Sue, tell us all about yourself –
I write women’s commercial fiction and my current contract is with Avon Books UK, part of HarperCollins. I also write short stories, columns, courses, serials and novellas, and I’m a creative writing tutor. I love being a full-time writer but in the past I worked for a bank, a digital prepress and Motor Cycle News.
What, for you would be a typical writing day?
I start about 7.30am and finish around 6.00pm, generally Monday to Friday but sometimes weekends. I usually take a couple of hours off for Zumba, FitStep, Yoga or piano. If I can, I shoehorn in a cuppa with my gym buddies. I always have a clear idea of my day: planning, writing a first draft, editing, writing front or back matter, working on promo with my publisher’s PR agency, writing course material etc. When I’m writing a first draft I tend to edit the day before’s session before moving on. It gets me in the zone.
We all have to embrace it, so Social Networking – a help or a hindrance?
I lurve it, when I have time. Twitter and Facebook are part of my morning routine. I use social media for contact with readers and other writers, promo, research and fun. I’ve acquired useful research sources (such as a close protection officer) and workshops, interviews and blog posts and even my fantastic street team through social media. However, when I’m feeling the pressure of a deadline I reduce or remove social media from my day. You can read more about my views on social media on my blog
Sue, you must be thrilled to be have AVON BOOKS UK as your current publisher. We all know it takes years to be an overnight success –
do you have any advice for fledgling authors?
We’d love you to share your top five writing tips with us, Sue!
Learn about viewpoint (from whose perspective you’re writing) and what use of it is acceptable in your genre or desired by any editor or agent you’re approaching.
Understand how to show rather than tell. If this seems hard, think about running everything through your viewpoint character: see, hear, taste, feel, think and know what they see, hear, taste, feel, think and know. Give your characters actions that reflect what they’re experiencing, ie Melissa wiped the sweat from her eyes rather than Melissa felt too hot.
Tell us about your next book
My next book is The Christmas Promise and though scheduled for September/October publication it’s available for preorder now!
For Ava Bliss, it’s going to be a Christmas to remember … On a snowy December evening Sam Jermyn steps into the life of bespoke hat maker Ava Blissham. Sparks fly, and not necessarily the good ones…When PR guru Sam commissions Ava to make a hat for someone special to him she makes a promise that will change her life. She just doesn’t know it yet. Ava needs this job – she’s struggling to make ends meet, her ex-boyfriend is a bully and she’s desperate for distraction because no one dreads Christmas like Ava Blissham. Soon Ava finds herself reluctantly needing something from Sam. He’s quick to help, but Ava is in for a nasty shock… Can Ava keep a cool head and be true to herself? Will she be able to keep her promise? If she does, might this be the Christmas dreams come true?
Finally – what are you working on ATM?
Having just finished the copy edits for The Christmas Promise I’m catching up on blog posts and writing a short story for S Magazine. Then, bliss, I’ll be able to return to Just for the Holidays, which is due to be published in May/June 2017. It’s about Leah, who has actively avoided acquiring a husband and kids, being stuck in France … looking after her sister’s husband and kids. On the bright side, she begins a holiday romance with Ronan, a grounded helicopter pilot spending the summer in his holiday-home next door – until his ex-wife turns up to live with him.
Thank you so much for sharing your time and expertise with us Sue. Good luck with all your projects. If anyone would like to learn more about Sue, here are the links where you can find her.
Website Blog Facebook Facebook author page
Twitter Google+ LinkedIn Instagram:
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental
Tamie Dearen lives in Texas with her very romantic husband of thirty-four years. They have two beautiful daughters, two amazing son-in-laws, and one awesome grandson. She plays piano, flute, harmonica, keyboards, and guitar, and loves composing and art. And she hates housework. She has been a dentist in private practice for thirty years. Tamie stays busy playing on her church’s praise team and leading a weekly Bible study. In her spare time, she writes books.
Amazon Author Page:ÊviewAuthor.at/TamieDearen
Amazon Books:
Barnes and Noble:http://www.barnesandnoble.com/c/tamie-dearen
iBooks:https://itunes.apple.com/us/artist/tamie-dearen/id819513899?mt=11
Twitter handle: https://twitter.com/TamieDearen
Facebook address: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Tamie-Dearen/1384772145109650
Website address: http://tamiedearen.com
Many thanks to Isabella Tartaruga for making this collage. Isabella is one of my beta readers and helped me with the Italian in SCOTCH ON THE ROCKS, which reached the final of the Exeter Novel Priz…
Source: The Exeter Novel Prize – and a fabulous birthday weekend
Mar 19
This gallery contains 6 photos.
