Writers, where do you get your ideas? In my just-released workbook, The Novel Workbook for Messy Writers, the whole first section is dedicated to getting ideas. While some experienced novelists probably have long lists of ideas waiting to be written, beginner writers might struggle with this step—the first step, really! That said, I encourage even experienced writers to complete “getting ideas” exercises. It’s a great for stretching and challenging your creative muscles. My workbook suggests numerous ways of generating ideas but one of my favorites is “This Meets That”.
“This Meets That” is similar to something we have in the book business called “comps”. “Comps” is short for comparables, and it refers to what other books that a book under discussion would be compared to. So an author, an agent, a publisher or a reviewer might describe a book thus: “It’s got the sweet romance of Stargirl but in a dystopian setting like Divergent” (I would read this!) Sometimes comps are simply expressed like “It’s X meets Y” or “part X and part Y”. When I was agent hunting, I described my young adult sci-fi, Zero Repeat Forever, as “Part Terminator and part Beauty and the Beast”. My publisher describes it as “The 5th Wave meets Beauty and the Beast”. But one of my favorite ways to describe it has always been “Twilight meets Terminator”!
What does this have to do with getting ideas? For indie romance authors, who often write and publish six or more books per year, the “getting ideas” part of writing is critical. Readers are hungry for new premises and new characters, but new ways of telling familiar stories are also always popular. So a great way to generate ideas is to mash two familiar stories together, creating something new. In doing this you not only have created an interesting premise for your book, but you also now have access to at least two existing books/stories’ worth of inspiration (and indeed detail) to draw from.
X meets Y premises can be lots of fun, and the further X is from Y the better, in my opinion. Only imagine the possibilities! I’d love to read “Cinderella meets Clan of the Cave Bear” for example. A prehistoric prince and his enchanted mystery princess? Are you kidding me? That would be awesome. Or how about “Scheherazade meets High Fidelity” about a plucky Muslim teen who keeps her disgruntled record store boss amused with stories so he doesn’t close down his failing business. (OMG someone please write this).
I could go on and on about this, but I’m at risk of coming up with premises I want to actually write. And I have a deadline. I need to focus!
What X meets Y retellings would you like to write?
There are many thousands, if not millions of aspiring novelists out there who simply don’t know where to start. Thousands more writers have attempted or even completed a novel or two but are looking for a new way of approaching their next one. Then there are successful, published novelists who are sure they’ve forgotten how to write a novel and will never be able to do it again. And finally there are published novelists who are confident they can do it again if they could just find their laptop under the chaos on their desk.
The Novel Workbook for Messy Writers is for all of the above and more. It’s a writer’s workbook that provides just enough structure to get the creative juices flowing, while leaving writers the freedom to get their words down how, when and where they want to. Lists, quotes, doodles, collage, prose, verse, song lyrics, maps and diagrams will all fit into the Workbook pages, allowing writers to create a complete and detailed blueprint for their novel, including such information as character names, setting descriptions, genre, musical inspiration, props, world-building and much more.
Including prompts and tips on each page, The Novel Workbook for Messy Writers is for novelists of all ages, at any stage in their writing career.
G.S. (Gabrielle) Prendergast is the bestselling author of numerous books for children and teens. She studied writing at the University of New South Wales in Australia, at San Francisco State University and the University of British Columbia. After years of working in the music industry, in social welfare, and the film industry, Gabrielle began writing books when she became a mother, so she could work from home. Her books have received nominations for the White Pine Award, the Canadian Library Association Award, the Vancouver Book Prize and several other honors. She won the BC Book Prize for her YA sci-fi Zero Repeat Forever and the Westchester Award for her YA novel in verse Audacious. Born in the UK and both an Australian and New Zealand citizen, Gabrielle now lives in East Vancouver in a permanent state of “under-construction”. You can find Gabrielle on Instagram or Tiktok @gsprendergast
My latest book, Victoria & Violet, is the first novel in my brand-new Royal Maids series and I am super proud of it! Why? Because it is the first book in which I have included real people and real events alongside the fictional. To do this has been an ambition of mine ever since my first book was published in 2007 so having achieved it feels like a very big deal.
Best of all, readers and reviewers seem to be loving it, too!
Although Queen Victoria, Lord Melbourne, the Duchess of Kent, Lehzen and others feature in the book, the story really revolves around the lives and burgeoning romance of fictional housemaid Violet Parker and fictional assistant to Lord Melbourne, James Greene. These two characters were a joy to create, and their electricity was immediate which made a usually hard job all the easier!
