Win a set of my Roman set books

To help Christina Phillips celebrate the publication of Forbidden, her debut Berkeley sensation, I'm offering one lucky commentator on her blog a signed set of my Roman books. So that's The Gladiator Honour, A Noble Captive, Sold & Seduced and The Roman's Virgin Mistress up for grabs. She also has a ton of other great prizes and her book looks excellent. Why not go and comment?

In my own news: my editor called late last night and I've had to drop everything to work on a Special Project that is due on the 24th. It should be fun but blog service and twitter might be a bit sporadic because of it!

The Roman's Virgin Mistress in French

Thanks to Joelle, a reader in France, I learnt that La Rose du Colisee (The Roman's Virgin Mistress) is up on the Harlequin France site.

Before anyone says anything, I do know the cover was recently used for Juliet Landon's The Warlord's Mistress. The various different Harlequin offices have full access to all the artwork and they are able to pick and choose the artwork that they feel will be best suited for the book in that particular market. And the cover has such a very lovely seductive feel that I am thrilled the French thought it could fit my book.

The blurb for La Rose is:
République romaine, 69 av. J.-C. Veuve, la belle Silvana dirige avec son oncle une maison de plaisirs. Aux yeux de tous, elle offre l’apparence d’une femme comblée. Nul ne sait que son oncle est couvert de dettes et que la ruine les menace. Courtisée par de riches soupirants, dont le jeune et fougueux Eutychus qui veut l’épouser, elle répugne pourtant à faire un mariage d’intérêt. Mais, un jour, l’arrogant cousin d’Eutychus, Lucius Fortis, proche de Jules César, vient lui proposer un marché : il fera d’elle une femme riche pourvu qu’elle s’engage à renoncer à Eutychus. Humiliée d’être prise pour une créature vénale, Silvana refuse.…

You can purchase it here.

My friend Jen Black told that when you go into the French hypermarkets, they have long rows of the covers and they are quite a site to see.

Kindle and Harlequin

As you may or may not know, Amazon has released a new ebook reading device -- Kindle.
Harlequin is very committed to providing ebooks in ALL formats, so it has released its front list and back list in Kindle. I believe ebooks are released to other sources besides eharlequin on publication date. So this means that The Roman's Virgin Mistress is available in the Kindle format now and A Christmas Wedding Wager will be available in Kindle on 1 December.
I have no idea about ebook readers as I do not own one, but some people swear by them. I know they are very good for people who have failing eyesight and want large print at a decent price.

BBC Radio Newcastle

This morning, I appeared on the Paul and Ian show on Radio BBC Newcastle. There will be a listen again feature so you can hear the show. It will be available at some point after 1pm. I am about 20 minutes into the thing.
The show is amusing and light hearted. But I think (hope?) I came across well. They are known quantity to me as I appeared on the show in May 2006. A pair of likely lads from the Toon. Light hearted. Fun with a quirky sense of humour.
And I did get to read the first couple of lines of The Roman's Virgin Mistress, so I can feel it was a success. And they were kind enough not to tell me that it wasn't!

My revisions have arrived and so it is a matter of improving and strengthening TD. It can be done. It is a matter of working at it.

Coffee Time Romance prize

The blog about a day in my life is up at Coffee Time Romance. There is a chance to win a copy of The Roman's Virgin Mistress. I am currently hoping that someone will enter...

The Shelfari thing is slightly addictive at the moment. What books to put on my shelf. That sort of thing. Anyway, I find it interesting.

My daughter has finished HP for the second time. She read it once and then had to reread it. She thinks it is better than books 5 and 6. Perhaps equal to book 4. She also keeps teasing me with hints. Everyone is not as they seem. Umm, I figured that would happen. She was also very satisfied with the ending.

My editors' thoughts are supposed to arrive on Tuesday. They do like TD but have ideas on how it could be strengthened. This is what I like to hear. I want my books to be the strongest possible read.

I am feeling more positive about my current wip. The crows of doubt often attack at this stage. I don't think I am ever truly happy with a book until I have my editors' input.

