Well - I didn't win ...

 But I had a wonderful evening. 

It was great to be on my publisher Joffe's table to celebrate simply being nominated. Sue Fortin won the Jackie Collins but she is a friend so I have forgiven her. Next time! 

I enjoyed wearing my sparkly jumpsuit. I took the long gloves then forgot to put them on! I wondered if traveling on the Tube to the venue at Tower Hill from Chelsea at 4 p.m. in all my finery would be 'interesting'  but except from one young girl no one batted an eyelid. 

Anton Du Beke was an excellent celebrity presenter, along side the RNA's Brigid Cody and he was super generous in posing for selfies with everyone. There was food and drink and photos and excitement. Lots of gossip and laughter and the chance to see old friends.  Finalists had to arrive early for a photo shoot, but I haven't been able to get those photos to open! The tension built up from there until the moment when the envelope was opened. If you want to see - and read - all the winners you will find them on the RNA website. A real variety of popular romantic fiction. 

The awards were only the start of a fabulous week I spent in Chelsea. More posts over the next few weeks. 

I've  borrowed the photos from Fellow finalist and Cariad Chapter member Jan Baynham and from the official photographer Katie Hipkiss Visuals. Ownership acknowledged with many thanks. 

Table awaiting guests.

My name in lights

Deep in conversation - and where did the sumo wrestler arms come from? 

Posing with Anton along with fellow Joffe contender Jan and her daughter Jo. 

The RNA Awards

 Well, the awards event was on Monday so we know by now if I won, but as I will still be in London today and away from the nuts and bolts of creating the blog, I won't be talking about it until next week, as this post was written before I left. Are you with me so far? 

Whatever the outcome it is always a privilege to be chosen to compete for an award and the RNA awards, with the short lists selected by panels of ordinary readers, are particularly special - at least I think so. I admit I am a bit of a pot hunter - been that way since age 13 when I made up my mind to win what my dad called the Victor Ludorum at the school Eisteddfod. And I did - next time around. But the big prize for me, as a writer, is that people should enjoy my books. 

If you don't win you don't get to make a thank you speech - so I am doing mine here and if you've heard it before - I will be delighted! 

Thanks have to go to Lu, my long suffering editor, who deals with all sorts of holes and hiccups with patience and humour. To Berni for the lovely covers and for Choc-lit who took a chance on me over a decade ago and were willing to try the American style genre, romantic suspense, on a UK audience. Happily they seemed to like it!  Thanks to friends, inside and outside the RNA, for their help and support, listening to half soaked plot plans, patchy word counts and general moaning. To the RNA and the award organisers for the work they put in, all on a voluntary basis

But the  biggest thanks have to go to the readers who buy and enjoy the books, That is what makes it all worthwhile. 

So - what are you going to wear?

 My mother was a dressmaker by trade. Fashion and sewing were her passion the way words and writing are mine. It's not surprising that I was a clothes-horse before I could walk. It was natural that if I had an event coming up, she would make something for me. In fact, we would sometimes sit down and review the next few months to make a programme. She was a fabric addict, collecting supplies in sales in advance of requirements which were stored in 'The Trunk'. It's big tin affair which now has the paperwork for my PhD in it, as I wanted somewhere to store all my precious hand written notes that I thought might be a protected in the event of fire. The fabric has migrated to other locations and I've donated some. When we were doing one of those reviews the trunk was always raided to see what goodies it might contain that could be used, without having to spend much more than the cost of cotton and a zip and maybe a pattern, if she didn't cut her own, or adapt one. During the war she had enough fabric stored to clothe herself, my grandmother and my aunt for the duration, when dress material, like many things, was scarce. You can imagine the size of the stash - I think it must have overflowed the trunk then. 

Now she's gone I am on my own. If I want a new outfit I have to buy it! One of the last things she made me was a floor length sequined dress for a convention ball in America. I still have it and planned to wear it for the Awards when A Villa in Portofino was nominated. Unfortunately when I tried it on, it had got a bit snug around the middle, so I wore the green jumpsuit I'd bought for a gala dinner at the RNA Conference. Not sparkly.