Their paths have crossed a few times before the book opens, but the interest is firmly in James’s court (so to speak!), rather than Violet’s who has far more important and life-changing things on her mind than romance, such as escaping the clutches of her overbearing mother and forging a life of her own. Of course, it is not as though Violet would ever consider James a possible suitor considering his superior status…yet he really is most persistent!
All too soon, James and Violet are thrown together over and over again as their roles become ever more important to Victoria and Lord Melbourne. Amid a court that travels from the gardens of Windsor Castle to the corridors of Buckingham Palace to the wedding of the Queen herself, Victoria & Violet takes you on an adventure of drama, intrigue and romance that I hope has you quickly turning the pages!
Why not give it a try?
Happy reading,
Rachel x
Victoria & Violet
It should be a dream come true to serve the Queen of England…
When Violet Parker is told she will be Queen Victoria’s personal housemaid, she cannot believe her good fortune. She finally has the chance to escape her overbearing mother, a servant to the Duchess of Kent.
Violet hopes to explore who she is and what the world has to offer without her mother’s schemes overshadowing her every thought and action.
Then she meets James Greene, assistant to the queen’s chief political adviser, Lord Melbourne. From entirely different backgrounds and social class, Violet and James should have neither need nor desire to speak to one another, yet through their service, their paths cross and their lives merge—as do their feelings.
Only Victoria’s court is not always the place for romance, but rather secrets, scandals, and conspiracies…
Rachel lives in a small town near Bath, England. She is the author of 29 novels including the Ladies of Carson Street trilogy, the Shop Girl series (Aria Fiction) and the Templeton Cove Stories (Harlequin). Her latest novel, Victoria & Violet is the first book in her new Royal Maids series with the Wild Rose Press and releases 17th October 2022.
Rachel is a member of the Romantic Novelists Association as well as the Historical Novel Society and has thousands of social media followers all over the world.
To sign up for her newsletter (a guaranteed giveaway every month!), click here: https://bit.ly/3zyH7dt
Grin, the hero of my most recent cyborg romance release, is an architect. He designs buildings and oversees their construction. His skills are very much in demand. He enjoys his role tremendously.
His newfound heroine, Mohini, is planning an extremely dangerous mission. The participants won’t likely survive it. They will be venturing deep into enemy territory, possibly facing battle robots and armies of undead warriors. There will be explosions and shootouts and firefights in deep space.
An architect is likely not the first hero anyone would consider for such a daring assignment. (grins)
Grin isn’t a normal architect, however. He’s a cyborg and all cyborgs were trained for battle. Many of Grin’s brethren LOVE fighting. It pleases their design.
Grin doesn’t enjoy fighting. At all. His programming is different. Killing or harming beings gives him no joy.
He will fight, however, to protect the beings he cares for. Grin will do anything to keep his daring female safe, even risk capture by a past enemy and/or death.
That, I believe, makes him even MORE heroic. He is stepping forward when needed, knowing full well he isn’t the perfect candidate for the tasks he’s volunteering to complete.
I suspect you’re the same way. You’ve tackled tasks you had no experience or interest in completing because those tasks had to be done.
Maybe you took care of a child while their parents were ill, rearranging your already busy days to ensure they were tended to and happy.
Or you helped a newcomer to your town find the post office. (That is an extremely stressful task for a direction-challenged person such as myself.)
Or you loaned a much-cherished reference book to a writer, knowing the book might be damaged or you might not get it back.
Or you asked a hard question of a leader, knowing it had to be asked but the leader wouldn’t welcome it.
These are hero moves. You might not be saving the entire world but you ARE saving someone’s world. You’re making a difference in lives and in the universe.
Tell me about your moments of heroism. I want to hear how you’ve stepped forward in the past and helped when it would have been much easier for yourself not to volunteer.
Grin And Bare Him
This cyborg will be the warrior his female requires.
Cyborgs are designed to fight. That is their primary purpose and 98.2356 percent of the manufactured warriors enjoy battle. Tremendously.
Grin, a K model, is one of the rare exceptions. When he escaped his cruel creators, he set down his sword and allocated his processors to less violent pursuits. He projects he’s left his war-waging planet rotations behind him forever.