TheRomanceReader at Heart reviews The Roman's Virgin Mistress

I was absolutely delighted to discover that the Romance Reader at Heart had reviewed The Roman's Virgin Mistress and had given it one of their Top Pick awards. I have a lot of respect for The Romance Reader at Heart and their reviews. I know that their reivew for The Lady Soldier taught me a great deal and made me understand and question things. I also know that they review from the heart.

One of my favourite bits of the reviews was I absolutely knew that when I picked up Michelle Style's new book, I was going to be wonderfully entertained, and I am so happy that I was right! I love, love, love Michelle Style's books. Her writing is always above par and her stories are fabulous! You can read the rest of the review here:

It is such a compliment. I really do try to entertain readers. And I am so honoured.

The PHS Review site has also done a review of TRVM.

I loved the fact the reviewer said Michelle Styles’ historical romances are simply terrific! The Roman’s Virgin Mistress is a spellbinding tale that vividly evokes the past and that is laden with intense sensuality, dramatic emotion, heart warming drama and poignant romance.

Yesterday, I also got a fan letter in the post! A very lovely reader from Vista California had writtten to me via harlequin Enterprises. She loved TRVM and wondered if I would sign some book labels for her. She enclosed an IRC and self addressed envelope. It was a really thrilling moment.

Hopefully you can tell that I love and adore reader feedback. I do try to answer all reader letters and I also try to read all reviews. They are important to me. I o keep them in a heart shaped box and look at them when ever the crows of doubt really strike. The box has three new additions!

A Review for TRVM and trying times --bees

Julie Bunello has posted a lovely review on cataromance for . My favourite bit was Michelle Styles is one of the most exciting and original voices in historical romance and her latest novel, The Roman’s Virgin Mistress, is a superbly crafted tale which will hold her readers in thrall! It is wonderful to think that someone feels I have an exciting and original voice.
I also liked: Laced with plenty of passion, adventure and intrigue, The Roman’s Virgin Mistress is an engrossing historical romance written by a novelist who seamlessly interweaves historical detail with high drama, intense emotion and sizzling sensuality.
Julie, of course is a highly expereinced reviewer and takes her reviewing very seriously. If you have not seen the new look cataromance, be sure and do so. It is wonderful.
I was also pleased to read on Roxanne St Clair's RWA blog that It's true, it's true: the historical romance novel is alive and selling! In the words of a buyer from one of the major chains, historicals are "trending up" for the first time in a while. This is especially true of the bestselling authors of historical romance, and booksellers are closely watching the numbers of new and midlist authors in this sub genre, because increased sales from those authors is the sign that the trend is real and lasting. Terrific news for the hundreds of writers and millions of readers of the beloved historical.

Let us hope the trend is long and lasting. And readers continue to enjoy my books. The only thing I can do is to make my books as enjoyable as possible.

Yesterday was a day of frustration. We had a bee swarm. In mid July! Arrogantly I had considered we were beyond such things. Most of the swarms happen in late May/early June. By mid'July there is no real chance of getting honey off a swarm. The annoying part is that honey production also stops on the hive they swarmed from.
This time, the swarm which was about the size of a basketball -- so a proper swarm with the old queen rather than a cast -- landed in the Monterey cypress. I had no wish to lop bits of the tree off, so I attempted to use smoke and a skep. They appered to go into the skep, BUT when I checked later in the midst of a rainstorm, the bees had vanished. So did they give up and go back to to their hive? Or take off for somewhere more suitible? I don't know. All I know was that I had to lug the spare brood box back into the house. As I did not know which hive the bees had come from, I could not simply dump them back in. My thought was to put them in their own hive and then reunited with whichever colony seemed weakest AFTER I had taken the honey off.
Once the rain stops, I will have to check the honey situation and try to determine which hive is making a new queen.
SIGH.

