Almost Summer - Are You a Summer Traveler?

             If you watch my Facebook page, you'll know that I seem to travel A LOT in the Spring - especially from mid-April through the end of May. In the past five or so years, I've been to Ireland twice, Germany, Alaska, as well as locations for dental boards (IRL I'm a licensing examiner for dental hygiene boards!) in NY, PA, OH, and NJ.

Ireland - sightseeing/researching and writing with writing friends --

 

Germany - for the LoveLetters Convention (that's going on right now!) --

 

 It was amazing fun to meet with over 800 readers from Germany and all over Europe! And to meet the wonderful Sarah Morgan and Annie West and so many other authors....


Alaska was breathtaking and we had wonderful weather for the cruise and visit to Denali afterwards -

 

Hubby and I were celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary and have wanted to visit Alaska for a long time. It was worth the wait. 

So, usually, once we get to summer, I'm over traveling! I love to drive down to the shore (Wildwood or Ocean City NJ) for a day at the beach, but that's as far as I want to go. Over the last few years, I haven't even attended RWA's conference which is in July because I'm exhausted from the Spring travels. 

How about you? Do you vacation/travel during the summer? I know lots of people who are heading to Scotland this summer. Others going to RWA in NYC in July. Others spending time at the beach all up and down the East Coast. Do you have any plans? Tell me about them! 

 

 Terri is thrilled that THE HIGHLANDER'S DANGEROUS TEMPTATION will hit the retail shelves next week (6/4/2019) in a special edition! Look for it in Target, Walmart, etc. She's also working on the next Harlequin Historical for her A HIGHLAND FEUDING series and on a special Viking project for HH, too! Visit her website for all sorts of info or connect with her on her FB page or profile.


  

Season of Change and a Day of Remembrance

by Joanne Rock

Today, as those of us in the US remember those who died while serving their country, I'm spending time with my oldest son who lives far from home. A nice benefit of Memorial Day for many of us is the long weekend and the possibility for some extra family time.

We are moving this summer, so I'm sorting through things to give to my boys who are living on their own. I'm contemplating what to do with all the winter clothes now that I'll be spending most of my time in a warmer climate. And I'm really wondering how to fit a whole life in a 27 foot moving truck.

It's been a long time since I did a full-scale move. Although I've hopped back and forth between Florida and New York for the past few years, I haven't truly uprooted since 2002. That's a lot of years for things to accumulate. I don't worry about packing the kitchen or the bedrooms. But places like the attic and basement, where things have been quietly accumulating, are going to be packing nightmares.

I've given myself two weeks for the project, but that might be optimistic given the book-in-progress that needs to be finished. I'm excited to be writing my own six-book series for Harlequin Desire starting in November 2019. The book that's due next is the fourth book which will release in March 2020.

It's a season of change and a day of remembrance. The combination makes me remember how lucky I am to have the chance to make big changes and move forward, no matter how hectic the pace. Don't forget to observe a moment of silence at 3 pm today to remember and honor those we've lost.

**Have you moved recently? Will I survive the mayhem? And how many boxes will I need for this sprawling house?! Share with me any words of wisdom this week and I'd be thrilled to send one reader an advance copy of my June Desire, RANCHER IN HER BED.

Michelle Styles: The Joy of Historical Outliers

Outliers, people out of the ordinary who sometimes do extraordinary things interest me. I particularly like discovering people who do not fit various historical narratives and writing about them. This has been one of the major themes through out my published writing career.  I love the detective nature of it as these are people who exist in the historical records but who are often overlooked because historians view the world through specific lenses (EH Carr was the man who developed the notion that all history is subjective and to understand what was truly going on you must first understand the lenses you are viewing it through. The time line objective view of history is a 19th century Leopold von Ranke idea.  Carr was a Marxist by the way).

The Lady Soldier which I co-wrote with Kate Allan (the agent Kate Nash) was the story of a woman who becomes a successful soldier during the Peninsula Campaign. Kate developed the hero and I was responsible for the heroine. A publisher, John Hale promised to look at it but he didn’t hold out much hope as he wasn’t sure such women existed. Cue a research note at the end of the manuscript detailing real life women soldiers who were being overlooked and my author note habit was born.