Then he meets his beautiful, beguiling female, the one being he’s destined to protect, to claim, to love for all eternity, and his plans for peace are completely decimated.
Mohini needs a ship.
She has a dangerous mission to complete and the first step in that assignment is arranging transport to an enemy-controlled planet. The vessel she has set her sights on is guarded by the sexiest cyborg she’s ever seen.
To gain access to his ship, Mohini is prepared to kiss, caress, seduce the muscular male. The mission is her focus. The pleasure she experiences will merely be a bonus.
A female has to do what a female has to do to save the universe.
Grin And Bare Him is a Cyborg SciFi Romance set in a dark, gritty, sometimes-violent universe.
It features a humanoid female undertaking a dangerous mission, a cyborg intent on keeping her alive, and an enemy with enough firepower to blow up an entire sector.
USA Today bestselling author Cynthia Sax writes steamy Cyborg, Alien and Contemporary Romances. Her stories have been featured on TV, in Star Magazine, and numerous top ten lists.
Do you love Hallmark movies? Do you sometimes wish the movies would be spicier? A little hotter? If so, All Cowboy and a Holiday Bride is a book for you. It’s sweet, emotional with a happily ever after but with a large dose of sexy.
Excerpt from All Cowboy & a Holiday Bride…
“Don’t fall in love,” Sadie Locke sashayed out of the bathroom, bringing with her the fresh scent of soap and woman. “Now that we’ve taken our first shower together and all.”
“That’s what you’re worried about? I asked to take a shower with you and now I’m high risk for falling in love?” Channing Dawson chuckled and hauled himself up out of bed, then grabbed his rumpled jeans off the floor. “Ain’t happening. I could never love a water hog.”
She captured him with her pale grey gaze. “I’m not worried about things going off the grid. I’m just listing the rules. We don’t want this to get complicated. Sorry about hogging the water, but that bathroom is as big as a broom closet and I’m claustrophobic. Not to mention, the spider we saw was big enough to wear shoes.”
“This is an old hunting cabin. We’re lucky it has a toilet, let alone a shower. I have an idea though.” He used his thumbnail to scratch his temple thoughtfully.
“You do? Call an exterminator, I hope.”
“We could always start meeting at your house. I bet your bathroom, and bed for that matter, is plenty big enough.” He didn’t expect a response to his question, and she didn’t disappoint. Every time he’d mentioned the subject before, she’d ignored him.
“I’m grateful this place has indoor plumbing. I can also tolerate the pet spiders. The mornings are getting nippy though. We might have to give that wood stove a whirl.” She gave her dog, Waffles, a scratch on the head. He was cuddled up on an old rug in front of the stove.
“Just so we’re clear, you don’t have to recite the ‘rules’ every time we get together like I have a kindergarten education. Sex-only is pretty self-explanatory. We meet up three times a week, have a fun time, and then we go about our own business.”
“Do I sense some sarcasm in your tone?” She flicked an eyebrow as she recapped the whiskey bottle they were passing between them last night. “Are you feeling disrespected?”
“Nope. I’m capable of keeping my heart, and dick, in two different lanes.”
“Good news because I really like what we have here.”
A Marriage of Convenience will turn into a Holiday Romance…with a surprise baby.
Sadie Locke has always been great at giving her friends relationship advice, but when it comes to her own love life not so much. That’s why she’s not looking for forever. She and Channing have been secretly carrying on a fling for months, but everything’s about to change. And boy does Santa have his work cut out for him…
Channing Dawson has life just the way he likes it. His business is thriving. And he and Sadie have a no-strings “friendlationship”. What more could a man want? After his brother passed away, he didn’t dare risk loving and losing again. Yet, his heart is speaking a different holiday tune.
Sadie pulls a fast one and makes him her husband. A marriage of convenience or not, the rules are all blurred. He isn’t sure about having a holiday bride, until he realizes he’s had feelings for her all along. Sometimes the risk is worth it all. He could get used to sharing Christmas with her, but does she feel the same? Her secrets, and she has plenty, might ruin any chance they have for a future.
Then he receives the unexpected gift of a lifetime…
About Rhonda Lee Carver
Rhonda Lee Carver is a bestselling author of contemporary western and romantic suspense, but she loves to write other genres too. She’s known for writing stories that keep readers laughing, crying, gripping the edge of their seats, and screaming all in one book…like riding a virtual roller coaster. Whether she’s creating sexy cowboys or tough guys, or sassy, independent heroines, readers are sure to find strong, powerful, memorable characters that are relatable.
