It is always an exciting moment for an author when their new book is published, so I hope you will forgive me for indulging in a little fanfare today! I’d like to introduce my heroine, Pru.
Prudence Clifford is one of the main characters in my latest Regency, The Night She Met the Duke. It hits the shelves at the end of this month.
So, here’s a little bit about Pru and her story. Continue reading
We should be talking about autumn, that season of mists and mellow fruitfulness…
Or Hallowe’en, darker nights, spooky goings-on and tales by candlelight.
As you can see, this book has a Christmas theme. I am sorry, it can’t be helped. It is out there. Continue reading
Storytelling is an art as old as time. I make up stories, tell yarns.
I am not an academic, I didn’t go to university and I didn’t study the art of writing at any college. I remember telling stories in primary school (possibly it began even earlier, I can’t remember) and I learned my art as I went along. Still do, in fact.
So I am NOT telling you how to write (or how to read). I am talking about stuff that distracts me when I’m reading a novel. Things I try to avoid.
We have all heard that old maxim, but whatever genre you write in, you will come across something that needs you to do a little research. At least, that is my experience. Continue reading
Hello again. I’m back about the RNA Awards…
Recently I was here with Louise Allen, chatting about how it felt like to be shortlisted for the RNA Awards. Now the Awards are over, and I’m back to tell you all about it.
The Romantic Novelist Association has released its shortlist for the Romantic Novel of the Year Awards and I am delighted to be amongst the finalists, along with fellow author and long time friend, Louise Allen.
Earlier I caught up Louise for a natter and I thought you might like to listen in….
SM It came as a most delightful shock to me when I discovered I had been nominated for the RNA Awards this year. To be honest, I have been so involved in my latest book that I had forgotten all about submitting Cinderella and the Scarred Viscount. How did you feel when you heard the news? Something like this, perhaps…?
LA Stunned, to be honest! I’d forgotten too, having agreed to a very tight deadline on the book I’ve just delivered. It came as a shock, but also a huge boost because I had just reached that ghastly stage with the current book when everything seemed to be wrong with it. It was such a joy to realise that sometimes I can write things people enjoy. Continue reading
Children in Read is the biggest signed book auction in the world. Libertà books suggests some books to bid for, and it’s for a great cause
You really won’t want to miss this year’s Children In Read Author’s and Illustrators’ Auction for BBC Children in Need.
There are fabulous signed books in every genre you can think of, all donated by their authors for this great cause.
All funds raised go to Children in Need, a great cause which supports children’s charities both in the UK and overseas.
If you were thinking of buying a book for yourself, or as a gift for a booklover you know this Christmas – or both! – the auction site is definitely worth a browse. You’ll be helping a very worthwhile cause and you’ll have your booked signed by the author.
This is the biggest signed book auction in the world and you’ll find donations from world famous, best-selling authors; familiar and much-loved names. Continue reading
This week, in connection with something unrelated to this blog, I came across a lot of book descriptors. By that, I mean the kind of words that are supposed to identify types and genres of fiction. Now I think I know what’s meant by romance or historical or saga. But some of the others? Um. Not so much.
So this blog is about a failing in my education. I need to get my head around these new and unfamiliar words to describe fiction. Who knows, I may even be writing some of them?
But if I don’t understand the book descriptors, how will I ever know?
One of the first book descriptors I fell over was Uplit. I tried the dictionary. Nope. (It asked me if I’d meant to type uplift. Sigh.) Continue reading
I’ve been wondering all week who it was who first “emerged blinking into the sunlight.” It’s a lovely phrase but these days it’s turned into a cliché. Google it, and you find rather a lot of very dull examples but no source.
That is especially true now that Covid 19 restrictions may be coming to an end at last. For the time being. Perhaps.
So where did this lovely phrase originate? Shakespeare? The Bible? Milton? Doesn’t look like it.
Or could it be Mole, abandoning his whitewashing for the sheer delights of the spring, the river and friends?
Or poor devastated Orpheus, evicted from the Underworld, alone.
Maybe, though, it is more mundane. Maybe even collective. Prisoners, say. Or people who have gathered underground as a refuge. Maybe even an audience at some all-night movie show, leaving the cinema as day breaks.
So this morning, I woke up just after dawn. I’m a lark, not an owl, and this is normal for me. But it had rained like Niagara nearly all of yesterday and the light this morning was extraordinary. Piercing is the only word. It was my Mole moment. I wanted to be out there adventuring.
And pretty soon I was.
With a herd of elephants on the move.
I should explain that last night friends came to dinner. The first friends round my table for eighteen months! (I was like a labrador whose master has just come home from a year in Space.) And on the way to my house they had photographed this herd.
I needed to see them. So out I went into the diamond-bright morning to look. And there they were, heading in determined convoy across a playing field. That’s the playing field outside the Saatchi Gallery at the Duke of York’s Headquarters on the King’s Road. Continue reading
Today the Libertà hive are in celebratory mood, springing towards summer by relaunching our collection of novellas, Beach Hut Surprise.
In spring, says the poet, a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love. (Actually it was Tennyson in Locksley Hall, written when he was twenty-five and presumably knew what he was talking about. At least in the Young Man Department anyway.)
This spring, after a grim year of Covid 19 and at least three lockdowns, most of us, even the least romantic, are starting to think of Getting Out A Bit. It gives us hope. Continue reading
A big thank you to all those who commented on the post, the giveaway is now closed and the winner was drawn at random under the watchful gaze of Willow, chief scrutineer.
Sabillatul, you can email me at author@melinda-hammond.co.uk or DM me via twitter @SarahMRomance and I will arrange to get your goodies posted to you! Congratulations!
Am I excited about thirty? You bet I am.
Thirty Historical romances – that’s a full shelf!
Given the current state of the world, it is wonderful to have something to celebrate so I want to share with you my delight at reaching this milestone.
Thirty! Who would have thought it? So go on, raise a glass with me!