Y'all it's a dire timeline we currently find ourselves in and it's spilling over into Romancelandia. Word got out this week that Harlequin is killing the Harlequin Historical line. I follow longtime HH writers Terri Brisbin and Amanda McCabe on Facebook and they both posted the news - so that's good enough for me when it comes verify your sources. Terri's post has the most thorough information so I'll embed that below:
There have been rumors that Harlequin was going to kill the Historical for over a decade now, with things ramping up to a fever pitch when Harlequin was acquired by Harpercollins in 2014. Surely with the juggernaut that was Avon, Harpercollins would jettison Harlequin Historical. I mean why put up with red-headed stepchild HH when you got Julia Quinn, Lisa Kleypas and Eloisa James? Fast forward to 2026 and Avon has thrown all their weight behind contemporary romance with cartoon covers and the only historical on my radar is the upcoming Julie Anne Long, coming in June 2026 (with an illustrated cover, natch). Harlequin Historical hung on a lot longer than I think anyone gave them credit for, even as Harlequin bungled their way through the marketing of that line (legit, there was a stretch where they stopped distributing HH to physical retail spaces - like, you could not find an HH in a bookstore!)
I've been out in these Harlequin streets a long time but it's getting hard to love them. Look, I understand the economics of the situation. Inflation and rising costs - not to mention the economics of big box stores and our Evil Overlords at Amazon - have killed the mass market paperback format. Then you look at the fact that romance readers were the first to truly embrace digital reading, in droves, which I think also helped hasten the demise of mass market but also caught the industry by "surprise" and, having learned nothing from the music industry, they bungled their way through the transition to digital - which, honestly, they're still bungling. Digital gave rise to self-publishing, which gave rise to "cheaper books," which larger conglomerate publishers just cannot compete with because of overhead costs. A romance reader buying retail (and reading 100+ books every year) was going to take a flier on a 99 cent book, even if that traditional publisher priced their digital formats at a reasonable price point (and many of them didn't - how many times have we seen ebook editions that are more expensive than the print?). Compounding this? Publishers dug in their heels with libraries when it came to digital lending. Early on this wasn't an issue with Harlequin, who were REALLY friendly with library digital buying and borrowing until they were sold to Harpercollins (hello, metered access), but it's another reason why we're in the boat we're in folks.
Am I old and cranky? Yes. But it's my blog and I can crank all I want.
It's hard to stress what Harlequin Historical brought to Romancelandia but I've been single-handedly trying to remind y'all for years now. When Regency England wallpaper took over, you could still find some variety and history with Harlequin. They were the last historical publisher to abandon westerns (albeit they too eventually did), you could routinely find medievals there along with Vikings. Oh sure, they had Regencies, but they also had Victorians that read like actual Victorian era settings and not Regency 2.0: The Revenge. And then they'd slip in some off-the-beaten path gems, like Jeannie Lin's Tang Dynasty books or Michelle Styles' stories set in Ancient Rome.
I realize we have many more books to come until the line shuts down in 2027, and the backlist will live on for a long time (although backlist also has a shelf life...) but I'm vacillating between sadness and pure rage that this moment has come. I'm mad publishers keep fumbling their business so poorly. I'm mad at the state of the world we live in where nobody can or even wants to read a book anymore. I'm mad at the state of my chosen profession for continuing to stress that Libraries Are More Than Books while the world burns down all around us because NOBODY IS READING BOOKS ANYMORE AND WHY AREN'T WE ADDRESSING THAT AS A PROFESSION?! I'm mad at everyone who felt abandoned by historical romance and stopped reading it even though I understand why you feel that way. In general I'm just cranky and mad about all of it right now, even as my TBR can be seen from space.
So, what to do in the meantime? I need to spend more time focusing on my own Harlequin Historical pile and sharing that love. I also hope that you all go out and pick up an HH title that tickles your fancy - then talk it up to where ever it is you may talk books.
When I was a wee baby romance reader I remember how frustrated I would get with Old Lady Romance Readers lamenting the demise of the genre because of erotic romance, and now, as they say, the shoe just may be on the other foot. For I am lamenting the demise of the genre thanks to TikTok, publishers not knowing what the hell they're doing, and a world that has rendered most of us incapable of doing much outside of trudging through our daily existence hoping to keep our heads above water even as we all feel like slipping under. Books can be a life preserver in a lot of ways, but the market is narrowing and shrinking, at least in traditional publishing spaces, and it doesn't instill much hope. Can self-publishing save us? With so much of it grossly dependent on Amazon? Doubts, I have them.