By day, she taps into her creative, fictional world but at some point, she transitions back into reality where she’s a volleyball-stands cheerleader, homework virtuoso (at least she thinks so), amateur nurse to skinned knees, mediocre chef with some awesome microwave skills, pet-guru (all the strays show up at her house), and a Jackie of all trades for her kids who are the loves of her life. Yoga and chocolate keep her sane. Hallmark movies require cuddling up with tissues because she can be emotional. She adds a sprinkle of her own real-life adventures in each story she spins because a little truth never hurt anyone. She wouldn’t give up one thing in her crazy, chaotic, ever-amusing life, except, she might do magic tricks for the bungalow on the beach she’s had her eye on (GOALS).
Writing, for Rhonda, is like falling in love and finding a new best friend over and over again. Her characters will find a place inside your heart, too.
The fifth book for Oyster Harbor series was a blast to write. It was my first time writing slightly older characters. We’re talking adult children and emotional baggage on top of the usual relationship problems. I’m happy to say the steam level didn’t go down at all. In fact, Thelma and Tom might be the hottest couple ever in Oyster Harbor!
Thelma’s Song by Afton Locke
historical romance/women’s fiction Release Date: 19 November 20—TODAY!
Order from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BK715P93 Other vendors: https://books2read.com/u/mY8lzW Amazon Oyster Harbor series: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B074CCLCMK
Though her bluesy voice can bring grown men to tears, Thelma Waters moves to Oyster Harbor for a peaceful life—avoiding singing and men. Anything to forget her wild youth as a performer, so addicted to fame she’d do anything to get it. When Tom Lewes—Oyster Harbor’s remaining bigot—hires her as a lounge singer to save his failing restaurant, he stirs up more than her old talent.
His obsession with profits reminds her of every man who used her, especially the one who shattered her heart. Meanwhile, his grief over his daughter’s death intensifies when restaurant renovations uncover a shocking secret. Reminding her of the child she lost so long ago.
And as soon as Oyster Harbor restores what Thelma has craved for so long, her dreams of family are ripped away, turning her song of joy to the bluest of blues. Will Tom be the answer to her prayers, or her biggest heartache yet?
Silence hung between her and Tom, thick and greasy as a lump of lard left out in the summer heat. Frozen, she watched the flush rise up his neck and fill his face. No wonder he served a drink called Red Tide.
What would he do? Break all business ties with her? Or worse? At the moment, she didn’t care what he did. She simply needed to get away from him.
“Miss Waters, don’t ever strike me again,” he said quietly, “or there will be consequences.”
Ignoring the fine trembling working her legs, she took a step closer to him. “What does that mean? Tying me to a tree like poor Jimmy Clark?”
“I never touched a hair on his head,” he shot back.
“You were there. Cali told me everything.” Luckily, Jonathan had reformed.
“Do you want to be punished?” Tom asked. “Because it seems you’re itching for a fight.”
He was right about that. Her fingers ached to throw his sorry ass into the washing machine then iron his face. No need to add starch because he already had plenty.
Instead, she burst into tears. Couldn’t stop. When it came to Letty, she had no strength.
“Easy. Easy,” he muttered, patting her arm. “I didn’t mean to make you cry, for Christ’s sake.”
“Watch your language,” she said between sniffles. “You’re nothing but a heartless heathen. You know that?”
“You’re probably right.” He looped an arm around her shoulders and gave her a little squeeze. “Look, I’m sorry, okay?”
“Letty may mean nothing to you, but today….” Her voice broke. “Today is her eighteenth birthday. Or would have been, if she’s not drawing breath anymore.”
“I didn’t know.”
She turned her head to look at him. The arrogant smirk was gone. His eyes, contrite. The skin below them, puffy.
He stiffened and dropped his hands when she traced a soft fingertip under his lower eyelids. “Wh-what are you doing?”
“You’ve been crying too,” she whispered.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said, turning his face aside.
“I’ve done it enough to know what it looks like. Did my singing do that to you?”
“I suppose,” he said, shrugging. “The one song really— Well, it shook me up, kind of.”
Her legs stopped trembling. She even smiled. “That’s what the blues are supposed to do.”
“I’ve probably been working too hard lately,” he said, giving his shoulders a good shake.
