Eeek! Exciting!

At last the day has come when the New Voices competition is up and running, with a very glamorous and gorgeous website, just waiting to be filled with glamorous and gorgeous first chapters. If you have one tucked away inside your computer, now's the time to expose it to daylight, print it out (because mistakes are always a million times more noticeable on paper for some reason), give it a polish and then get it posted. What have you got to lose?


On the same subject, this Thursday sees my contribution to the search for Mills & Boon’s next signing with a special library event in which you can (hopefully) find out the highs, lows, facts, figures, dos and don’ts you need to know about writing for the world’s best-loved romance publisher. The cupcakes are ordered, the library ladies are prepared, and there are even a couple of spaces left (At least there were on Friday – you can check by phoning Nantwich library 01270 375361. But don’t put it off, in the manner of uber-procrastinator me, because they were down to the last few tickets!)

If you’re coming to the event from out of the area and don’t know your way around do drop me an email (via website mailbox) and I’ll get back to you with Useful Info. (How hard it can be to find your way around a town the size of the average B&Q superstore I don't know. But email me anyway!)

All Good Things Come To An End...

...including the summer holidays and my Balfour Competition. After our final trip (involving much excitement, planes, trains, an A-List celebrity, Abby Green, unflattering clothes, Natalie Rivers, a shopping centre and Heidi Rice, amongst other things - more details at some point in the future) all girls are back at school today and the house is quiet. So messy it looks like hundreds of teenagers broke in and held a rave here while we were away, but quiet. You can't have everything.

Last night, in between searching for pens that work, hockey socks, Jane Eyre and ties, the daughters picked out the names of ten people who will be receiving copies of Emily's Innocence. Thanks to everyone who contacted me - wish I could send out copies to you all, but well done Caroline, Kelly, Kristy, Amanda G, Amanda C, Peggy, Jane, Denise, Jayne and Jacqueline. If you left your address I'll get your book in the post today, if you didn't I'll be emailing!

And at some point, I'm going to get my (mysteriously wider) ass into the White Chair of Creativity and write. And write and write and write...

Gah!

Nipping off to squeeze the last bit of fun out of the summer holidays at an indecent hour tomorrow morning - did intend to pick out names and get books sent off before we went, but got a bit sidetracked by the Great Washing and Packing Challenge. Which means there's still a couple more days to drop me an email with the number of Balfour girls and your address. I'll choose ten winners when I get back!

Balfour Legacy, part 2.

It’s only August and there’s still a week left of the summer holidays, but today is one of those crisp, blue-sky apple scented mornings that leaves you in no doubt that autumn is sneaking up on you. Going outside before the daughters emerge from their beds I was so captivated by the dewy lushness of the garden that I felt sorry for Muffin, banged up in his hutch, and opened the door so he could lollop around. An hour later, realizing that he’s breakfasted extravagantly on the lettuces my husband planted out at the weekend I’m not sure that this was such a good idea. Muffin however, has tasted freedom as well as twenty one romaine lettuces and has no intention of giving himself up. Oh dear. Garden will look a good deal less lush tomorrow morning.

Anyway, moving away from Muffin’s Guilt and back to Emily’s Innocence - a big thank you to everyone who’s mailed so far with the answer to the question. It took a while to get my author copies, but when I did I got quite a few so I’m going to pick out ten names to send books to. If you are leaving an answer on the website, perhaps you could also leave your postal address too, to save time if yours is one of the names picked out (If you’ve already left your answer without an address don’t worry!)

It might seem a bit odd that I’m blogging about the background to this book when the plot and the characters came from an outline rather than from my own head. However, although the process of writing a book for a continuity series is very different from writing one in the ordinary run of things, it requires a HUGE amount of creative thinking to bring the characters to life and make them move naturally along the path carved out for them. I’ve said elsewhere that it feels like writing backwards. Usually I start with characters and flesh them out enough so that they themselves dictate the course of the action through their responses and choices, however, in a continuity you already know (broadly) what’s going to happen. You just have to make it work, and this means doing an awful lot of reading between the lines and thinking in the bath.

This was the first time I’ve ever created a fictional kingdom in one of my books, and it was huge fun. The only information I was given about Santosa was that it was ‘a small island principality off the coast of Brazil’, so the rest was up to me. A lovely couple of hours of cyber-tourism led me to the island of Fernando de Noronha and this became the inspiration for Santosa.






The view from exclusive Santosan restaurant,
The Purple Parrot...












...And the scene upon which Luis looks down

as he flies Emily home from the ballet on the mainland

And the beach where Luciana's birthday party was held, with 'Rico's monument'...

