RIVA COVER SURVEY

Mills and Boon are redesigning the covers for the RIVA series this summer and they want your input.  They have produced three new designs for three books published in the series and they want to know which cover you'd be most likely to pick up. They are new, refreshing, different.

I'm not telling you which I prefer; it's really important to get the views of the readers this series is aimed at. I would, though, be very interested to hear what you love, what you hate, and what about any cover makes you pick it up in the bookstore or supermarket.

What book did you buy recently just because the cover leapt out at you?

To see the covers and add your voice, click on SURVEY

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY

It's been a few weeks since I've played Six Sentence Sunday and I've missed it, so here's a clip on the subject of character from my new book for writers.
 

To come alive on the page, your hero and heroine must be more than two-dimensional cardboard cut-outs that you move around the stage. You should not be asking yourself “what can I make them do next”. If your characters are blood-and-bones, heart-and-soul real, you will know what they would do, just as you instinctively know what someone close to you would do in any given circumstance.

You may hear authors talking about characters who “take over” the story. That is not because the author is not in control of her characters, but because she has created three-dimensional, living, breathing people, men and women she knows so well that her writing brain is flying ahead of her fingers on the keyboard.

To truly know your characters you must understand not just what they look like, where they went to school, what they do for a living but see them living in their own world, having a life before you write Chapter One.

Here's a link to download to your Kindle.

Liz Fielding's Little Book of Writing Romance

Some of you may have noticed the "Coming Soon" title on the sidebar of my blog. Not quite as "soon" as I'd hoped, alas.

I was planning to launch Liz Fielding's Little Book of Writing Romance as the New Year dawned - to go with all those New Year resolutions - but I'm beginning to discover the frustrations of being a publisher.
It's not all done once the author has written The End.

It is, however, getting closer.
Tomorrow I should have the production proofs and, hopefully, if all is well, it won't be long after that before the book will be downloaded onto eBook platforms and available for download to your eBook, phone, iPad or PC.

So, what it is?

My Little Book of Writing Romance is, basically, a primer. A beginner's book of writing romance. The book I wish I'd had when I was a new, know-nothing writer hoping to be published by Mills and Boon.

There were very few books about how-to write back then. There was no internet where you could go for advice, no opportunity to chat to authors, take a class. (Now I'm sounding like the Ancient Novelist, but honestly, it wasn't that long ago!)

When I first put pen to paper (and it was a real pen and real paper) and wrote the first books that were rejected, I was on my own.

I wrote three whole books — every word of 55,000 words — before I picked up on the fact that I only had to send three chapters for them to know it was tosh. I don’t regret that. Finishing a book is a huge step forward and each one was a huge learning experience.

The only feedback I had was from the editor who read my efforts. I still have the letters – they are very precious to me, even the one that said my efforts were a little “wooden”. Kindly editors pointed me in the direction of writers I should read — Sara Craven, Elizabeth Oldfield — and said they would read my next effort, but there was no solid advice (it wasn't their job to teach me how to write).

I learned by reading, by practice (you learn a lot writing three books). I taught myself to be a writer. I also learned that I wanted it badly enough to keep doing it. There is a word for that. Bloodymindedness?

It’s more than twenty years since I received “the call” on a sunny summer afternoon.
Since then, I’ve published more than sixty books, won awards and had a wonderful career and it's time to pay it forward to a new generation.
I started this year with my involvement in Mills and Boon's New Voices competition and that inspired me to put together some of the stuff I've learned over the years.
Liz Fielding’s Little Book of Writing Romance is a straightforward, no-nonsense book that helps the new writer to translate the story in her head into the written word.

How to start. How to grab your reader on the first page, tackle conflict, dig deep for emotion. How to give your reader a hero and heroine who had a life before your book begins, who are meant to be together — who don’t just fall in love because you put them together in a book — and who your reader can imagine having a life after they read the last page.

Real people, taking the journey of their lives.

It's nearly there.  Another week. (Fingers firmly crossed!)

Leave a comment telling me why you'd like a copy - I've copies for five lucky readers. The dipping hat will come out next Sunday evening.

