Milka!
You are the Winner of Miranda Neville’s debut novel, Never Resist Temptation.
Email us at riskies@yahoo.com with your snail mail address.
Congratulations!!!!
Milka!
You are the Winner of Miranda Neville’s debut novel, Never Resist Temptation.
Email us at riskies@yahoo.com with your snail mail address.
Congratulations!!!!
Because imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, I’m going to copy my friend Mary Blayney‘s idea and talk about interesting ancestors. Mary’s family has a very interesting fellow in the the family tree, Major General Lord Blayney, whom she wrote about on History Hoydens (part 1 and part 2) and who lived during the Regency, fought against Napoleon’s army, and became a prisoner of war. He even wrote a book about it, available on Google Books.
My ancestors are not so impressive, but there is one who has a good story. In 1836, My great great grandfather, Joseph Batt, brought his wife and eight of his nine children from Alscace Loraine to America. On the voyage over, there was a terrible storm and it looked as if the ship was certain to perish. My grandfather, a devout Catholic, prayed to the Virgin Mary, promising her he would build a shrine in her honor if she spared his family from the storm. The storm subsided and the family arrived safely in their new country.
Batt made good on his promise. He settled near Buffalo, New York, where his oldest son had already settled. Soon he prospered. He built a chapel on his land, just as he’d promised. The chapel still stands today: Our Lady Help of Christians in Cheektowaga, NY.
The Chapel has been rebuilt a few times, but a painting of Our Lady looking down on the ship still hangs above the altar.
I wish I could say I visited this chapel, but I haven’t. I did not even know about it until I was well into adulthood. Although when I was growing up my family often visited our Buffalo relatives, I’ve been there rarely as an adult and my unsentimental family just never talked about or visited this wonderful place.
How about you? Do you have any interesting stories of ancestors?
Only a little more than two weeks before the release of The Unlacing of Miss Leigh. Also on April 1, you can get The Diamonds of Welbourne Manor from eharlequin. Check my website that day for the links.
Today our guest is Miranda Neville who offers us a tasty new Regency treat in Never Resist Temptation. Miranda originally hails from the UK but now lives and writes in Vermont. Her Avon debut promises to whet our appetites for more! Please give Miranda a delicious Risky welcome and one lucky commenter, chosen at random, will win an autographed copy of Never Resist Temptation.
1. This is your debut novel! Tell us about your book.
First, thank you so much for inviting me to visit the Riskies. A copy of Never Resist Temptation will go to one commenter.
Never Resist Temptation starts with that old romance staple—one I never get tired of—the heroine who is lost at cards by her wicked uncle. Jacobin, being a feisty lady, runs away and goes to work as a pastry cook at the Brighton Pavilion. Then her uncle is poisoned by a dessert she made and she’s on the run again. The good news is she’s been offered another job; the bad that her new employer is the winner of that card game. Anthony, the Earl of Storrington, has his own reasons for employing a pastry chef. He’s unaware of her true identity but things soon heat up between them.
“…genuine, lusty and fun.” Publisher’s Weekly
“…a delicious and delightful read.” Romantic Times 4 Stars
“I adored Never Resist Temptation.” Michelle Buonfiglio’s Romance B(u)y The Book
“Don’t resist the temptation – pick up the book!” Romance Novel TV
…
2. We love to hear about a new author’s journey to publication. Tell us about yours and include your “The Call” story!
I went into this as clueless as anyone. I’d always had the yen to write an historical romance so I did. Once I joined the RWA and tried to sell the book I discovered all the things that were wrong, like 10,000 words of backstory in the first three chapters. I did get some encouraging words on my writing from agents, editors and contest judges, but I gradually realized even the slimmed down version was unlikely to sell: it was too “traditional Regency.” I abandoned it, along with its half finished sequel, and spent a weekend thinking about a plot and characters that worked in what I’d learned about the current romance market.
I can’t really describe how the story evolved but it really came together. The first draft took six months and I enjoyed (almost) every moment. Then I went the usual route: appointments at conferences, contests, agent queries, and garnered my fair share of rejections. Once I won a contest and had an editor request the full, I began to get some interest from agents. Meredith Bernstein (what a great woman!) took me on and sold the book in three weeks. She called me one morning to say a couple of publishers had turned me down, then the same afternoon to relay an offer from Avon (thank you, most wonderful Lucia Macro). I went from wild despair to swilling champagne in a matter of hours.
2. Who can’t love a book that includes pastries? Tell us something about your research for the book, especially the cooking part.
Reading Ian Kelley’s biography of the great French chef Antonin Carême was the catalyst for the story. I wanted to incorporate his tenure as the Prince Regent’s chef. I was intrigued that female cooks were much more prevalent in England than on the continent. Carême didn’t like employing women as cooks and didn’t appreciate the female cooks who worked for Prinny. This gave me the idea of having Jacobin disguised as a young man. Cross-dressing roles are such fun, and Anthony is very confused by his initial attraction when he thinks she’s a boy. Most of the recipes described (and in some cases quoted) in the book come from Carême’s cookbooks. I tracked down details about period kitchens, stoves, utensils and so forth, though much of it never made it into the story.