I’ve blogged before (over at Nalini Singh’s blog *shameless namedrop*) about the way fairy tales have a habit of working their way into my books, and the story that echoed through this one was Red Riding Hood. It appeared from nowhere on the first page of the prologue, then dissolved into thin air again, only to resurface as the sexual tension mounted. I was a bit surprised by this, as it’s not a story in which I’d ever identified any strong romantic elements (unlike Beauty and the Beast, or Cinderella – both of which have influenced previous books) but I when I came to think about it, it was the darker aspects – fears of being powerless, preyed upon, devoured – which were relevant here. I had an image in my head while I was writing – a very precisely remembered illustration from a fairy tale book I had as a child, of endless tall black trees and a slender figure in a billowing scarlet cloak running through them (I wish I could find it now), and this totally informed the build up to the love scene between Luis and Emily. I love it when that kind of random-thought thing happens and guides the writing.

The other thing that forms the backdrop of a book is the music I listen to while I'm writing. Breakaway by Kelly Clarkson (pinched from daughter #2's itunes account) was Emily's theme song, while the mighty King's of Leon's Use Somebody was Luis's. Other songs on the playlist included All Saints Pure Shores (for its beachy Santosan vibe) Tiny Dancer (for obvious reasons) and a couple of songs by a band called Dexter Freebish Kate Hardy drew my attention to a couple of years ago now. And assorted other odd things that must have made sense at the time, at a particular stage of the book but haven't been given much of an ipod airing since (Stronger anyone? Didn't think so... It's a strange business, writing.)

I think the only other thing to say about writing this book was how fab it was to be working alongside other authors - both from a fangirl point of view, but also because of the support we gave each other. I was in regular, hand-holding contact with Kate Hewitt and Carole Mortimer and Sharon Kendrick and it really did make the whole thing seem like quite an adventure. The best bit of which is now, when I get to actually read the books I got such tantalising glimpses into back then! (Am currently LOVING Sharon's book, Kat's Pride. Kat is a fantastic heroine. And as for Carlos... *fans self* Off to read more...)

Keep those competition answers coming and I'll pick out names at the weekend!

The Balfour Legacy: Emily's Innocence

Okaaaay... Have done the arduous ‘back to school’ shopping trip for uniform and shoes and am beginning to make headway with the washing landslide, which means that there’s nothing to stop me finally getting around to doing the long-postponed post about my contribution to the Balfour series. Well, nothing apart from three daughters lounging untidily and noisily around the house and a book that’s demanding to be written, but the pile of author copies currently cluttering up my desk is ruining the otherwise zen-like minimalism of my workspace (ha!) and I really need to re-home them before I can apply myself properly to Kit and Sophie. So, I'm hiding out in my bedroom with tea, toast and my laptop to bring you the lowdown on writing Emily's Innocence. Listen carefully, there'll be questions at the end!


When my editor first mentioned the idea of the Balfour series to me I was a pathetically easy-sell. ‘Big English country house… wealthy patriarch… wives, mistresses… eight daughters…’ ‘I’ll do it.’

I knew straight away that this was going to be exactly my kind of book, and I was even more excited when I got ‘the bible’ – a booklet detailing all the background, characters and story outlines for each of the sisters – through the post. Flicking through, finding the story that had my name on it and starting to read about Emily and Luis was a real heart-racing, hand-trembling moment because, in spite of my eagerness to be involved in the series there was a worry lurking in the dark recesses of my mind that I just wouldn’t connect with the story or characters I’d been given.

But the moment I read the phrase ‘incorrigible playboy bachelor’ I knew everything was going to be alright. As someone who has veered helplessly towards serious, tormented heroes in the past it felt like an absolute gift to be presented with the task of creating a shameless playboy and I started writing with great enthusiasm. Luis quickly sprang to life on the page with his sarcastic asides and wisecracking one-liners and I adored writing the bits with him in it. OK, let’s be honest – I just adored him. Here’s the face I based him on…

However, it was when I got to about the halfway mark in the book that I suddenly hit a wall and realized that, much as I was having a ball creating a wicked, unapologetically shallow hero with his mind permanently below his waist (or that of any passing beauty) I’d actually pretty much neglected to the ‘hero’ part of his job description. I’d always aimed to develop depth to him through the action of the book, but the way I’d written him that journey was simply going to be too long to accomplish in 250 pages! So, after a long and increasingly excited conversation with my editor one day I put down the phone and went back to the start, introducing a darker edge to Luis’s character and a more powerful motivating force behind his behaviour. The original story outline in 'the bible' specified that his older brother had died, leaving Luis as the reluctant heir to the Santosan throne. By taking that a step further and making Luis indirectly responsible (or so he sees it) for Rico’s death it opened up a whole goldmine of emotion for me to romp about in. (India Grey's Obvious Tip for Aspiring Writers – give yourself enough material to work with and it makes the whole business of getting words on the page a great deal easier!)