I had a lovely day yesterday. First I met up with writerly friend, Toni Sands, who lives very near me. We actually bumped into one another near Ammanford library and popped in there first, discussing who we’d been reading.

Toni had been reading the lovely Jill Mansell. I’d been reading a crime novel by a new-to-me writer that I expected to enjoy but didn’t. The author, who I won’t mention, described every person who made an appearance in minute detail – with a heavy helping of cliché. He also described every building (and its history) and every room.

Chekov believed that over description was an insult to the reader, that too many details lessen credibility. There was a good story at the heart of the book and I could see it making great television, but I found it a hard read and in the end didn’t care enough about the fate of the characters to wade through so much tedious stuff.

Toni and I had coffee and lots of “writing” chat. The books we’re working on, the ones just delivered, the future of publishing. How many of you have an eReader already? How many of you are hoping for one under the Christmas tree?

After that I went to Llandeilo with the dh to do a little Christmas shopping – anyone with a bright idea for an 85 year old aunt who’s allergic to plants and flowers and whose eye-sight is not good enough for heavy reading, could well find me falling on them in gratitude and sending them a copy of the book of their choice from my backlist!

We had lunch in Café Braz, a small restaurant we hadn’t tried before but will certainly visit again.

The cards – most of them – have now been sent. Still hunting for some addresses. I only send a few. The stupid amount of money I used to spend on them now goes to charity; St Martins-in-the-Fields will receive it again this year.

Decorations are beginning to make an appearance. Chocs have been sent to RomanceHQ for the editorial troops. I’m almost set.

This is the first year in as long as I can remember when I won’t be in charge of the cooker on the big day, but if you’re looking for recipes to inspire you, check out the revamped Harlequin Romance Authors blog.

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY

And for this week's Six Sentence Sunday we return to Isola del Serrone with Sarah Gratton and Matteo di Serrone, who are spending the weekend at the vineyard at the start of harvest.

'I’ve been wanting to do this,’ he said as he backed her into a bay housing one of the barrels and kissed her, sliding his hands inside her t-shirt to unclasp her bra.


She leaned back over the gentle curve, sighing with pleasure as he took possession of her breasts. ‘Is this what is known as being had “over a barrel”?’


He shook his head, clearly not familiar with the expression.


‘At your mercy, my lord,’ she explained.


‘On the contrary, cara, I rather think that I am at yours.’


For more details about Six Sentence Sunday click here

For the first chapter of FLIRTING WITH ITALIAN click the Browse button if you're in the UK -

Or if you're in the States - click HARLEQUIN

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY

Welcome back to Six Sentence Sunday!

Today I'm snipping my six sentences from WILD FIRE, the third in my Beaumont Brides trilogy.

TV soap queen and West End star, Melanie Beaumont has accepted a bet from an old friend that she can't do an ordinary job for a month - take the Cinderella role and work as a cleaner.

She's just mad enough at everyone to give it a go. Her first job, cleaning up after a party that's got out of hand, goes pretty well - until the owner of the apartment arrives home earlier than expected...

Jack Wolfe's steel grey eyes flickered about the apartment and came back to rest upon Melanie as she wriggled out of Tom's grasp and got to her feet. She fielded the look, held it, refusing to be intimidated, but the man was not a bit like his brother.


Tom was young, still soft, with an eager puppy-like charm that ensured quick forgiveness of his doubtless many sins. She knew the type and kept firmly on a training lead he would be amusing company.


Jack Wolfe was darker, leaner, harder. A Doberman to Tom's Labrador.

For more details about Six Sentence Sunday click here

ITALIAN FOOD

I promised you food to go with my Italian book and here Sarah and Matteo share lunch, starting with one of my favourites - antipasto.
Most cuisines have this lovely pick and mix starter - I had some wonderful mezza when I lived in the Middle East.
But wonderful spicy meats, sun dried tomatoes, artichoke hearts, olives and creamy cheese served with fresh ciabatta on a shady terrace - perfect bliss.


There was a pause while Graziella brought antipasto for them to graze on and Matteo opened a bottle of the golden sparkling wine that was the pride of the Serrone vineyard.

