Tag Archive | Indie publishing

New Ancient Roman Erotic Short: For The Women Of Rome 2

It is finally here. I am very proud to release my new erotic short, For The Women of Rome 2. The story continues with Cornelia and Marcus. Cornelia either has to learn to share or figure a way to keep Marcus to herself. But when a new slave is purchased on the blocks, will it end their new found happiness?

I am happy to be back in the saddle after a year hiatus from writing erotic shorts. I’ve done some intense thinking over the last year. With all the changes of recategorize and blocking erotica and erotic romances from being advertised on Amazon, I had to rethink my business plan and go wide with my catalog. I pulled all of my titles out of KU over a 3 month period during the Spring, and I am slowly releasing them wide. They are becoming available on iTunes, Kobo and Barnes and Noble one series at a time. I am trying to do this month by month, with one of my popular series of shorts releasing once a month.

The reason, it takes time to put all the shorts into the new formatting. So, just bare with me. It will all be available within 6 months. Meanwhile, ALL of my erotic shorts are still available on Amazon. I have reduced the cost to $0.99 each. Plus, there are some series in Omnibus and printed editions. The print editions have always been available wide. So, thank you for your understanding and patience. As an author and manager of my writing business, I have to make tough choices to stay in the business of writing. Since Kindle Unlimited wasn’t working anymore for me for visibility or for sales, I moved onto the next step to insure I could still continue what I love to do: write.

Which of course brings me to the next step: writing new erotic shorts. I have been trying to write longer shorts to keep me competitive with the page read payouts of KU. But it just wasn’t working creatively. Drawing out the stories just seemed like to be adding fillers. Some of the stories I did enjoy being longer, but I am a pantser. I like to let the story flow and evolve. Some are longer than others. So, making them all longer just wasn’t working creatively. It stunted my projects and made many turn into dead-ends.

So, returning back to writing my shorts, it means many stories are going to return to 3k-5k range or even the 5k-7k range. Some series have longer lengths, like the whole On Call series lended itself to be longer each story. Others are shorter like the Scottish Erotic Tales and the Roman Erotic Tales. With the $0.99 price for all my erotic shorts now, I’m hoping more people will enjoy them and take a ride to the dirty dark side with me. 😉

So, with the release of the next Roman Erotic Tale, For The Women Of Rome 2, I embark on this new chapter of my writing journey. I am excited to take you along, and promise many surprises for 2019. I will finish the Roman Erotic Tales with For The Women Of Rome 3, and release a whole new series called, The Queens of Andromeda. It’s a sci-fi/fantasy along the veins of Marion Zimmer Bradley and Anne McCaffrey, two of my favorite Sci-Fi writers. I will give more clues and sneak peek hints as I get closer to its release for next year.

Meanwhile, have a fantastic Holiday Season! Best wishes for the New Year! And look for a Thanksgiving Erotica Deals promo that will be starting next week. -Lynda

For The Women of Rome 2 Buy Links:

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Women-Rome-Roman-Erotic-Tales-ebook/dp/B07KKHN1Y8

Barnes and Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/for-the-women-of-rome-2-lynda-belle/1129900889

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/for-the-women-of-rome-2

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id1442572665

An Update: The New Focus For Lynda Belle

Oct10

sexywriting I’ve been having quite a strange year. If you might have noticed, I haven’t written a lot with this pen name for about a year since I’ve been focusing on other work. But that work now has come to a close. I’ve finished projects and gotten far enough in others that I can now return to writing as Lynda Belle for awhile. All writers go through ebbs and flow in the creativity. I’ve found that the ups and downs of this year have hit a lot of my creative juice hard. But I’ve picked myself up. It took a lot of thinking and a complete rethink of my business model, but I think I’ve come up with a plan.

I’m returning to writing my erotic shorts again and you get to reap the benefits. And there is more. I have been slowly releasing my back catalog wide. My titles are becoming available on Barnes and Noble.com, Kobo.com and iBooks. This will enable me to lower the prices on my titles to $0.99 for all shorts. You will start to see the prices coming down on all retailers for my past titles soon. Just bare with me since I am doing everything myself. I have no staff since I self-publish everything. So, it takes time to ready my stories, release them, and reset prices.

But I also know I have a following with Kindle Unlimited readers. So, after much thought, I’ve decided that I will be releasing my new stories into KU first so those that have followed me through the years can take advantage of my new stories. They will be available for sale, of course, through Amazon for the first three months after release. Then after three months, I’ll release them wide. This will be an experiment at first, just to see how it goes.

So to all my followers, I would love any feedback on my plans. Let me know if you enjoy have the stories in KU for a limited time and than wide, or would rather just purchase them from the retailer of your choice. It will help me get my stories out to the people that read them.

