New adult contemporary romance: expanding beyond the college campus
by
Kitsy Clare
New
adult romance exploded on the scene a few years after St. Martins
Press ran a contest that stated: “Since
twenty-somethings are devouring YA, St. Martin’s Press is seeking
fiction similar to YA that can be published and marketed as adult—a
sort of an “older YA” or “new adult” fiction.” Readers
clamored for novels that described the college experience, first
full-time jobs, and their first steamy adult romances as people hit
their twenties.
NA
authors delved deeply into issues such as in Tammara Webber’s
powerful exploration of abuse in
Easy,
but the novels were always set in college, the drama often occurring
in dorms and fraternity parties.
As
the genre grows, authors are eager to expand into new subgenres and
settings outside of college walls and break out of narrow confines
that squeeze the genre into limited pigeonholes. Courtney
Lewis, a librarian and blogger, otherwise known as the Sassy
Librarian reports on a recent NA panel she attended: “It
was suggested that the genre might gain more legitimacy when readers
(and librarians and publishers) begin associating it with other
genres, broadening the scope of the label.” I heartily agree.
Gritty
NA romance that deals with more universal survival skills than the
limited setting of the dorm scene is popping up all over. One example
is J.R. Redmerski’s The
Edge of Never,
where the setting is literally the highway. Camryn decides to take a
long road trip to reassess the life she’s lived thus far. Another
is Collide
by Gail McHugh, where Emily moves to NYC to be closer to her
boyfriend, but ends up working in an Italian restaurant and meeting a
new love. A third example is Nikki Turner’s Project
Chick,
the saga of a young urban single mom.
In
writing my first NA romance, Model
Position
I stuck to the well-oiled trope template and set it in college. Well,
I did stray a little; setting it in art school, where no one lived in
dorms, but already had their own edgy apartments in Manhattan’s
East Village. Still, many of the scenes were set in the drawing
class.
But
for the next in my NA Art of Love series, Private
Internship
I had a different idea for the setting. Artist Sienna’s bad-boy
love interest is a sculptor she interns for. He creates installations
out of sugar. What better setting than the factory building I’ve
been I’ve been obsessed with for decades: specifically the Domino
Sugar Factory in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. In it, Caz Mason has tons
and tons of sugar to play around with!
You
see, I moved right around the corner from that spooky factory before
the neighborhood became a hipster paradise. I recall strolling by it
when it was still in business, ever eager to see which cargo ship had
docked on its East River port. They came from Cuba, Brazil, even
Thailand—a myriad of exotic, faraway places. Here’s a summary of
Private Internship:
Sienna’s
bestie, Harper warned her not to intern for famous bad boy artist,
Casper Mason. After all, he just fired Harper who helped Sienna get
the interview. But the moment Sienna sees Casper—or Caz—sweaty
and practically shirtless and swinging from chains while he works on
his sculpture, she’s hooked. He’s the richest, hottest artist in
New York, and he lives in the fabulous Williamsburg Sugar Factory.
But he’s also an incorrigible game-player, who seems to relish
testing Sienna’s loyalty with a string of unsettling tests.
She
knows she should get away fast. But by the time Sienna sneaks into
his locked storage room and begins to unearth his dark and terrifying
secret, she’s fallen way too hard for the handsome, charismatic
Caz.
Little
did I know that my setting for this novel was going to be a constant
fixture in the news last summer when famous sculptress Kara Walker
would set up her regal sugar sphinx mama in that doomed place. As
Walker explains through her sugar slave boys who, in the heat of the
summer, were literally melting—an arm dropping off here, a nose
there, the sugar trade was a very nasty business, fueled by oppressed
slaves hauled in from Africa to the Caribbean and elsewhere.
Coincidentally,
in Private
Internship
I have Caz quoting from Voltaire’s Candide,
when a horrified Candide comes across a slave boy who’s lost an arm
and leg. The boy explains: “When we work in the sugar mills and get
a finger caught in the machinery, they cut off the hand; but if we
try to run away, they cut off a leg … it is the price we pay for
the sugar you eat in Europe.”
Caz
is no fool; he’s aware of the dark side of his spun-sugar art
medium. Ironically, as he tears three sugar packets and pours one
after the other into his gourmet blend coffee, he says to Sienna in
all seriousness, “Sugar, it’s delicious yet deadly, sweet yet
bitter to the arteries. It’s no good for anyone.”
