ROMANCE GUIDELINES

• Historical:  We classify historical romance as any romantic story set before WWII, but we are specifically looking for stories set outside the Regency period. If you have a great Regency story, we want to read it. But we would prefer to feature books set in time periods not so commonly used of late.
    
  
• Paranormal: Stories featuring vampires, werewolves, ghosts, etc. Essentially, things that go bump in the night and make us want to check under our bed before going to sleep.
     
  
• Contemporary:  Contemporary stories should reflect and be relevant to the lives of today’s romance readers. These stories can be steamy or sweet, heartwarming or hysterical, as long as they are set in contemporary times and follow the usual genre guidelines.
  
  
• Romantic Suspense:  We seek dark, gritty stories of murder, mayhem, and unrelenting suspense.  We want to be furiously turning the pages, unable to stop until we reach the end.
  
  
• Erotic Romance:  Red-hot stories of erotic adventure featuring romantic elements of love and/or commitment.  All settings and situations will be considered with the usual exceptions. Since the “no-no’s” of erotic romance have been laid out many, many, times, we will advise you to use your better judgment. If your story has a major “ick” factor such as pedophilia, or any of the other traditional taboos, it’s not for us.

 Acceptable lengths:

• Glimmer (short): 12-18,000 words
  
• Gleam (novella):  19-30,000 words
  
• Sparkle (category):  31-60,000 words
  
• Dazzle (novel):  61-90,000 words

ROMANCE HEAT LEVELS

	Diamond: Sweet romances where most of the heat is kept behind closed doors. These are stories for readers who want to read about the emotional aspects of romance, rather than the physical. Most Resplendence titles are of higher sensuality level.
	Emerald: Moderate sensuality where love scenes are acceptable, but the heat level is still relatively mild. Clinical terms for genitalia are acceptable, but no graphic euphemisms.
	Sapphire: Standard sensuality level for most mainstream romances. Love scenes can be hotter and occur more frequently. Read within the genre to get a feel for the typical heat level for today’s market.
	Garnet: Hot, spicy romances featuring detailed love scenes. Graphic description of body parts and intercourse is not only acceptable, but encouraged. Garnet novels are considered erotic romance, but they do not feature subject matter that is typically controversial.
	Fire Opal:  The hottest of the hot, these novels feature intense, erotic scenes including, but not limited to, ménage, BDSM, and same-sex partners. Intimate scenes account for a larger portion of the novel, and sexual elements often dominate the plots. One caveat: we are not looking for straight erotica or sex for the sake of sex. We seek erotic romance that is scorching, yet still involves some level of commitment between the main protagonists. A strong plot and likeable characters are a must.

HOW TO SUBMIT TO RESPLENDENCE

Please send a query letter (in the body of an email) including your contact information, a brief summary of your story, and any pertinent publishing credits.  Include information on your novel’s length and sensuality level. Attach a synopsis and first three chapters of your manuscript to your query and send it to submissions@resplendencepublishing.com.  Please do not send a full manuscript unless it is requested.  Make sure to add susane@resplendencepublishing.com to your e-mail address book so our response to your query does not go to your spam folder.

Direct any inquiries or questions regarding your ROMANCE submission to Susan Everhardt at susane@resplendencepublishing.com.

Response times vary depending on the volume of queries, but we encourage you to send us a follow up email if you do not hear from us within 12 (twelve) weeks.  We do accept multiple submissions (it is not realistic to expect an author to wait months, possibly years, submitting to one publisher at a time and waiting for each to respond), but we appreciate it if you let us know.

We are highly selective in what we publish and encourage you to submit only your best work. Currently our acceptance rate is 1-3%.

All submissions should be free of typographical, grammatical and spelling errors.  Be sure to eliminate info-dumps which slow pacing, passive voice, cardboard characters and clichés. Stories must be original, well-written, well-paced, and feature characters we can relate to and fall in love with. We are looking for stories that captivate us and transport us, books we can’t put down no matter how late it is and what time the alarm is set to go off in the morning. 

FORMATTING GUIDLINES

All submissions must be prepared according to the following guidelines:

• Word (.doc) or Rich Text Format (.rtf) files only
• 1.5 line spacing
• 1 inch margins
• Times New Roman or Courier New 12 point font
• Title and author’s name in upper left corner
• Page numbers in upper right corner.
• Title page including title, genre, word count, and all contact information
• We accept submissions by email only.  Paper submissions will be discarded.
  

ROYALTIES

As per our standard contract, we offer 35-40% royalties on all single-author e-books and 7% royalties on print books.  Some contract terms are open to negotiation and we are happy to work with both agented and unagented authors.

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