I absolutely loved writing His Unsuitable Viscountess as  it allowed me to research women business-owners in the Regency (my editor expressed doubts). I loved discovering the two highest paid bankers in the 1820s were women – Sarah Childs of Childs of Bank (aka Lady Jersey of Almack’s fame  -did the Lady Patronesses actually need Brumnell's input or was it a useful fig leaf?) and Harriot Coutts of Coutts bank ( where the Royal Family still banks). All in all there were 20 women who held licenses to print money in the Regency times. I discovered other businesswomen as well. Of those who married, most had sons and passed the business on to them. Over time, the narrative gets altered and the women are subtly erased until people believe such women never truly existed.

 When I first wrote Taming His Viking Woman, the evidence was circumstantial that such women warriors existed. I was pretty sure they must have. Then they did DNA testing and discovered that women warriors did exist in the Viking age and were not a product of some writer's fantasy.

At the moment, there is a strand of argument in historical romance circles that People of Colour shouldn’t be there in starring roles as it is unrealistic. That no POC was a member of the First Estate, if you will and they all led miserable, horrible lives. What utter balderdash and nonsense. 

There are a few outliers, probably more than the ones I mention), many who have been rendered invisible because their lives don’t fit the historical narrative or lenses of the writer. Simply because people believe the received and skewed historical narrative doesn't make them right.

 Off the top of my head to combat nay-sayer  – John Perkins (the first black British Naval Officer) is from the Georgian period. He won the most prizes of any naval officer in the Georgian period except for Nelson.  He was mostly based in the Caribbean and was particularly effective against he Americans. His Naval Chronicle obituary states ‘ he annoyed the enemy more than any other officer, by his repeated feats of gallantry and the immense number of prizes he won.’ The records of what happened to his substantial estate are lost and he never married. When I last looked Naval officers were members of the First Estate. 2. Nathaniel Wells, the High Sherriff in Wales in 1818 and friend to the Prince of Wales . His first wife was the daughter of the chaplain to George II. His second wife was related to William Wilberforce's wife.  The son of a slave, he inherited his money from his father and was extremely wealthy through sugar plantations.  3. Cesar Picton, a man who rose from being a slave to a wealthy coal merchant in Kingston upon Thames. His estate when he died included 2 acres of lands, ships, shops and a wharf. 4. Equiano aka Gustav Vassa who made his first fortune in shipping and his second from being a best selling author. He marries a white woman and leaves his surviving daughter a sizable fortune.

Protrait of Thomas-Alexandre Dumas from Wikipedia

 There were over 10,000 people of colour living in Britain in the 18^th century and not all in abject poverty. It is just that few people are actually interested in researching them as they don't fit the narrative and so they get overlooked.  Or their race and colour is referred to obliquely and people forget or prefer to gloss over. Let me put it this way -- Wellington probably never raised an officer from the ranks as Bernard Cornwell would have it but the Prince Regent did regularly dine with the son of a slave -- Nathaniel Wells. 

I could go on about France which is possibly somewhat more interesting for the historical romance novelist. Alexandre Dumas’s father Thomas-AlexandreDumas Davy de la Pailleterie was a high ranking general in Napoleon’s army. Thomas-Alexandre was the son of a Marquis and his mother an African slave.  And his entire life is fascinating. There was a habit of French planters, particularly men like the Marquis  to send their natural sons (if you will) to be educated in France as they were immediately freed once on French soil (until Napoleon brought back slavery).  People of Colour were very involved in the arts. Gericault the artist had a favourite Haitian model who was very wealthy in his own right. And of course, you have the whole Haitian and Santa Domingo history. 

However these few examples should be enough to prove that there were wealthy people of colour, people who fit the definition of First Estate during this period. It is simply that htey have been overlooked for years because we view history through certain lenses.

Gercault's Raft of the Medusa with his favourite
model, waving at the top, from Wikipedia

This is not to say that these people did not suffer huge racism, particularly from arrogant imbeciles.  It is merely to illustrate that some people of colour were in the First Estate in Georgian and Regency times and they deserve to have their stories used as inspiration, rather than derided as some politically correct  fantasy.

And I have promise myself not to ask why there are so few Jewish set Regencies and Victorians when you have the Rothchilds, Sebag-Montefiores and other prominent families making such positive contributions to British society.

Personally I love researching historical outliers and hope more people will actually try to write stories based on these people or at least stop deriding things as fantasy when they are historical fact.

In other news:

I sold my 28^th novel to Harlequin Historical, A DEAL WITH HER REBEL VIKING. It will be published n December.

Michelle Styles writes warm, witty and intimate historical romances in a wide range of time periods for Harlequin Historical. Her most recent was Sent as the Viking’s Bride. You can learn more about  Michelle and her books on www.michellestyles.co.uk

Christina Hollis: A Lovely Puzzle...

