Shopping

I spent yesterday morning at Merry Hell, aka Merry Hill. I don't like shopping for me, it's no fun when you're fluffy, but, the new spring stuff is in and I needed to find something for the Savoy. It's no good me leaving it till nearer the time as I haven't anytime to shop as the belles have a dance show coming up and we have a holiday before then too.
I managed to melt a serious amount of plastic on a new suit, top, shoes, bag, scarf, make-up and a nice John Rocha tunic top that was in the sale at Debenhams. My friend is dragging me to Weight Watchers with her on Thursday. That'll be fun - she's promised to help me with the math. So will I become less fluffy? will pigs fly? watch this space!

Stunned!!!

Things To Do has been nominated for the Ecataromance Reviewers' Choice Award. Wow!

Love at the library part 2

Well, I'm back. It was an interesting morning and I chatted with some really nice people. I'm holding the draw later for people who took a free ticket to win a prize parcel of some goodies and a copy of Things To Do.
It was very heartening to see how popular romances are with book borrowers. I always knew they were but it was still good to see the proof with my own eyes. Lots of RNA members books being taken out.
I finished c2 of the medical partial and sent it to Jess, I've started in on c3. I also put down a little bit of a new project as I saw this great competition mentioned that I thought might suit this idea I've had buzzing around in my brain for a while now. Now if someone would just invent a few extra hours in my day I'll be just fine!

Love at the library

Tomorrow is the meet the author, love at the library event. Since it's half term and as usual the local press are too busy taking photo's of primary school children picking up litter, if I see anyone other than a couple of retired folks, some kids who are out for a giggle and a dog I'll be happy.
I get very nervous about meeting people and talking about my writing. I wish I had someone else to hide behind. As it is I've dragooned eldest dd into coming as my assistant to persuade people to take raffle tickets for the free draw to win a copy of Things To Do and I've a supply of pens and postcards.
My wonderful friends at Wombourne writers have promised to drop by and so have some of my walk for health group (they are also supporting me in my quest to become less fluffy) So, if you happen to be in the vicinity of Wombourne Library tomorrow between 10 and 12 don't be shy - come and say hello - there's a free pen in it for you ;)

The Savoy and being 'fluffy'

Fluffy is a batcave term for carrying a few extra pounds. Or in my case, quite a few extra pounds. As the Savoy tickets arrived yesterday and I just booked our train I decided I needed to tackle my added fluffiness a little more severely. I don't over eat so a diet is tricky. I've cut down where I can and the fluffiness remains. (This is where Polycystic ovaries don't help in the fluffiness battle.)
I know that my problem is lack of exercise. Eldest dd and I went to a local health club today to try out the facilities and to see if I could justify the expense of joining. She, of course, loved it. My eldest is very keen on sport of any kind so it was her idea of heaven. I liked the pool, it was warm, had swim lanes and the hairdyers worked in the changing rooms. I can't see myself becoming a gym bunny however, to be honest, the gym scared me. It was so noisy with music playing and televisions everywhere, the machines all had to be set with numbers to program them - my idea of hell.
My GP has forbidden any kind of aerobic activity as my hip is not good so my other choices were limited. I'm too old, unco-ordinated and fluffy to trampoline so apart from the pool I'm thinking I probably wouldn't use the other facilities much.
Sigh - Eldest child and I discussed it at length and we decided to get the local leisure centre programme instead. If we can make at least two sessions a week there for six weeks I'll look at the posh club again.
In the meantime it's back to my trusty pedometer.

Snow and birthdays

Today is my birthday and the schools are closed because of the snow, which means my birthday meal out is looking a bit shaky. I should have gone out on Tuesday with my friend but she had to bail because she's buried under work, so I don't think socialising is in the stars for me this week. The kids are outside making a snowman. I give La about fifteen minutes before she comes back in wet through and dithering telling me she doesn't like snow.
My presents were interesting from the girls. My dh had coerced them into buying me a bottle of Happy, my favourite perfume but the two little ones decided to present me with a gift of their own choosing too. La gave me a tiny snowglobe which she informed me she'd meant to give me last year but forgot. Boo gave me a small teapot. I don't drink tea. She then went on to say she'd won it at the school summer fair and not to worry about the damaged box lid as that was where she'd torn the raffle ticket off.
I love birthdays!

I hate cleaning...

I'm not a natural Mrs housewife type person. I love the house to look clean and tidy but with a husband who thinks the floor is a suitable place to store his stuff and three very messy daughters, I'm on a hiding to nothing. I spent most of this weekend digging out my middle daughters room and I'm nowhere near done. I think she has the market cornered in odd socks, handbags and Bratz doll bits.
I treated myself to Liz Fielding's latest book, The Valentine Bride yesterday whilst I was at Asda. I'd like to get Natasha Oakleys latest too but I bought the dvd of Muriel's Wedding and The Runaway Bride to watch with my eldest dd instead. I'll have to check my bank balance for next weekend and see if I can manage it then instead.