Please keep in mind I try to make some of a living off of my writing. So, I do have to charge for my stories. It all can’t be free all of the time. But I will continue to do my erotica/erotic romance promo deals each month as well. Though, I may be having less FREE deals and more $0.99 deals for my titles.

So, that is about it. That is a complete update of the road ahead of me for writing. I’ll end with some of the stories I’m working on to be released soon. I am currently writing the next installment in the “For The Women Of Rome” series. That should be out in a couple weeks. Plus, I have an idea for a sequel for the “Bordello of Vampire Pleasure”. I will be delving into the world of the vampire bordello and into the world of the vampire in the story “Death or Eternity” which was a limited time free story with newsletter sign-ups.

So, take care, follow my blog for more updates, and please look for my first new story in the upcoming weeks.

-Lynda

CockyGate Update: It’s Over! Settlement Reached in Lawsuit!

Jul24

roostercockygate Today, it was just announced on Twitter that the lawsuit between Faleena Hopkins and the Cocktales Anthology group of authors (Cocky Collective), Jennifer Watson, Tara Crescent, and Kevin Kneupper have been dropped and the trademark enforcement surrendered. Yes, all of this fight ended up in court, with Faleena Hopkins suing a large group of defendants, and it was announced today it is over!

View the tweet announcement here!

But why let this get this out of hand? I’ve read a lot on both sides of the issue. Everyone was fighting for what they thought was right. Faleena Hopkins was fighting to preserve her brand and the group of other Indie authors, were fighting to preserve their right to use the word “Cocky”. I’m not surprised it all ended up in the courts, because that’s how things can get when you’re doing business. I guess, that is something to keep in mind while being an Indie or self-published author. Research what you are doing. Believe in yourself, and fight for what you believe in.

Whether this is a good win or bad loss? I think it really deserves a look at the overall picture. I’ve seen this written up as a lot of “romance writers” having a cat fight. I’ve seen it demeaned into something of silly importance. But as it has been going on, it was pretty obvious how it could be applied to all genres, copywriting of words and series names to the benefit of the trademark holder. I think looking at the big picture was the best way to approach it, and belittling the significance has been the work of people that don’t understand the romance industry or how Indie publishing works. It was an easy way to take a blow at both.

Now that it is settled and dying down, I’m taking away that self-publishing has to be looked at as a business. Things can get ugly and real fast. Caution and research is always the best road to take in my opinion. Maybe people will look back at this time of history as the early days of the internet and how things were establishing. We’ll be able to say, we were there making history.

Here’s the link of Faleena Hopkins saying she has given up her trademark on YouTube.
Withdrawn trademark listed on the US TradeMark Office Website.

-Lynda

#Cockygate: The Internet has Gone Crazy Over an Author Trying to TM a Word

May9

roostercockygate After watching the hoopla over “Cockygate” the last few days, I have decided to blog about it, mostly for posterity sake. After all, I think this is the pioneer age of self-publishing, and there are some weird, crazy things happening that can get the global hive mind of the internet into a frenzy. Whether you’re a romance author or not, many people in publishing, authors, self-publishers(Indies) and writing groups have gotten involved. All behind the back drop of one author deciding to trademark her series name and protect her brand, most likely because of the making of an upcoming movie. What has happened is probably beyond what she or anyone else could imagine. Mass craziness in social media and writing message boards.

What Happened:
So, basically an author named Faleena Hopkins has registered the word “Cocky” because it relates to a family of characters she’s created and the name of her book series. She registered it with a trademark in a certain font, and now is going around threatening to sue all the authors that have the word “Cocky” appear in their title and telling them to change their titles. She sends a letter to the authors saying she can sue and take the money they’ve earned from their book.

Here’s a link to the letter she has been sending out in Tech Dirt’s Article:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20180507/11303539791/romance-novelist-secures-trademark-word-cocky-begins-beating-other-novelists-over-head-with-it.shtml
So, authors with the word “cocky” had their books pulled from Amazon, because she reported their books as a violation of her TM. So, several authors either changed their titles and their covers to comply with her demands, or stood up to her and called on the RWA organization to help. To let you know, RWA or Romantic Writers of America is a writers group that helps romance writers with the business of doing writing. I am a member of my local chapter, and can’t say enough praises and help this organization does for writers. You must be a member if you write romance. But, I digress.