Influences and seed for The Roman's Virgin Mistress

Twyla Tharp in her wonderful book The Creative Habit speaks about seeds or influences. Basically she makes the point there are no new ideas under the sun. Get over it and think about the combination of ideas to make something your very own. Ideas and seeds for books never come from just one place. Tharp also makes the point that if one keeps going back to the same source, the well rapidly runs dry and creativity ceases.
So what are the influences that I know about for The Roman's Virgin Mistress.
Tom Holland's book Rubicon, in particular his chapter on Baiae and its contribution to the fall of the Republic first made me want to write about this city. I wanted to write about it since I wrote GH. Regular readers will know that I wrote two other books between GH and TRVM. These books have yet to appear in the North American Market.
I was particularly intrigued by the role of the Queens of Baiae, the society hostesses who controlled the access to power. Unlike Rome, women were far more in the ascendancy here. Baiae had this very loose reputation. More divorces had happened on the sands of Baiae than anywhere else for example.
Catullus's poems to his Mistress also provided some inspiration. But I did not think and still not think I could write a jaded woman without any morals. ( I may to try sometime as a challenge) I wanted something else.
Then I happened to read again about Anna Nicole Smith and her fight against her late husband's son for her inheritance. This made me wonder what if -- my heroine was more sinned against than sinning and simply notorious for having married. I had a heroine that I could work with. And yes, I know the virgin widow is a stock character, but I like to think that I made Silvana a bit different. It is also a sordid fact of life that many women have been married to old men. Catherine Howard and Henry VIII is another example. Was that marriage actually consummated? By the time Henry VIII married Katharine Parr, Katharine is simply a nurse.
The book The World of Lady Jane Grey also I suppose was an influence as it shows quite clearly the sort of precarious world Katharine Parr lived in.There is no guarantee that had he lived, Katharine Parr would have been Henry III's last wife.
Also was an unconsummated marriage a real marriage and would the wife have right to inherit? What if she needed to inherit? What complications would being a virgin then cause? So I had my heroine or at least an idea of how I could make her. And I know some people groan at the thought but the character really intrigued me. What would it be like to have everyone think you are a whore and to know that you are not, but because of other considerations, you did not dare say.
But what about my hero and my premise.
Why would any one want to get involved with Silvana? And how could it be made worse?
Baiae was the sort of place that made men and destroyed them. I wanted my hero to be of the establishment and someone for whom being involved with Silvana would be fraught with peril.
I knew also that I wanted Baiae to resemble the Regency. There are far more obvious similarities with the Regency time period than say with the Medieval time period, or even the Celtic period. There are plenty of parallels with our own period. I happened to be rereading Faro's Daughter when things fell into place. Excellent book by the way. Read it if you haven't.
What if I used a senator who had to disentangle his young nephew from the clutches of this Society presumed whore? It is an excellent stock in trade premise and one that Roman themselves used ad nauseum -- upright and often uptight man being charged with getting rid of undesirable woman discovers she is actually not as she seems and falls in love to the dismay of his family. These sort of stories were notorious for deus ex machina by the way. The normal situation was for a god or goddess to appear and revel that the woman in question had been mixed up at birth or to hand her a large fortune or whatever.
As an aside: a fun thing to do sometimes is to see if you can up with the basic premise for a story and see what fable/fairy tale/myth/saga it relates back to. There are no new premises under the sun, just twists on old ones. A good working knowledge of folklore and myth is a useful thing. Ovid's Metamorpheses is a good place to start.
There are other seeds as well, I know Fortis's reaching out of his hand at the very start was inspired by the movie of Howl's Moving Castle. I loved Christain Bale's voice in that movie and he helped to inspire Fortis. I wanted someone who had been through the mill and had a reason to protect his reputation, but who also knew the score, knew how Baiae operated.
And if I think I am sure there were other seeds. But hopefully will give you some idea of the main influences. The ideas really come from everywhere but it is the combo that makes them your own.

Coffetime Romance's Review of TRVM

Coffeetime Romance has reviewed The Roman's Virgin Mistress. The reviewer gave it 5 cups. According to their rating system, it means: Ultra Rare Extraordinary Read
Not many books will be rated a 5. This is a book you would like to tell everybody about because you just can’t say enough about it.

