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Ages ago I mentioned that I'd got a box of author copies of my latest release Craving the Forbidden and promised to blog about it, which - true to form - I've so far failed to do. But as the book is now available on Amazon (and the Mills & Boon website - check out the clever link thing I managed to put over there on the sidebar <-- ) and is about to hit the shelves of bookshops here in the UK it's about time I got my act together, so come back tomorrow for some background information on Kit and Sophie's story, and a chance to win a copy.

In other book news, I also got some copies of an anthology in which I'm honoured to be included, along with fabulous authors Jessica Hart and Amy Andrews. The book that I have in it is Mistress: Hired for the Billionaire's Pleasure (featuring Orlando Winterton, my all-time favourite hero.) It's called Loving our Heroes, is coming out at the end of October and £1 from every sale goes to Help for Heroes. I feel particularly proud to be involved in supporting this charity for reasons I'll explain tomorrow when I talk about Kit and Sophie's story. In the meantime, here's the cover - isn't it fabulous?

Downton Debrief (WARNING: may contain massive spoilers)

My, things are moving fast in downtown Downton aren't they? April 1917 already (the war definitely will be over by Christmas at this rate...) Thomas is back in Yorkshire and back at work, though the wound in his hand still looks alarmingly fresh. Matthew is still in one piece (no surprises there, having seen his battle-dodging last week) and heading back off to the trenches, where the sniping will be far less fierce than in the Dining Room at Downton. Edith finally gets a snogging scene, while Bates is missing in action, Maggie Smith's Jennifer Saunders impression gets better and better and Carson finds it all a bit much.

I really like the way the seemingly irredeemable O'Brien is oh-so-gradually revealing her human side, and I loved the set-up for future heartache in the storyline between Daisy and William. (Relationship Dilemma 1917-style: you don't want to finish with your boyfriend just before he heads off to the trenches incase he dies. But what if he just gets horribly injured...?)

So what did everyone else think of Episode two ?

It's been a while since I mentioned it...

...but James D'Arcy's looking mighty fine these days isn't he?

*happy sigh* Hero inspiration in every finely-shaped feature. Since the book I'm currently working on is set in a different time-period (and also features a pilot hero) I think it wouldn't be disloyal to Orlando to use him again...

Who are you finding inspiring at the moment? Do share!

This Sunday...

Lay in supplies of red wine, firewood and Kit Kats. Put the kids to bed early and take the phone off the hook. Downton's Back!

I'm desperately excited about the new series, but also a teeny bit apprehensive too. It's set in the same period as the book I'm writing now, and have had in my head for the last 6 years or so - what if it turns out to be freakily similar to the central story in my book? (and annoyingly better?) So much has been written about this time period already and there's no limit to the number of stories still to be told and unique ways to tell them, so I suppose it's unlikely that I'm going to see my particular take on it spookily played out before a TV audience of millions. But let's just say if any of the men have enlisted in the Royal Flying Corps I'll be watching from behind the sofa...

Better stock up on extra wine and Kit Kats, just incase.

A week of contrasts

It was probably a bit daft to squeeze in one last camping trip before school started again: certainly the wise people at the Met Office suggested as much, as did the (very tiny) Voice Of Reason inside my own head, whispering stuff about the need to organise school shoes and PE shorts and track down a whole raft of 6th form text books. But one of my greatest skills is ignoring the voice of reason, so the last Friday of the holidays saw us heading off in the direction of the Peak District, in a car stuffed with waterproofs, hot water bottles, thick socks and wellies - because (*nervous laugh*) we're not completely without sense.

When we got there, the campsite looked like this. At a weekend. In the summer holidays. (*more nervous laughing.*)

Of course, it rained. Quite a lot, as it happened - mostly on the morning we were trying to pack the tent up; a task which took on an interesting 'It's a Knockout' aspect with the addition of gallons of water pouring over the whole proceedings. But in between downpours it was almost freakishly hot and sunny. Well, for Derbyshire anyway, which, happily, is a county generously endowed with pubs in which to dry off. We shopped for new term supplies in beautiful Buxton, and sampled water from the famous spring. It was warm...

Let's just say I was a bit more enthusiastic about the Bakewell puddings in Bakewell. Unsurprisingly, perhaps.

In line with this summer's 'misery tourism' theme we had to make a trip to the Plague Village of Eyam, where we spent an afternoon utterly engrossed in the tragic events of 1665-66 and looking at yet more graves. Honestly, what kind of childhood am I giving my poor daughters?

Before we headed home again on Tuesday, Chatsworth was on the itinerary. Of course, we couldn't have foreseen the torrentialness (if that's not a word, it should be) of the deluge in which we took down the tent, nor the extent of our bedragglement as we trudged - in wellies, gently steaming as we dried out - around the most magnificent house in England. Given time, Daughter #1 might possibly forgive me for making her spend her summer holidays visiting the dead, but showing up at Mr Darcy's house looking like refugees from Glastonbury may take therapy. The house guides were very kind, possibly because we looked like people who weren't really used to being Indoors, and the wallpaper was lovely, but a bottle of water cost £1.50, which made me think rather more kindly about the warm, free water in Buxton. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man in possession of a large fortune probably got it by fleecing tourists.