Edited to add: Many thanks to Eurohackie for providing the link to the official Harlequin announcement. Also, they're reducing the number of Presents they publish every month which HOLY SH*T YOU GUYS!
28 comments:
I found the "official" Harlequin notice while I was working on my own blog post: https://authornetwork.harlequin.com/content?id=20127 They are also going to cut down on the number of Presents titles offered every month, so you *know* this shit is about to get real.
I can't see the FB post that you embedded, but I can only imagine. I am sad and angry - sad because HH is still a strong stable of authors, and angry because where are these authors gonna go now?? If everybody goes independent, how many of them are going to [be able to] offer paper versions of their books?
This version of romancelandia, beholden to social media, sucks.
Eurohackie: Oh! Thanks for the Harlequin press release. I'll tack that on to the end of my blog post. I double-checked Terri's FB post and she does have it set to "public" but if others have trouble seeing it I might need to rework it as a screen shot or something.
Also, everything you said in the second paragraph. I'm also concerned that if enough folks got digital-only they might decide to lock into the KU universe and yes, this version of Romancelandia blows.
I will never not be angry at publishing as a whole; between misogyny, white mediocrity and racism, they fucked their own cash cow until it now lies moribund--but that's okay, the old white fucks at the top still make millions hand over fist, who cares how many careers they kill (writers, editors, and everyone else in the industry). And they cozied up to Bezos because libraries serve the public, and offering your throat to the competition that wants to obliterate you was preferable to them than having the unwashed reading "for free". So they shot their own faces off, saving the leopard the trouble of eating them, and fucked us all over in the process.
In the end, once they finish Harlequin off entirely, they'll make sure we know it's our fault, and that there are good ~educational~ books for us, that won't "fill our heads" with nonsense about agency and rights, or with "unrealistic expectations" such as joy, physical and/or emotional.
AND!!! The prices they're charging for digital editions--and this is truly across the fucking board--are beyond ridiculous. Even two years ago, I see digital editions from trad publishers priced the same, or a few pennies over, paper editions--so you had 150 page novellas on sale for US$14, category length novels at anywhere from US$16 to $19, and anything over 300 pages starting at US$25. Considering that what you get is a license to read a file that retailers can delete from your digital reader (unless you are savvy and have the right kind of device, so you can use Calibre to get usable personal copies, and so on), a lot of people are absolutely tied to kindle unlimited (and likely also tied to a device, which mean they can't participate in less draconian programs, such as the Kobo one (sorry, can't remember what's called).
(I'll stop now)
AL: No need to stop - I mean, it's all so enraging, especially since publishers continue to make missteps and commit to decisions that I think most readers would tell them "Um, maybe that's not a great idea."
I'm not sure how romance can be more popular than ever and yet here we are with the offerings from traditional publishers narrowing (which if you had told me this 10 years ago I would have said they can get narrower?!). I do think self-publishing can and might be picking up some of this slack - the problem is we're stuck in the hellscape that is Amazon's algorithm with less-than-zero search functionality and discovery is absolute shit. Compounded by the fact that readers and hobbyist reviewers/bloggers you could once turn to by reading their reviews are leaving in droves because Google's algorithm has killed discoverability there and unique voices on social media platforms are getting drowned out by folks hyping Dark Romance stories that are Misogynist AF.
Gurl, I could go on for days.
Once Google decided that "don't be evil" wasn't making them enough money, things truly got dark everywhere (and boy, the internalized misogyny in a lot of the newer romance is terrifying--it's like reading BAD shit published in the late 1970s, with the same fucking red flags. Even smoking, because why the fuck not).
I'm holding on to the bloggers I know with both hands, but even them are either turning to other platforms (why why why why) or burned out ::gestures at everything::
Oh, like me, who hasn't posted the January TBR review yet, because the reading mojo is on the fritz again...
But hope it's the most stubborn bitch around, and so, here we still are.
How discouraging. HH are the only Harlequins I read. I've pretty much switched to Historical fiction, Thrillers, police procedurals and straight fiction because I can't finish most romance I try to read. But, I've been like this since 2019, which is why I rarely blog anymore. I keep "hoping" I'll get my mojo back, but real life hasn't been kind with my time. Wendy - I'm still out here and hopefully will get back on the blog train soon.
I want to hug you all, first to offer comfort and second, to cling like we're on the last lifeboat off the Titanic. Hearing library problems and reading mojo on the fritz? Noooooo! Books have been my escape since I learned to read, and the idea that people are losing that path scares me as much as anything.
