Author Archives: newromantics4
Scotch on the Rocks by Lizzie Lamb and November Book at the Door Winner
Many thanks to Jessie of Behind the Willow for organising this giveaway for me. I loved her review of Scotch on the Rocks and I hope you do, too.
And the winner is:
Anyes from Far Away in the Sunshine!
Anyes will need to watch her mail box because on it’s way is a brand new paper back copy of Scotch on the Rocks by Lizzie Lamb, the print of the first line artwork by Bradley Corbett and a fun packet of extra goodies sent along by the author!
Ishabel Stuart raced her car against the combined forces of time and tide, a thunderstorm snapping at her heels.
Lizzie Lamb writes humorous, contemporary romance, you can find her on her website, on Twitter and on Facebook. If you hop on over to any of those places you’ll see that it just so happens, that her books are on sale right now!
If she’s a new author to you, this is the perfect time to give her books a try.
I think they are just as good…
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Welcome to our blog – SUE MOORCROFT
New Romantics Press is thrilled to welcome successful author and fellow RNA member Sue Moorcroft to our blog. Lizzie has known Sue for quite a few years now (!) but thought some of our followers w…
A Fresh Page
Now the very last of the twinkly lights have been put away and before February crashes headlong into Valentine’s Day and then Easter, here’s a mini wrap up of 2014 for the New Romantics Press and a teeny peak at some of the very exciting plans, for what is going to be our fourth year as one of the literary world’s favourite indie groups! (Over-egged the last bit, slightly, but hey you know what we mean).
Lizzie, June and myself spent much of the start of 2014 promoting our latest novels, Boot Camp Bride (Lizzie Lamb); 20’s Girl and all that Jazz (June Kearns) and A Change of Heart (Adrienne Vaughan). Aided and abetted by Mags, who was busy editing her new one, Twins of a Gazelle.
February 2014 – Lizzie, June and myself hosted a Meet the Author event at Waterstones, Market Harborough, which was a great success and resulted in lots of media coverage, including an in-depth interview with BBC Radio Leicester for Lizzie and I with the inimitable Tony Wadsworth and Julie Meyers, great supporters of the NRPs since day one.
As summer started to sizzle, the stunning Belmont Hotel invited Lizzie and I, to host a Literary Luncheon, where 30 plus ladies relaxed in the elegant restaurant, enjoyed lunch, readings and chatted about writing …and it wasn’t just the lunch that was saucy! Then, June’s talented film-maker daughter Mary, made a ‘fly on the wall’ video of us talking about our projects (see link here) which was amazing and really gave us a focus for the rest of the year.
July saw us flying the flag at the Romantic Novelist’s Association National Conference at the Harper Adams University in Shropshire, meeting many old friends and making lots of new ones. In September I was thrilled that A Change of Heart was shortlisted for the Best Author Published Read awards at the Festival of Romantic Fiction held at Leighton Buzzard – the highlight of which, was an impromptu dinner with best-selling, award-winning authors Katie Fforde, Liz Fenwick and Jo Thomas – what a hoot!
Following a series of ‘behind closed doors’ meetings we started to hatch a plan for our ‘global’ Author Showcase in London. And in a flash, November saw June, Lizzie and myself hosting a glitzy reception at Waterstones, High Street, Kensington kindly sponsored by June’s son Patrick and his partner Tom. (Sadly, Mags couldn’t make the gig due to a new knee, which is now coming on nicely, I’m happy to report.)
Trundling towards the end of 2014, and the ‘World Premiere’ of the final novel in my Heartfelt trilogy Secrets of the Heart, held in the very cocktail bar in Dublin where the story opens, saw a merry crew of industry professionals, media, friends and family bandy together to welcome the arrival of my latest offering, which to date has been extremely well received. So, thank you all for your incredible support, it’s been amazing!
Phew! 2015 dawned full on and feisty, as we gathered for our first meet of the year, amid diaries, calendars and planners. Mags is due to publish Twins of a Gazelle next month, Lizzie’s latest romcom, Scotch on the Rocks, will be out in March – can’t wait for these two fantastic new novels – as myself and June continue, heads down, working on current WIPs.
We’re planning to attend as many events as possible. Word of Lizzie’s fantastic talk The Changing Face of Publishing last November at Leicester’s favourite ‘art house’ Phoenix Square, has started to spread and to date she is booked to talk at Lutterworth Writers Group on Tuesday March 24th and then on September 19th at the London chapter of the RNA. I’m booked to talk there too, a little earlier on 20th June. I’ve also been conscripted by the Society of Women Writers & Journalists to speak later this year – date to be confirmed.
We’ll be supporting all our fabulous writer chums at the RNA Awards, the RoNAs on March 16th in London, and also have the RNA Conference in our sights for July, also in London.
And that lot is just the stuff we know about …looks like it’s going to be a quiet one again ladies – ahem!
Huge and grateful thanks to you all for your fabulous and continued support, and we’re all looking forward to seeing you at some stage this year …bring it on.







Oh, My Giddy Aunt!
‘I have always maintained the importance of aunts.’
Jane Austen
‘Aunts are not bad but they are inclined to be soppy and call you darling chiz chiz chiz.’
Nigel Molesworth
‘Aunts,’ someone said recently, ‘seem to have starring roles in all of your stories.’
Do they? Well yes, I suppose that they do.
I think the stiff-as-sticks Beatrice and Eugenie, from An Englishwoman’s Guide, were probably summoned-up by Lady Bracknell – Algy Moncrief’s awful aunt in The Importance of Being Earnest.
Lovely Leonie, from The 20’s Girl – who taught her niece to dance the hoochie coochie and the turkey trot, while wearing ostrich feathers and waving an Egyptian cigarette in a long ebony holder – is possibly more like Auntie Mame, who sent her nephew to a school where all classes were held in the nude, under ultra-violet ray!
I adored my own aunts. I was the first girl in my mum’s family, and her sisters completely spoiled me – sitting me on their knees, twirling my curls around their fingers. Sigh.
PG Wodehouse seemed to have a thing about aunts, too. As a schoolboy, he was passed around between quite a few of them, apparently.
In his stories, they keep being blamed for all ills and failures.
‘Behind every poor innocent blighter who is going down for the third time in the soup,’ Bertie Wooster moans, ‘you will find, if you look carefully enough, the aunt who shoved him into it.’
Then, there are Agatha and Dahlia – sister’s to Bertie’s father in The Mating Season. Agatha, according to Bertie, ‘is the one who chews broken bottles and kills rats with her teeth.’ She has ‘an eye like a man-eating fish and wears barbed wire next to the skin.’
Who could resist characters like that?
This picture of my mum and her sisters, Nell and Kath was taken in Somerset, when they were all in their late eighties. We were spending a few days together at a hotel in Somerset. I have never got through so much brandy in my life. ‘Ooh, just another nip, ducky! Helps you to sleep, y’know.’ All three lived well into their nineties.
I think of them every day.
Eccentric, exotic, mad, bad or dotty – for me, aunts do seem to offer a new angle on the world and on my writing. Does anyone else feel the same attraction?!