‘You must taste this,’ he said, pouring a little into a second glass before she could refuse. ‘The grape variety was bred by my grandfather. It was his lifetime’s work.’ He swirled the wine around his own glass to release the aromas, encouraging her to do the same. ‘There is a scent of herbs…’ — he took a mouthful, taking his time to allow the flavours to develop — ‘… and a honeyed aftertaste, enriching the peach and melon flavours of the classic Frascati. It reflects everything that is Isola del Serrone.’

‘You a clearly passionate about it.’

‘A man must be passionate about something. My grandfather produced the flavour, my task is to improve yield and disease resistance for the next generation.’ If only on a part-time basis. ‘The Serrone vines have always been grown organically.’

She took a sip – how could she possibly refuse after that? – and her smile was unforced. 

‘It’s delicious. Like drinking a summer’s day.’

She couldn’t have said anything more calculated to charm him. He would need to be very careful.

‘I’d have to pay an advertising agency a fortune to come up with something that good.’  He picked up the servers and piling cold meat, artichoke hearts, sun dried tomatoes, olives onto her plate.  ‘How much will it cost me to quote you?’  

‘A piece of that bread?’  Then, as he cut into the freshly baked ciabatta, ‘I thought the vineyard was run by a co-operative.  I looked up Isola del Serrone on the internet,’ she explained, as she picked up a fork.  ‘Maybe I misunderstood?  I clicked on the translation device but the language was a bit mangled.  Or perhaps there’s more than one vineyard?’

‘You didn’t misunderstand.’ He filled his own plate. ‘My great-grandfather set up the co-operative after the war.  He wanted to rebuild the community. Give the villagers a share in what it produced after all they had suffered. Give the young men a reason to stay on the land rather than join the stampede to the factories in the north.’

‘Was he here?  During the war,’ she asked.
Again, not the kind of question he expected...


Next time it will be the pasta.

So what is your favourite Italian food? Spicy sauces, fabulous ices?  Do you have a favourite recipe? Do share!

MONDAY MASH-UP

Time for another round up of great links I've visited in the past week.

Are There Really Rules for Writing from Sarah Duncan's blog.

Special Christmas Releases from Harlequin.

Jody Hedlund on marketing your own book.

Social Media Snuggle from Kristen Lamb.

Brigid Coady at the Pink Heart Society on the joys of owning a Kindle.

WRITING ITALY

I've been so busy the last couple of weeks, mentoring my New Voices finalist, putting the final finishing touches to THE LAST WOMAN HE'D EVER DATE and getting stuck into a non-fic project I'm working on.  More of that later.

But I have new book on the blocks. FLIRTING WITH ITALIAN is now available online from Mills and Boon (you can read the first chapter here) and from Harlequin in paper and eBook format.

You'll probably have to wait a couple of weeks for delivery from any of the other online outlets, or retail, but I thought it was time to make you better acquainted with the setting. Well, there's Rome. Hard to say anything about the city that's new. It is just, amazing.

The secondary location in the book, Isola del Serrone, a large village in a wine-producing area south east of Rome, is a figment of my imagination based on my own visits to the area.

I love this picture, which seems to encapsulate those large villages and small towns I visited when I was in Italy. Narrow alleys, beautiful golden squares, so much unimaginable age.

In Italy, history is not so much a tourist destination as part of life.  And the Romans, in many places, are just Johnny-come-lately types.  Where I stayed with friends, they speak a dialect which is an older language than Latin.

It's a new world for Sarah Gratton who, newly single, is picking up the threads of the life she had abandoned for the "perfect job" the "perfect man".  Travelling, teaching abroad. And her much loved great-grandfather, knowing how much she is hurting, tells her not to look back but forward, and gives her a little advice:

Sarah started as Lex took her hand. 
            ‘It’s not far,’ she told him. ‘I’ll be home for visits so often you’ll be sick of me.  Half term.  The holidays.’

     ‘      What for?  To see an old man?’ His gesture was dismissive. ‘Don’t waste your time or your money.  Enjoy Italy while you have the chance.’

‘I’ll have plenty of time to see everything.’ And could travel with the money she’d been saving for her wedding, for the big dress.  Her share of the deposit they had been saving for a house. One with a garden for the children they would have one day.    

