Romantic tie-up

Focus
http://www.bworldonline.com/Weekender042409/main.php?id=focus2
BY JEFFREY O. VALISNO, Senior Reporter

Romantic tie-up

When the Filipino romance pocketbook line Precious Hearts Romances started in 1991, it started with just 50 copies of one title. The pocketbook's publisher, Segundo Matias, Jr. of the publishing company Precious Pages Corp., made the delivery himself to an outlet in the Ever-Gotesco Grand Central Mall in Kalookan City. "In three days, all the 50 copies sold out," Mr. Matias told BusinessWorld in an interview last Wednesday. "That is when we knew we had something big on our hands," he said.

Now, the Precious Hearts Romances line of pocketbooks has more than 6,000 titles, with more than 30 million copies sold to date, making it one of the most successful Filipino romance novel series.

And very soon its stories will be told on the small screen.

The novels are sold not only in the publishing company's 16 stand-alone stores in SM Malls nationwide, as well as in most branches of National Book Store, but also in major cities around the world which have a large concentration of Filipino migrant workers, including Hong Kong and Singapore.

From just four titles per month, Precious Hearts Romances now releases 40-60 titles per month. All are eagerly awaited by their avid readers, predominantly females.

Ask Mr. Matias what made Precious Hearts Romances a hit, and he will say it is about the quality of the stories they select for publication. "We strive to come up with pocketbooks that provides the right emotion to the readers. The stories are thrilling, romantic, and heart-warming," he said in Filipino.

Edith Garcia, Precious Hearts Romances editor-in-chief, explained the formula of local romance novels. "Boy meets girl. Boy gets girl. Boy loses girl. Boy gets girl again," she told BusinessWorld in an interview. "All romance novels basically follow this same formula. It is what happens in between-the details, the creative exposition and characterization that sets great novels like ours apart from the rest," she added.

Ms. Garcia said Precious Hearts Romances is very strict in approving manuscripts for publication. Vulgarity, and profanity is strictly prohibited even under the guise of creativity, she said. "Our stories can be naughty at times, but never vulgar," she said. She added that as the editor-in-chief, she is always on the look out for plagiarism, since there are those who submit manuscripts based on Mills and Boon, or Harelequin Romance novels.

Writers whose stories get pass the scrutiny of Ms. Garcia (and her team of 10 female editors) are rewarded handsomely. Mr. Matias said Precious Hearts Romances attract the best writers because it is known for paying well. New writers receive between P6,000-P7,000 per approved manuscript, while more established writers, as well as Precious Hearts Romances exclusive writers, get as much as P20,000.

The standard 128-page Precious Hearts Romances paperback costs P37 each. Special editions cost as much as P109 each. These seem pricey, compared to the other Filipino romance pocketbooks available in wet markets, which are available for as little as P12 each. "We learned that the manuscripts that we reject get published by other companies and sold for P12," she said. Ms. Garcia, however, discourages readers from buying the cheaper pocketbooks. "Have you seen them? They are full of typographical errors!" she said.

Mr. Matias said most of romance novel writers are females, with male writers adapting female pseudonyms. "We tried before to introduce novels with male writers, but readers just do not buy them," he said. "I guess it is because most of our readers are female, and they think they could identify better with a novel written by a female," he added.

He said among the best-selling authors of Precious Hearts Romances is Martha Cecilia. Ms. Garcia said that among their current writers, two are males writing under female pseudonyms.

"Sometimes kasi, there are things that men find corny, but those things are actually the things that women like," Ms. Garcia said. "Our male writers, perhaps, are very attuned to their feminine side [so] that they understand what women want, and how women think," she added.

Ms. Garcia said that based on a survey they recently conducted among their readers, more than 90% are females. "There are also males who read our romance novels, probably because they want to get some tips on how to deal with women," she said.

She added that 56% of the readers of Precious Hearts Romances are professionals, dispelling perceptions that Filipino pocket books are only for the less educated. "Our readers are nurses, bank tellers, office employees, OFWs," she said.

Because of their readership, Ms. Garcia said Precious Hearts Romances are written with the perspective of the female heroine. And of course, a happy ending is a requirement. "It will not be a romance novel without a happy ending," she said.

The popularity of Precious Hearts Romances did not go unnoticed - media giant ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corp. is translating the stories for TV.

Laurenti M. Dyogi, ABS-CBN business unit head, explained that he first came to know Precious Hearts Romances last year when he got hold of one pocketbook while he was in Europe for auditions for season 2 of the TV show Pinoy Big Brother.

"That is when I discovered that the pocketbooks are very interesting. They have stories that are very Pinoy," he said in a recent press conference.

Immediately after he returned from Europe, he broached the idea to ABS-CBN executives. After the idea got the green light, Mr. Dyogi began negotiations with Mr. Matias, who previously worked for ABS-CBN as a writer.

"We were asked before to have our stories featured in a TV show, but we declined before because those behind the production did not want to read the books. They just want a synopsis from us," Mr. Matias explained. "That is not the case with Direk Lauren [Mr. Dyogi.] He really made sure that those involved in the production will read the books so they would understand the stories better," he added.

The TV show Precious Hearts Romances Presents will premiere on May 4, 3:30 p.m. on ABS-CBN Channel 2. The program will take over the time slot of the drama series Pieta, which will end on May 1.

For its first offering, Precious Hearts Romances Presents will feature The Bud Brothers series of pocketbooks, written by best-selling romance author Rose Tan. It is about eight college fraternity brothers who put up a business, the Bud Brothers Flower Farm, and the quirky yet gorgeous women these men fall for.

"Romance readers can expect the same flavor of fun and romance they've read in the pocketbooks to be translated on screen," Mr. Dyogi said.

To ensure the success of the new TV show, ABS-CBN has tapped top-notch directors Jerry Lopez-Sineneng, and Cathy Garcia-Molina. Ace scriptwriters Mel Mendoza-del Rosario, Michiko Yamamoto, and Jose Javier Reyes were selected to make the pocketbook stories come alive on TV. Chosen to appear on The Bud Brother series are ABS-CBN's hottest stars including Jake Cuenca, Cristine Reyes, John Pratts, and Mariel Rodriguez. "We want afternoon TV viewing to be light and romantic, not overly dramatic," Mr. Dyogi said.