I knew we were in trouble at HH when they cut my advance on the last contract. And I started ramping up other writing and working backup plans. But I've been to indie bookstores lately and seen what's out there. Cartoon covers and sports romance. It would be easier for me to learn gay sex than hockey, so that's probably not my path.
And a lot of authors like me are abandoning KU because 1. It sucks and 2. Amazon sucks more. Indie bookstores are doing better, but you will get blisters on your knees begging for shelf space in them The word on the street is that we should all have Shopify sites, run our own bookstores and make bank doing events. But for that, you need people to know who you are, and with blogs dying and AI scraping books...
Forgive the author rant. I am crazier than usual this week. But I feel your pain. I started doing this 20 years ago, looked up from the keyboard this week and it's like someone moved my job from Earth to Mars.
I'm just a reader, so I have no idea of the business side but looking from the outside, missteps is the kindest I could be. I know its by design but I'm baffled, angry, and exhausted with how it feels like everything is narrowing. It feels like we got five years of actual abundance where it felt like the genre was expanding and including, so many options! Now all the discontinuing and mashing of sub genres that essentially erase the essence of the subs they're merging. I'm just as cranky as you are, it feels very therapeutic to read and feel shared with, so thank you. Why I'm also sad about blogs disappearing, I almost teared up at how you discuss how hard it is to read right now (I live in MN and it is honestly worse than I think people not living here can really grasp) I finished my tbr challenge days ago but haven't been able to sit down and write up the review. I'm definitely the closest I've ever been to quitting blogging, but dammit I've always enjoyed talking, sharing, and discussing these books, so I'm going to keep trying to fill that well and thank you for keeping on and trying and helping to inspire me to.
I feel all of this with you. I am older, and possibly just as cranky! I loved having the Historical line available when it felt like everything else was set in the Recency. Many enjoyable books, and some (Jeannie Lin!) that are amazing. I hate that they squandered the loyalty and goodwill of readers.
When I self-published the alternate history romance that my partner and I collaborated on, I refused to put it in KU and signed on with a distributor to make sure than our book was available in digital formats other than Kindle, and in print other than on Amazon. It was a lot of work, and I understand why authors who AREN'T old retired folks who have plenty of time and don't really need the money take the slightly easier, more lucrative path.
I feel for all of you. I'm gonna pray this is just a phase, and like so many things, it will come back around. I miss so many of my favorite HH author's books. Maybe we should start our own publishing company? Wouldn't that be a blast? Just imagine getting to read all the submissions!
AL: Burn-out is real. At this point I'm hanging on by my fingernails out of sheer stubbornness and (almost) 23 years worth of archives. Also, if nothing else I figure folks get two new posts a month from me between Unusual Historicals and my TBR Challenge review. Oh the days when I was blogging as much as 3 times per week. How did I have the energy? Oh yeah, everything wasn't on fire and/or sucking out my soul....
DORINE! I'm glad you're still lurking about, even if you aren't able to blog. Believe me, I get it. And yes - I feel this so hard. Last year I only managed to read 50-something books and there was a definite uptick of historical mysteries in my reading.
Christine: I mean, I can't even imagine. My own job has changed dramatically in the last 20 years, but I haven't been asked (yet, at any rate) to become my own cottage industry entrepreneur. I think self-publishing is great in many ways, but I feel for authors who don't have the skill-set or bandwidth to deal with that - the landscape just feels extra volatile right now. And yes! I know several folks who have set up Shopify sites and are selling direct - but the discoverability problem is a very real one and being beholden to Evil Tech Overlord Algorithms compounds the issue.
Whiskey: OMG - this! We had a few years where it truly felt like the genre was moving towards expansion and diversification and then mass market continued to whither on the vine, publishers decided to put all their eggs in the influencer/Tiktok basket, romantasy hit hard and publishing being publishing - it became chase more of the same and cash the checks. I am VERY confident that historical romance could make a comeback if publishers actually gave a damn about it again, put a modicum of promotion behind even just a few select titles. But no. We know this one type of thing is really popular right now so we're going to beat that dead horse to the barn and back and wait for a self-published author to do all the work for us, become big, and then we'll poach them and/or their idea.
I'm from your neighboring state of Michigan, and I really feel for the Midwest right now. MN, Chicago, and they're coming for Ohio. I just can't. I'm enraged and saddened for all of us.
(And thank you for the kind words).
SonomaLass: LOL! Lord help us if people are just as cranky as I am. That's the thing - self-publishing is so much work! And even diversifying so you're not locked into Amazon, they chew up so much of the market share I can see how an author struggling and trying to get by would pick their battles and play the hot hand - although KU has become increasingly (even more so!) problematic from a payment and earnings standpoint in the last couple of years. Then you read stories about how reading for pleasure is dropping overall - it just makes me want to crawl into a hole.