‘There’s never enough time,’ he warned her. ‘Your life goes by in a flash. Enjoy every minute of it.’

‘Of course,’ she said, on automatic.

‘No, I mean really enjoy it.’ He regarded her with that thoughtful gaze that his patients would have recognised when he had still been in practice. The one that saw through the “headaches” to the real problem. 'I prescribe an affair. No falling in love, breaking your heart stuff, mind.  Nothing serious,’ he warned. ‘A just-for-fun romance with some dark-eyed Italian. A memory to make you smile rather than weep. To keep you warm at night when you’re old.’

He's speaking from the heart and when she goes in search of his own memory, she finds Matteo di Serrone.
What do you think? Does he fit the bill?

PIVOTAL MOMENT!

TIME TO VOTE!

Voting for the final four "pivotal moments" of the New Voices 2011 competition begins on 1st November at 9 am. You have three days to make your choice; here's the lovely Charlotte Phillip's moment of change for Anna and Jack in her entry, Honeymoon With a Stranger.

Do go and support her and the other three writers who have worked so hard over the past week.

And if you entered a chapter - or two - I hope you're already polishing up your first three chapters to submit in the usual way. There were lots of really great entries and Mills and Boon are still looking for writers with that little extra sparkle. Go for it!

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY

It's Sunday - and time for six sentences. This week from my new release, FLIRTING WITH ITALIAN.

Italy is all about food, about pleasure and when Sarah is invited to lunch with Matteo de Serrone, all that English restraint just melts away.

            Vivid colour, the scent of herbs and the sun-baked earth. The touch of a man’s lips for the first time in months.   

            Languorous in the still heat of the early afternoon, lulled by the faint hum of drowsy insects, mesmerised by Matteo’s dark eyes gleaming softly in the shade urging her to this one last pleasure, she leaned forward the inch required to take the grape, closing her lips around it.  Around the tips of his fingers.

            The grape exploded on her tongue, the juice dribbling over her lips, over his fingers.  And it seemed the most natural thing in the world to lick it up…

For more details about Six Sentence Sunday click here

BIG GIVEAWAY

STOP PRESS!

My lovely author, Charlotte Phillips, is through to the last four in the NEW VOICES competition!

All four here

Romance Is Not Dead

Voting in the  Mills and Boon NEW VOICES competition ends tomorrow!  If you haven't already voted, Chapter Two of my mentor author Charlotte Phillips, HONEYMOON WITH A STRANGER is on the website.

I'm practically chewing my nails to the knuckles!

There's time, too, to take part in the week long Small Blogs Big Giveaways bash.  You'll find links to other participating blogs at the bottom of the post as well as some of the prizes.  I'm offering three paper copies of TEMPTED BY TROUBLE and three copies of my eBook trilogy, Wild Justice, Wild Lady and Wild Fire.

Good luck!

The Biggest International Bookish Giveaway Online

62 prizes split between 5 winners + 6 Gift Card Giveaways!

Follow the event on twitter

HOSTS, Feat. Authors & Other Giveaways

Organized by: *Reading Romances

* Having Other Giveaways During The Event 

Hosts:

*Can't Put It Down

*The Magic Attic

Bona Fide Reflections

*Laurie's Thoughts & Reviews

My Cute Bookshelf

A Writer's Life With Liz Fielding

No Page Left Behind

*Close Encounters with the Night Kind

*Sweeping The USA

*Frugal Experiments

Alexa Loves Books

I Just Wanna Sit Here and Read

Romance Around the Corner

Coffee Beans & Love Scenes

So Many Books, So Little Time

*Sexxy Blogger

Thank you to our featured authors:

Talia Jager | Fiona Lowe | Jenn LeBlanc | Donna Alward| Christy Hayes| Gail Barrett| Lorhainne Eckhart | Sarah Ballance | Sandy Wolters | Hazel Osmond | *Bianca Swann | *Natasha Blackthorne | *Barbara Monajem | *Kate Hewitt | Wendi Zwaduk 

Want to be the first to be contacted when the sign ups start? Leave your info here and you'll receive the information about the 5th edition: November 18 - 25. Go to the website to know more.