Their gazes met and held. She struggled to look away but failed. Truth was, it felt good to get angry for a change. The sadness wore at her every day. Like sandpaper.
This man knew her sadness. Breathed its same stench. Endured the same tentacles squeezing his heart. Even if he wouldn’t admit it.
Now, her legs simply felt weak. Her entire body did. The performance, topped off by their fiery argument, had taken every bit of her strength. She rested her hands on his shoulders and laid her head against his chest.
His tall, solid frame felt so good. His heart thrumming against her ear, music. It had been so long since she’d been with a man.
A strong finger pressed her jaw and tilted her face up. It was the last thing she recalled before drowning in a tidal wave of hot, deep kissing. Beard stubble—black as his hair—brushed across her cheek. Ground against her neck, along with his open mouth.
Tasting. Sucking. Claiming. Until every nerve ending in her body shrieked with ecstasy.
She drew back, giving her pounding heart a rest before it exploded. “I-I thought we weren’t going to kiss anymore.”
“I guess we changed our minds,” he murmured against her ear.
About Afton Locke
Afton Locke is a USA Today Bestselling Author who writes outside the box. Her trips always inspire her, sometimes years after they’re over. She lives with her husband, usually surrounded by animals, both wild and domestic. When she’s not writing, Afton enjoys hiking, cooking, reading, and watching retro TV.
When I read this line penned in Maya Angelou’s poem, “And Still I Rise,” the inspirational example of a woman like Mary Eliza Mahoney comes to my mind.
Mary was born in the spring of 1845 in Boston Massachusetts to former slaves. They had moved to Boston from North Carolina in search of a better life for themselves and their children.
At age ten, Mary attended the Phillips School, one of the first integrated schools in Boston. By eighteen, she knew she wanted to be a nurse and began working at the New England Hospital for Women and Children. For fifteen years, she acted as janitor, cook, washerwoman, and finally as a nurse’s aide, where she got hands-on experience with the nursing profession. In 1878, at the age of thirty-three, Mary’s diligence and work ethic gained her admittance to the hospital’s professional graduate school for nursing, despite not meeting the age range criteria of being twenty-one to thirty-one. The program, which ran for sixteen months, offered lectures and first-hand experience in the hospital. Of the forty-two students that entered the program in 1878, Mary was one of four to graduate in 1879, making her the first African American in the US to earn a professional nursing license. Due to racial discrimination in the public sphere, Mary worked as a private care nurse, mostly, but not solely, for white wealthy families.
Because the nursing associations she was active in were not always welcoming to blacks, she co-founded the National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses in 1908. The mission of the NACGN was to improve educational access for black women to nursing practices, raise their living standards, and change the poor perception society had of them. It existed until 1951 when it merged with the American Nurses Association.
In 1911, Mary became the director of the Howard Orphanage Asylum for black children in Kings Park, Long Island and served until 1912.
After forty years, she finally retired from nursing but not from advocacy. When the 19th Amendment was ratified in August 1920, Mahoney was among the first women who registered to vote in Boston.
Mary lived until she was eighty and died of breast cancer on January 4, 1926. Ten years later her achievements were honored by having an award named after her to recognize individual nurses or groups of nurses who promote integration in the nursing field. One of those honorees campaigned to have a monument erected in her honor. In 1973, the monument was dedicated at her gravesite. In 1993, Mary was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York.
Many African-Americans, male and female—myself included—are the embodiments of the dreams and hopes of their enslaved ancestors. I’m glad to have learned of the dream and the hope that was Mary Eliza Mahoney.
For a chance at a $10 Amazon gift card, share your thoughts on Mary’s story or on anyone you can think of who paved the way for others.
One Breath Away
Sentenced to hand for a crime she didn’t commit, former slave Mary Hamilton was exonerated at literally the last gasp. She returns to Safe Haven, broken and resigned to live alone. Never having been courted, cuddled or spooned, Mary now fears any kind of physical intimacy when arousal forces her to relive the asphyxiation of her hanging. But then the handsome stranger who saved her shows up, stealing her breath from across the room and promising so much more.
Wealthy freeborn-Black Eban Thurman followed Mary to Safe Haven, believing a relationship with Mary was foretold by the stars. He must marry her to reclaim his family farm. But first he must help her heal, and to do that means revealing his own predilection for edgier sex.
