In Translation

I've blogged before about the strange experience of seeing your book in translation. Your name is on the front, but you have no idea what the contents is really like.

This time it's Norwegian and the book is Never Coming Home. This is what they look like.  Isn't the cover lovely. It's released by the publishers Cappelen Damm. Here's the link  LINK

I hope my Norwegian readers enjoy it!

Bringing Devlin Back

Writing my new Christmas novella - What Happens at Christmas - was a bit of a surprise. It was never on the radar, until it was! I've gone into the details of how that happened in a post on the Being Anne blog, which was part of last week's launch week book blast.  There's a link at the bottom of this post, if you haven't read it yet.

Bringing Devlin back was a bit of a surprise too. After publication of Never Coming Home lots of people asked if I would be making him the star of a series - he got compared to Lee Child's Jack Reacher - a lot - which really surprised me. But I never expected him to have a role like that. He has his Happy Ever After with Kaz, and that's the story, for me.

Except when I was writing What Happens At Christmas, I knew that Drew was going to need some help. He's an action man, but he doesn't have the skills - or the connections - to get himself out of the mess I've dropped him in, on his own. I'd already given him a flat in London - I can't remember if it was already in Chelsea. It may have been, as it's an area I used to live and know reasonably well.

When I realised about the needing help thing, and exactly who was going to be perfect for the role, it didn't take much to make them neighbours in Chelsea, then friends.  And of course Devlin was exactly the person Drew would be able to reach out to, when he needed that sort of skill set.

It was actually great fun to bring Devlin back, in a cameo role, and to get a glimpse into his family life. In fact, I enjoyed it so much I have half an idea for another story with Devlin and Drew. It would have to have another hero too - and a new heroine and a new love story ...

But, three heroes!!!

Can I cope with that?

At the moment it is just an idea. Just an idea.

Three heroes.

That really would be another story 


(Link to the blog post on Being Anne is HERE )

Two faces of romantic suspense. With contests!

As everyone knows, the romantic suspense author gets to hang out with the crime writers and the romantics. This month I'm proving it by taking part in two month-long events that have contests with great give aways. 

The Thriller side is taking part in the Homicides of March. European members of the International Thriller Writers are giving away 41 books to one lucky winner. I'm told that if you encourage friends to enter too you get extra points and more chances to win. Some great books in there. Think how good they would look on your bookshelf!  You can see the details here
The Homicides of March

The other event, with my romance hat on, is the Romance Reviews 4th Anniversary Party. Lots of book give-aways, and an overall prize of a gift certificate. There is a Q&A and you have to register on the site, but I am assured that it is easy - and free. My question, and a copy of Never Coming Home, will be appearing on 28th March, but there are events and books available throughout the month. Over 300 romance writers are involved, so plenty of prizes. More information here.
The Romance Review contest

Good luck!!

Good News Week!

It's been one of those weeks - I'm happy to say that I've just signed the contract for a brand new novella, which will be coming out as one of Choclit's e-book line - Choclit Lite.  It's a bit different from what I usually write. Quite a bit lighter - crime, but no dead bodies at all. (Don't worry, the bodies will be back in the next one.) The novella is a little holiday from the dark stuff -  lots of fun chasing my hero and heroine around the Italian Riviera for 50,000 words or so. I can't give you a title yet as the publisher is thinking of changing it - until then, we're all in suspense.

The other big news was a complete surprise and I really mean complete. Last year my debut novel, Never Coming Home had quite a bit of success in some of the contests organised by regional chapters of the Romance Writers of America - ones for published authors, judged by readers, booksellers and librarians.

I didn't plan on entering Out of Sight Out of Mind, my 2013 paperback release, for any of them, because of the cost of postage, etc.  But my friend, the American author, Barbara Longley, who I got to know when we were both competing in the American Title contest, had entered her contemporary novel Far from Perfect for the 2013 Maggies - run by the Georgia chapter of the RWA - and won her category. Inspired by Barbara, I thought I'd have a go. I hadn't tried that contest in 2013. I had nothing to lose but the postage.

My entry went off, went through the judging, and a few weeks ago the finalists were posted. Out of Sight Out of Mind wasn't one of them. I was disappointed, naturally, but that's life.

