HERE COME THE GROOMS!

Since it's the weekend and, hopefully, you'll have a little time to enjoy your favourite book blogs, I'm introducing the three books featured in this year's HERE COME THE GROOMS contest.

First, Kate Walker's -

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THE DEVIL AND MISS JONES

Kate's groom is Carlos Diablo Ortega -  who, as he tells Martha - made his  fortune in 'horses and wine' - is a championship polo player and owns a hugely successful vineyard. He's also just discovered that he's not actually the son of the man he thought was his father - or the grandson of Javier Ortega.  And that has turned his life upside down.

Martha's rather different -  but her life has just been turned upside down too.

Martha Jones has never taken a risk in her whole life. Until the day she runs out on her wedding and succumbs to the magnetism of a man she has only just met! A man she knows only as Diablo.

Lone wolf Carlos Ortega won't promise Miss Jones more than one searing-hot night. Yet Carlos is shocked by Martha's sweet innocence. This runaway bride is a virgin, and it seems the repercussions of their sizzling encounter could last forever . . .

Finally there is Anne McAllister's brand new novel - out at the same time as  The Devil and MIss Jones - that's March (UK) and April (USA  - Presents Extra)

SAVAS’S WILDCAT

Anne's Groom is Yiannis, the youngest of the Savas brothers and his heroine, Catriona MacLean. Yiannis and Cat have a bit of a history – or a lot of history, depending on which of them you ask.

According to the back cover:

Yiannis Savas, the irresistible playboy of the Savas dynasty, was every girl’s dream. But he quickly turned into Cat’s nightmare when his idea of a relationship was no more than a fiery affair.

Now Cat MacLean has grown up and out of her girlish fantasies. Determined not to fall prey to smooth talk and fast charm again, she’d engaged to someone sensible.

Then she’s forced to spend a week with the one man she’s never been able to forget . . .

 Finally my own -

FLIRTING WITH ITALIAN

My Groom is Conte Matteo di Serrone, the owner of a great vineyard, a plant breeder who is working with the UN’s Food and Agriculture Office.

The lady in Matteo’s life is Sarah Gratton, a history teacher, who is picking up her life after her fiance falls for someone new and she finds herself working in an international school in Rome.

The blurb for Liz’s book says:

Bag: packed. Flight: booked. Soon I’ll be in Rome and experiencing life in a foreign language! Watch this space…
Newly single Sarah Gratton is about to jump start her life and a just-for-fun romance with dark-eyed Matteo di Serrone could be just what the doctor ordered! 

This Italian count is ideal flirting material—if Sarah’s brave enough to make a move!

Well, she might not be—but luckily Matteo is! Matteo decides to keep this mysterious woman close—no hardship at all, given their spine-tingling awareness of each other and for a while it’s like something out of a fairy tale—until Sarah realizes she’s made the most rookie mistake of all: falling in love with her holiday fling….

Now for the competition - each of the Grooms has asked one question; your task, should you wish to win a copy of each of these books, is to answer all three of them.

Here is Carlos' question - What is Martha wearing – and holding when he first sees her?

Yiannis's question is quite simple -  he wants to know - Who’s Harry?

Matteo’s question is -  I asked Sarah if she’d found someone. Who was it?

Yiannis, Carlos and Matteo would like you to check out their books. You can access them by clicking on the books tab at the top of each of our web pages and then find the individual book pages.

If you’d like to enter this year’s Here Come the Grooms! contest, read the blurbs/ the extracts and/or our blogs and find the answers to the questions the grooms have asked  and send them to each of us . You send all 3 answers to each of us to complete your entry - that way you have three chances of be on of the three winners  of  three great books. (Let's hope your lucky number is  3!)

Send all three of us an email with Here Come The Grooms in the subject line so that it will go into the right folder.

The contest is now open and it closes on Sadie Hawkins Day - or Leap Year Day - February 29th.

Good Luck!

Hi, I’m Matteo di Serrone and apparently I’m one of the Grooms in a competition that Liz and her friends, Kate and Anne run each year.

Liz asked me to drop by and introduce myself. Roman - we've had a palazzo in the city for more than seven generations - Italian, a botanist, wine maker, the head of the Serrone family, with all that entails.