As for Emily, the outline specified that she was the adored baby of the family, ‘however, the indulgence of her father and her sisters has not ruined her character – she remains down-to-earth, beautiful and good, a stronger version of her graceful, kind-hearted mother.’ I have to admit when I read that my heart sank a little as it can be a challenge to create a heroine who is virtuous and sweet without making her come across like the annoying class swot. However, I decided Luis was my secret weapon here. He's exactly the kind of person who would address this head-on and voice all those issues directly, forcing Emily to confront the possiblity that her irreproachable values and high moral standards are just hypocrisy and naivite in disguise. Introducing this alternative perspective on Emily’s character early on made her feel more human to me, and from that point on I really bonded with her. Here’s how I pictured her…

It was in email conversations with Natalie Rivers and Michelle Styles that I explored the importance of ballet in relation to Emily's character, and it threw up some interesting points. Emily is regarded as a brilliant dancer, which implies a certain ease with her own body and openness to physical expression, yet these were the very things that her uptight character struggled with most. Call me sadistic, but I like to see a character struggle, and so it was this discrepancy which formed the core of Emily's conflict and the basis for her journey. Who better than louche, sexy Luis to help her overcome her inhibition?

So, that's a little introduction to the characters... come back on Thursday when I'll be talking about the background, setting and inspiration behind the story. In the meantime I'd like to make some inroads into this pile of author copies and send out the neat postcards I've had made. For a chance to get one email me via the website (there's a link somewhere over there <--- but it's got a bit lost amongst all the other stuff) and answer this simple question: How many Balfour sisters are there? (You can find the answer in the above ramble if you look closely enough!)

Some things I would blog about if I had time to blog...

• Books I’ve read recently
  Particularly Abby Green’s Breaking the Sheikh's Rules, which has gone right into my top ten Modern/Presents books somewhere around the number one slot thanks to a combination of a really sexy hero, the most appealing and adorable heroine and the kind of setting that makes me sigh with nostalgic satisfaction. I’m not usually a huge fan of sheikh books for all sorts of reasons, but this one hooked me in on page one with its lush Irish backdrop and the horses – there was something about it that whizzed me right back to the first Mills & Boon books I ever read as a teenager and reminded me exactly why I fell in love with them. I’ve also just finished Michelle Reid’s Balfour book – Mia’s Scandal, which features another really fabulous, memorable heroine. It was - predictably - gorgeously written, pacy, sexy and satisfying, as well as being really interesting to see bits of the wider Balfour puzzle slotting into place, and find characters I’d got to know pretty well pop up in a different setting. Made me want to go back and re-visit my Balfour book, so it’s pretty convenient that…

• My author copies finally arrived!
  Emily and Luis are in the building. I, however, will not be for much longer as we are about to go on holiday, making it extremely bad timing to blog in detail about the book and do a contest. Gah! Will get to it when we get home again, but in the meantime, talking of contests…
  
  
• Mills & Boon’s New Voices Contest has just been launched.
  If you have ever harboured any ambition to write for the world’s biggest and best-loved romance publisher this is a fab chance to give it a go. My take on it is that it’s not so much about winning an i-pad or an editor – though one lucky, talented person is going to wake up with an almighty champagne hangover at the end of it all – but about being given that crucial little push to start putting your dreams in motion. I often wonder how long it would have taken me to stop faffing around and finding excuses if Penny Jordan hadn’t told me to go away and write a chapter and send it to her within two weeks, so if you’re an uber-procrastinator like me you can look on this as your call to action. Start writing over the summer, ready to put something up on the website in September (under a pseudonym if you’re shy) and take advantage of a whole lot of free and honest critiquing. (Which might hurt, but will be a taste of things to come if you get accepted!) And tied into the contest is...

• The event I’m doing at Nantwich Library on September 9th.
  I’m doing away with the workshop thing and am going for a much more relaxed, informal discussion on Everything You Need to Know About Writing a Mills & Boon Romance (And Possibly Several Things That You Don’t) so Nantwich Library is the place to be if you have burning questions about lines, love scenes, layering conflict, or anything else – even if it doesn’t begin with ‘L’. I'd really love to see you, if you're remotely thinking of coming. (I think you need to phone the library to book places - details are here on the romance is not dead website.) I’m fully intending to max up the girly afternoon tea opportunity, and am really looking forward to doing my first M&B event on home turf, in the library where I used to spend Saturday mornings sitting on the mustard-coloured scratchy carpet reading The Wild Swans (my absolute favourite book for years – I borrowed it so many times I don’t know why my mum didn’t just buy me a copy for Christmas. Sniff.) Anyway, on the subject of home turf, daughters 1 and 2 came with me last week to the launch of…

• An exhibition in our local (gem of a) museum entitled Nantwich People Past and Present. Penny Jordan and I are both included, along with a surprising amount of interesting and inspiring people for such a tiny rural market town. I am in a corner, nose to nose with Isabella Blow. And not many people can say that.

First I do Christmas and then I conquer the world....

