One of the best things you can do to your romance readers

I was delighted yesterday to almost make someone cry. She had been kind enough to read my book The Sanctuary. Her exact words were, "I was touched by your story, to the point of tears." Now that could just have been because it was so bad, but I hope she was crying in a good way. I love a good cry at a book or at the movies. I remember sitting in a cinema and wailing over "West Side Story", it's heart wrenching after all that exuberance - singing, dancing and falling in love when it all comes crashing down after the shooting. Then, of course, there was the bit in Bambie where his mother gets shot. That was so sad. Plus, don't even mention 'Breakfast at Tiffany's', where they go and find that poor cat, soaking wet in the rain. Here's a link to that scene which still does it for me, every time! What films or books have made you cry I wonder?

FABULOUS London Olympic Opening Ceremony

WOW, FABULOUS, AMAZING, QUIRKY, CONFUSING, HILARIOUS - Danny Boyle's opening ceremony was all of those and more. An extraordinary hotch potch of everything that makes up Britain today. What a stroke of genius to congratulate the workers of the NHS who are so often villified when in fact most of them do a fabulous job. How lovely and quirky to see both a posse of Mary Poppins's as well as our WONDERFUL Queen not taking herself too seriously. Tears ran down my face when Rowan Atkinson was playing the fool. Other tears were inspired by Akram Khan's totally moving choreography remembering those who couldn't be with us, reflecting a somewhat darker side of terrorism which occasionally blights our wonderful city.

Security has been so tight lately, thank goodness. My home city was celebrated with superb views of the Thames and Tower Bridge and now a new landmark, the Olympic stadium. Was the Olympic opening ceremony relevant, did it reflect us? Totally. So much of it rang bells. Yes, I do listen to The Archers, my sister does live in a rural idyll with farm animals down the lane and my brother-in-law does play cricket on a village green. Dizzee Rascal's rapping does blast out of the streets of Croydon near where I live and work and yes, I have seen Rowan Atkinson filming in London. Yes, I do know someone who volunteered at the opening ceremony. Yes, that kiss between two women on the clips of TV and films reflects that I know more than a few couples in civil partnerships - those things reflect Britain today as did Danny Boyle's wonderful, chaotic, stunning ceremony. Well done Britain, well done Danny, well done athletes, well done London!!!

Here's Daniel Craig trying not to laugh!

Beautiful Weymouth by the sea

One of the wonderful things about living in London is being able to get to other places easily. We have recently spent a couple of days in Weymouth, Dorset. What a fabulous place! I always feel inspired to write by the sea and have set many books, including The Sanctuary at seaside locations. By the way, it's still on summer sale at only .99 cents or .77 pence from Amazon. There's a donkey in my story which is about a girl who inherits an animal sanctuary. The donkey in the photo above is one of a group which gives children rides on Weymouth beach and I am indebted to writer Laura James who tells me that the lady who owns them has won awards - they certainly looked very happy as they mooched up and down the sands.

Weymouth is the quintessential English seaside location. Yesterday I kept on being reminded of the postcards of Donald McGill. There we were on the beach, roasting in beautiful sunshine, all turning into pink lobsters. There were fat people, skinny people, ladies of a certain age on deckchairs fast asleep, unwittingly flashing their knickers, children misbehaving and a punch and judy show. There was also the serious matter of the Olympic sailing which is coming to Weymouth this week. Another serious note were the many memorials on the seafront to the brave American and British troops who left from this idyllic sandy beach for the Omaha landings. Weymouth has a fabulous history and many beautiful Georgian houses as well as a peaceful historic harbour. Do visit if you get the chance. The other photo is of me swimming by Durdle Dor, a really fabulous ethereal location reached by walking along the cliffs. It was freezing but very refreshing. The three hour drive also gave me enough time to do some more editing on my next book with Astraea which I hope will be 'Take a Chance' a cosy crime set in an English country house owned by one Lady Margrave. Watch this space....

The Sanctuary and other Astraea Press books only 99 cents or .77p

I've just had a wonderful review for The Sanctuary on Amazon which is really super. Here's the link. The Sanctuary is described as a warm and uplifting story in the review. What's more, my publisher Astraea Press are having a summer sale and all books are only 99 cents or just .77p. So, if you haven't already got your holiday reads on Kindle etc, do go and have a look today. Astraea do sweet romances, romantic suspense etc. Perfect beach reads. Enjoy!