Back at home it was all hands to the laundry pile as the countdown to school ticked into the final hours. (Actually, that's just wishful thinking. I tackled the laundry pile heroically and alone.) Once all three daughters had been pushed out of the door, more or less clean and ironed on Wednesday morning, I had just one day to transform myself from weather-beaten tent-dweller to the kind of person who wouldn't be thrown out of a smart restaurant in Charlotte Street.

With the dirt mostly removed from beneath my fingernails, headed excitedly down to London to meet up with a group of fellow Presents authors. Lunch was in honour of visiting Australian writers Annie West and Trish Morey and was champagne-fuelled, delicious and an absolute riot of non-stop conversation. It was heaven to be in heels rather than wellies, eating perfect food cooked by someone else, in the company of wonderful, inspiring women. More efficient people than I took photos (or charmed passing businessmen into taking them, Presents-heroine style.) As the day gave way to evening and the time of my train home approached, neither the flow of conversation nor champagne showed any sign of abating and I dearly wished I could have stayed. Luckily it's a mere seven weeks to the annual Mills and Boon Author lunch... Better get some writing done before then.

What's everyone else been doing over the summer, and how are we all feeling about the onset of Autumn? And is anyone all fired up to get their entry off to New Voices? Let me know if you are so I can cheer you on!

Fly-by post

Because I'm crazily trying to catch up on washing from last weekend's camping trip* and simultaneously packing for another one tomorrow, I haven't really got time to muse on the bizarre fact that it's suddenly September. So, here's David Sylvian to ease you gently into autumn. He sounds slightly puzzled about it all too, but I love this song and always dig it out for a nostalgia-wallow at this time of year.

Back next week, when the house is empty, I'm looking for excuses to avoid opening my neglected book file, and can start getting excited about New Voices and my upcoming Modern release Craving the Forbidden. I have books to give away...

* the family reunion one, which also involves the team games, all-day drinking and fancy dress - in my case this year no corset, but a rather dashing highwayman's cloak and hat as Adam Ant. Surprisingly warm and practical. Am thinking of packing them for weekend in Peak District too.

So, where was I?

'France' is the short answer to that, although I have to confess that was only for the last ten days or so and doesn't quite justify my absence from the blog for almost a month. I always struggle to keep up during the school holidays (with the blog as well as much else, like ironing and getting dressed before 3pm) but this year I've been slacker than ever. (Hmm. Am tempted to pretend I've been languishing in a wi-fi-less house on the other side of the Channel all summer, rather than merely for the last week.)

Cleverly I put myself ICO venue-finding this year, hoping that no-one would detect my cunningly hidden agenda of combining family holiday with sneaky research trip for the book I'm trying to write, which is partly set in WW1. The house I found (or rather, two houses as we forced the same friends as last year to come with us again) was a couple of miles outside Montreuil, which is where Field Marshal Haig was based during the war but (rather tellingly) a pretty long way from the front line, which ensured my obsession wasn't allowed to dominate too much. It was also gorgeous. Last year we holidayed boy-scout style, in tents which, despite my best efforts with bunting and solar-powered fairy lights remained more Slumdog Millionaire than Out of Africa. This year I was determined to aim higher in the Gracious Living stakes - to the extent of a proper bed at least - and achieve a week of proper relaxation.

The research part of the week involved a day around Arras, the scene of much action in April 1917, and a trip to Vimy Ridge. There you can walk along reconstructed Canadian and German trenches only 25 metres apart and see the grassed-over scars of old trenches and craters and shell holes, as well as the magnificent monument to the 11000 Canadian missing...

We were pretty close to Étaples, site of the enormous British transit camp and field hospital during the war, but there's little there to see now. Bearing in mind the 'summer holiday' aspect of the trip I'd made a resolution not to drag everyone round endless cemeteries and cast a pall of solemnity over the whole week, but we could hardly drive past the Military Cemetery, with its crazy-beautiful Lutyens arches and steps, now could we? It was just after lunchtime when we stopped, but the sun was casting long shadows behind each headstone by the time we reluctantly left.

The rest of the week was spent lazing about in or beside the bathwater-warm swimming pool, eating bread, playing the odd, incompetent game of tennis (me, not the athletic-ace kids), drinking insanely cheap Muscadet and eating more bread. We did manage trips to Agincourt and the beach, but the wind was fierce at the coast and the sea considerably colder than the pool back at base-camp, where swimming could go on late into the night...

All in all a fabulous week, right up until the moment when Daughter #3 woke me up with the words 'I feel sick' and reality came crashing back in. On the upside, it was very clever of her to leave it until the last day of the holiday, and there's no doubt that a poorly child is a whole lot easier to look after in a house stuffed with comfortable beds, sofas and en suite bathrooms than a tent, but there was no putting off the journey home the following day. We stopped for one last time in Montreuil to buy a bucket and raced up to Calais. Probably best to draw a veil over the rest of the trip home. We were, however, so relieved to get back that it distracted us from the contrast with the immaculate and stylish house we'd left in France and the one we returned to, with the overgrown, jungly garden strewn with windfall apples and the rancid yogurt in the fridge.

Later, with Poorly Daughter safe and sleeping in her own bed and the washing machine on, we collapsed on the sofa and turned on the TV. Pictures of riots and looting - news that had escaped us in our technology-free French idyll - filled the screen. Switched it off quickly, dug bottle of Muscadet out of its swaddling in a bag of washing and retreated gratefully into twilit apple-scented jungle garden to talk wistfully about ditching TV and internet permanently, and moving to France.