The one good thing about having a party on the 18th December is that it forces you to tidy away all the clutter beforehand, and give the house a thorough cleaning afterwards. Spent much of Saturday washing sofa covers and scrubbing the kitchen (don't ask) with the result that everywhere is now looking unnaturally tidy, gleaming and like the home of someone who is in control of the whole Christmas juggernaut.

Of course, this is all a complete illusion, but at least after a last frantic shopping day yesterday the daughters are roughly equal in present terms. This is an annual challenge; balancing the number of parcels to be unwrapped with both the 'wow factor' and the amount spent, and having three girls makes it particularly challenging. Choosing sparkly fripperies that are equal in charm and value and yet still distinctly original and well-suited to the daughter in question requires a range of skills that you could only possibly hope to find if you melted together the brains of a management accountant, a psychologist, Kofi Anan and one of those style journalists who do annoying London-centric shopping features in Sunday magazines.

Anyway, in the midst of all this it's been fabulous to discover that so many people took the time out of their own festive preparations to answer the competiton question for a chance to win a copy of Powerful Italian Penniless Housekeeper (and it's also been gorgeous to get your messages in the emails too.) The daughters picked two winners each from an empty Quality Street box, and the names that came out are... Peggy, Jacqueline, Kelly, Jayne H, Sri and Susan. I'll email you later to get addresses and put the books in the post (where they'll no doubt spend a quiet Christmas, but hopefully arrive soon after.)

Am now off to look for something to give the children for breakfast. This year I very cunningly booked my Sainsburys online shop well in advance and felt enormously smug and in control. However, when it was delivered on Sunday I remembered that I'd only ordered bizarre seasonal items like dill sauce, mini-sausages-wrapped-in-bacon and 300 lemons and there isn't a box of Cheerios in sight.

(I wonder what toast and brandy butter is like?)

And the Winner is...

I’ve been so busy trying to get myself organized for my annual trip to London for the Mills & Boon Authors’ Lunch (and the associated glamorous revelry that goes on with it) that there hasn’t been a moment to announce that the winner of the Spanish Aristocrat Forced Bride competition is Lesley, with Johanna as a runner-up. Congratulations ladies, and I’ll get prizes in the post early next week on my return from the Big Smoke.

Once again this year Abby Green and I shall be setting up our Campaign Headquarters in a shared hotel room with a well-stocked mini bar. Over the next few days I am looking forward to…

• Applying my butterfly mind (too easily distracted here by the internet, the laundry pile, the telephone, the writing on the back of the cereal packets) to my New Book for the entire length of the train journey and then boring Abby Green with the plot dilemmas.
  
• Seeing Abby and Natalie Rivers and Christina Hollis and Michelle Styles and the Kates (Hardy and Walker) and Carole Mortimer and Sabrina Phillips and Sharon Kendrick and Penny Jordan and Chantelle Shaw and EVERYONE!
  
• Having hotel-room biscuits in bed for breakfast. With a hangover.
  
• Meeting my editor for afternoon tea tomorrow.
  
• Not having to decide what’s for dinner
  
• Wearing make-up and posh underwear (ie not faded, elastic-less or more than 5 years old)
  
• Not having to get up in time for the school run
  
• Coming home and hugging the daughters. And Him. Because no matter how much fun it is to go away, that’s always one of the best bits.

Back next week with a full report!

Where did THAT week go?

Sorry, have been absent much longer than I intended, due to a combination of post-fabulous-weekend-exhaustion, an avalanche of washing and the last minute frenzied panic of getting the children back to school. The headlines are that my team didn’t bring home the wooden spoon this year (no thanks to me, of course) and that the fancy dress was riotously funny. You can’t ever really say you know your own brothers until you’ve seen them in wigs and dresses, I’d say. We were predictably poor at taking photos, but as soon as those from more organized members of the family filter through I’ll post a selection of edited highlights. One magical moment we did manage to capture was the bit on Sunday night when my Auntie Moira (who has always had an incredible talent for making things feel special and leaving a trail of fairy dust everywhere she goes) gave us all fire lanterns, and we made a wish as we lit them and watched them drift up through the night sky and float high over the dark fields like glowing stars, or very languid comets. It’s a scene that will no doubt go in a book one day, but in the meantime is safely stored in my mental box of Gorgeous Memories.

Anyway, back to business and I find myself thwarted at every turn. Not only have my author copies STILL not shown up, but with the children out of the way at school I’ve been trying to put together a post with Tristan and Lily’s playlist, only to discover that copyright law now prevents it. (See those playlist things over there <-- ?? Purely decorative now, it seems.) Like all authors I’m all in favour of anything that stops the free distribution of stuff people have sweated blood, neglected their children and given up sleep to produce so I’m not grumbling about this at all, but I could have done without the hours of mind-numbing internet searching I’ve endured trying to work out if I can post stuff here that I’ve bought from i-tunes. The answer, I believe, is no but if anyone knows different do get in touch! I adored this playlist way too much not to share it—it’s my favourite of them all by miles, largely because it naturally fit the book so damned well. If you’ve read Tristan and Lily's story you might like to check out some of these songs…. Tonight and the Rest of my Life—Nina Gordon (The mood of this inspired the first chapter to such a degree that a couple of lines are spookily similar. See if you can spot them!)