How to write a pocket novel

I couldn't go to the Romantic Novelists Association conference this year. However, one of those who did attend, Kate Jackson Bedford has posted up a really useful blog about one of the talks. Maggie Seed who is the editor of My Weekly pocket novels gave a presentation about what she looks for in a pocket novel. I have had six pocket novels published by My Weekly and People's Friend. These include 'The Sanctuary' a romantic mystery with a rescue dog and a troubled teenager thrown in. This is on the special low price of .77p for the summer!!! Buy now! Like all genres, to keep up with the times, pocket novels are changing to include more mystery, murder and mayhem but essentially they are still heartstopping romances. Kate's blog gave a very good round up of what they're looking for in submissions. They are a wonderful antidote to Fifty Shades of Grey! You will also find tips at The Pocketeers Blogspot. Happy reading and writing! PS - the photo above is of Douglas Booth and outrageously good looking young actor who has been the model for many of my pocket novel heroes. Sigh...

What a writing retreat can do for you.

A few years ago a friend of mine, Giselle Green - an incredibly talented writer - invited me to a writing retreat with her and a couple of friends. I was sceptical. How on earth would I cope somewhere which had no connection to the internet, no telephones and no TV. Did such places still exist on earth? Well, they do and they can be fabulous for a writer. It's an opportunity to get away completely. Most retreats are either in the country or by the sea. Our retreat is in amongst wonderful gardens and here they are.

Tucked away from the real world they are an opportunity to concentrate on your writing in a way you simply don't get at home. I wrote most of my book, The Sanctuary at this retreat. If you're sitting in front of a PC people never feel you're working and writing time can be so easily curtailed by a phone call or other work and pressures. We each have our own little self-catering room so that tea and coffee is on tap whenever you want. It also means that one of us cooks and invites the other over in the evening. So, after an isolated day writing, reading and making notes we can get together for a gossip and a laugh. I'm a very early riser and do my best writing between 5 and 10am but by then I'm pretty pooped. When I'm on retreat I can have a nap and then be ready to write again in the afternoon. I simply can't follow that pattern when all the demands of house, children etc crowd in on me at home. I had a truly wonderful time. I managed to iron out a lot of the difficult areas of the crime story I'm writing and now have only 10,000 words to go till the end. What's more I made a new best friend while I was there. That's his picture above. He's a red siberian pedigree cat with an amazing yowl of a miaow, and the skinniest cat I've ever seen. Anyhow, I should be off writing those 10,000 words now so, goodbye and if you get a chance to go on retreat, grab it!

HAIL in July and how it can help our writing...

Hi - we have been having the most appalling weather in England. Here is a photo of hail which fell this week. It was so bad that people were getting up off the sofa and opening their front doors to remark upon it. One thing it did was make me think about IMPACT in writing. One of the things I do as a published writer, is to critique other peoples' manuscripts. If people ask me the one most common mistake new writers make, I would say that it is to have a novel without incident. We read novels because we want to see something happening, to feel something. I will give you an example. One novel I was required to critique was about a relationship which had happened years before and ended in divorce. The hero and heroine were thrown together again, she was forced to work for him. He had a small son from a different relationship who had nightmares. Part of working for him in his house was that they had to live together for a period. That, and only that is all I can remember of the novel. Nothing happened. There were no incidents of note, no heartstopping moments, no revelations. They just poodled along drinking tea and chatting and having the occasional meal. It was competently put together, the timelines worked, the dialogue was realistic, the characters were believable. BUT they had virtually no history that was revealed to the reader, they had nothing to drive them or give them motives. This meant that there was no incident in the book and therefore no impact. Looking at that hailstorm made me think how people in our road had reacted, they felt scared that we might be flooded and it had shaken them out of their routine. We read to experience that process of getting out of the ordinary. So, to make a novel interesting give it 'incident' make characters feel and do extraordinary things. They must be believable but they must also be extraordinary for us to be interested. Otherwise you risk ending up with 50 to 100,000 words which are, frankly, no more interesting than every day life. I thought of this only recently when I watched the film Million Dollar Baby. The heroine is totally driven due to coming from a poor background and having a hideous family. She wants to be a boxer to escape. She wins fights, she ends up terribly injured. The hero turns from being a curmudgeonly old misery to helping her on her journey and finally to taking a life changing step to help her in her bedridden plight. The film is full of incident and excitement, packed with backstory, it tugs at the heartstrings. THAT is what your book should try to do... In my book 'The Sanctuary' I have an inheritance, a family mystery and a marital breakdown THINGS HAPPEN. Make things happen in your writing and you are sure to be published. Good luck!