date has published 23 titles. Ron has been a Costa Prize judge and is a council member of the Booksellers Association and the Independent Booksellers Group.

Caroline Sanderson is a writer and books journalist, and Royal Literary Fund Fellow at the University of Worcester. She is Associate Editor for The Bookseller, and the editor of ALCS News. Caroline is the author of five non-fiction books, and co-hosts a monthly book club on BBC Radio Gloucestershire.

A total of 300 books were entered for this year’s Romantic Novel of the Year Awards.

The shortlisted books will be announced on the RNA website on February 7^th and the RoNA Awards will be presented in London on March 13^th. For tickets

For more information about the RoNA judges, visit our website news pages

http://www.romanticnovelistsassociation.org/news

To learn more about the awards, go to http://www.romanticnovelistsassociation.org/awards

For more details on the RoNA Awards event, or to buy tickets, visit our website activities pages.  http://www.romanticnovelistsassociation.org/activities 

Heidi Swain's welcome to the 2016 intake of the New Writers’ Scheme

It is always lovely to hear good news and when this news comes from one of the graduates of the RNA New Writers’ Scheme we want to share it. When Heidi Swain named popped up in The Bookseller then of course it followed that we wanted her to visit our blog! Welcome Heidi.

Firstly I would like to say a big thank you to Elaine Everest for inviting me to feature today and

secondly, wave a cheery ‘hello’ to all you lucky folk who have secured a spot on the New Writers Scheme this year. May I suggest that you all take a big breath and brace yourselves because if you are determined, focused and ready, big things could be about to happen!

2015 was a truly monumental year for me and I put much of my good fortune down to securing a space on the New Writers Scheme the year before and then joining the RNA as a full member.

In 2014 I submitted my novel, The Cherry Tree Café, to the scheme and then, having worked through the insightful critique, which flagged up some typical rookie errors, and met with the other ladies in my wonderful local chapter, set about considering where and how to submit.

In summer 2014 I then sent the freshly edited manuscript off to Books and The City (the digital imprint of Simon and Schuster) and in December of that year signed my first two book deal, initially to have the novels published in e-book format. Needless to say I was absolutely delighted, but the hard work of course was just about to begin. Along with getting to grips with editing deadlines and traveling to London for meetings, there was also the business of promotion to get to grips with. Love it or hate it authors need a solid social media platform and as an unrestrained chatterbox I personally

found Facebook, Twitter, Blogging and guesting, as well as posting on Instagram and Pinterest, great fun. I was also invited to take part in the Books and The City Spring Blogger Evening last March which meant giving a reading and taking part in a Q and A. Fortunately Milly Johnson and Jane Costello were there to guide me through, which is another great thing about writing romance – we are a very friendly bunch of authors.

So, The Cherry Tree Café was published on July the 16^th and the launch party, blog tour, press feature and radio spots all happened in the weeks that followed. It was crazy, it was hectic and of course there was still the next novel, Summer at Skylark Farm, to polish, edit and present in preparation for publication on June 2^nd 2016!

It is, in some respects, impossible to believe that so much has happened in such a short space of time and having attended my first RNA conference last year and made such good friends with my Norfolk chapter ladies and beyond (thank you Facebook), I am exceedingly thankful to have such a caring association to help keep me on the straight and narrow and support the next leg of my author journey. If you are new to the scheme this year then I would say, do not delay, get involved as soon as you can and make the most of your membership.

My own journey took a very exciting turn at the end of 2015 as I not only had the extreme pleasure of seeing my name in The Bookseller, I also signed another two book deal and this time around for both

novels to be published in print as well as in e-book format.

The success of The Cherry Tree Café, which I am proud to say became an Amazon Number 1 Bestseller last autumn, played a huge part in securing this latest deal and I am eternally grateful to the New Writers Scheme and the RNA for giving me the confidence to put my work out there and pursue my lifelong dream.

Whether you are new to the scheme this year, or have renewed your membership, I wish you all the very best of luck, because if you have set your sights on publication and are determined to make it happen, then it will and I can’t wait to read all about your success.

Happy New Year everyone!

Heidi Swain

Heidi’s Links:

Amazon Author Page

Blog        

Facebook

Twitter    

Cherry Tree Café Link

Summer at Skylark Farm Amazon pre-order  

Thank you, Heidi. We are both graduates of the NWS and agree it’s a fabulous scheme for all new writers of romance. Good luck for 2016 and thank you for sharing.

The RNA blog is brought to you by

Elaine Everest & Natalie Kleinman

If you would like to write for the blog please contact us on elaineeverest@aol.com

The Digital Debate - Ben Johncock's Thoughts

This morning, faced with kicking off the discussion of e-readers and digital books, I took the coward's option and decided not to weigh in with my views first (this will give me more time to poll the local population - here read trips to the pub). So, scanning the tweets of the morning, I stumbled across the wonderful Ben Johncock who describes himself as an unpublished author, freelance writer who blogs for The Bookseller. I think Ben's website does a far better job though. He made the mistake of tweeting a link about Apple's new tablet pc here. I shamelessly asked if he would share his thoughts which he did via tweets.... (I have edited out the @lizfenwick except at the start!)

@lizfenwick Hi Liz, glad to be of help! It's an interesting question you ask, as I'm both a book lover and Apple nut.

I think it's important to remember that digital is all about convenience and quality (more and better). Books are consumed in a totally different way to music. A novel you consume slowly over time, whereas a song is only a few mins.
Walkmans sucked because you could only carry 20 songs, tops, with you at any one time. Quality was an issue too, and access.
With music, you dip in and out, listen to many different songs (products) in a short space of time. No so with books.
Digital Books are trying to solve a problem that no one has.
I remember @ meandmybigmouth saying something like, you don't start your morning with a bit of Amis, then skip to McEwan, then onto Rushdie.
Watching the book trade trying to keep up with the digital age is like watching your dad dance at a wedding...they're having a go, but it's a bit embarrassing at times.
The success of the iPod was down to the software anyway, and no one I've seen re eBooks has even remotely addressed this.
And who can then? What electronics company does good software? I can only think of one.
Hardware, ok, even if it does look like the hideously deformed bastard child of a Spectrum & a microwave (Kindle), not software.
So that's what I think, at least for novels. Scott Pack has some interesting ideas re cook books, travel etc.

What are your thoughts? Thus far only 20 of you have voted in our poll. Come on and join the debate...