Here's where I'm a student. Isn't it beautiful?

I've been amazed how fast my first academic year at university has evaporated. I now have four assignments to complete within the next two weeks, so my mind is buzzing. 

My poor brain went into overload this morning when my husband handed me a present. "I know you don't care about being the only kid in class without a smartphone," he said, just about managing to keep a straight face, "but you'll need this to keep in touch with the others via WhatsApp over the long vac."

One of the many, many reasons I love my OH is his generosity. Only last week he paid the parking fee at the hospital for a mother who couldn't get her credit card to work in the machine. And now this...a beautiful new replacement for my plain black Nokia emergency phone.

A little light reading...pic via Pixabay

The only trouble is, technology is not my friend. I say that all the time, but it's true! It's taken me several hours to puzzle out how to operate this new device. 

Now I'm set up and ready to go (I think).  I'm trying to decide which apps to install and podcasts to follow. Do you have any recommendations? I like reading and writing (obviously!) gardening, cooking and ecology. I've already signed up for Forestry England's iNaturalist project. 

Can you suggest any others? What things do you enjoy listening to on your phone? 

Christina Hollis's first non-fiction book, Struggle and Suffrage in Bristol is published by Pen and Sword Books. You can find out more about that here, catch up with her at https://christinahollisbooks.online, on Twitter, Facebook, and see a full list of her published books at christinahollis.com

Mothers' Day by Kate Walker

I've never been quite sure why the UK's Mothers' Day is on a different date to - well, the rest of the world, it seems. But I want to wish a Happy Mothers' Day to everyone who is celebrating it today. (Well - to any mother anywhere!)

A  couple of years ago, Mother’s Day weekend had a special impact for me as it fell on the date when we would have celebrated my mother’s 100th birthday. We still celebrated it actually. My sisters and I met up to share a dinner and to raise a toast to her memory.  That way we could follow the advice she left us in her final message to us – a note she wrote to all of us in what she knew were her last days. ‘You have been my joy all your lives,’ she wrote.  ‘I love you. Love one another.’ 

My greatest delight and my greatest sadness came together on the day that I received the letter (there wasn’t ‘the call’ back then!) to say that Mills & Boon were accepting my first novel, The Chalk Line, which was the same day as she was given a diagnosis of terminal cancer.   We had hoped that she would live long enough to read my first novel in print – she refused to read the typescript because she was holding on in order to be able to  hold the book in her hands. Sadly, she didn’t quite manage it, but the doctors said that she lived much longer than they had ever anticipated. I like to think the thought of seeing my book was one of the things that kept her going.

My mother taught me to read. She instilled in me a love of books and reading. Because of her there were always books available at home to feed the reading hunger she created. She also dreamed of being a writer herself and had several poems published in her early twenties. I have one hazy memory of her sitting at a writing desk we had in our Yorkshire home, writing away on what I thought were letters, but later, discovered that in fact she was working on some children’s stories. I don’t know what happened to those tales – which is such a pity as I think she would have been a magical story teller herself.

She also read aloud to us – often by a real coal fire so that we could curl up beside her,  close our eyes, and see the pictures in the story inside our heads… Listening to those stories, concentrating solely  on what I was  hearing, focusing on the way characters behaved, the dialogue they spoke was the best possible training ground for learning how a novel worked on an instinctive and gut level. 

I have no doubt that listening to those stories and then drifting off to sleep with them in my head, I took the first steps on the road to becoming the writer I am today, with a storytelling skill learned, literally, at my mother’s knee! I made up stories to myself, finished off the tales she hadn’t yet  brought to an end, imagined how the characters she had created or read about would have behaved. And I learned the basics of simple, straightforward story-telling , building up excitement, using dialogue as a result.

Happy  Mothers'Day to all mothers  today.  I hope it is a lovely day for you.

Every Day Should Be Mother's Day

I know it's the day after, but I think we all need to pay more attention to the women in our lives.

When I first started writing, I wrote a romcom with four kids at home. They inspired me. I put four kids in a book and someone said, "You can't put kids in romantic comedy." I laughed because I'd just sold a book with five kids. So many of my stories have mothers and their kids. All the how-to-write books say write what you know. I have four kids so...well, let's just say I've got kids in many, many of my books!