Dorine: LOL! I would know just enough about that to bungle the whole thing very badly and it would circle the drain quickly. Easier to complain and rant on my blog 🤣
Just an update to say that I can see Terri's FB post now. Its just as upsetting as I thought it would be.
It seems a lot of the currently-popular stuff is actually fanfic with the numbers filed off, and apparently agents are reading fanfic while scouting for talent. This is not helping the overload of super-tropey, thin-characterization stuff out there. I have nothing against fanfic - I write copious amount of it myself - but the most popular stuff that's being turned into "real" fic is usually pretty crummy.
And, of course, there's not much fanfic out there that is or would translate easily into HR, though Bridgerton is --right there-- in the cultural zeitgeist, and Julia Quinn is about to start offering HR in special edition hardback! Publishers are just totally nuts, ugh.
Christine, thanks for sharing the author's POV! Its encouraging to hear that at least some of you aren't giving in and going KU. I wish there was some other alternative, because so many HH writers are telling interesting stories, even now. I don't blame you for not wanting to set up shop for yourself - if it was that easy, professional publishing wouldn't exist!
I haven't written in a few years (family issues) but I've watched the decline of the historical romance with both resignation and horror. I knew this would happen, and I've been carping on about it for years. No history, might as well read a contemporary, right?
But Harlequin Historical was different. It was the only line of historical romance that European bookstories took an interest in. And that was part of the problem. Harper Collins didn't buy Harlequin for the books. They bought the line for the unparallelled distribution network that Harlequin/Mills and Boon had built up over the years. As long as the books paid, they'd let them carry on, but they weren't about to pump any money into it.
And then the Regency wallpaper books flooded the shelves, continuing way beyond interest in the period started to decline. At one point you could guarantee a top 100 listing if you wrote a Regency. Then they turned into non-historical historicals. Bridgerton apart, and the TV series is far more fantasy/Game of Thrones than it is anything to do with real history.
In the UK, the saga/woman's story is still going strong-ish. Set in the 20th century, usually post-war, they're more about the women than the romance.
So open a video game, lose yourself in another world that way. Notably, the video game companies stepped it up during the Pandemic. That was a gold-edged chance for the publishing industry to really seize the day, but they didn't. They let Animal Crossing and Breath of the Wild take over instead.
So many mistakes. And who gets the rough end of the banana? The authors, hung out to dry.
Microbite social media may have taken over, but blogging is still viable! I mean, I just started my vintage reviews blog a few years ago, LOL. I was on LJ during its heyday, so its a medium I still love and wish would get more action. Maybe the tides will turn again in longform blogging's favor, who knows!
Solidarity with you - I've been thinking of you ever since the news first broke in MN.
Offering this up without guarantees, but perhaps an avenue for increased discoverability for blogs: there's a site, powrss.com, that's basically a blog feed; you enter your blog and they will post links to your stuff every day you publish something; people subscribe to see what's new out there, and they may find you. (Clear blog posts matter there: if it's a review, book title and author, for example.) It's not perfect, by far, as there's no way yet to separate into personal interests, it's just one long ass feed, but I've gotten more than a few visitors to my blog that way all the same, since I joined.
I always hope that someone with good administrative skills will round up a few good editors and authors who are struggling with the "do everything" of it all, and start a press, but every time I've seen it done it either doesn't even get off the ground (anyone here remembers the Quartet Press debacle?), ends in burnout (see the short-lived Bookpushers press, or even LooseID) or fraud (see...pretty much every indie press implosion out there).
(And yet, I do hope the right group of people can make it happen, because fuck wealthy white asshole men who destroy everything they touch)
Eurohackie: OMG, I'm stealing that - fanfic with the numbers filed off, because you're not wrong. It's directly related to the screed I wrote last month about the genre becoming obsessed with Trope Marketing.
Lynne: I think I said something similar back when HC gobbled up Harlequin (but who can remember now - I can't remember last week...) - Harlequin's distribution is GLOBAL and has been for many, many years. How many countries can you go to and find a Harlequin book for sale? A lot of them.
Oh the missed opportunities over the years - Bridgerton aside, what about the insane popularity that was Downton Abbey? Or the whole Tyler Sheridan juggernaut - even that guy branched Yellowstone off into historicals (1883, 1923, Lawman: Bass Reeves....).
I know so many people who are now getting their historical fix by turning to historical mysteries or historical fiction with romantic elements. All well and good - but not the same thing as historical romance. Sigh.
