At the recent IASPR conference Jennifer Hallock was discussing how "within English-language romance sold in the United States and written at least fifty years after the events described"
mainstream bestsellers are disproportionately: (1) set in Great Britain; (2) overpopulated with nobles; and (3) selective in their historical accuracy.So I was very interested to see that Harlequin now has a special imprint which publishes romances written in Spanish (i.e. not just translations from English): HQÑ - HarperCollins Ibérica
It publishes a range of sub-genres, and one of them is historicals. I haven't looked at all the historicals they've published so far, and although there are quite a lot which are set in Great Britain and/or contain nobles, there definitely seem to be a fair number set in Spain, in a variety of time-periods, from Roman Hispania in 154 BC onwards. I'm pretty certain there are a lot more set in the Iberian peninsula than one would find in the equivalent set of historicals written in English.Does anyone know more about this imprint? I couldn't find a lot of information about it and don't know when it launched or whether there are specific guidelines for its authors.
Yes, I do know it. If you want to know more about it, you can always visit El rincón de la novela romántica website, because they usually talk a lot about romance novels written originally in Spanish. Generally speaking, I'm not very fond of Spanish romance writers, they sound very verbose to me. And the heroes? Insufferable people that make me want to throw the kindle to the wall. That's one of the reasons I don't review these books in my blog, because they make me so angry...
ReplyDeleteBut it could be that, after several bad experiences, I don't usually read them. So I have read very few of them lately. Perhaps things have changed nowadays.
I love romances set here, if only for a change in the setting. But up to this day, I haven't found many I could recommend. I'll try to read more in the future.
Here you can read the press notice they released when they created this label, bak in 2013
DeleteThanks very much for the information! I did look for a press release, but I was searching in English and, obviously, that didn't turn anything up. For those who can't read Spanish, I'll just give a few of the details from the press release.
ReplyDeleteHQÑ was launched on 14 February 2013
Since 2008 Harlequin has been the leader of the digital publication marketplace, with sales of over 1 million ebooks sold. Now, with the launch of HQÑ, the publisher is taking a new step in the development of its strategy in this area, offering new opportunities for the publication of works by Spanish-speaking authors, with the possibility of having their stories reach every corner of the world.
We are open to receiving all Spanish-language manuscripts. Our editors are all devoted readers who will read each work carefully before making their selections. Once a manuscript has been chosen, these authors will receive the same marketing and distribution support as the biggest names published by Harlequin.