The Next Big Thing

I've been tagged by the lovely Kate Hardy to be part of The Next Big Thing blog.  You basically answer a series of questions about your latest book.  But before I get to that I want to let you know that I was SUPER excited to find out my February release is going to be paired with Kate Hardy's next book.  I've read Kate's books for the last five years and she was one of the people who encouraged and inspired me to write for Mills and Boon, so sharing a book with her is just awesome!  Her Inescapable Temptation comes out in February.

But in the meantime on to The Next Big Thing

What is the title of your book?

Her Christmas Eve Diamond

How did you come by the idea?

I begged my editor to write a Christmas story as I love all things Christmassy.  I also wanted to set my story in Glasgow and introduce some Scottish words and foods!

What genre does your book fall under?

Medical Romance

Which actors would you choose to play your characters if it were a movie?

My hero is based on the delicious Bradley Cooper and my heroine on the actress Stana Katic who plays Kate Beckett in Castle.

What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

When The Grinch meets the Christmas Fairy who will come out on top?

Will your book be self-published or traditional?

It was published by Harlequin Mills and Boon in November in the UK, USA, Australia and France.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

Around 2 months.  I tend to write 1000 words a day.

Who or What inspired you to write this book?

My definite love of Christmas!  I'm just about to start next year's Christmas book!

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

This story also focuses on a dad who has been separated from his child and a woman who is struggling to adjust to her Gran's worsening dementia.

Nurse Cassidy Rae is a stickler for rules, but even she revels in the magoc of Christmas! This year, however, new registrar Brad Donovan's surfer-boy good looks and cocky charm are severely testing her goodwill to all men.  But in the festive season miracles can happen, and Brad's about to give Cassidy a Yuletide to remember...

Beginnings, Middles or Endings??

What's your favourite part of writing a book?  Is it the beginning - where everything is new and fresh and there is a whole world of opportunities?  Is it the middle where things are tying together, you have two fully-fledged characters that feel real?  Or is it the end - the happy ever after - the bit everyone is waiting for?
Or maybe you're a little bit bad.  And your favourite part is the big Black Moment.  That horrible bit of the book where it seems as if there is no return??

I'm in a happy place.  Last night I started a new book.  And you might have guessed it but my favourite part of the book is the beginning.  I love the ideas, the potential developments, the little sentences you drop in that let the reader know there is something in this characters back story that will stop his or her path to a straightforward happy ever after.

I also love the drama.  Starting in the middle of something.  And not always with the two main characters on the page.  My first book It Started with a Pregnancy, began with my hero and heroine meeting in a bar and a night of passion followed.  Not the most unusual start.  But I learned from this.  And I developed.

My second story had drama.  The Boy who Made Them Love Again started with my hero pulling up outside a small hospital with the First Lady in premature labour in the back of the car!  He comes face to face with the woman he walked away from five years earlier and so the drama continues.

My third book was a follow up - still using the President and First Lady.  In this one my heroine turns up at the police cordon, heavily pregnant and trying to reach the doctor that's looking after the President's premature daughter.  She promptly collapses and is taken inside to meet her ex - the hero - and the only man she can trust to rescue her much-wanted child.  Sigh.  I love a bit of drama.



Book four, A Bond Between Strangers, starts with my hero receiving a letter telling him there has been an IVF mix up.  The embryos that had been created for him and his wife (with his sperm and a donors egg) and were due to be destroyed, have been mistakenly implanted in someone else.  His wife is long gone - but this is his baby - and all he's ever wanted is a family.  Someone else is carrying his child.  And he wants it.

Book five is the christmas story.  Her Christmas Eve Diamond starts with my heroine going to get her fortune told with her friends.  She doesn't believe in all that and is less than impressed when the fortune teller predicts she will be a Christmas bride.  It's August and she doesn't even have a boyfriend.  What's more she's vowed her next man will be a fellow Scot, but the fortune teller has other things in mind.....

Book six is the cruise ship story.  An Inescapable Temptation.  This one starts with the hero jumping in to rescue a child in Venice harbour.  He gets knocked out and my heroine ends up resuscitating him!

As for Book Seven????  Well, I'm not going to give too much away.  But again there is drama.  My study currently has a very important algorithm for a certain disease pinned on my wall.  Something big is going to happen in Chicago - something very big!

So, you can see a pattern forming here.  It's a bit worrying to be honest.  Apart from my first story, do I know how to write a story with a quiet build up?  I try not to do the backstory dump thing, and I do always try to start in the middle of the action.

What's interesting is that the middle of the action doesn't always have the hero and heroine on the first page.  It was one of the things I noticed about the New Voices contest.  I wanted to see the hero and heroine together straight away and yet I don't always do it myself.  Granted, it happens within a couple of pages, but maybe I still have a few things to learn.