My favourite bit of the review was: An amazing read and one filled with interesting historical facts. Ms. Styles has done the research for this book extremely well and makes it an entertaining read. I loved the strong willed and equally strong tempered character of Silvana. Fortis is equally arrogant and strong willed, but short to temper. That makes him a wonderful alpha male in my book. The suspense of the story will have you holding your breath, while the love scenes will make you melt. This book is a must read for anyone who loves historical romances with just a dash of suspense. Ms. Styles is on my author watch list after reading this marvelous book.

You can read the whole review here.

I have just had a phone call from the Tyne Tees news producer. Apparently they are going to use the piece about me TONIGHT! The video is poised and ready. Cue massive nerves.

Dear Author Review

The review for The Roman's Virgin Mistress is up on Dear Author.com. I received a B which means that Jayne really liked it, despite the title. LOL.
Personally I like the title but there again I had a rapid awakening to the power titles. As a newly bought M&B author, I asked my Mother-in-law's next neighbour to tell me some of her favourite M&B authors and I would try to get some signed books for her. This is a woman who inhales M&B novels. Her reply was that she didn't have favourite but if there was Virgin or Mistress in the title, she bought the book.
I have little to do with titles or really cover art or back cover copy. All of that is the providence of the marketing department and the editors. They work very hard to give books a certain feel. My own humble opinion is that my editors do an outstanding job. I let them get on with the job. It is my task to provide the content that goes between the covers. And if I do that well enough, my customers will be satisfied and will come back for more. Or at least I hope so.

Dear Author, photo shoots and water

First of all The Roman's Virgin Mistress was reccomended as a July read by Dear Author. This is a tremendous honour and thrill. I have a lot of time for Jayne who is one of the main reviewers. She gives very honest reviews and reviews which make me stop and think. So this made my day.
Today, I also did a photo shoot for the Evening Chronicle and prentended that I was a glamourous author. Luckily/unluckily the photographer saw through my act and pointed out that I had a tendency to look like a scared rabbit in the headlights. Sigh. But I suspect the photographer is very good and look forward to seeing the photos and the piece.

Yesterday saw my husband down in Hull where he phoned several times about the bad weather. At first I thought he was exaggerating, but then heard the slight panic in his voice as the water started to lap the car windows as I was trying to discover if the M62 was actually open or not. Thankfully, he drove through and eventually managed to make it back home. The strangest thing was that other motorists were busy trying to take photos as they drove, one very nearly went into the deep water and then a wave washed in the car and apparently put an end to his phototaking...

Decisions, Decisions

It has only been a few days since I turned in my latest and already I am starting to feel the tug of not writing. I am want to be immersed in a story again. I suspect this is because I hate housework, and now have no excuses. My dh has been making noises about the dust covering and the cobwebs...
I am thinking about my next two books. They are a duet. This means that there is a slight over arching story but that the books must be able to stand alone. It is a challenge. I enjoy challenges -- this is one of the reasons that I think my editors enjoys giving them to me. they are also going to be set in the early 1820's when locomotive fever was at its peak in the North East. It was a thoroughly exciting time and many of the advances paved the way for the age of steam.
The books will appear in the schedule -- one month apart. It means my delivery time has to be spot on as well.
At the moment, I have a number of ideas floating around in my brain. The fun part is that for the first time this year, I am not working with previosuly mentioned characters or worlds, so I get to create a new one.
I also need to sketch and make up worksheets for the workshop I will bew giving on Goal,Motivation and Conflict over on e-harlequin at the beginning of next month. I want it to be a really imformative, intersting workshop that other writers can get a lot out of.

I also have to write my blog for Kate Hardy's blog party. She and her fellow guests are giving away books and I have promised a copy of The Roman's Virgin Mistress. I just have to come up with a suitable topic.

Weatherwise -- today is a day more suited to ducks. They keep finding new pools to swim and dabble in. It is just disconcerting when they start swimming around the car!