But I also write powerful moms in their stories. I've been lucky to have so many strong women in my life. My daughters, my mother, my mother-in-law, my grandmother, my friends and my readers. They've shared so much with me—from fortitude, to resilience, to unconditional love. They've allowed me to be a part of their stories, and they've shared their stories that came before me. Stories of their lives—some where happy, some not so much, but all of those stories taught me—are teaching me—who I want to be.  These amazing women were mothers, grandmothers, friends, Rosie Riveters, secretaries, teachers, nurses, pharmacists, cooks and comics...  

I know how lucky I am to have my live to have lived a life with so many amazing women populating it.  They're each why I love writing moms, grandmas and strong women!

If you're a mom, I hope you had a wonderful day (if you're not a mom, I hope you had a wonderful one, too)! And if you're looking for a new story (whether or not your a mother), I have a few Mom books for you!

Thanks, as always, for letting me a part of your stories!

Holly

My Month of May by Susan Sands

Hello all, and happy spring!!

I hope you are all enjoying some much-deserved warmer weather wherever you are. Here in Georgia, the days have gotten significantly less chilly and are often downright hot in the afternoons. Of course, after our wet and endless winter, none of us are allowed to utter a word of complaint.

Pollen, on the other hand, is another matter entirely. It's still around and coating everything and everyone in it's yellow glory, though not as thickly as in April.

I'm not particularly allergic to it, but what comes after. The grasses and such that bloom in early May are my kryptonite. I sneeze constantly and want to scratch my eyes out for weeks every year around this time. My husband refers to May as "My Month of May." Not his, but mine. My birthday, Mother's Day, and anniversary are all in May. So, we celebrate them all in the midst of my horrific month-long allergy attack.

If you see a photo of me this month, it will likely be with red, watery eyes, and a runny nose. Yes, I've tried Benadryl at night, Claritin during the day, eye drops, Flonase, and enough saline to lower the ocean's levels. I live in Georgia, y'all. Things grow and bloom. Mostly in the month of May.

Obviously, this isn't going to kill me, so my apologies for living in my own little ragweed-infested world while others struggle with far worse illnesses, but I blog about what's happening in mine. LOL.  I will trudge on with My Month of May and continue to write and enjoy the beauty around me and appreciate the mild temps before they scorch the earth in a month or so.

My current book is out on submission and I'm in limbo waiting to hear back from editors, so keep your fingers crossed on my behalf for good news...

I'm working on a new novel set in the Low Country in South Carolina, one of my favorite vacation spots. It's about a woman whose DNA test results set off a chain of events that threaten to destroy the foundations of several families in the area.

Best wishes on a lovely Month of May!!

Susan

When Life Gives You Lemons...

by Joanne Rock

April has pummeled the heck out of me this year. It started off happily, as I was able to spend time

with a dear friend I hadn’t seen in years. I met her in New Orleans and we had days of “just us girls” time, which I love. But once I got home, things fell apart fast and I’ve been limping along ever since. Throw in a significant work deadline, and I’m exhausted—emotionally and physically, too.

I’m not here to complain… just maybe to commiserate, because I know you’ve all been there. Whether it’s a family crisis, a personal rift, a health scare, a death in the family or… well, there are many things that can wrong in a life on any given day, aren’t there? Anyway, picture a month that trampled you, and let’s talk about it for a minute.

It’s funny how when things start rocking in life, the reverberations are felt in every corner or your existence. Work feels harder. Tasks that you used to be able to knock off your to-do list easily start piling up and feel overwhelming. And the loneliness of going through a hardship is unique too. No matter how many friends you have, some hurts are yours alone, and there’s a sadness in having to bear those wounds by yourself.

I’m determined to shake off some of my hurts and worries as May begins. I’m not depressed in a clinical sense, so please don’t think I’m offering advice on how to battle something like that. I’m just talking about coming back from those life potholes that leave us bruised and saddened. Where to start to find joy after an emotional wound?

For starters, I’m choosing my safe places to talk openly very carefully. I’ve learned that venting too

much, or in too many directions, can only come back to bite me when well-meaning people in my life inadvertently remind me of the crisis down the road when I don’t want to think about it. So I share the hurts with just a few trusted souls, and find the balancing of venting enough to get the sting out, without overloading everyone I know.

Then, I’m exercising. And I don’t do the gym or anything strenuous, but I’m getting out every day to walk or ride my bike. Sometimes twice. The fresh air and moving around is always, always a good idea to change my perspective and helps me look outward. Eating well when I feel down is more important than ever too, since a poor diet when I’m down only succeeds in making my body feel as bad as my head and my heart!