That's it - I hate talking about myself and anyway the Italian gossip magazines have been having a field day with the revelations about our family in the last few weeks. It’s all there so maybe I should tell you about my home instead.

I live - when I can get away from the Rome, from my work - in the small town of Isola del Serrone, in the Lazio region of Italy.

My family have been there for centuries, we one with the soil. The Volci were here before the upstart Romans got going and we still speak a dialect that predates Latin.

Italian is a very modern language – created to unite a country that was a series of city states, each with their own language. Dante’s writing was used as a template, which is why Italian is so beautiful but at home we still speak the old language.

I first met Sarah on a path high above Isola del Serrone, in a place that overlooks my home and my family vineyard. She was trespassing. My idiot younger brother warned me that she was there – after he’d held open the gate for her.

I really couldn’t blame him.

I’d only been with her a few moments and I was kissing her. Her reaction, the tears, left me as shaken as she clearly was. What could I do but offer her lunch? How better to get to know her? To find out why she was so interested in my house. What she was doing so far off the tourist trail.

Good food, my best wine, will lower the guard, reveal secrets.

‘So,’ he said, as they dug into the creamy pasta, ‘you didn’t tell me how long you have been in Rome?’

‘A month, give or take a few days.’

‘And you are enjoying it?’

‘Great job. Great apartment. What’s not to like?’

‘You have a job?’ he asked, clearly astonished.

‘Of course.’

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean so sound so surprised, but since you don’t speak Italian…’

‘I’m teaching at an English language school in Rome. Maternity cover.’

It was clearly not what he’d been expecting if the barely perceptible pause, an instinctive lift to his brows was anything to go by. But he was swift to recover.

‘History,’ he said. ‘I recall that you have a degree in history.’

‘It feels a bit like taking coal to Newcastle to be honest,’ she said. Then, because he clearly hadn’t a clue what she was talking about, ‘They used to mine vast quantities of the stuff in Newcastle. It’s a saying.’

‘Of course. I understand. But your degree is in Modern History.’

‘I’ve become pretty familiar with the Tudors, since they’re part of the curriculum. But not a Roman in sight,’ she admitted.

‘Are you enjoying it?’

‘Yes, I am.’ Which was true. The job. Rome.

‘But you must miss your family. Friends.’

‘They are a telephone call away. We exchange emails, photographs.’ As if to make the point, she picked up her phone and dropped it in her bag. ‘Chat on Skype.’

‘It’s not the same,’ he pointed out. ‘A computer can’t give you a hug.’

She laughed. ‘No, that’s true.’ And you had to like a man who understood the need for a hug now and then. ‘But I always wanted to travel.’ She lifted her shoulders. ‘I talked about doing a gap year, before university, but in the end I decided to be sensible, get the degree and the PGCE over and done with first, then travel.’ Sensible Sarah. ‘I had all the brochures, was deciding where I’d go, what I’d do, when the dream job came up. Too good to miss and when I met Tom on my first day it seemed like fate…’

‘Everything set fair until he ran into the boulder.’

And she smiled again, not because she didn’t still have the bruises, but what was the point in poking at them to see how much they hurt? It was over. It had been over from the moment Louise had walked into the staff room. Forget the teeth and claws. Why would she fight for a man who had never looked at her the way he’d looked at Louise? As if he’d been felled.

Being mean was pointless. Louise had the kind of voluptuous figure that any man would swoon over. But Matteo had made her laugh about it. Who would have guessed that was ever going to happen?

‘This seemed like a good moment to go back to the beginning,’ she said. ‘I signed up with an agency which recruits teachers for overseas jobs, got a reference so good from my Headmaster that I suspect he couldn’t wait to be rid of me.’ She pulled a face. ‘It’s tricky when you all work together.’

‘A decent man would have left.’

‘He did, but he’s head of sports. The kids love him. And I’m the one who always wanted to travel.’

‘You left so that he could return to his job?’ He grinned. ‘I take it all back. You are not nice, Sarah Gratton.’

‘Excuse me?’

How much “nicer” could a woman get?

‘Every day this man goes to work he will know he has you to thank for his job. And so will Louise. She won’t be able to stand it. Sooner or later she’ll insist he changes his job and he’ll blame her. It’s positively Machiavellian.’