So what's your favourite part?  Are you all about the middle and the developing characters?  Are you a wrung-out sort of person and all about the Black Moment?  Or, are you hearts and roses and all about the Happy Ever After?  Or are you like me, all about drama and all about beginnings?

Having fun!

I'm just back from London and lying on top of my bed in a state of all-out recovery.

Thurday was a 5 am start to Glasgow airport, followed by the Stansted Express into London, a quick ride on a tube train to drop off my case at the gorgeous Charing Cross Hotel, then another ride on the tube to Richmond to reach..........

Mills and Boon Headquarters

I was a bit nervous at Mills and Boon headquarters.  I had arranged with my editor to film an interview to help publicise the Medical Fast Track coming up in June.  I also filmed some Love Bites segments that will be released in September when A Bond Between Strangers comes out, then again in November when Her Christmas Eve Diamond is released.

I was obviously in mid flow here!

I'm a bit worried people won't understand my strong Scottish accent but I'll just need to wait and see!

Next it was off to a lovely restaurant with my editor called Rock and Rose.  Very opulent!

There might have been cocktails......and wine......and lovely food......and then coffee and dessert.  But my lips are sealed!
Then it was a mad dash back to my hotel, then onto Waterstones in Piccadily for 5 o'clock as that's where the RNA members were meeting.

Talli Roland, Denyse King, me and Nina Harrington, who isn't paying attention!

Myself and Fiona Harper

It was then a quick (but not in my shoes!) walk along to the Royal Overseas League where the RNA Summer Party was being held.

Nina Harrington and Fiona Harper outside the Overseas League

The contenders for the Joan Hessayon award

The party was great fun with Evonne Wareham winning the Joan Hessayon award for her novel Never Coming Home.

Myself and my lovely editor Carly Byrne.

And after the party myself and my shoes disappeared for drinks with some fellow authors.

And whilst the shoes were beautiful, by this point my feet had died.  The lovely Anna Louise Lucia volunteered her silver sandals - well, actually I borrowed them as we walked back to the hotel.

Brigid Coady and Abby Green.

Abby and Heidi Rice.

At this point I had to don my shoes again and walk back to Charing Cross with Fiona, except we took the scenic route.  I could show you a photo of my feet but it isn't pretty!

And so I finished my visit to London the following morning by visiting my new nephew Oliver, who was born over a month ago and this was my first chance to see him.  Needless to say, he is gorgeous!

So near and yet so far....

I'm in the last fifth of my Christmas story.  I've finally hit the 40,000 word mark and I do know what's going to happen in the next two chapters.  I just want someone else to write it for me.
It's quite sad as I really, really wanted to write a Christmas story for Mills and Boon.  In fact I begged!

But part of my issue is the book I've written previously.  Book 4 shot out of my fingers like wildfire.  I don't know where it came from.  It's part of a duet with Anne Fraser and I've just been given a title for it The Bond Between Strangers.

It seemed to have a life all of its own.  I wrote everyday and couldn't stop.  It wouldn't let me.  I loved my characters and they spoke to me constantly.

This book has been like wading through treacle.

The beginning came easily, my partial went to my editor who gave me some pointers which have been amended accordingly.  It's just the rest of it that's been the problem.

But I know I'm not the only one.  Two books I've read recently have had interesting dedications that made me feel as if I'm not alone.  Barbara Wallace's The Heart of a Hero which read To my editors - for being so patient while I worked to get this story just right, and Trish Wylie's The Inconvenient Laws of Attraction which read - For everyone who kept me from hitting the ground until I remembered how to fly again.

So I am absolutely determined to finish this week.  1500 words a day will do it.

And off I go....

Anyone else had a treacle like book??

My latest heroine...

This is the latest inspiration for my Christmas heroine - Cassidy Rae.  Isn't she gorgeous?  And what about that dress?  You all know I'm a girl that likes red......

I have to admit to not being a particularly big fan of Castle when it first started.  I could take it or leave it.  But it's kind of grown on me.  Like a disease.

And one of the reasons I like it so much now is because of Kate Beckett.  Apart from the fact the woman is extraordinarily beautiful, there are lots of personality traits about her I find intriguing.

There's the obvious - she's smart, she's sassy and she can take care of herself.  But there is also a hint of vulnerability about her.  And a huge lack of ability to actually say how she feels.

So when I was looking for inspiration for my character Cassidy, a nurse in a Glasgow hospital, I found it all wrapped up in Kate Beckett.

I'm at just over 20,000 words so far and taking a little time out this week to make my hero a little nastier.  I wonder who I'll find for inspiration for him??