But yesterday I got an e-mail from the organiser. There had been a glitch in the scoring, and Out of Sight Out of Mind was a finalist after all!

The Maggie Awards for Excellence have been given out by Georgia Romance Writers for over three decades. It is a highly respected award in the writing community. I'm thrilled and honoured to have been chosen as a finalist. 

As a taster for the book, the video is below.

The video for Out of Sight Out of Mind

Not lost in Translation

The first translation of one of my books into a language other than English has recently gone live. Never Coming Home has been published in Italian. It's now called Scomparsa, which apparently translates as 'Disappearence', and it has a brand new cover.

It's a strange feeling, knowing your book has taken on a life that you know nothing about.

So - this week I'm celebrating becoming just that little bit Italian. If you'd like to take a closer look, here's the link.

Amazon in Italy

Never Coming Home Trailer

The link below is to my first ever book trailer!

Celebrating that Never Coming Home is in the Kindle sale for another few days.

I've wanted to do one of these for ages - even did a course on Movie Maker, and took a lot of pictures to use, but never got my nerve up to do it. Now, thanks to recommendations from other writer friends, I've managed 30 (free) seconds from Animoto.

So, starring Rosie and shot on location in Florence and the back garden - the big budget trailer for Never Coming Home I've crashed the text a bit in the last shot (wince) but I'll do better next time.


Never Coming Home

Oklahoma Romance Writers of America - National Readers' Choice Awards

Writers will tell you that there is nothing to beat the feeling when your first book is accepted for publication. It's a time of euphoria, but when your feet start to make contact with the ground again, it's a scary time too. If you have friends in the industry you know that the work begins NOW. Edits, followed by promotion of the book, followed by ...

That's the scariest point of all - the book goes out to the public. Readers. People who have paid for you to entertain them. Your publisher had faith in you, which is reassuring, but it's no guarantee. There are an awful lot of books out there. A recent trip to the London Book Fair confirms this, if it needed confirmation. (More about my visit to LBF next week.)
Your book is there - friends and family buy it and say how much they love it. Then reviewers find it and make their judgements ...

My second book, Out of Sight Out of Mind has just made that journey and I'm glad to say is collecting some generous and enthusiastic reviews. But the story has not ended for my debut novel Never Coming Home.

I'm delighted to announce that Never Coming Home has been chosen as a finalist for best first book in the Oklahoma Romance Writers Of America National Readers' Choice Awards.

I'm so pleased to be chosen to be part of these awards. It's an honour for my first book and even if I don't win, I will treasure the nomination. My thanks to all those involved in organising and judging the contest, for their work in making it all happen.

Colorado Romance Writers - Award of Excellence

I'm pleased and excited to be able to display the badge above - which was awarded to my debut novel Never Coming Home for achieving the final of the Colorado Romance Writers annual Awards of Excellence, in the category romantic suspense. The winners of the awards will be announced later in the year. Do I have hopes? Of course - but I know that all those other books in my category will have as much heart- stopping romance, and be as thrilling, as their authors could make them. The competition will be strong, and the ultimate winners are the readers, as everyone strives to produce the very best book they can.

Just to be in the final, with my first published book, is an honour. I wish every success to all my fellow nominees, in all categories, and my thanks to the organizers and judges who give their time to make the contest possible.

A Valentine Surprise! Single Titles Reviewers' Choice Award

What a fabulous Valentine surprise. No, not red roses from the man of my dreams - I'm still working on that one - but an e-mail from Single Titles to tell me that Never Coming Home has won a Reviewers' Choice Award for 2012.

Single Titles is one of the CataNetwork of review sites and I am thrilled and excited that they enjoyed Never Coming Home and made it one of their award winners.

I'm proud to display the winners' logo.

Now, where did I put that champagne ...

Single Titles
http://singletitles.com/?p=8360

Never Coming Home - The Location Tour

A number of people have told me that they were saving their copy of Never Coming Home to take on holiday with them. I hope they all enjoyed it. Now that the summer and the beach holiday season is drawing to an end, I thought it was a good time for some arm-chair travel, either to remember places visited, or to plan holidays to come.

So, I give you ... 

Never Coming Home - The Location Tour. 