Originally posted on Lizzie Lamb – author:
Many thanks to Isabella Tartaruga for making this collage. Isabella is one of my beta readers and helped me with the Italian in SCOTCH ON THE ROCKS, which reached the final of the Exeter Novel Prize. I named a character in the novel after her – hence the plaque…
HAZEL GAYNOR began with the lesson of E.L. James’s runaway success. ALL publicity is good publicity. What followed was effervescent.
As a reader Hazel needed to be told three things:
She showed how to go about doing this by quoting from the Bookseller Marketing and Publicity Conference using the link #mpconf15, reminding us the author knows their book the best, and is, therefore, the ideal publicist.
All that followed made perfect sense. Hazel emphasised be nice to everyone, engage rather than sell, keep engaging and interacting. Social media is to entertain, to inform, and to connect.
What not to do – #buymybook #buymybook #buymybook.
Her advice: focus on fluid media, Twitter, Facebook and be a user not a promoter. Be visual on Pinterest, use video – You Tube, Book Tube, Facebook Virtual Events – plus look at two new mediums for ideas:
www.the-pool.com –for podcasts, sample chapters, interviews [billed on Google as a platform for women too busy to browse], and Periscope #whereiwrite [launched by Twitter March 2015] where authors give live tours around writing spaces.
She recommended, chat and engage with people, support other writers, tag a relevant hashtag, share quotes from books, do a Twitter chat (be prepared), run a giveaway promotion/competition share interesting, relevant book-related content on your Author Central profile on Amazon, share milestones.
Who are you online? She emphasised the importance of photographs on Websites and Blog Posts, on Twitter, create a mailing list. Keep changing your Facebook Profile, and, more importantly, your FB Author Page.
She advised three to six months pre-publication, start sharing progress, cover reveal, look into Goodreads giveaways, and invite reviews.
Launch – quote from book. Make use of your Pinterest Notice Board, make it lively and interesting re-pinning from other Notice Boards but cave Copyright.
Engage with readers through your Goodreads Author Profile and Dashboard.
Be a real person in your locality, at writing festivals and events, book clubs and libraries. Run Workshops, attend conferences and festivals.
Skype – now there’s something to consider. Write articles online and in print. Write Blog posts. Review other authors’ books. Be interviewed.
Be creative like Joan Hessayon’ Award Winner Brigid Coady, photographed as “Writer in Residence” on her commuter train from Maidstone, and check out Matt Haig, author of The Humans.
Pitch a press release – what is your book? Research radio, TV, events, and don’t forget business cards, and book markers.
Finally, CELEBRATE.
But a note of caution, what if, after all this, it goes bad? Low attendance sucks. Mistakes happen.
Hazel’s personal observation, get over it like you do rejection of your precious manuscript(s). No resting on your laurels nowadays when you’ve written and published a book. That is just the beginning.
Thank you Hazel Gaynor for detailing what needs to happen next. Hazel ended with a Woody Allen quote “Eighty percent of success is showing up”.
First published in Romance Matters Autumn 2015
Mags Cullingford
Independent Author Last Bite of the Cherry (2012) and
Twins of a Gazelle (2015)
Mags is currently completing and polishing her as yet untitled third novel – After her mother’s fatal car accident, Lexie Neave receives threatening anonymous letters. Private investigator Forbes’s brief is to identify the writer and discover what it is Lexie has that’s “valuable, very valuable which by rights is mine”. Lexie hasn’t a clue, and she’s in danger.
Source: #Author Spotlight @Lizzie_Lamb and #BookReview Scotch on the Rocks for #RBRT
Many thanks to Luccia Grey for hosting me on her blog. Since I wrote this post I have learned that I am short listed for the Exter Novel Prize for Scotch on the Rocks. Thrilled to bits !!
Thank you Rosie for blogging Barb’s great review 😍
Source: Guest blogger: Lizzie Lamb
I’m appearing ‘down under’ today on the Australian Romance Readers’ Association blog today talking about my love of Scotland. It’s a great blog but there’s always a waiting list to appear on it. Do have a look if you have time.
Thanks to the wonder of the internet, I am able to talk to readers ‘down under’ on the Australian Romance Readers Association today about why I love writing Scottish themed novels. Here’s the link if you’d like to leave a comment.
https://australianromancereaders.wordpress.com/
I am also featured on Rosie Amber’s great blog today where she has published a fabulous review of Scotch on the Rocks written by witty Barb Taub. It’s the perfect download for Valentine’s Day and it reached #1 Best Seller status on Amazon two weeks after publication. Here’s the link to Barb’s review:
All that remains is for me to wish everyone a lovely day and to share the opening lines of an anonymous Latin lyric titled The Vigil of Venus (3rd century A.D.)
