November Releases

Margaret James THE SILVER LOCKET
Choc Lit
1st November
£7.99 (paperback)

As the First World War gets under way, Rose Courtenay runs away from home to become an army nurse, falls in love with a married man, and has to make many difficult choices.

Sue Moorcroft WANT TO KNOW A SECRET?
Choc Lit
1 November 2010
£7.99
Money and love? Which matters most?

Karen Abbott A LOVE WORTH WAITING FOR

F. A. Thorpe Linford Romance Series - Large Print

November 2010

Cost - £8.99

Jasmine Jones gets the opportunity to open a Teashop in the lovely village

of Manorbier in Pembrokeshire -- but when disturbing things begin to happen,

Jasmine wonders who wants her business to fail...surely not local artist

Rhys Morgan ?

Trisha Ashley TWELVE DAYS OF CHRISTMAS
Avon HarperCollins
October 28th
Cost 6.99
For widow Holly Brown, looking after a remote house on the Lancashire moors seems the perfect way to escape the festivities - but when the owner unexpectedly returns just before a blizzard cuts the village off, the Twelve Days of Christmas take a very unexpected turn.

Annie Burrows A COUNTESS BY CHRISTMAS (in anthology "Regency Mistletoe and Marriages"
which also contains story by Joanna Maitland, "The Earl's Mistletoe Bride")
Mills and Boon
November 2010
£6.99
Two sparkling regency romances, set during the Christmas season

Lynne Connolly UNBROKEN
Total E-Bound
November 8th 2010
Cost TBA
Zoltan's looking for imperfection, and he finds it in Vashti.

























Dilly Court A MOTHER’S SECRET
Arrow
4 November 2011
£19.99
Raised in a notorious East End baby farm, Cassy thinks that the Indian woman
who saves her from the gutter is her mother, but she has yet to learn the
secret of her birth.

Liz Fielding MISTLETOE AND THE LOST STILETTO
Harlequin "Romance"
$4.50 US
With the entire world hunting for Lucy, hiding out in Santa's Grotto seemed like a good idea. Ho, ho, ho...

Liz Fielding A STRANGER'S KISS
Linford Romance Library
November, £8.99
Tara takes refuge with a stranger to avoid a stalker.  Out of the frying pan into the roasting pan...

June Francis SUNSHINE AND SHOWERS
Allison & Busby Ltd.
8th November,
£7.99
Patsy Doyle is settled into her role as live-in-maid to the Tanners'
household whilst Joy Kirk is busy planning her wedding but have both let themselves in for more than they bargained?

Kate Harrison THE SECRET SHOPPER UNWRAPPED
Orion
November 11
£6.99
Sandie, Emily and Grazia are on the warpath, exposing shocking Christmas shopping experiences, while they try to juggle love lives, family sagas and sabotage as December 25 approaches...

Anna Jacobs PERSONS OF RANK
Magna Large Print
15 November, 2010
£20.99
Regency romance: The dowager believes people of rank should not fall in love but her granddaughter and niece can’t help themselves, which brings a tangle of complications.

Jan Jones THE PENNY PLAIN MYSTERIES (Part 1 of 4: The Jigsaw Puzzle)
Four-part serial
People's Friend (weekly magazine)
Starts 24th November 2010 (Issue dated 27.10.10)
85p or thereabouts
A jigsaw from the past propels Penny to a puzzling future.

Freda Lightfoot ANGELS AT WAR
Allison & Busby Ltd.
November 2010
£19.99
Racked with guilt over the tragic death of her sister Maggie, Livia promises never to let anyone down again and to do something worthwhile with her life.

Freda Lightfoot HOUSE OF ANGELS
Magna large print
October 2010
£20.99
The Angel sisters struggle to escape their bullying father and find an
unexpected half-sister.

Freda Lightfoot HOSTAGE QUEEN
ebook
November 2010
£6.99 +VAT
In a court rife with murder, political intrigue, debauchery, jealousy and
the hunger for power, can Marguerite de Valois hope to keep her head.
