Wendy: oh, I could go ON about the fanficification of professional publishing. I was deep in fandom when the whole Fifty Shades stuff happened, and believe me, the fandom folks were *not* happy about that. Of course, fandom has changed since that book was published, becoming more 'mainstream' and accepting of fanwork being written for money instead of love of the original canon, and now that we have actual proof that AO3 is being mined for the Next Big Thing in Publishing - just, UGH.
Defector just did a longform article about this very thing: https://defector.com/fanfictions-total-cultural-victory
Wendy - I have known you as a reader and supporter of our Harlequin Historical line and have appreciated every time you featured one of our books. You kept our books visible when it was see/find to find them and I'll always remember the thrill of seeing one of my books in your column! Thanks.
I am still in the gobsmacked step of grief - so many things are up in the air at this time for authors there with books under contract. I went through this back in 2004 when they announced the line was being closed - rushed to finish books to get them published before it closed - but back then the clamor from readers and booksellers and librarians made them change their mind. I don't think that's happening this time.
My favorite thing about writing Harlequin Historicals was the permission to write WHEN I wanted and HOW I wanted (sweet, sexy, etc) within the parameter of two main characters and their journey to love. I wrote English and Scottish medievals, London and Edinburgh Regencies and even some Vikings. It was amazing fun...and I'm glad that readers enjoyed our stories....
And yes, almost 2 more years of wonderful Historical romances in ebook and print - so I hope readers will gather them as they come out!
And then, they sprayed their edges...
Here's more than you want to know.
I'm turning 65 this June. The husband retired a couple of years ago, and my having a certain, extremely moderate level of income, is seriously part of our retirement plan. It's one of the reasons I can keep calm and carry on.
In the last year, as things started to go south, I did a deep dive into marketing, I also changed anti-depressants, which has upped the amount I can write. Turns out, I'd been on bad drugs for a while. So the fire in me is back.
I don't think I'm sworn to secrecy on any of this. But my agent had been telling me about the spruced up fanfic. I even read some and enjoyed it. Not exactly me, though. I have been looking into Kickstarter, tried it for a small project so I could essentially learn to fail so I could succeed later.
Worked on marketing with consultants, which involves being perpetually charming online. Good luck to me on that. Learned Canva. Learned Tiktok. Learned what I was not good at.
My last conversation with my agent is that the market is "Risk adverse." No one is making sales right now. On Publisher's Marketplace, all the historical sales are to Dragonblade which works best if you right a lot and fast, or LBGTQ, which I would rather see as an own voices thing than my primary source of income.
My next project, outside of Harlequin, may or may not get shopped. I am excited, as is my agent, but it may turn out to be a Kickstarter or self pub with a collector's edition, hard covered, double sided book jacket, sprayed edge masterpiece. People used to like just read. Now, some of them want a shelf full of collectable editions, aka JQ's new venture.
Or, trad pubbed. Or self pubbed, Or serial pubbed. Definitely not KU which I will keep for short stories that aren't worth more than .99 and make me no money, anyway.
And my next project? Something that crosses about 4 genres, but has a lot of Victorian research, a snarky modern heroine, a romance plot that may or may not be primary, and a little horror.
Also, series potential. since no one wants to read anyone who isn't writing a series.
I'm having fun, anyway.
Christine: that really sucks to hear that nobody is buying HR right now except Dragonblade. I have read a couple of novels from them and its been kind of a "meh" experience. I suspected - and then actually looked it up, and lo and behold their entire editorial staff is freelance, and there's not a developmental one among them. So many of the Dragonblade stories sound interesting/fresh/new/different, but they aren't being brought to their fullest potential. Having to write fast and a lot doesn't help.
Once upon a time, I had allusions to becoming a professionally published romance writer. I even do my due diligence in checking out the publishing scene. And that's when I realized that writing was the easy part. It's everything *else* that I just had no stomach to do - and this was way back before the explosion of social media. Goodness knows I don't have the stomach for it now, either - you practically have to be a brand in whatever guise you have online - reader/reviewer/writer/whatever. I just want to nerd out with fellow fans about good books! That doesn't require branding!
I write fanfic, but for me, the fun of it is in expanding the original universe. Even when I wrote AU, I tried to keep the characters as in character as possible, for all that I was removing them from their original environment. That was very important to me. Fanfic is a different skillset than original fic; I've never bought that it was just "training wheels" to learn how to write. It's why I just can't fathom filing the serial numbers off fanfic and publishing it as original work. If you can do that successfully, then what part of it was fannish in the first place??
Sigh. Hand me a soapbox and a cane to wave, LOL.
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