Rome -- series 2

Rome started last night on BBC 2. The second episode is on SUNDAY!!!! So while there is not long to wait, I do have to remember the date.
The episode was packed full and I was thoroughly engrossed. It was reasonably accurate as to the main events -- although some of the subplots were slightly dubious. For example -- could Pullio really kill that many men in tavern without basically having a scratch on him. And also why is he sporting a beard? The vast majority of Roman men were clean shaven during this period. And I keep trying to decide which Pullio I liked better...And what was with the strange custom of the Romans wearing belts at funerals -- the whole point was that during the mourning period, you were supposed to go unbelted. But it did hold me within its world.
I wonder if Livia will make an appearance in this series, and if they are going to show Octavian shadowy first wife whom he divorced to marry Livia.

I see that the Roman's Virgin Mistress is now published and available for purchase on Amazon.com. I suspectthat will mean that it is out in the bookstores there as well. It will be out in the UK bookstores officially on 6 July.

As far as I know the piece about me has not yet appeared on ITV News North East, but every night lately I have been watching with the video at the ready...

I turned in my latest ms and now I will start doing my prep work for the next two as they are a duo. I also have a stack of admin plus blogs for other people to write. And the dust in my house has reached epic porportions...

Filming for TV

On Friday, despite the terrible weather, the man for ITV News North East (aka Tyne Tees) came to the house to do a feature. The piece will last about three minutes and he was here for about three hours!
It was at times nerve wracking, exhilerating and throughly exciting. The producer was fantastic to work with. Very professional. Very calm and easy going. Even the sun room springing several leaks failed to phase him -- although he did gently suggest that we do the readings elsewhere.
He did have to remind me that it was not a cookery programme and so not to speak while I did my Roman cooking demo. This was very difficult.
I also managed to do drop spinning without sending the spindle bouncing across the kitchen floor. I was impressed as every time I had pracised it that morning, the thread broke.
I also did two readings of The Roman's Virgin Mistress. Fingers crossed that it went okay. He is doing the editting of the piece next week and it should go out at the back end of the week. I am hoping to video it -- although I shall probably watch behind the sofa, cringing.
After it was done, I discovered I was brain dead and so did not get as much done on my wip as I would like. I am now however in the editting phase and will get the ms to my editors this week -- although not Monday as I had orginally planned. This is my favourite part of writing, truly.

ROME tv series

I saw on the BBC last night that the new series of ROME starts on the BBC on 20 June. This is utterly fantastic news as I understand that the second series is even better than the first. And of course TheRoman's Virgin Mistress is out in the shops in the UK at the beginning of July.
In case anyone is wondering, my senior editor has no connection with the BBC and my book was scheduled over a year ago. However, scheduling is a black art akin to witch craft. But I hope it means a very good serendipity for me.
For me, it is always interesting to see how they handled the time period and where they put the emphasis. There are so many ways of looking at a time period, that the only thing one can hope is that it rings true to your reader.

Contest for The Roman's Virgin Mistress

My latest newsletter has gone out. A bit late but I hope everyone will forgive me.
The contest is for a hardback copy of The Roman's Virgin Mistress. The second prize is for one of my backlist books.
The question that needs answering is:
What are the names of the hero and heroine of The Roman's Virgin Mistress?
Please email me with TRVM contest in the title. I will be drawing the winner on 18 June.
Please note that if you enter and do not belong to my newsletter, I will send you an invitation to join. In addition to info about my upcoming books, my newsletters has writing tips, facts about my research, and recipes.

The Roman's Virgin Mistress on sale

The Roman's Virgin Mistress is a July release in both the UK and the North American markets. This means it goes on sale on Mills and Boon.co.uk and e-harlequin today, a full month before it appears in the shops.

It is also available as an E-Book. All Harlequin Historicals are in the e-book format, so if you want to read it that fashion -- you now have the option. The e-books are published in the three most popular formats.

I know I need to send out my latest newsletter which will have details of my contest and how you can win a Hardback copy of The Roman's Virgin Mistress. It should be going out today or tomorrow.

Update

Thanks to Michelle Willingham, I have now seen the review for The Roman's Virgin Mistress in the RT.