The book moves around the globe at a brisk pace. The settings for the action were important to me - a way of adding extra texture to the manuscript, and a chance to re-visit my own memories as I wrote. Thankfully, none of my experiences were as scary or heartbreaking as those I created for Kaz and Devlin. I've visited, or lived in, a lot of the places I wrote about. And taken photographs. Now I'm sharing them. I hope a glimpse of the locations which inspired me will add to your enjoyment of the story.

To see the tour, just click on the pages link above.

Bon Voyage!

An Interview with the Romantic Novelists' Association

I do know it's Monday, not Wednesday - but I'm sharing my excitement at featuring on the RNA blog today.

I think I'm fairly safe in making a sweeping generalisation, and saying that all the participants in the New Writers' Scheme, which is run by the Romantic Novelists' Association, share a big ambition - to be a contender for the Joan Hessayon Award. Nominees for the award are all graduates from the New Writers' Scheme who have made it into publication. This year there are eight - and I'm one of them!

As part of the run up to the Award, which will be presented at the RNA Summer Party in May, contenders are being interviewed on the RNA blog.

Today it is my turn. So - if you want to know more about me, Never Coming Home, or a distinctly dubious recipe for making sausages, courtesy of the Glamorgan Archive, the link is t.co/CbEzymrc

Finally launched.

The sparkling wine was chilled, the chocolates (little mauve wrapped hearts) were waiting, the books were on display - Never Coming Home was about to be officially launched. I was nervous. Then people began to come though the door and  I didn't have time for nerves. I was much too busy meeting and greeting. And then showing off, and talking about myself, and the book.

I had a wonderful time,
as I think the photos show.

Thanks to Jan for taking them and to Veronica for doing such a grand job as Master of Ceremonies,  and Waterstones for hosting the event, and everyone who attended, and especially those who bought the book :) to everyone who asked questions, who laughed at my jokes and who were such a warm and supportive audience. 



One shelf gone

And another!

   


Thank you all.

Here's to the next time!   


 




 



























Tomorrow is a Big Day.

I'll be signing these tomorrow!

15th March 2012. A red letter day. For a start, it is publication day in the United States. A big hello. I hope you enjoy it!

It is also the day of the official launch of Never Coming Home here in the UK. At 7 pm tomorrow evening I will be welcoming people to Waterstones in Cardiff to celebrate my first published book. My debut novel. WOW. This is a dream that has finally come true. It's taken a while.

There are bottles of bubbly chilling in the fridge, the chocolate hearts will be delivered later today and Waterstones have copies of the book for me to sign. SIGN. I have the camera charged up and the special pen, the gold one I have been saving for such a long time, just for this occasion.There will be a question and answer session and I hope the evening will be a lot of fun.

How do I feel? Excited. Apprehensive. Still not sure I'm not dreaming.

I really want everyone who makes the effort to come along to have a good time. I want to have a good time.

I want everything to be perfect. I'm going over the arrangements in my head at least twice an hour.

That's the control freak coming out.

Am I turning into Author-zilla?

Publication day! Or, where have I been this week.

I've had a spectacular week, and it's only Wednesday! Monday I was in London. Always a cause for celebration, but this was even better than usual because it was for the RONA Awards ceremony - the Romantic Novelists' Association's equivalent of the Oscars.

I spent a lovely sunny morning taking pictures of locations that appear in Never Coming Home - I'm planning a blog trail of places that feature - like a certain bench in St James' Park, where I nearly got run over by a lorry from the Royal Parks. Look out for that at a later date.

No - it's not mine!

Then I went back to my hotel, put on my glad rags and more makeup that I have worn in a long time and took the bus - number 176 - and a very pleasant journey it was, to 1 Whitehall Place for the Awards. Many people have blogged about that - you can see an account, and take part in the voting for the winner of winners, on the RNA's own site. Choc-lit had three nominations and won two of them. Hence the picture of the lovely glass star. That one is Christina's but Jane's is equally lovely. Much champagne and celebration.

And today is publication day for Never Coming Home. I have waited over a year for this, and it feels very strange. Like having a birthday. And there's more to come, as the official launch will be next week in Waterstones in Cardiff, when I will talk about the book. Shutting me up is always the problem. And there will be chocolate. I hope to see a lot of friends there. If you don't come, I shall be forced to eat the chocolate by myself. Which would be a tragedy.