Chrissie Loveday FROM THIS DAY ON
Ulverscroft Linford Romance Large Print
November 2010
£8.99
Set in a Cornish village, misogenist male doctor meets his new female locum
and sparks fly ... but they reckon without his aunt who's a bit of witch.

Sue Moorcroft STARTING OVER
Isis (Large Print hardback)
1 November 2010
£20.95
New home, new friends, new love. Can starting over be that simple?

Sue Moorcroft ONE SUMMER IN MALTA
Isis
01 November 2010
£11.99
Tina has only one opportunity to spend a summer in Malta. Shame the past is waiting for her there.

























Gillian Villiers TOMORROW’S PROMISE
Thorpe Large Print
1 November 2010
Cost - £8.99
Lara is determined never to risk falling in love, but when she takes up a
new post and agrees to share a house with laid-back fellow teacher Mick, she
finds it isn’t quite so simple.


SHORT STORIES

Kate Jackson THE CIRCLE OF LIFE
Short Story
Peoples Friend Christmas Special
DC Thomson
28th October
£2.99
Christmas will never be same again without Grace.

Gill Stewart on The Evolution of a Story

Gill Stewart, writing as Gillian Villars, tells us about ‘Tomorrow’s Promise’ – The Evolution of a Story


In her recent post , Kate Harrison discussed the task of re-writing a story once the novel had actually been published. That really is quite a challenge and it was fascinating to read about it. The evolution of my story has been slightly different and probably easier as it has not taken place ‘in public'.

The story I’m referring to is ‘Tomorrow’s Promise’, my second People’s Friend Pocket Novel which is out now. The title was new to me and made me think about all the evolutions this story has been through to reach eventual publication.

Firstly the title – it started off in my head as ‘Lara’ and stayed with that title for years. Then when PF accepted it, it was as ‘Lara of Ladybank Row’. And now it is published under the completely different title of ‘Tomorrow’s Promise’.

But it’s not only the title that has been evolving. The story itself has changed many times, although as always been essentially the same – the story of Lara, a teacher, who takes on the challenge of a new job and run down house, who is quite happy thank you and certainly isn’t looking for love or reconciliation with her parents, but through the novel finds both…

In its original incarnation the story was intended to be the first of a trilogy, each centring on the love story of one of three friends. The second incarnation was as a novel in its own right, with some of the friends’ stories woven in. The third and final version was altered to suit the format of the People’s Friend Pocket Novel and had to be considerably shortened (it helped having to take out all the swear words and sex!).

This is a story I am very fond of and I’m delighted I didn’t give up on it and that it has eventually found a home. For me it shows that the saying ‘if at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again’ is very true, especially when it comes to writing.

Here's a link to an great article from the Dumfries & Galloway Standard on Gillian Stewart (Gillian Villiers). You can read her post on why she writes here.

Why Do I Write by Gillian Stewart (Gillian Villiers)

Why do we write? Is it just to get published? If so, I should be very happy, as my first novella ‘Rachel’s Coming Home’ has just been published by People’s Friend Pocket Novels. And I have to admit it is exciting, seeing this piece of work actually in print. Holding it was thrilling! And telling friends and family was both exciting and embarrassing, as I’m not very good at self-publicising.

But to get back to my first question, why do we – or I – write? And I’ve come to the conclusion that wonderful as publication is it is not the reason I do it. I write because I love it and I can’t stop.

I write at a very messy desk in the corner of the sitting room in our farmhouse in southern Scotland. I used to share an office with my husband Dave until he evicted me for being too untidy. It seems piles of books and papers are more acceptable in the sitting room than in his (immaculate) office. And I love the sitting room because from here I have a view across farmland to the Forest of Ae. Even in today’s rain it’s beautiful. This may be one reason all my stories so far have been set in the Scottish countryside. I don’t think there is any better place to be and nor do my characters!

So sitting here, alternately admiring the view and losing myself in the lives of people who engross me every bit as much as my family, is something that I hope to do for years to come. Of course I wouldn’t say no to being snapped up by a major publisher, but the here and now is pretty good.