Now I am a nominee again for Masquerade on the Riviera and this time I am going sparkly - a jump suit I bought in the Phase 8 sale after Xmas. That was a speculative purchase, a bit like the fabric in the trunk. I knew I would have the chance to wear it somewhere, but I really didn't think it would be another trip to the awards.  It was a bargain, but like all Phase 8 garments much too long, so I have had to shorten it. Took a while, with much trying on and a brief panic over whether I had done the same leg twice, but it is now done and gives me a buzz every time I pass it hanging up in the spare room. 

It's black - or at least dark grey - and I don't wear much black these days as I think it doesn't suit me as much as it did when I was a teenager and wore it all the time - as you do. But well, it was a bargain, and I shall just have to go heavy on the blusher. I'm looking forward to wearing it, with some sparkly shoes and jewelry - may as well go all out. 

There is one big question though - if I can find them, do I wear my elbow length evening gloves?

Where did Masquerade come from?

 Masquerade on the Riviera is currently a nominee for the Jackie Collins Romantic Thriller of the Year, and I did threaten a couple of posts ago to talk some more about it. I'm over the moon to be in the contest for the second time! 

How did I come to write it? Well -  it's the fourth in the Rivera Series, which are my sunshine escapist romantic suspense books, so it already has siblings, but this one is a bit different. For a start it's partially set on the English Riviera. My editor did get a bit worried that we were not going to end up in France or Italy, but the book concluded in Monaco, so she didn't need to fret. 

I have said before - often - that writers can get a bit sniffy when asked about their inspiration, because often we don't actually know.  In this case, with my contrary nature, I knew I wanted the English Riviera setting, just to mix things up a bit, and once I was in Torquay then the town's most celebrated literary inhabitant was a no-brainer. In a bit of homage I went truffling though some of the most famous Agatha Christie  motifs - so - there is a body in a library, a lot of Egyptian artifacts, a slightly creepy gothic style house, with a secret passage.  I think Enid Blyton might have got a look in with that last one.

Visiting Torquay for that year's Crime Writers' Association conference added some local colour.  The heroine, Masie, was already in place as she had had a minor role in the previous book and was due for her time centre stage. Quite how Elliott got to be an Egyptologist I'm not certain, but as the book revolved around a cursed Egyptian necklace I suppose that was fairly obvious too, when you think about it. I am NOT an Egyptologist, so I had to research that one, which  I enjoyed. The academic
background is me, I suppose, the convoluted plot - I have no idea. The Masked Ball might owe a bit to Georgette Heyer - doesn't everyone know what a domino is - no not the game with the spots. The Monaco setting and the private yacht is pure wish fulfilment - one of the up sides of past me choosing to make the head of the detective agency which roughly cements the series together, into a billionaire. It was fun to write, and it is brilliant to know that the reader judges for the RNA Awards enjoyed it enough to put it into the final. 

That, after all, is why we write them - to give enjoyment to readers - although a few have said they learned a few things too - hopefully about Egyptology and artistic provenance and not stealing valuable jewels - which I hope was an added bonus.  

First of May

 May Day - the date, not the distress call. Apparently that comes from the French m'aider - 'help me' and is a fairly recent invention, as is the designation of 1st May as International Workers' Day. It's been a Bank Holiday sine the 1970s but now rationalised to the nearest Monday. 

I'm thinking of something much older than all of these - Beltane - the Celtic festival between the spring solstice and midsummer. The start of summer, the coming of light, traditionally celebrated as a fire festival with beacons and bonfires. The light side of the celebrations are maypoles, Morris dancing and the crowning of a May Queen. Of course it is the darker side of the festival that interests me. I do write romantic suspense, after all, It has fascinated me since reading Mary Stewart's Wildfire at Midnight, many decades ago. The book is set on the Isle of Skye  with a series of murders and unexpected fires, with pagan overtones - very creepy. with lots of suspense.  

I always credit Mary Stewart with setting my taste in reading and I have nurtured the idea of a book featuring the pagan festivals for a long time. 

 I might actually be writing it at the moment. I'm indulging myself with the current WIP and a hint - maybe more than a hint - of the supernatural seems to be part of it. Not sure yet how it is going to work out - but all those folklore courses at the Lifelong Leaning Department of the University have to go somewhere. Beltane is a big draw, of course, but Midsummer might be a candidate as I think it may better fit my time line.

I'm inventing a village on the South Wales coast to go in the book so I can invent my own local celebrations to go with them.  I hope I can do it as well as Mary Stewart.