LIZ FIELDING

ELIZABETH OLDFIELD'S VINTAGE BABES

I first met Elizabeth Oldfield just as my third book, Instant Fire, had been published. A group of Mills & Boon authors had been invited to tea at the historic Brown's Hotel in Albemarle Street for afternoon tea, by the fabulous Charlotte Lamb. A very memorable occasion for a very new author.

We met in the cloakroom; I was trying to get my shaking legs under control, while she was so cool, so authorly. But then Elizabeth Oldfield was the author I'd been advised to read when my first Mills & Boon was turned down. She was the stellar author held out as an example...

Now, for the first time in several years, she has a new book. Not a straight romance, but a book for the baby boomer generation. A story to make us all realise that the first chin hair isn't the end of the world. Or having a life...

Here's Elizabeth to tell you a little about it.

After writing 40 Mills & Boon romances over 18 years, I retired from the romantic genre. I wanted time to relax, go travelling with my alpha male husband and, finally, to attempt a long-held ambition of writing mainstream women's fiction. VINTAGE BABES is the result.

Whereas a proliferation of chick-lit is targeted towards younger females, few books cater for the older women - yet more than 50% of women readers are over fifty. VINTAGE BABES explores the sometimes scary, sometimes comic business of being female and of 'a certain age'.

Carol - divorced, fifty-plus and a reporter on a small-town newspaper - has one grumble; the way friends and family will try to fix her up with a Mr Wonderful. No thanks! She's perfectly content on her own, free to wield the TV remote control and shave her legs in the bath with no-one bellyaching. Then life shifts into the kick-ass mode.

Jenny, Carol's meek plump housewife friend, is eager to find herself a job, but her husband disapproves. Can she summon up the confidence to do what she wants?

Tina, a glamorous, recently-widowed gold-digger has one major problem - she hates getting older.

When the three women work-out together with Max, an exotic personal trainer, all their lives are changed.


And here's an excerpt:

'OHOC, OHOT, WLTM a WOCA with GSOH. That'd suit you.'

I looked across at Melanie. 'I beg your pardon.'

'Own house, own car. Own hair, own teeth,' she translated. 'Would like to meet a woman of a certain age with good sense of humour for a long term relationship. Interested?'

'No thanks. And you shouldn't be logging onto encounter sites and printing out details in company time and at company expense. Eric may have let you get away with murder, but Mr Lingard would not approve.'

'He isn't here.'

'Makes no difference.'

If she had a spare moment and, I suspected, whenever she was left in the office alone, Melanie scanned what seemed to be a never-ending scroll of lonely hearts 'males eager to contact females.' When I had asked why a girl in her twenties should need to forage for dates in such a way, I had been informed that 'everyone does it.' I'd also been informed that there are specialist sites catering for vegans, poets and herpes carriers. Wow!

Courtesy of the net, Melanie had even gone speed-dating where, in the course of one evening and after sipping a free cocktail, the organisers had introduced her to eighteen members of the opposite sex and allotted her three minutes to talk to each. So much for romance! Whatever happened to old-fashioned courting?

Melanie had subsequently met up with two of the men and afterwards given me a detailed - too detailed- account of what had happened. While not wanting to go all the way on a first date and be viewed as 'easy', she had agreed to blow jobs. Crikey! In my youth, a lad would've considered himself fortunate if a girl had held his hand. Melanie had not, however, felt inclined to see either of the guys again. And vice versa.

'I am a well-mannered, healthy and intelligent businessman, looking for an older solvent lady who -'

'No!'

Melanie popped a Smint in her mouth. She sucks them continuously. ''Wouldn't you like to team up with a guy? There's a lot on offer for the silver surfer market.'
I stiffened. 'I am not a silver surfer.'

'You are nearly.'

I disagreed. To my reckoning, you don't rate as a silver surfer until you clock at least sixty and more like sixty-five. I was a long way off that. A mere chick. A funky chick, too. But I wasn't prepared to argue the point. Not with someone who regards thirty as 'past it'.

'What I wouldn't like,' I said, 'is to fix to meet a guy over the Net and find myself lumbered with a well-mannered, healthy and intelligent serial killer. Or rapist.'

Melanie rolled her eyes skywards. 'That is so last millenium. On-line dating is just window shopping. You chat for two or three weeks, then arrange a get-together in a public place. If you're sensible, it's perfectly safe. How about this one? JLFAS. Just looking for adulterous sex.'

I shuddered. I'm not saying my moral compass is superior to anyone else's, but I would never sleep with a married man.

'Spare me.'

VINTAGE BABES can be viewed at Accent Press or on at Amazon.

Question: Who is the woman over fifty whom you most admire - and why?

A signed copy of VINTAGE BABES will be sent to the provider of the most impressive answer.