Gravity of Love—Enigma (Chapter Two… It even mentions a dove!)

Remember When it Rained—Josh Groban (Lily remembers waking up in the night with Tristan.)

This Woman’s Work—Kate Bush. (Tristan’s regrets as he watches Lily sleeping in the hospital in Barcelona.)

My Immortal-- Evanescence and Breathe Me—Sia (Lily struggles to come to terms with what she’s lost.)

9 Crimes—Damien Rice (Loving each other/destroying each other. Sigh. Gorgeous song.)


Now all that I need to do, if everyone hasn’t passed out from extreme apathy while waiting, is post the question. It’s been so long since I began all this that I suspect ‘What is the title of the book I’ve been rambling on about?’ might be a good one, but instead I’m asking for the names of Tristan and Lily’s best friends. (First names only will do—you’ll find them in the post from 24th August, below.) Email me via the website, and I’ll pick out a winner a week today and send them (hopefully) one of the elusive copies of the book, some of my favourite L’Occitane soap from where Lily gets her ‘milk and honey’ fragrance, and some other bits and pieces.

There, now you see I’ve finally got round to finishing this off, and now I’ve gone and mentioned the website. And that’s a whole new chapter on my Things To Do list. (Buries head in hands and weeps.)

Christmas Cracker number Seven!!

Haved just waved the children off to school with Him in charge, (laden down with badly wrapped presents for teachers, long overdue dinner money and reply slips for 47 letters from the last half term) and have now retreated back into the warm to drink tea and watch trashy TV, with the totally legitimate excuse that I'm awaiting a call from a journalist for a telephone interview. Definitely feel that I have the better deal here, which has provoked a guilty awareness that, for all my moaning about the shortcomings of the domestic male in general and my own specimen in particular, this is actually quite often the case.

I'm not just thinking about his services as spider exterminator and putter-up of shelves, but about the bigger stuff too, like the fact that he kept the faith (and-- more to the point-- kept me) during the long years when I was writing lots and earning nothing. He brings me cups of tea and glasses of wine (according to time of day/level of desperation) while I wrestle with deadlines and listens endlessly (or at least makes and effort to look like he's listening) as I try to work out plot twists and character motivation. He graciously puts up with my enthusiasm for searching out new hero material, and my unrestrained and voiciferous appreciation of certain character prototypes (James D'Arcy/Orlando) So, in view of all that, and since today is our sixteenth Wedding Anniversary I thought that today's Christmas Cracker really ought to be Him.

Us on our wedding day-- December 19th 1854 (or does it just seem that long ago?)

(...and here we are later, in a spooky foreshadowing of Things To Come, doing our very own version of a Mills & Boon cover shot...)

In other news, tonight-- right after we heft the giant Christmas tree in from the garden and watch the children decorate the bottom left hand corner of it-- I'm going to draw a winner for my half of the competition Kate Hewitt and I have been running, so if you haven't done so yet, leave a comment to be included! (If I don't do it soon I'm going to give into the temptation to keep the sweet little Hultquist necklace I bought the other day, which would be very Wrong of me.)

More Christmas Totty (aka Christmas Cracker number Five)

Today He has taken the day off work and we’re going to nail Christmas once and for all. At least that’s what He thinks, because he has no conception of the enormity of the job nor how short the school day actually is. Shall no doubt return home later with repetitive strain injury from handing the credit card over so often and the threat of acrimonious divorce hanging over us.

However, in the midst of all that I’m also planning to buy something suitably sparkly and Christmassy as a prize for the contest Kate Hewitt and I are running together. Anyone who leaves a comment this week will automatically be entered—keep your random thoughts about what makes a man irresistible coming! (I'd much rather be applying my mind to that issue than to whether the turkey I've ordered will fit in my oven.)

In the meantime here's today's Christmas Cracker for your attention, ladies...

(PS-- sincere apologies to anyone who's awaiting an email from me. I've got horribly behind on everything but will catch up soon, I hope.) (Cue the sound of hollow laughter...)

Christmas Cracker Number Two, and a competition!

After a busy few days of family and friends and endless hours spent on sleet-lashed motorways I’m struggling to catch up on ordinary life. Whoever thought it was a good idea to go away the weekend before the busiest week of the school year? Oh yes, that would be Him then.