Here are tags to look on Twitter to follow along with the current scuttle on what is going on too: #cockygate #cocky #byefaleena #freecocky

Here’s an article about this from a few days ago in regards to the trademark legalese: http://legalinspiration.com/?p=503

I’ve also noticed RWA has tweeted that they are aware and asking for other authors to report to them that are affected. They have since helped the authors that have reported it to get their books back on Amazon.
Tweet from RWA: https://twitter.com/romancewriters/status/993883786931777536

The implications are clear. If authors start trademarking words and suing other authors for their use, it could be VERY messy. Imagine an author trademarking “aliens” or “starship” and suing sci-fi authors. I also do know one of the authors that got this email and lost two of her books, Tara Crescent. She’s been a part of some of my erotica/erotic romance deals that I do monthly. She lost two books entitled “Cocky Doctors” and “Cocky Firefighters”. They have since been reinstated on Amazon.

So, it’s hard for me to understand why someone would want to go out and hurt other authors like this. Especially, since it was amazing to see how wonderful the Romance and Indie community have really helped the authors that have been sent these emails and asked to change their titles or get sued. RWA helped reinstate the books that were taken down by Amazon. Many of the books were just pulled down and that is part of the reason why the panic happened, because the Zon tends to just pull or close accounts and then review each case individually. So, that is possibly why there was such a mass panic among the authors.

Cockygate is spilling into the other areas of the media now too. I’m guessing because the title is catchy and the implication on trying to copyright a word as a Trademark. Maybe Faleena Hopkins didn’t intend this to happen, and I know there have been huge amounts of negativity swung at her. She’s taken down her Facebook page and maybe soon her Twitter account may come down. It will definitely affect her career and who she can do business with in the future probably all due to trying to protect her perceived brand. She seems to still be saying she was just trying to help her readers buy the proper books. We’ll have to see how this all goes. There is already a filing against the Trademark patent by Kevin Kneupper that happens to be a lawyer and author.

This can all be a lesson for future self-publishing authors. You need to really look into something before you do it, because actions can have far reaching consequences in this day and age.

UPDATE: 5/23/18

As of 5/14/18, it is noted on the TM website in the application for “Cocky” has a “Cancelation pending” notice.

So, there seems to be a trend for copycat TM’ing authors trying to get a hold of “Revolution” and “forever”. I’m not sure if this is for the publicity now, since Faleena Hopkins has gotten so much attention for what she did. But the author that TM’ed the word “forever”, Heidi McLaughlin, is claiming it was her agent or someone impersonating her, and is retracting the application.

Plus, an app has now been programed to help authors keep tabs on what words are being copyrighted and trademarked. It’s called CockyBot, and can help an author stay on top of things before receiving a take down notice.

So, the drama continues to unfold. I’ll keep adding more information as it happens. 😉

-Lynda

Update: June 7, 2018

Lawyers have gotten involved now. According to a letter and post on RWA’s website blog,

**(You may have to be a RWA member to get onto the site)

May 16 was the date that RWA sent a DEMAND LETTER to Faleena Hopkins to retract trademark infringement claims and future claims on behalf of RWA and Tara Crescent. Also, the letter asked to send documents to Amazon to retract the infringement, and to send proof of these actions of retraction, and to apologize. They are also filing to challenge the trademark.

May 25, Faleena Hopkins fired back with a Preliminary Injunction and Temporary Restraining order against Tara Crescent, Kevin Kneupper, and Jennifer Watson in regards to publishing, selling, promoting and distributing, “Cocktales, the Cockiest Anthology”. Lawyers from RWA had to defend Tara Crescent at the TRO hearing to defend her right to keep her books published. The Temp. Restraining Order was denied.

RWA is funding Tara Crescent’s fees to fight in court! On June 1, Preliminary Injunction was denied in the New York court. But the fight continues on!

Stay tuned for updates. This can affect all authors in all genres. There is a run of people going to the trademark office now to file for different words and series names. On Twitter, you can follow the bot at: @cockybot.

UPDATE July 3, 2018: It looks like #CockyGate is over. Tara Crescent and Faleena Hopkins have settled in New York court. Faleena agreed to back down and Tara is changing the word “Cocky” into a different font. It seems both sides are backing down and compromising and that has to be at least something of a good outcome. Here is a Daily Mail article that explains the recent events taking mostly Faleena’s side.

I’m still looking for more on this. However, it looks like Faleena is trying to spin this in her favor, and calling others bullies. It just seems to me she didn’t understand the laws of trademark usage and tried to enforce something she really didn’t understand well. But that is just my opinion.

Lesson from all of this and what Cocky Gate might be remembered for: if you are an author, really talk to a lawyer or some professional that might know what they are doing. Because the repercussions can be real and costly. Saying you didn’t know isn’t an excuse. But it is possible, this just all blew up with out her meaning to. But then, on the other side, she could have handled it better in her letters in the first place.

Like I said, hopefully the entire author community will take this as a grain of salt in the learning process. Let’s just all try to keep it professional in the end.