5 Things

Robin tagged me to blog five things people don't know about me. Since I've already done this twice I thought I'd make this five secret or not so secret things about my books.

1. One scene in The Cinderella Substitute was sparked by a phrase one of my Asda collegue's used in a story she was telling me one day during her break. The scene was the one where Jenni's mum is wandering the street.

2. Marrying Max was inspired by Jessica Hart's wonderful fake engagement stories. I longed to write one to see if I could create a believable situation.

3. Cue Me In was my first attempt at a spooky story, it's very much tongue in cheek and the castle in the story is loosely based on Corfe castle.

4. Fall in Love features Cornwall and surfers. We spend a lot of time in Cornwall and Devon. New Bay is fictional but has elements of lots of the seaside towns we stayed at. Check out our upcoming beach duet, coming out in May. Jessica Raymond and I have two new stories set in New Bay. You may recognise some of the characters.

5. The yacht in Things To Do meant I interviewed a yacht broker and had a personal tour of a million pound yacht.

If you want to do this, consider yourself tagged!

Press releases and promo

I suck at both of them. At least I think I do at the moment. One of my goals for this year was to make more effort at both. I hadn't bargained on my cable company crashing my net access without warning seemingly everytime I have a chat booked.
Thank you to everyone who has emailed me since the announcement of the romance prize shortlist. I'm overwhelmed and a little stunned still. I need to book my tickets now for the Savoy and for the conference.
Writing wise, I'm onto chapter two of my new medical and I think I can see where it's going better now thanks to Jess's inciteful critique. So I'm planning to push on with that as my task for this week.

It's official

The announcement of the shortlist for the Romance prize has been posted.
http://www.rna-uk.org click on RNA romance prize 2007
The Nominees are:

Accepting The Boss's Proposal - Natasha Oakley
An Improper Companion - Anne Herries
Her Ready-Made Family - Jessica Hart
Lord Greville's Captive - Nicola Cornick
The Gladiator's Honour - Michelle Styles
The Millionaire's Runaway Bride - Catherine George

and Marrying Max by me!!

I can't believe my book is there with all those fabulous authors. I've read all of the books except Anne and Catherine's and I know how fabulous they are. To even be considered in the same line as Jessica Hart makes me feel faint - those of you who read here regularly know how much I admire her work and how excited I was to meet her last year.
Congratulations to all the authors!

Agents and other stuff

I had an offer of representation yesterday from the agent who was looking at Charlie Darling. After a lot of research and thought I decided not to go with the offer. No doubt I'll kick myself at some point in the future about this decision but at the moment it feels right.
I finished the first chapter of my new medical and sent it to Jessica. Hopefully I've got the tone right but I'll see what she thinks.
My next step is to finish the chapter of Places To Go and send her that, then tackle chapter two of the medical. No news yet from M&B but I had two lovely emails, one from Shirley who was my editor at Peoples Friend for Marrying Max. It was so nice to hear from her as she was excited about the shortlisting. The other one was from Angela James at Samhain. Samhain have taken up the e book rights for Marrying Max so they are very thrilled too.

Ccccoooolllldddd

I hate being cold. It's freezing here and we didn't get the snow they promised. I want a snow day - chance to stay home in the warm. I heard from a friend on the Samhain boards that I've been quoted in the RWR magazine for this month. Just wish I could remember what it was about, I have vague recall of doing something for someone a few months ago about hints and tips. I don't get the magazine so if anyone here spots it, please let me know.
I heard from the agent that has Charlie and he told me he's reading. I'm doing my research to see if he's a good fit for me. No news from M&B which is okay as I'd like to be further in with my new story first. I'm almost done with the first chapter - I think the rest will be faster to write but this one is a challenge to get the tone right.
I'm also working on Places To Go - I'm hoping to have a new chapter done on that soon too. The March edition of The Romantic Times will be out soon and I'm on tenterhooks to see my advert and read the review for Things To Do. Exciting stuff happening so far this year!

I've been nominated.

I just had a phonecall from a lovely lady from The Romantic Novelist's Association. Marrying Max has made the shortlist for category romance novel of the year. I need to send more copies for the next round of judging. The winner is announced at a lunch at the Savoy hotel on Friday 27th April in London.
I am so excited - I would never have entered Max if my lovely friend and fellow writer Michelle Styles hadn't suggested I send copies. She has also made the shortlist with her fabulous book - Gladiators Honour. Whoo hoo! The official announcement should be made soon, but WOW!!!