It is a pleasant review EXCEPT the reviewer manages to get the hero's name wrong and misspells the location.

The story takes place in Baiae and the hero's name is Fortis. No Balia or Forte are mentioned. The modern name for Baiae is Baia. Minor points but to my mind important.

The reviewer says that I am attempting to capitalise on the popularity of ROME. Although I am grateful to her for mentioning the tv series, it is more complicated than simply attempting to take advantage. When I first began writing about the period, the series did not exist. Serendipity is probably a better word. Or maybe there is something in the ether.
I now see that there are several Viking set films due for release next year. I wonder if I shall be accused of trying to capitalise on them. And what about my Victorian set ones? Luckily North and South has been out for awhile. And I was forced to watch Richard Armitage in that and Robin Hood while I wrote the book, but really liked Toby Stephens in Jane Eyre far more. So Jack is probably a combo of the two.

I write what I write because I happen to like the time periods, not because I want to capitalise on anything. I think it would show. But if serendipity happens, fine. If not, I trust other people will be like me and like the period.

Life in half term

The children are on half term holiday this week. And this means all sorts of things are happening.
Yesterday was my daughter's 14th birthday and it is hard to believe that it has been fourteenth years since that momentous event.
The July RT came out .The Roman's Virgin Mistress has been awarded 3 stars. Nothing I can do about that, but I shall be interested to read the review. Last time Gladiator's Honor was reviewed, the reviewer mistakenly thought the Roman Republic had a royal family and she hated the modern language that was used.
Ummm, I will pass on that particular reviewer's grasp of history but it did rankle as I never use the word *royal*.
As for the other bit -- I don't write in Latin, therefore I think I am free to translate my words into English and to have my sentences make sense in English. The ordering of words is different in Latin. It used to drive me insane! Equally and obviously, we are not entirely sure how the Romans actually spoke in vernacular. I follow Lindsey Davies and others writers of Roman mysteries on using a more modern phrasing in any case. In Davies' latest novel, Saturnalia, she gives an explanation of where she gets her slang from and how she makes some of it up! Her characters are so wonderfully colourful that I hope she keeps writing just as she wants.

As long as the novel feels authentic, then I have no problem with modern sounding language. After all, the reader has to be able to read it and much of slang in bygone eras is long forgotten now. So does the writer use the exact word (if known) or a close approximation? The past needs to be accessible. 100% accuracy is not an achievable goal.

I suspect when people read my Vikings, some might say that I again use too modern of language. But I would ask them to find me the actual incidents of Vikings from the late 7th century speaking. Again the writer has to make them understood. The Vikings and Romans considered themselves to be modern. They could not really conceive of a time beyond of their own immediate horizon.

Anyway, I am going to get back to my current Victorian. This is easier in some ways as we do know the words people used, and one can give a better impression. But given my background, I know that the words will still have a flavour of me in them.

Sold and Seduced in North America

I googled Sold and Seduced today was surprised to discover that Amazon Canada is offering both it and A Noble Captive. I have no idea why they are doing this, but in case anyone was interested, I thought to point it out.

The one that made me laugh was Amazon.co.uk offering a used copy of the North American paperback edition of The Roman's Virgin Mistress. They have been offeringthis for awhile. I have no idea who put it on, but I doubt the copies have been printed yet. The only arc that I know about is the Romantic Times one -- but why offer it in the UK and not the US? It is a mystery to me.

I am being slow with my newsletter. It should be finished tomorrow morning. There will be a contest for the hardback version of The Roman's Virgin Mistress. For a number of reasons TRVM is my favourite Roman set historical that I have written, so I am very excited about it being released.

Currently I am workig on the motivation of my characters. I had become fixated on one thing and had lost the opportunity for good conflict. This stymied me. I have now made a slight tweak and I think it works better and will ultimately increase the conflict for my hero. How can he want two things at the same time that are mutually exclusive? If one, not the other. Will he be satisfied with just one, or why must he have both? Ithink it is starting to come together.