BOOKS (60):

Shelfari: Book reviews on your book blog

GIFT CARDS:

$25 gift certificate to Amazon or The Book Depository

$15 Barnes & Noble eGift Card (US & Intl) or Gift Card (US)

$10 gift certificate to Amazon

$15.00 in books from the Book Depository

$10 in books from the Book Depository

$5 gift certificate to Changeling Press for a book of the winner's choice

(x2) $ 5 gift certificate to Amazon

READ THE FULL LIST OF PRIZES HERE

FLIRTING WITH ITALIAN

A four star review from Romantic Times BOOKclub for FLIRTING WITH ITALIAN!

After a difficult breakup, teacher Sarah Gratton takes a sabbatical in Rome and travels to a rural village to find the woman who sheltered her grandfather during World War II and with whom he had fallen in love, though he returned to his English wife.

While searching for this mystery woman, Sarah meets businessman and vineyard owner Matteo Di Serrone. 

This is a heartwarming story with memorable characters. Fielding’s beautiful descriptions of the setting and the use of Sarah’s blog to her students as a way to communicate her thoughts bring the reader deep into the story.

That's my good news story, but it's a huge week for, Charlotte Phillips, who made the Top 21 in Mills & Boon's NEW VOICES competition.

Chapter Two of HONEYMOON WITH A STRANGER went up on the website yesterday and you can comments from 9 am (GMT) Friday. Do go and read her entry here and cheer her on there and follow her on Twitter at @charlieflips.

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY

It's that time of the week again - Six Sentence Sunday - and this week I've chosen six sentences from the third of my Beaumont Brides trilogy - WILD FIRE.

His touch was like summer lightning, wild fire that ran between them and as he continued to hold onto her hand, his eyes too seemed to heat from within.

They were not, as she had first thought, a steely grey, but were flecked with warm gold lights that seemed to bore into her very soul and for a moment she was certain that he felt the same charge of excitement. Then steeply hooded lids came down, cloaking his feelings.

'Guard it with your life, Melanie.'

The key was warm from his body, but his hands were cool. Long, slender fingers wrapped around her warm hand and the warmer key. Hidden layers of heat, like the hidden layers of meaning she sensed behind everything he said. 


If you want to read more, there are links for the Kindle, Nook and any other reading device (including your PC - so handy for a secret read when you should be working!) on the sidebar.


And for more details about Six Sentence Sunday click here

WHAT'S ON MY BOOKSHELF?

With the book finished and awaiting my editor's verdict, I've had a little time catch up on my reading in the last week.

First, up is the delightful Haunting Jasmine by Anajali Banerjee. 


Jasmine, struggling after a painful divorce, has been asked to spend a month taking care of her aunt's bookstore on a west coast island off Seattle.  The bookstore is full of old books that seem to be telling her things. And some of the authors drop by to help her out with the reading group and the children's reading group. And then there's the handsome doctor who appears just when needed.

The book is a delight and I'm so grateful to Nicola Marsh for telling me about it.

I think I discovered We Are Not Alone by Kristin Lamb on Twitter. It would certainly be appropriate if I had, because Kristin is a world class expert on using Social Media.

I'm scarcely a beginner at this - I had my first website in 1997 - but I have learned a ton from this book.

White Lies and Custard Creams by the lovely Susan Alison, who I met at the Romantic Novelists' Association conference in Caerleon earlier this year is just a mad romp. A gorgeous dog - of course; a lovely man; the craziest bunch of lodgers and neighbours to be found in one house, one street, anywhere. A bit of cross-dressing and a big mystery.

A lovely time!

Giles and Florence by John Harding, was a gift from a friend, a delightful surprise arriving in my post box a couple of weeks ago.

I have started it and it's the most unusual book I've read in a long time.

I am entranced by the style - the writer is a young girl who has been denied books and "stole" reading by learning letters from packages in the kitchen. She devours books but has to keep her habit a secret.

I am entranced.

MASHUP

A few brilliant links for you to check out...