Kate Hewitt is way ahead of me in bringing you news of the joint competition we’re holding. Both of us are at the point of embarking on new books, so we’re asking you to tell us about the kind of settings and heroes you like best. This follows neatly on from the ‘hot hero’ discussion we had here a couple of weeks ago, so leave your top tips for melting men here (ooh—check me out—I’ve gone all alliterative) and your favourite fantasy settings on Kate’s blog and we’ll each draw a winner next week. (And who knows—the combination may just end up being a book waiting to be written, in which case Kate and I will have an undignified wrangle over who gets to do it...) You don’t necessarily have to supply names of specific individuals for the hero (unless you want to) but now’s your chance to throw in any physical attributes, personality traits, mannerisms, values, nationalities, family circumstances even particular professions that you love reading about and which help to create a man who turns your knees to water.

Talking of which, here’s Christmas Cracker number two. (BIG sigh.)

The only clip I could find of this on youtube is dubbed in Spanish, but I watched it about 3 times before I noticed because unsurprisingly, I wasn’t listening to the words. I want to go to an office Christmas party and I want a dress like that and I want Rodrigo Santoro to be there. And I want to leave my mobile phone in the taxi on the way home.

Late again!

Sorry about that. A combination of guinea pigs, chocolate cake, ironing and a hot scene with my hero and heroine in a ruined tower at twilight conspired to keep me away from the blog yesterday. I did however manage to wake up in time to do the early morning phone interview with City Talk radio, which you can listen to here. (scroll down to Tuesday, and click on the breakfast show link. It's an hour and five minutes into the programme.) Hmm. The question ‘Is your pseudonym as important as the stories you write?’ was a particular low point for me, but then I had missed the bit at the beginning where they were sniggering over passages from Harlequin books...

Ah well. On a more positive note, I’ve finally got around to picking some winners for Orlando and Rachel’s competiton. Big congratulations to Crystal, who daughter #1 picked (out of a cereal packet, which was the most convenient thing to put the names in at the time!) as the first prize winner. Runners up prizes go to Amy, Trenda and Jane, so I’ll email everyone soon to find out addresses for sending goodies. Thanks again to everyone who entered!

School's Out!

The house is littered with cereal box models, folders of artwork and improbably numerous bits of PE kit, all of which I've been trying to process before we go away tomorrow. The children are in expansive holiday mood-- inviting friends for tea and for sleepovers at every opportunity and making regular stealthy raids on fridge and biscuit tin which would earn the respect of any one of Michelle Styles's Viking heroes.

Talking of which, I finished Viking Warrior Unwilling Wife on Friday when my husband was away-- which was good, because he does have an irritating habit of looking at me every three seconds when I'm coming to the end of a book I've raved about and saying 'Are you crying yet?' It's a fabulous story-- a beautiful, tender romance between two fantastically well-drawn characters, but also an edge-of-the-seat adventure. The emotional journey of the hero and heroine is set against a real journey which is fraught with dangers, and which challenges each of them to re-examine the things they thought they knew. I love Michelle's writing voice so much, and I particularly love the voice she gives to her characters-- the dialogue in this book is fast-paced and wry and totally credible, and made it very, very easy to fall in love with Vikar. (Even without the pervasive images of his green eyes, and the most beautifully depicted love scene in a cave. A cave with a waterfall. Oh yes.... Heaven can wait....) I was hopelessly slow in getting to reading this one, which came out in June. If like me you haven’t read it yet, make sure you put it in your suitcase this holiday!

So, today is packing and excitement-management day. Last night, sprawled on the sofa amid the chaos of waterproofs and fishing nets, drinking wine and wistfully watching gorgeous Francesco wander around the Parthenon we did feel fleetingly lazy and ashamed for not whisking the children off somewhere exotic and mind-broadening this summer. They, however, are boiling over with excitement at going back to the same place we go to every year and are busy writing lists of the order in which they want to do the usual things: the beach with the fossils, the beach where we always barbeque, fish and chips in the harbour and crabbing from the rocks. Last year we were lucky enough to be on a deserted beach when the Red Arrows were doing a display across the bay, so a repeat of that is featuring heavily on wishlists too. Mine included. I’d just finished writing Mistress Hired for the Billionaire’s Pleasure then, and was madly in love with Orlando, so to see the RAF in all their dashing glory was quite something.



This year I’m still deeply involved in the middle of a book, which isn’t quite so ideal in theory, but I’m actually really looking forward to having some time away from the non-stop madness here just to think and get to know my characters better. I'm crazy about the hero already, and it’s a bit like being a teenager again, marking the summers by different crushes. Way back then it was the summer of the Surf Instructor, or the summer of the Gorgeous Blond Boy in the Year Above; now it’s the summer of the RAF hero, or-- this year-- the summer of the Spanish Duke. It’s just as well I have a very understanding husband.