You know else has been kind of helpful for me? Taking a mental inventory of my worries, figuring out if/how I can address them, making a plan to fix what I can, and then giving myself permission to bag up the rest and toss it out of my head. If I need to get up and write down my plan before I go to bed, I’ll do it. But once I write it, I can’t think about it anymore. I guess taking the worry out of my swirling thoughts and putting it somewhere else is what I find useful.

So, change focus, take of myself, share what I can of the burden, and then get back to doing the things I love until I can stop fixating on a hurt/loss. I hope I can find time to sleep a little more, too, but I know that’s not always an option when you’re going through a tough time. But small kindnesses to yourself count. You might not be able to sleep in on the weekend, but could you call a friend for coffee? Treat yourself to a new plant that will remind you of growing in a positive direction? Rearrange a room in a way that you find more cheery? My environment has a big impact on me, so things like that are good for me.

But I do think the prescription for getting through a tough time is uniquely personal. Ideally, we learn how to come back from life’s arrows more effectively over time. We strengthen our relationships with those who remain close to us. Hold hands with those we love and hope things get better. Certainly, we owe it to ourselves to nurture our spirits with the same tender kindness we’d show to a dear friend.

*What do you do for a pick me up when you need some emotional TLC? And let me share some kindness with you by sending a book to one commenter, because I always think romance is uplifting no matter what. And yes, I’m reading more this week! I’ll send one random poster an advance copy of my June Desire, Rancher in Her Bed.

On Celebrating Art ~ @AuthorKristina Knight

Photo Courtesty Paul Gilmore on Unsplash

"art is more than a product of your efforts - it should be about feeling, life, attitude, soul..." ~Sergio Bongart

I love this quote, and it seems to me to go with the picture over here. Because it's all about frame of mind. If you focus on the long, slippery, empty road, it's a rainy day...but if you focus on the sky, you can see the sun beginning to break through the clouds, the lushness of the green grass and trees, and you can see that the day is about to change.

Around here, this would turn into a muggy, humid yukky afternoon. The kind that requires a lot of cold beverages and a cool pool to float in. I imagine, with the mountains in the background, that maybe it wouldn't be so humid in the picture. Maybe the ground would remain wet and maybe the leaves on the trees would make that slippery sound as I walk through, and maybe the road would make that swooshy sound if a car were to pass by.

Back to the quote. To me, art is an amazing painting or a great photograph or a really well made quilt. It is something that I can look at, something I can't touch (because museums frown on that sort of thing), and that ability to only look and imagine might, in turn, change the way I look at things.

Which, I suppose, means the books I read (and write) are, in fact, art. Because while I can touch the cover, I can't reach out and touch the sunrise or the first kiss or that horrible, terrible black moment when all is lost. I can experience those things, but I can't touch them. Like I can't touch the paintings at the museum or the quilts on display at the county fair. However, if you ever hear me say something like, "I'm an ahhhtist", please feel free to slap me about the head, mmmkay? Back to the topic of art.

There are days when I look at my computer and I am the rainy, slippery, lonely road: I need to be avoided. I'm focusing on what is wrong with my book or characters or whatever kerfuffle abounds on the interwebz that day. Lately there seems to be a new kerfuffle every day and it's maddening and its tiring and I'm getting of the subject really quickly, aren't I? Those are the days when I'm in the wrong frame of mind. I'm missing that beautiful moment when the sunshine (a review, a new contract, a kind word from my agent or editor) breaks through  to change the day.

Those are the days when I remind myself to change my frame of mind. Not to focus on the slippery road of a bad review or another writer whose career seems to be going places faster than my own. Instead of that negative focus, I look for the sunshine breaking through. Maybe it's a new freelance job or maybe it's a "OMG, how did you make me like *him*" comment from my critique partner. Sometimes it's something wonderful happening for a dear friend. Sometimes it's a bebe moment of triumph. More often than not, that sunshine is as simple as re-reading a sentence that I wrote a week or a day or a month ago that makes me see a character (or something happening in my real life) in a different light. And I realize, even if things aren't all roses and success, that I get to do this wonderful, amazing thing. I get to tell stories and the stories that I tell might change the way someone looks at their corner of the world. Maybe just for a moment, but maybe, that change will be longer lasting. In either case, I've done my job well.

What is your art? How will you celebrate it today?

Kristina Knight's latest release, Moonlight Match, is available now! 