‘No!’

The chicken, golden-skinned and scented with rosemary, arrived at that moment, giving her a moment to gather herself.

It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be.

Could it?

Did that warm glow come from knowing she’d done the right thing?  Or was that no more than self-righteous cant?

How many times had she imagined him walking down the corridors, seeing her everywhere the way she’d seen him? Missing her? Realising what a mistake he’d made?

Matteo dressed a green salad. Topped up her glass.

‘No need to look so distraught, Sarah. You didn’t twist his arm. The choice was his.’

‘He loved his job.’

‘So did you.’

‘Yes, I did. But right now I’m picking up my life plan, taking the first step on my journey around the world.’

‘You are happy?’

Right now? At this minute? With the sun slanting through the heavily laden vines overhead. The soft murmur of insects, the scent of warm earth and Matteo di Serrone teasing her, making her laugh.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’m happy.’

He glanced across the table, holding her fixed in the power of his dark eyes as he said, ‘Then let me say that I’m very glad you started your journey in Rome, Sarah.’

And she found herself saying, ‘So am I.’

The chicken was amazing, a melting of dollop of dolcelatte could not be denied, but she finally begged for mercy when he offered her a peach.

‘Enough.  No more.’

‘You must have something. A pear? A plum?’ Then, in apparent desperation, ‘A grape?’

She laughed. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d laughed as much.

‘No,’ she declared. ‘Not even a grape.’ But refusing to take no for an answer, Matteo reached up and plucked a huge dark grape from a bunch growing above his head. Held it close enough to her lips for her to smell the sweetness.

‘Resistance is futile,’ he said and she felt herself sliding into temptation.

Everything today had been about the senses.

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…

All the details of the competition are in the previous post - you have three questions to answer, and for three chances to win send all your answers to Anne, Kate and Liz.

Meanwhile, I have a fountain to fill with wine and a statue to organise before the wedding.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!.

I hope you’ll be spending the day with your loved one, quietly, madly, doing whatever floats your boat.

It doesn’t have to be about expensive, out of season roses, or chocolate or champagne. “I love you” written in lipstick on the bathroom mirror, or in the steamed up windows of the bus, or a heart drawn in the snow says it all.

It’s about taking the time to remember all the good things you share and saving a moment to say the words.

Meanwhile, since it's Valentine's Day it's time to welcome the Grooms!

First up, Yiannis Savas from Anne McAllister's Savas's Wildcat!

 

Yiannis Savas, the irresistible playboy of the Savas dynasty, was every girl's dream.  But he quickly turned into Cat's nightmare when his idea of a relationship was no more than a fiery affair.

Now Cat MacLean has grown up and out of her girlish fantasies.  Determined not to fall prey to smooth talk and fast charm again, she's engaged to someone sensible.

Then she's forced to spend a week with the one man she's never been able to forget...

Yiannis' question is "Who's Harry?"

Next it's Carlos Diablo Ortega from Kate Walker's The Devil and Miss Jones

Martha Jones has never taken a risk in her whole life. Until the day she runs out on her wedding and succumbs to the magnetism of a man she has only just met! A man she knows only as Diablo.
Lone wolf Carlos Ortega won't promise Miss Jones more than one searing-hot night. Yet Carlos is shocked by Martha's sweet innocence. This runaway bride is a virgin, and it seems the repercussions of their sizzling encounter could last forever . . .
 
Carlos' question is What is Martha wearing – and holding when he first sees her?

Finally it's Matteo di Serrone from my own, Flirting With Italian

Sarah Gratton is a history teacher, picking up her life after her fiance falls for someone new. She has taken a job in an international school in Rome and has her heart set on finding out what happened to the woman who saved her great-grandfather's life in 1944. Instead she finds Matteo.

 

Matteo's question is, I asked Sarah if she'd found someone. Who was it?
 

Here's the competition - email Anne, Kate and myself (all three of us!) - subject line Here Come the Grooms - with the answers to all three of the questions posed by our grooms. You'll find the answers in the excerpts on our web pages. Three lucky winners will each win a copy of all three books.

We'll be drawing the prize winners on Sadie Hawkins Days, which, if you've been paying attention you'll know is 29 February.

Good luck!