Then just as Eban begins to win Mary’s trust, an enemy from the past threatens to keep them one breath away from love…
Excerpt…
He shouldn’t have agreed to the marriage stipulation, but Judah wouldn’t return the land to a bachelor. At the time marrying hadn’t entered Eban’s mind. Without Nora, he had no desire to leave a legacy anyway. And after sampling women of many races, Eban accepted he’d never marry. Then the stars changed his mind.
He glanced at them now. They shimmered as they had the night of that fateful watch. According to the first mate who swore by astrology, he’d perceived a special celestial alignment for Eban. The stars foretold a coupling resulting from a rescue in which Eban would meet his wife. Having found Mary, Eban knew that prophecy would be fulfilled.
“How could ya have believed ya heritage held no worth for ya without Nora?”
Eban blenched, though he shouldn’t have been surprised his aunt knew where his thoughts had gone and had headed him off at the pass.
He clucked his teeth. “To tell the truth—”
His aunt snorted. “That’d be a nice change.”
Eban frowned, but ignored the barb and continued. “I came home, not to reclaim Heart’s Ease, but to assuage my curiosity. Secretly I’d hoped to find Nora as miserable as I was. Then I met Mary.” Mary. He chuckled. “After meeting her, I see how short-sighted—how Esau-like—I’ve been.”
He glanced up again. “She’ll marry me, Clem. It’s written right there in the sky, and the stars don’t lie.”
Fall is my favorite season. The leaves turn to gorgeous red, orange and yellow. The air grows crisp with the hint of the fading summer during the day, and the cool promise of winter at night.
At the marsh, the Great Blue Heron and other water birds move through the brown reeds in search of food as Canada Geese fly south for the winter.
Along the shoreline, the cries of gulls pierce the air as they glide overhead against the backdrop of the crashing waves.
With colorful leaves gliding to the ground in carefree swirls, squirrels are gathering acorns, carrying them to their nests or burying them before winter arrives.
Peering up from the forest floor, the last few flowers spear through the brown blanket of leaves like nature’s fireworks.
Though busy preparing for the winter, against the fleeting warmth of the day, this fox curls up to enjoy a well-deserved nap. Winter will be here soon, but for now, it’s time to enjoy nature’s beauty at fall.
Contest
***ONE winner will be drawn from everyone who posts on my guest blog post about, ‘Nature’s Beauty at Fall!’ on Delilah’s blog between 13 November 2022 – 20 November 2022 and will win a signed copy of His Woman.”
About Diana Cosby
A retired Navy Chief, Diana Cosby is an international bestselling author of Scottish medieval romantic suspense. Books in her award-winning MacGruder Brothersseries have been translated into five languages. Diana has spoken at the Library of Congress, Lady Jane’s Salon in NYC, and appeared in Woman’s Day, on USA Today’s romance blog, “Happy Ever After,” MSN.com, Atlantic County Women Magazine, and Texoma Living Magazine.
After her career in the Navy, Diana dove into her passion – writing romance novels. With 34 moves behind her, she was anxious to create characters who reflected the amazing cultures and people she’s met throughout the world. After the release of the bestselling MacGruder Brothersseries and The Oath Trilogy, she released the bestselling The Forbidden Series.
Diana looks forward to the years of writing ahead and meeting the amazing people who will share this journey.
Writers, where do you get your ideas? In my just-released workbook, The Novel Workbook for Messy Writers, the whole first section is dedicated to getting ideas. While some experienced novelists probably have long lists of ideas waiting to be written, beginner writers might struggle with this step—the first step, really! That said, I encourage even experienced writers to complete “getting ideas” exercises. It’s a great for stretching and challenging your creative muscles. My workbook suggests numerous ways of generating ideas but one of my favorites is “This Meets That”.
“This Meets That” is similar to something we have in the book business called “comps”. “Comps” is short for comparables, and it refers to what other books that a book under discussion would be compared to. So an author, an agent, a publisher or a reviewer might describe a book thus: “It’s got the sweet romance of Stargirl but in a dystopian setting like Divergent” (I would read this!) Sometimes comps are simply expressed like “It’s X meets Y” or “part X and part Y”. When I was agent hunting, I described my young adult sci-fi, Zero Repeat Forever, as “Part Terminator and part Beauty and the Beast”. My publisher describes it as “The 5th Wave meets Beauty and the Beast”. But one of my favorite ways to describe it has always been “Twilight meets Terminator”!