Moonlight Match is part of the Resort to Romance continuity project ~ 10 sweet romances, all set during a week-long matchmaking event in the Bahamas! 

Aster Harrington believes in love but love doesn’t seem to believe in her. She’s hoping Goldie and Ginny, the matchmakers who’ve matched on two generations of Harringtons, can work a little love magic for her…

Some call Ethan Talbot rigid, but he prefers to think of himself as prepared. Unfortunately, when he’s matched with Aster Harrington at Joy Island’s Matchmaking Week, all those carefully prepared plans go out the window. He can get back to finding a suitable wife once he’s home in New York. After all, how much damage can one week in the Bahamas do to his plans?

Kristina Knight is a contemporary romance author, part-time swim-kid wrangler, and full-time ThinMints enthusiast. You can find out more the book and Kristina on her website, and feel free to stalk follow her on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.

Reflection and Resilience

I have a new book out this month, but I'll bury that news because today, as I write this, Notre Dame Cathedral is burning.

It's six or eight or nine hundred years old. (Every time I read a headline, it gets older.) I visited it some thirty-five years ago. The fact that I have this photo of this landmark in my weathered old photograph album, with snapshots taken on a film camera, has forced me to take a moment to consider how the loss of such an ancient building in our modern world makes me feel.

I'm not particularly religious, but I feel the magnitude of this event. I feel connected to the millions of people who have glimpsed this touchstone through the centuries. Perhaps you have sat inside its walls for prayer or reflection yourself?

Remember when we had time for such things? When we didn't fill our heads with the next item in the news feed? When we had to wait for our film to be developed to show people what we had seen and done? When we returned from vacation and waited weeks before we turned in our rolls of film to the one-hour developer?

The world has become such a busy, fractured place, yet I found myself talking about this with a lot of different people today. For the first time in a long time the world seems to have all glanced the same direction, paused in a moment of unnatural quiet, and agreed that this is a terrible shame.

It is upsetting, but according to this article on CBC website:

It was ransacked by rioting Protestant Huguenots in the 16th century, pillaged again during the French Revolution of the 1790s, and left in a state of semi-neglect. Hugo's 1831 work led to revived interest in the cathedral and a major "partly botched" restoration that began in 1844.

and,

French President Emmanuel Macron has promised to rebuild fire-ravaged Notre Dame Cathedral and says he is seeking international help to restore the Paris landmark.

That's heartening, isn't it? Despite the fact the entire world seems to be burning down on a daily basis (according to my social media feeds) this devastated cathedral continues to symbolize a tremendous resilience. I have no doubt that it will be restored and that the restoration will bring people together in its own way. Believing that brings me a lot of comfort.

How are you feeling about this loss?

Award-winning and USA Today Bestselling author Dani Collins thrives on giving readers emotional, compelling, heart-soaring romance with some laughter and heat thrown in, just like real life. Her latest Harlequin Presents, Innocent's Nine-Month Scandal, is on shelves now.

Watch for a related story, Innocent's Pregnancy Revelation, to appear as a free, serialized short story on Harlequin.com starting April 22, 2019.

A new Harlequin Historical Author -- Joanna Johnson by Michelle Styles

Once upon a time about last September, I went to the annual Association of Mills & Boon Authors lunch and then to the Toast to the Authors. As I went into the toast, an editor waylaid me -- she had that day telephoned a new author to buy her book for Harlequin Historical. She'd been very nervous as she was about to go on sick leave for a few weeks and did not want to delay one second as she wanted the story scheduled as soon as possible. Luckily the woman in question had answered and all was fine. The editor loved the book and wanted to ensure the author in question was scooped up by the other Historical authors because she had taken to heart my little talk about hard it can be for new authors as it is a steep learning curve. It was the first time I had seen an editor immediately post call and believe me they are every bit as thrilled and excited as the author in question. They love finding new talent.They want to nurture that talent and they are secretly hoping when manuscripts get returned that they do get the chance to buy so other people can get the same thrilling read.

Anyway, as requested  I scooped up Joanna Johnson who was still in that state of pleased bemusement. I was thrilled to do so as it can be such a daunting experience to be new. And she agreed to tell her side of the story: 

I definitely didn’t expect to get ‘The Call’ while 100 miles away from home, standing in my parents’ kitchen.