Today is the launch of Be My Hero - the second book of the Cinderella series. I love this cover. The original one wasn't at all me but this one is great - The book should be available by tonight UK time and sometime in the day US time at http://www.moonlitromance.com/ and will be available at fictionwise shortly too. I'll give you all a shout when it goes up there.

Here's the excerpt I promised -

Polly knelt on a chair at the kitchen table with her colouring pencils.
‘That’s a nice picture.’ He admired her handiwork. The picture was of a man and a woman holding hands with crowns on their heads. A drawing of a little girl with yellow hair, also wearing a crown, was next to them.
‘That’s you and Nathalie getting married,’ Polly explained. ‘I’m in my princess dress because I’m the bridesmaid.’
Evan swallowed. ‘Um - Poll, sweetheart, Nathalie and I are just friends. We aren’t getting married.’ Even as he said the words out loud, he knew he wanted to marry Nathalie, had always wanted to marry Nathalie. The revelation quickened his pulse as it hit home like a thunderbolt.
‘I saw you kiss her - I peeped round the door when she said goodnight. That means you’ll marry her,’ Polly declared confidently as she began to colour in Nathalie’s hair in the picture with a black fibre-tip pen.
‘Poll, it’s not that simple, okay?’
His daughter silenced him with a look and a shrug of her shoulders. At least he should be grateful that Polly didn’t want him to remarry Laurel.
He toyed with the idea of calling Nathalie but he felt the initiative needed to come from her. If he pushed too hard at the moment, he could make everything worse. He rubbed his hand through his hair in frustration. The cases he dealt with in court weren’t as tricky to handle as Nathalie and his feelings for her.
The house phone rang and he rushed to answer it, hoping it would be her.

(C) Nell Dixon 2007

Things To Do

Is up on Amazon UK - I just found it by accident! whoo hoo! This has totally made my day.

Be My Hero

Be My Hero is due for release tomorrow. I'm kind of nervous about this book because it touches on something that's a difficult issue for many women. Infertility and the choices we sometimes are forced to make. It's something I have considerable firsthand experience of and I didn't want to write a schmaltzy story. Nathalie's story ends happily as all good romances should (at least the ones I like to read) but I hope I've done her justice.
The book has a special dedication - it's dedicated to all the staff and consultants at the unit for assisted fertility at Birmingham's womens hospital. Without them and my wonderful consultants, Mr Jordan and the Mr Afnan, I wouldn't have my family.
I'll post an excerpt for you tomorrow and the cover!
I'm guestblogging today at Sweeter Romantic Notions author blog - talking about the internet. Don't forget to go here http://blog.myspace.com/nelldixon and read Meg Allison's interview.

Launching My author spotlights

http://blog.myspace.com/nelldixon Drop by here to read more about multi-pubbed writer Meg Allison. I'll be posting regular spotlight interviews with guest authors over at my Myspace blog. If you write sweet/sensual or YA and would like an interview then please drop me a line.

ps Meg is a lovely person as well as a super talented author so please check her out.

Premature Back-ulation

Yes, cable is down again. I'm typing this from work just so you all don't think I've fallen off the edge of the planet, which I might do in a minute. I'm doing the book a day giveaway tomorrow Jan 16th over at The Romance Studio so if you fancy winning a copy of Things To Do hop over and enter the draw. If I ever get to access my emails ever again and you win I'll send you a copy.
To say I'm a bit pizzled off is the understatement of the year. I think we'll be changing provider because this is just ridiculous.
On the writing front - I managed some more on Places to Go yesterday and rewrote most of my medical as I'm still tinkering to get the tone right. It's very different from Charlie Darling.

Catching myself up

Now I finally can access the net again I've been catching up like a crazy woman. First 1000 words done on my medical now only 49k to go. I feel so much better for having got started, I probably wrote 5k before I was reasonably happy with the start. I'm sure it will change again though.
Places to Go is also moving along again, which is great as it's so much fun to write.
The weather here has been wet and wild for the last few days and my poor garden looks extremely battered. My dwarf conifer in my front rock garden looks to have bitten the dust and my DH is making noises about attaching ropes to my towbar to yank it out. The corkscrew hazel is budding up nicely although with the wild weather our squirrel has gone into hiding.

I'm baack!

Yay! Cable appears to be working again - at last. We've compensation for all the disruption in reduced bills and free calls for the next six months but what a nightmare!
I've started my new medical and managed a chapter on Places to Go - wow, really pleased with that. I also have a very rough almost completed synopsis for the new medical.
Things To Do is finally listed on Amazon.com!!! Now once I'm caught up again I plan to have a new contest so please keep your eyes peeled and I'll be announcing that shortly here and over at my website. I'll also be emailing the first of my guest authors their interview questions for my My space blog spotlights.
Oh, it's so good to be back.