You can tell I'm excited today - I'm babbling.

And a delivery man has just brought a parcel, from my publishers ...

An invitation

Waterstones and Choc Lit warmly invite you to the launch of

Never Coming Home by local Welsh author -Evonne Wareham

                             To be held at Waterstones, 2a The Hayes, Cardiff, CF10 1WB CM23 3ATCM23 3AT

7pm - 8.30pm on Thursday, 15^th March.

Evonne will sign copies of her debut novel
Guests are invited to participate in a Q & A and taste chocolate!

Please RSVP to info@choclitpublishing.co.uk

                

Never Coming Home - on Tour

This is it - what may be my first and last opportunity to pretend to be a rock-chick.

The 'Wispa it ...' blog tour will be kicking off on Friday on Jera's Jamboree. 'Wispa it ... ' (Wispa, like the chocolate bar) will be featuring snippets from Never Coming Home, just to whet your appetite, along with give aways and interviews and Q&As based loosely on the theme 'How did I get here?'.

The programme is below - and I hope you'll be able to drop in to some or all of the dates to enjoy the tasters of NCH and find out a bit more about my writing history and about the book.

I'll post any updates and links as soon as I can.

A great big thank you to all the lovely bloggers who are hosting me - it's going to be a lot of fun.

Friday 3rd February  Jera's Jamboree  http://bit.ly/yLWYr5
Tuesday 7th February The Nutpress http://bit.ly/9jmjPE
Friday 10th February Love Reading Love Books
Tuesday 14th February Katy Little Lady
Friday 17th February Debs Daydream
Tuesday 21st February Sarah's Book Review
Thursday 23rd February Novelicious
Friday 24th February Trashionista
Tuesday 28th February Book Babe
Friday 2nd March Lou Graham's Blog
Wednesday 7th March Choc Lit website

At last - the Book

There's only one post possible today. On Monday my author copies of Never Coming Home arrived. I didn't kiss the nice man from UPS who brought them. He will probably be relieved about that. Then I tore open the box and sat on the stairs and cried, just like the old Rod Stewart song. So there was only one place to photograph the books. The books. Real books. With my name on.

I can't claim credit for the way they look - a big thanks goes to Berni, the designer, Helen for the back cover copy and to author Meg Gardiner for giving me a lovely cover quote.

Yesterday I had coffee with Lorraine and Vanessa, my fellow members of the tiny RNA Cardiff Chapter. And they were the first people, after my mum, to hold the baby and coo over it. They said all the right things, so thanks to them too.

It will be available to the public in March. Although you can pre-order a copy now. :)

PS - Update on the resolutions - I can't speak for Devlin and Kaz, but my resolution about having fun is coming along nicely. Funnily enough, I seem to have had a lot of offers to help with that one!

I'm not doing too badly on the social media front. I'm twittering, a bit erratically - another thanks is due to all the people who have helped and welcomed me there. My Facebook pages are still 'work in progress'. Translation - 'A bit of a mess'. I will get there, honest, and to all the friends requests waiting. Everyone needs friends.

A Life in Chocolate

As you might guess, being published by a company called Choc-Lit means that chocolate features rather heavily in the lives of its authors.

At this time of year selection boxes are high on the list of gifts given and received, and this also happens to be one of the favourite ways of describing the novel selection offered by Choc-Lit, to help guide readers to the type of book they might enjoy. It's a handy device. I can make it clear that my writing is at the dark end of the box. If you're looking for sweet romance, this is not the place. Villains, a high body count and an even higher heart rate - from thrills and passion - that's me.

The authors also play the game of matching characters to types of chocolate. In the case of Kaz - heroine of Never Coming Home - I can't resist matching her to some of the unusual combinations appearing from artisan chocolate makers that involve flowers. I've sampled milk chocolate petals containing strawberry and geranium from fair trade choccygirls, Plush, over the holiday - delicious and reminiscent of Turkish Delight. They're perfect for Kaz as she's a gardener by profession. And Devlin? Definitely the darkest chocolate you can get. He's a man without a past, so there's not too much to know about him, until Kaz begins to get close and persuades him to talk! So - he'd probably be a very simple bar of dark chocolate - the finest and the richest, to reflect his complex personality - whatever he thinks about himself, I think he deserves the best.