Still,
out of Caz and Sienna’s power struggles, a sweet romance just might
emerge. And what better place to set it in than an actual defunct
sugar factory! So, choose your settings with care. Make sure you’re
as passionate about them as you are about your characters and the
steamy romance blossoming between them. Don’t get me wrong, a good
college romance can still be a fabulous read. But if you’re writing
NA romance, be brave, and consider writing beyond the confines of
dorm life. If it’s an exciting time and place to you, it will
surely be exciting to your readers, as well.
Private Internship by Kitsy Clare
(An Art of Love novel)Published by: Inkspell Publishing
Publication date: September 29th 2014
Genres: New Adult, Romance
Goodreads: Click
Sienna’s bestie, Harper warned her not to intern for famous bad boy artist, Casper Mason. After all, he just fired Harper who helped Sienna get the interview. But the moment Sienna sees Casper—or Caz—sweaty, practically shirtless and swinging from chains as he works on his sculpture, she’s hooked. He’s the richest, hottest artist in New York, and he lives in the fabulous Williamsburg Sugar Factory. But he’s also an incorrigible game-player, who seems to relish testing Sienna’s loyalty with a string of unsettling tests.
She knows she should get away fast. But by the time Sienna sneaks into his locked storage room and begins to unearth his dark and terrifying secret, she’s fallen way too hard for the handsome, charismatic Caz.
Book
reviewers are saying:
"Beautiful. Amazing. A fantastic read that left me wanting more." -XoXo Book Blog
"A juicy read full of passion and magnetic chemistry that will have you hooked from beginning to end." -From the Purple Matter Book Blog
It’s
blessedly warmer in here and I realize this warehouse is so enormous
he’s only heated the renovated parts. In two of the corners Caz has
deposited huge piles of sugar packets—ones
tediously counted by spurned interns?
My
attention is drawn to the larger of the piles. Its packets are
shifting ever so slightly. Ah! The jig’s up; Caz is hiding under
it. Sugary mosh pit here I come!
I
tiptoe forward, ever so slowly and pounce, landing with a shockingly
loud crunch. Burrowing down into the packets, my hand hits a leathery
cowboy boot. I grip onto the top lip for all its worth. “Tag!” I
shriek. “Gotcha.”
Caz
explodes upward, like a giant cake surprise, his hair all at wild
angles. Grabbing me by the waist he pulls me down. We wrestle like
kids, sending packets flying in all directions. He’s stronger than
me, so it’s not long before his corded arms circle around me and
pin me there, some big kid winning one over on his little brother or
sister.
But
Caz is not like a big brother, not at all.
Not sure what we are now, as he gazes at me with his deep brown eyes,
animated, sparkly and questioning. Wide, as if he’s seeing me
clearly for the very first time. “You’re fun,” he whispers, his
sculptural, perfect mouth so near mine.
Kitsy Clare hails from Philadelphia and lives in New York. A romantic at heart, she loves to write about the sexy intrigue of the city, and particularly of the art world. She knows it well, having shown her paintings here before turning to writing. Model Position, her new adult novella is about artist Sienna and her friends. Living in a Bookworld says: "Beautifully written! We get to learn things about art & painting, which is refreshing. A colorful story from a promising new adult author." The next in her Art of Love series, Private Internship launches in September with Inkspell.
Kitsy loves to travel, draw, read romance, speculative fiction and teach writing workshops. She also writes YA as Catherine Stine. Her futuristic thriller, Ruby's Fire was a YA finalist in the Next Generation Indie book awards. Fireseed One, its companion novel, was a finalist in YA and Sci-Fi in the USA News International Book Awards, and an Indie Reader notable. Her YA horror, Dorianna, launches fall 2014 with Evernight Teen. She's a member of SFWA, RWA and SCBWI.
Kitsy loves to travel, draw, read romance, speculative fiction and teach writing workshops. She also writes YA as Catherine Stine. Her futuristic thriller, Ruby's Fire was a YA finalist in the Next Generation Indie book awards. Fireseed One, its companion novel, was a finalist in YA and Sci-Fi in the USA News International Book Awards, and an Indie Reader notable. Her YA horror, Dorianna, launches fall 2014 with Evernight Teen. She's a member of SFWA, RWA and SCBWI.
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