I’d sent the full manuscript for my first historical romance, The Marriage Rescue, off to Julia Williams at Harlequin a few weeks before. She had given me some very useful and encouraging feedback on an earlier draft, but I assumed her emailed request to phone me was to explain my rewrites hadn’t quite hit the mark. You can probably imagine my reaction then when instead of a kind rejection she offered a two-book contract – I think only bats and dolphins could have understood my squeaking! Being a published author was something I’d always dreamed of but never expected would really happen, so it took quite some time to sink in. It still hasn’t fully, although I’ve had fantastic support and a very warm welcome from the Romance community.

The heroine of The Marriage Rescue is the feisty Selina, a young Roma woman left with little choice but to marry country squire Edward. Roma culture has always interested me and I wanted to explore one of my favourite timeframes, the Regency era, through that lens. It was fascinating to research more deeply the customs and way of life of those on the road in 19^th-century England, contrasting sharply with the Jane Austen-esque world that was more familiar. Travellers faced such abuse and prejudice, reflected in Selina’s somewhat spiky demeanour – developing her personality was one of the things I enjoyed most about writing the book, as well as her struggle to overcome some prejudices of her own.

I think what I love most about historical romance fiction is the escapism. While writing The Marriage Rescue I could step into the shoes of a completely different person from a completely different time and try to experience life from their viewpoint, while being reassured there would definitely be a happy ending! It opens a window into another world and I’m not sure there’s anything I’d rather write. Hopefully that love will shine through, and others will enjoy reading the book (almost) as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Joanna  also kindly allowed me to read an advanced copy of The Marriage Rescue. It is a Regency but with an unusual twist -- the heroine is a Roma. Most Regency featuring  Roma have a Heathcliff vibe with the hero in question being part gypsy,  but Johnson really delves into the Roma culture and provides a worthy heroine who is fully Roma and more importantly at the start wants to stay that way. The story is a good one and a very pleasant way to pass a few hours. I look forward to seeing Johnson's undoubted talent grow as she learns to work with her voice. There is no doubt in my mind that Joanna Johnson  is far more than a one-book wonder.

You can read the first chapter for free here: https://aerbook.com/books/-210802.html

Michelle Styles writes warm, witty and intimate historical romances for Harlequin Historical in a wide range of time periods. Her latest Sent as the Viking's Bride was published in January 2019 and her next Viking (Tentatively titled Ramsomed by the Viking's Kiss) will be out later this year. You can learn more about Michelle and her books on www.michellestyles.co.uk 

Christina Hollis: Quick as a Flash!

Pic by Ipicgr via Pixabay

That's how fast the past six months have gone. I'm already well into my second semester at the University of Gloucestershire, yet as recently as last July becoming a mature student was the last thing on my mind.  I picked up a prospectus when I took my son to the university's open day and...here I am, studying for my Master's in Critical and Creative Writing!

Over the past twenty-six weeks I've read what feels like a million books, analysed the living daylights out of the pastoral tradition, developed the idea for a novel about coercive control, and written the first ten thousand words of a non-fiction project on the changing role of women in the countryside. Oh, and I'm also part of the editorial team putting together the university's 2019 collection of new writing. 

Friday12th April was the end of term. I spent the first day of my Easter break recovering! A lie-in until six am, then dog-walking, gardening, and eating. That's my idea of the perfect holiday. Today I'm blogging, then next Sunday I'll be taking part  in the village's Easter Service.  

We're not going away at all for the holiday, but compared to many of the women I wrote about in my most recent book, Struggle and Suffrage In Bristol I don't have anything to complain about.

Find out more at http://bit.ly/PSBristol

In August 1886, social campaigner Mary Clifford wrote of a workhouse treat she organized to the seaside.* A poor one-eyed girl who had been found a position as servant in a lodging house fifteen years earlier was allowed to accompany her old friends on the trip. The annual workhouse treat to the seaside was the sole outing she had all year. As well as putting her helpless mistress to bed each night, she was looking after another old lady of ninety-two and waiting on other lodgers in the house. This poor servant made the most of every minute of her day at the seaside. She gathered a long black tail of seaweed, filled her pocket-handkerchief with pebbles as a souvenir to take back for her mistress, and spent her holiday money on a bunch of country flowers. 

It makes you realise how lucky we are these days, doesn’t it? 

As well as non-fiction, Christina Hollis writes contemporary fiction starring complex men and independent women. She has written more than twenty novels, sold nearly three million books, and her work has been translated into twenty different languages. When she isn’t writing, Christina is cooking, walking her dog, or gardening.

You can catch up with her at https://christinahollisbooks.online, on Twitter, Facebook, and see a full list of her published books at christinahollis.com

*Williams, Gwen Mary, Mary Clifford Bristol, 1921 Arrowsmith books.