I'll be back in a week and a bit to pick a competition winner for my ever-expanding box of treats (to which an Audio CD of Sara Craven's Wife Against her Will, read by the lovely Michael Praed has just been added. Remember him? I used to pass interminable chemistry lessons dreaming of him, so I actually remember him a lot better than the periodic table, or how to balance an equation. That probably explains a lot...)

DAY FOUR

Somehow it’s Friday, which means that we’ve reached the part where I get to share the music that I was listening to when I wrote Orlando and Rachel’s story. (It also means I get to lie in the bath tonight with a glass of wine and finish Michelle Styles’s Viking Warrior Unwilling Wife, but more of that next week!)

I hope you’ve noticed the rather glitzy little playlist I’ve added down there on my sidebar, which has on it a few of the most significant tracks for the book. This was a story that really seemed to lend itself to lots of music—I suppose quite naturally, since Rachel was a musician; certainly lots of the songs on the playlist are very piano-y. I had my ipod on constantly while I was writing, and kept finding more songs which fitted the story and the mood. However, the ones over there on the left were the core ones that inspired me and put me instantly into the world of the book (and still do, whenever I hear them!)

The Michael Nyman piece from The Piano soundtrack was the tune I had on when I was writing the bit where Rachel runs away, and Chopin’s beautiful Nocturne in E minor plays a very significant role in the story, so undoubtedly earned its place on the playlist. Butterflies and Hurricanes by Muse and Vindicated by Dashboard Confessional were Orlando’s anthems, perfectly communicating his iron self-control, and his bitterness and anger. I hardly expected to find a track which suited Rachel so spookily, but about halfway through the book I heard the Shakira song The One and literally felt a shiver run down my spine. I’d just written a scene where Rachel is attempting to overcome her lack of domestic skill and cook dinner for Orlando. The words ‘So I learn to cook and finally lose My kitchen phobia,’ brought a very wide smile to my face...

So, the final question is this: What instrument does Rachel play professionally?
(There’s a bit of a clue on the cover of the book, if you can make out what it is. I still think it looks like they’re standing by a broken down car...)

Here’s a quick recap of the other three questions...
What is Orlando’s profession at the start of the book?
What is Rachel’s signature scent?
What is the name of Orlando’s ancestral home?
And finally... 4. What instrument does Rachel play professionally?

• 
  

Email me here with the answers and I’ll pick a winner when we get back from holiday on August 3rd. I have three signed copies of the book to send to runners up, and I’m still adding to my box of goodies for the winner, which so far includes...

One of these (smuggled out) from the centenary exhibition...

Some perfumed goodies from L'Occitane in Rachel's favourite scent....
A signed one of these....


And, obviously, a substantial amount of this...

DAY THREE— and an apology!

OK, so technically I’m not posting this on Day Three at all. Day Three turned out to be one of those days that makes you feel by about lunchtime like your head is in danger of exploding, and the only way of averting this would be a week in a spa in the Maldives with James D’Arcy/Henry Cavill/Just about anyone who isn’t a blood relative. Day Three began at 5.30am and finished sometime in the early hours, and involved a school trip (daughter #3 and me as a helper) a party, and the provision of cakes for 28 children (daughter #2 and class), a swimming lesson (daughter #3), and a last minute present crisis (daughter #1, with a long and anguished saga involving the leaving present she’s in charge of organising for her form tutor.) Luckily though, at the end of it all was lovely Francesco. (Which we collapsed to watch at about midnight, thanks to the wonders of digital recording...)


ANYWAY, this is all a rather long and rambling way of apologising for the fact that I didn’t manage yesterday’s post. Here, a day late, is a little bit of background about the setting of Mistress: Hired for the Billionaire’s Pleasure, (which is already available on Amazon!) and today’s question.

It was quite an indulgence writing a book that was set predominantly in England, and as most of it takes place in the depths of winter it was also a lovely change. I loved researching the settings for my previous books— Florence and Venice, and the sun-drenched south of France, but the contrast in the location alone made this book feel very different right from the outset. Easton Hall, Orlando Winterton’s grand ancestral home, is an important presence within the book, and is almost a symbolic extension of Orlando himself. When Rachel arrives there she is daunted by its size, and puzzled by the darkness and air of melancholy that fills its vast rooms, but gradually, during the brief time she spends there she makes her mark on the house and its wild grounds, revealing long-hidden secrets and starting to feel at home.

The inspiration for the house was Dunham Massey, a beautiful property in Cheshire owned by the National Trust. Easton Hall isn’t an exact likeness, but my favourite part of Dunham is the inner courtyard, around which the four wings of the house are built, and this found its way into the book as the setting for one significant snowy scene.

However, a Presents novel wouldn’t be complete without some exotic and luxurious travel. Easton is Orlando’s sanctuary, but in some ways it’s also his prison, and by moving the action to another location I was able to move the relationship between the characters on too and bring to the fore the unresolved issues between them. That gave me the excuse for a very indulgent afternoon spent doing in-depth research into the luxury hotels of Paris. To my mind, the spectacular Hotel Crillion.was the top choice...

