I'll be a monkey's uncle

[John Robinson]

Yesterday I found out from a very creditable, highly-placed little bird that two CBA houses have asked that no more manuscripts either written by men, or featuring male protaganists, be sent to them. They simply aren't interested "at this time." Thoughts?

[Michelle Sutton]

LOL! You are so creative. :) Give it a whirl. :)

[Rachel Marks]

ROLF....

Soda just came out of my nose. LOL...I'd buy that one in a second.

[Kat Heckenbach]

I was putzing around the site today, checking out old posts. Boy, am I glad I did. If I drank soda, it'd be coming out my nose right now, too! That's friggin' hilarious!

And it goes right along with all the joking lately about the CBA wanting Amish Vampire books...he, he.

[Charles Funderburg]

I'm with the others. This is priceless ... campy and priceless.

[Timothy Fish]

I suppose that if they don't want male protagonists, they don't want male protagonists. There really isn't much you can do about that. You also can't do much until it becomes more than a little bird that told you, but if you have written an uplifting historical Christian romance novel, or whatever it is that they want right now and you have done an excellent job giving them what they want, but they won't look at it because you are a man, then I suppose you can file a claim with the EEOC.

[John Robinson]

Piss on it. I'm 99.9% ready to make the crossover. Absent a strong "no" from God, guess that's what I'll do.

[Camille Eide]

Two questions for John:

1. Little birds can be picked off as easy with a .22 as the big ones, if your sights are straight. Are you a gun owner, John?

2. And what EXACTLY do you mean by crossover? I'm assuming you mean from living stream to main stream, not gender. Please clarify.

Just curious.
Camille

[John Robinson]

Yep, I'm a gun owner. I own a Ruger .22 plinking pistol, a Remington 870 shotgun with a modified choke, an M1 Garand my dad gave me that saw service in the Pacific (don't ask how he smuggled it home after the war!), and an SKS 7.62mm semi-auto rifle with after-market modifications (composite stock, banana magazine, folding bipod, the works). And by "crossing over", I simply mean switching from CBA publishing to secular.

[Camille Eide]

Oh. Just checking. I thougt I saw you post something on Chip's blog once about donning a dress if times get too slim for male writers.

Hey, my 20 yr old son has an SKS 7.62 with the works, too, along with an entire arsenal of God knows what else. All I know is that I lock his room when kiddies come to visit. When he's not in class or tossing pizzas, he's online studying every gun known to man. Wants to be FBI.

[John Robinson]

Yeah, I posted that "slipping on a dress" quip when things didn't look so bleak for male writers; it doesn't seem so funny now. PS: good for your son! He sounds like a fine man; we need more like him.

[William G.]

Did somebody say guns?????

[Rita Gerlach]

Wow, that is crazy in my opinion. I hear it all the time from women readers that they want to read novels with courageous male leads who take on the bad guy and a mission for good. Recently in a discussion with some female historical writers, this came up. They too said their readers are asking for strong male leads. Women want to read stories about 'knights in shining armor' from what writers are saying. Personally, I am sick of the female leads.

As far as novels written by men....what difference does it make what gender a writer is? What is important is a good story. So gentlemen, submit your work to those CBA houses with a female name or something like 'J Robinson'. Wouldn't it be discrimination if they turned a manuscript down simply because the author is male?

I'm shaking my head in disbelief.