Cras amet qui numquam amavit quique amavit cras amet
“Loveless hearts will love tomorrow,
Those who have loved will love again.”
And that, dear and gentle reader, is why I write romance.
Have a great day,
Lizzie
Three years and a couple of months ago the New Romantics Press (NRP) – Adrienne Vaughan, Lizzie Lamb, Mags Cullingford and June Kearns ‒ was born. Huddled together in the backroom of a village pub in the wilds of rural Leicestershire, trembling with fear and trepidation, four fledgling authors – having met through the RNA and all on the New Writers’ Scheme ‒ launched themselves on the world.
Dozens of book launches, blogs, newspaper reports, radio interviews and videos later, we’ve embraced each and every element of what being an author in today’s multi-media environment entails; standing shoulder-to-shoulder, through drafts, edits, rewrites and great big gaping holes of self-confidence. And still, what remains at the very essence is our passion to tell our stories our way.
Ten acclaimed novels ‒ hundreds of reviews, award nominations and a best seller ‒ later, the dream is a reality and the greatest reward is still when someone says. “I loved your book, when is the next one coming out?”
Here’s a quick update as we hunker down into 2016 …
Lizzie’s debut Tall, Dark and Kilted, was swiftly followed by Boot Camp Bride and having launched her third novel, Scotch on the Rocks last July, there was ‘no rest for the wicked’ as it rocketed up the Amazon charts to reach No 1 in Scottish Romance! So it was head down as Lizzie ‘got busy’ with novel number four, This Highland Magic.
“I’m dreaming about hitting the road in 2016 with our caravan, computer, parrot and husband to research number four, so Highlands of Scotland, here I come. Our travels have become part of the writing process for me and I love the adventure, laughter and shared experiences of our trips, keeping us buoyed and enthused throughout the long winter months. I just know 2016 is going to be one of our best years ever!” Says Lizzie.
Mags’s first two novels, Last Bite of the Cherry and Twins of a Gazelle are definitely romance with edge and she will be the first to admit her writing errs on the darker side, with an undercurrent of tense, psychological drama heightening emotions.She is currently completing and polishing her, as yet, untitled third novel which features threatening letters, a fatal car accident and a private investigator and, knowing Mags, some deep, dark romance too.
Mags says, “I must confess although I love writing, I’m absolutely rubbish at marketing and promoting and it’s my readers reaction to my books – as well as my NRP comrades, chums in the RNA and my writer friends in general – who inspire me to keep going. My resolution for 2016 is to get to grips and improve on these necessary skills, at least once January is over. It’s not that I’m procrastinating but I do like to take a leaf out of our cat Tina’s book and for me January is the time for hibernating.”
June is our historical novelist and to date has written two fabulous novels, The Englishwoman’s Guide to the Cowboy and The 20’s Girl, both acclaimed as eloquent and stylish with clever twists and turns, and nods to fashion and music, two of June’s passions.
Now working hard on novel No 3 June admits to be a little awry with her New Year resolutions. “So far I haven’t started reading War and Peace nor stayed away from the choc-and-nuts – but I have been working on my third book, so that’s something!
Set in the early 1960s, it’s gathering pace and coming along nicely. I’m trying to pin down recollections of the time by trawling through old photographs (I had a waist!), tramping London streets and visiting our son in San Francisco last year (my story is set in both places). It’s all bringing back lots of lovely memories and inspiration. Fingers crossed, I’m hoping to publish at the end of this year.”
“I write romantic suspense and having trained as a journalist I love lifting the veil of celebrity to reveal what lies beneath the glitz. I set my characters against the elements and each other, taking readers to wild, romantic locations where literally anything can happen and it usually does!
My first three novels – never thought I’d be saying that – were well received, my debut The Hollow Heart shortlisted for a Reader Award at the Festival of Romantic Fiction, as was the follow-up A Change of Heart and then last November I was absolutely thrilled to learn Secrets of the Heart was shortlisted for a Love Reading Award, amazing! But no resting on laurels here, so last year saw me interviewing a friend’s daughter who dresses members of the cast of Downton Abbey and Strictly Come Dancing; poking around in military reference books and studying reports on plots to murder the Pope, as I started working on, Scandal of the Seahorse Hotel. I aim to have it completed by the end of January before sending to my fabulous mentor, June Tate – a dear friend who I met through the RNA – and who helps me edit and polish ahead of launching to the ‘waiting world’ (okay I made that last bit up!).
So 2016 looks as exciting as ever and it simply remains for us to thank you all for your continued support – we could NOT have done it with you.
New Romantics Press 