(Now I'm going to give myself ten minutes to look at the website and dream of Orlando before getting back to work! It's my reward for the stresses of yesterday...)

Today's question: What is the name of Orlando's ancestral home?

Thanks to those of you who are sending answers every day. Just as a reminder, the closing date for answers to all four questions is 3rd August!

DAY TWO-- THE HEROINE

Rachel Campion had to be pretty special. And nice. I wasn't going to let just anyone have Orlando.

Because of Orlando's sight problems it was important to me that Rachel should have vivid red hair, but beyond that I didn't really focus too much on what she looked like-- in the book much more emphasis is placed on her voice and her evocative rose scent. I chose the name Rachel simply because I liked it and it suited her, so it seemed rather spookily satisfying when during my endless hours of research/ cyber-stalking in the early stages of writing the book I came across pictures and clips of James D'Arcy in An American Haunting. opposite gorgeous redhead Rachel Hurd-Wood. The film was dire, but although she's a good few years younger than my heroine, I'd found a face that seemed to fit the girl in my head.

Rachel Campion is the only child of a controlling single mother-- single of status and single of mind. Elizabeth Campion is totally obsessed with her daughter's career as a pianist and Rachel has been brought up in an intense hot-house environment that has turned her into a brilliant musician but left her isolated and totally ill-equipped to cope with the practicalities of everyday life. When the book opens she is poised on the brink of international stardom, thanks to a PR coup performed by a triumphant Elizabeth, in the form of Rachel's impending marriage to one of the music world's most influential composers. The fact that he is also a loathsome bully is something Elizabeth is quick to sweep under the carpet, and Rachel, sweet-natured and conditioned to be utterly obedient, sees no way out. Until she encounters a dark, beautiful man in the graveyard of the church on the morning of her wedding.

Lucky girl.

Today's question, and a little administrative information bulletin, (thanks to Trenda!):

What is Rachel's signature perfume?

Answers can be submitted via the website contact form. You can answer each question as it comes along, or wait until Friday and answer them all-- whatever you prefer. The closing date will be August 3rd, when I get back from holiday and can pick a winner for my growing collections of goodies. So far these include one of the fabulous Mills & Boon centenary posters (see here...) and some luscious rose-scented treats that Rachel would just love! (Oops. I think I just gave away the answer to today's question...)

Weekend Bulletin

Here I am sitting in the garden, playing on my new tiny baby laptop (shiny new toy! So exciting!) and dropping by to tell you that tomorrow, as promised, I’ll be launching the start of a week-long competition to celebrate the release of Mistress: Hired for the Billionaire’s Pleasure.

(How sweet is this? It's an Advent 4211, fact fans, and is the size of a smallish notebook and really light.

Obviously, it's going to revolutionise my working life and quadruple my productivity... )

Every day I’ll be posting about a different aspect of the book, with a question, and on Friday I’ll do a quick recap and announce the prizes (which I’m still finalising). However, bear with me a little as tomorrow’s post will be up slightly behind my usual post-school run/cup-of-tea and slice-of-toast kind of schedule. This is because I’m appearing on Channel M’s breakfast show tomorrow morning. Live! (or live-ish, given the state of me in the mornings...)

What’s worrying me most about this at the moment is not the question of what to wear (about a 5 on a scale of 1 to 10 Top Things to Worry About) or oversleeping and being horribly late (possibly a 7) but the fact that all around daughters are succumbing to the sickness bug that’s doing the rounds at school. I’m counting on my notorious oil-tanker constitution to see me right...

Should have bought more tea towels...

Thanks so much to everyone who entered the
competition to win help with the washing up from Daniel Craig. There were LOADS of entries, as I discovered last night at half past twelve when I printed them out and started tearing them up into little individual bits for my daughters to pick out of a hat/empty cereal box this morning.
Next time I must a) buy more tea towels and b) start tearing earlier.

The answer,of course, was that the inspiration for Angelo in The Italian's Captive Virgin, was kindly provided By Alex Pettyfer, and the winner, picked by Daughter #2 (who got up first) is HANNAH. Congratulations!

Since I have three daughters, I had to give them all a chance to pick a name, so Theresa and Margaret will also be recieving copies of the book. Not the same as Daniel Craig, I know!

Don't Forget...

Tomorrow I'm picking a winner for Daniel Craig. Or the next best thing to him anyway.They maybe sold out everywhere, but I finally have one of these in my hot little hands, and will be sending it out to a randomly picked person who emails the answer to this question here.

Which (young!) actor was the inspiration for blond, beautiful Angelo in The Italian's Captive Virgin?

The answer can be found on my website-- thanks to everyone who's already entered!