These Women Want to Remake the Romance Industry

Spread the love

Welcome to Today in Books, our daily round-up of literary headlines at the intersection of politics, culture, media, and more.

831 Stories Gives Romance a New Look

There’s nary a clinch nor a bodice to be found on the romance novels from 831 Stories, a publishing startup founded by Claire Mazur and Erica Cerulo. The indie house, which launched with more than $4 million in funding, has released 7 titles with covers that eschew both the traditional tropes of the genre and the contemporary illustrated style in favor of bold colors and clean lines intended to give the brand a uniform look and collectible appeal.

And it’s not just the books’ design that they’re particular about. Cerulo and Mazur prefer that 831’s authors keep physical descriptions of characters to a minimum in order to allow readers to “personalize” the experience, and their editorial guidelines specify that protagonists should be 25 or older and “self-actualized in a way that love doesn’t complete them, but is ‘additive,” and that there should always be sex on the page. With 831 Stories, they’re seeking to give readers a deeper connection to romance and each other through online discussion groups, fan fiction, and other extras intended to help beat the “book hangover.” It’s a smart strategy targeting romance’s largely female readership right as they age into having disposable income. This is one to watch.

The Author’s Role in Cover Design

Courtney Maum’s Substack, Before and After the Book Deal, is a terrific resource for authors published and aspiring authors and readers who are curious about how the sausage gets made. If you’ve ever wondered how much say authors have over their book covers or what happens if an author really hates the cover their publisher loves, this one is for you.

Here Comes Wuthering Heights

We here at Book Riot are firmly of the opinion that no adaptation—be it good, bad, or middling—can change the legacy of a beloved classic book, so I’m greeting the new trailer for Emerald Fennell’s Wuthering Heights with curiosity and a not-small appreciation for the trolling. Emily Brönte is going to be fine, and honestly, what did we expect from the filmmaker behind Saltburn? On a second viewing, the most outrageous thing about the trailer is the claim that Wuthering Heights is “the greatest love story of all time.” Whither the Romeo + Juliet stans?