Category Archives: Lucy at the Heart

Where Lucy talks about real stuff, real life and the journey we’re on together in this big, wide world.

My Breakup Book with Trad Publishing

on November 30, 2023

A Little Backstory I published my first book with Harlequin in 2003. Over the next two decades I published 75 more books with 4 traditional publishers and 1 small press. I learned so much, had some incredible editors and connected with readers that became part of the fabric of my life. In 2017, I got

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Tropes and How (not) to Use Them

on November 27, 2023

Like it, or hate it…tropes sell books. Every fiction popular genre has them, as do some of the nonfiction genres. Even literary fiction has popular tropes, though they are rarely referred to as such. 😉 But inserting a trope for marketing value can ruin the underlying story. It can also enhance it. We’ve all read

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Tips for Writers: Affordable Bookmarks

on November 16, 2023

The more time I spend on social media in the author/writer space, the more I realize how much we can help each other. I’m far from having all the answers, but what I do know, I will share. Let’s start with something that a lot of authors need and not all believe they can afford: bookmarks.

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2005 Travelogue for Australia by Hubcap

on August 9, 2022

My husband used to write travelogues for our trips. They always made me laugh. This is one he wrote for our trip to Australia in 2005. Wish I could find the one he did for New Zealand that same year. 🙂 _________________ As part of the Monroe family journey to the South Side, we now

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The Business vs. the Creativity of Writing

on August 4, 2022

Writing for publication is a business, but it is not only a business. It is a creative endeavor but not only a creative endeavor. Finding balance between those two truths creates a lot of tension in the writer’s psyche. In fact, it can be paralyzing to both creativity and forward career momentum when the two

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10 Important Truths I’ve Learned Being a Published Author

on July 22, 2021

1. The opening line is NOT the most important sentence in my book. Some people would have you believe that your entire story hinges on that first line.  Um, no.  If you excel at the clever first line, fantastic! I sure hope you also excel at the thousands of words to follow, because that’s what

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NaNoWriMo And You

on November 1, 2020

I sold my first book in Sept 2002 (it was published Oct 2003).  I hadn’t even heard of NaNoWriMo at that point, but I did hear about it the next year and, and the year after and the year after that, so on and so on.  I never felt compelled to participate.  I was already

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Book Room Clear Out

on October 23, 2020

My book storage room is getting seriously full and I was thinking of what I could do with all these author copies that are just stacking up now that I no longer run monthly contests.  And I thought, maybe I could finish off 2020 by doing some good. So, here’s the deal.  This is *not*

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Romance Conventions & Reader Expectations

on August 31, 2020
Are we married to certain literary conventions when we define genre romance?

I’ve been listening to Neil Gaiman’s MasterClass on Genre Fiction and it’s got me thinking.  Probably because so much of what he has said in his other courses struck a chord with me, I found it double disconcerting to be caught up short by his definition of genre fiction. Loosely stated, he says he had

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Craft of Writing Series by Lucy Monroe

on April 8, 2020

Anyone who knows me well, knows I love to mentor and to teach.  My agoraphobia had already curtailed my opportunities to do so (limiting my travel to the few months of summer when it’s most under control) when COVID-19 hit. And I realized I could keep mentoring if I was willing to put myself out

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