Pitch and win a critique of the first 5 pages of your manuscript by LIZ PELLETIER, senior editor ENTANGLED PUBLISHING at NICOLA MARSH'S BLOG

KRISTEN LAMB on Structure - Plot Problems: Falcor & the Luck Dragon and The Purple Tornado


SARAH DUNCAN on the eternal question - how much money will I make if I get published.

ROMANTIC NOVELISTS' ASSOCIATION Regency Day

Six Sentence Sunday

For this week's SSS - for more details about that see here - I've taken this little snip from the second book of my BEAUMONT BRIDES trilogy, WILD LADY.

When I wrote WILD JUSTICE, I had no notion of writing a trilogy but when my editor read it she said, "Three girls, three books and can I have the first chapter of the second one this week so that I can use it as a teaser in the back of the first book."

Of course. No problem...

Gulp.

I have to tell you, that if I'd known I'd be writing Claudia's story, I'd have made her nicer, which really would have been a shame!

This one has a "heroine in peril" plot, and a self-appointed bodyguard.

Claudia, who could usually reduce a man to stuttering incoherence in less time than it took to say it, was seriously shaken to discover that this man was quite immune to her particular brand of magic. 
     Insurance? 
     That was all that bothered him? He wasn't in the least concerned about her health, the fact that she might have broken her neck? Apparently not. As their eyes met across the wreck of her car she received the very strong impression that he was quite prepared to break it himself. Well, the day was still young and if her anonymous correspondent was right, he might yet get his wish; the thought was enough to drive the smile right off her face.


Actually there are seven sentences, but one of them is only one word and that's allowed.

I'M DONE!

I'm done! The book has left the building - although, as always, I woke up realising that I'd missed out something I meant to put in at the end.

Never mind, once my editor has read it, there will be revisions. Between now and then I'll be making little notes about all the things that always occur the minute I have to stop concentrating totally.

I have been struggling - as always - with ideas of a title.

It has a single mother in danger of losing her job and her home; the bad boy who left the area when she was a kid (she was posh, he was poor - times have changed); a donkey (inciting incident, cute meet...); old secrets; four dogs, a one-eyed pony. Oh, and there's the whole fairy godmother thing going on.

Any ideas? Please...

The nights are drawing in, there's a nip in the air so obviously it's time to get out the knitting that's lain abandoned in a basket in a corner of the sitting room since the clocks went forward at the end of March.

I hadn't knitted in years. Who had? But then I kept seeing books with knitting heroines and I remembered the pleasure of it. I used to love knitting. But still I didn't actually hunt out my pins. But then my lovely granddaughter arrived and I found myself walking into the wool shop in the Arcade and drooling over the patterns, the yarn.

It was a whole new world. No longer were baby clothes restricted to white, pink, blue or yellow. Babies wore strange and beautiful colours. Yarn was gorgeously soft Cashmerino I went knitting crazy for a while, but then the days grew longer, the garden called and projects languished.

There's the panda jumper I'm making for my granddaughter.

The shrug for my daughter (a really difficult pattern and I don't think that is going to ever get finished. And there's a pile of patterns and wool that I bought in a rush of enthusiasm.

Would she like this cupcake hat?


She does love a hat.




Or what about this frog outfit?

Probably not. She's not a baby any more, but a a little lady. Time for that ballet cross-over I think.

Yay, to the end of the wip and hooray for knitting!

SIX SENTENCE SUNDAY

For this week's SSS - for more details see here, I've dipped into the first of my BEAUMONT BRIDES trilogy, WILD JUSTICE.  It has a revenge plot, old secrets, new secrets and a heroine determined to take back control of her life from the man whose mission in life is to destroy it.

      Fizz. God, but how it suited her. Best kept chilled - inclined to erupt when shaken.
     The thought of making love in a four-poster bed had been simmering in her head, fanning the damped down fire. Her deliberate lack of interest had alerted him and he had known then that he would take her there; that she wouldn't, in the end, be able to resist the romance of it.
     But while he had thought to melt the ice a little, it seemed that unwittingly he had used a blow torch because now she had said the words, there was no way of taking them back.

Recently re-released as an eBook with this exciting new cover, you can download it for free from Amazon UK, Smashwords, Nook. It will cost you all of 99c from Amazon US.  Links on the sidebar.

Have a lovely day!