My kids are not as funny as they think.

The Makeover

My kids are not as funny as they think.

I do not have a chicken collection. A certain daughter thinks I do and has infected her siblings. So I have an ever-growing chicken population in the house. A reader even sent me the cutest chicken bowl a few weeks back...it was adorable. But I do not have a chicken collection. 

So when this certain person gave me two new chicken books, and I sighed. Because I do not have a chicken collection. But then I read them. I was hooked.  For years, I was the kindergarten story lady, like Pip in Carry Her Heart.  I love children's literature. Love it!  Still, I do not have a chicken collection.

Check out Interrupting Chicken. You'll be as hooked as I am.

Holly

PS I do not have a chicken collection.

PPS I do have a new book, The Makeover. And the main animal in the story isn't poultry...it's cattle.

National Pets Day . . . everyday by Kate Walker

Yesterday was apparently National Pets’ Day so on  my Facebook page I posted pictures of my two ‘official’ pets – Charlie the giant red and white Maine Coon cat  and his little ‘sister’ Ruby the black and white Cat’s Protection rescue who, chose us when we went looking for a new furry  Well, my official pets.

to love. These. I said – are my pets.

Then I moved away from my keyboard and went into the garden to organise things  before the sun set and darkness fell.  And that’s when I realised how inaccurate I had been when I said Charlie and Ruby were my pets.

W  well grown and fill the spaces wonderfully.  Then there’s a hedge and  what we laughingly call ‘the orchard’ beyond that. This space  is what my son used to label ‘the secret garden’ – it’s a rather hidden part of the garden beyond the hedge and there are some old apple trees and pear trees where there is always a huge crop of apples  but not so many pears to pick in the summer. Most of these apples  tend to become wind falls – that is when there is any typically British ‘spring’ weather the wild winds and the rain knock them to the ground and they all have to be gathered up before the birds get the. The windfalls go to the  home for retired horses where the horses and donkey there enjoy them with relish.

e have a large garden – with a long lawn and then a shrubbery down one side of the fence. Lots of shrubs and they have all been there for years so they are

So – as well as the two cats  - there’s the horses and the donkeys that are ‘pets’.

Back home in my garden I have a morning  and an evening ‘pet’ routine.  The mornings are for the birds who are usually sitting waiting for me before I venture out the door first thing. You’d think that feeding the birds would be simple – some wild bird seed  . . .and that’s it? But  no – I don’t know if we had particularly fussy eaters  but it goes something like this: wild bird seed on the hanging feeder for the  doves, the starlings, the sparrows.  The suet balls hanging in a tree  for the blackbirds, the ravens and the crows –  then suet cakes on the ground and mealworms for the robins, the bluetits, the seagulls – yes we get seagulls  even though we’re  miles from the sea . . . .

Right now it’s nesting and egg-laying time and it seems like some of the eggs are hatching as there is a HUGE amount of food disappearing every day. The birds themselves are so small that we assume they must be feeding babies because they’d be bursting at the seams if they ate all the food themselves.

When the birds have had their fill in the mornings things get a bit quieter – at least until the squirrels arrive.  I’ve tried to protect the bird food from these greedy little things but they have wo

rked out ways of hanging upside down from the bird feeders and pulling out peanuts and sunflower seeds to gobble up.

The evening is the time to put out the food for the hedgehogs. In the UK hedgehogs are in danger of becoming very rare so we’re always glad to encourage the family of these cute prickly creatures  who live at the bottom of the garden – they love the shrubbery and the little wooden ‘hedgehog houses’ we have set up for them.  He haven’t actually seen any of the hedgehogs this year but we know they are there because all the food goes and we have seen  bits of hedgehog poo around. What do we feed hedgehogs? Well, you can get special hedgehog food – but we use kitten crunchies and they love that. Sometime they hedgehogs get hungry early

and they come out looking for food before dusk. That’s when the cats play with them, sniffing and patting them and sometimes jumping right over them

.

So as you can see I have more than just my two beautiful cats as pets There are the horses and donkeys at the rescue centre -  . Out in the garden it’s more of a mini wildlife park – birds, gulls, squirrels and hedgehogs – and now I think we also have an occasional visiting fox!   I love feeding them and enjoy watching them from our garden room – but the animal feeding bill is ridiculous!

You can read more about me and my books on my web site and my blog -  and catch up with me too on my Facebook page