4. We’re all about being risky here. What was risky about your book?
Hmm. I like to use a lot of humor, even in the sex scenes. Is that risky? And talking of risk, I am always aware of the chance of conception and I think the intelligent hero and heroine should be too. I like to see sex followed by pregnancy or fear of pregnancy, or use of some preventive measure. The rather crude forms of contraception available back then are perhaps given too much credence in romances, but that’s OK. I was nervous having my 88-year-old father read the book but he took it very well (of course, he thinks his daughter deserves a Pulitzer). We had an interesting discussion about coitus interruptus!
5. What is it about the Regency era that drew you to it?
My favorite historical eras have two things in common: great power and great clothes. The Regency saw Britain established as Top Country and its aristocrats wielded enormous influence. Masters of the Universe in fabulous costumes (yes, I loved Colin Firth in the wet shirt).
6. What’s next for you?
I’m contracted for two more books at Avon. The series (hopefully eventually a trilogy) is set in the world of Regency book collectors. Bibliophilia is a strange obsession, inspiring rivalries, murderous skullduggery and (a fact sadly absent from the historical record) sexual passion! I worked in Sotheby’s rare books department for several years so I’m returning to my roots here.
Miranda will be stopping by so feel free to ask her questions about Never Resist Temptation, French cooking, or working in Sotheby’s rare books department. And remember. One lucky commenter will win an autographed copy of Never Resist Temptation.
What a difference a week makes:
For want of anything else to talk about besides the beautiful weather we’re having this week, I thought I’d simply pass on something from the Annual Register for 1816. The Annual Register was sort of like an Almanac, printing all the important events from the previous year. You can view this 1816 Annual Register on Google Books.
This is from the Chronicles section of the Annual Register, which gives important or interesting news events from each month. This is dated March 30 (because most of the other March articles were about shipwrecks, murders, and fires)
The following particulars of the Woolwich smuggling have been published in a morning paper —On the voyage home, a carpenter employed in securing the packages discovered the secret. Immediately on arrival he gave information at the Customhouse, but it was ten days more before the ship was inspected ; in the mean time much of the smuggled goods for certain persons were got away, and only those were left for men of less note. There were to the value of 7,OOOl. for one man, packed up as—”Return Congreve rockets.” There were many rare things which were got out of the way. In the mortars were laces, gloves, cambrics, etc. and in the tumbrils were claret, champagne, etc. Many people have long supplied themselves and friends with wine in this way, and their wives with finery. This is the only vessel which has been detected, but the trade has long and successfully been carried on to a great extent. The man who informed got about 1,000l.
Woolwich is in the borough of Greenwich on the Thames; it is about 3 miles east of Greenwich and 10 miles east of London, which goes to show that smuggling didn’t only take place in Cornwall!
Are you familiar with the Annual Registers? I have copies from 1810 to 1820 but if you can find them online you can search them so easily.
Be sure to visit my website for sneak peeks of my Undone, The Unlacing of Miss Leigh, and my novella, Justine and the Noble Viscount in The Diamonds of Welbourne Manor. There’s a new contest, too!
1. I’m Diane, not Megan; I’m just the person taking Megan’s place today. Megan came to my rescue on Monday when the unthinkable happened. Shudder. My internet was down. FOR TWO DAYS, so I’m taking her day.
2. Here is the view from my deck on Monday when it snowed in the Washington DC area and up and down most of the east coast, Monday being the day I was without internet, I’m just saying.
This weekend they are forecasting temperatures in the 70s.
Looks like I have lots of property, doesn’t it? The ten or twenty feet of woods behind my house is “common ground,” owned by my suburban community. And there’s a development of townhouses on the other side of it.
3. I was dying to blog on Monday to tell you all about my birthday present (we will not speak of what birthday this was). It arrived last Friday…..My Kindle2!!!
Totally extravagant gift. Not a necessity. A definite frill.
My daughter gave me an Amazon.com gift card so I promptly purchased all the Kindle versions of my books (they only had 3). Isn’t that cool how it displays the cover of The Vanishing Viscountess.
My husband gave it to me. His idea was that if HE loved it, I could get him one for his birthday, but he’s not as thrilled with it as I am. His great love is his iphone and a Kindle was not enough to lead him astray.
I also downloaded Regency England by John Plowright, which is really about the political events during the time Lord Liverpool was Prime Minister. 1812 to 1827, longer than anybody.
I also downloaded several free ebooks, including Elizabeth Rolls’ His Lady Mistress, one of the 16 free ebooks Harlequin is offering to celebrate their Diamond Anniversary. You can see the titles HERE.
Books out of copyright are free, too: I downloaded Cecelia by Fanny Burney, The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Radcliffe, Travels in England in 1782 by Karl Philipp Moritz, The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Orczy, Persuasion by Jane Austen.
There has been spirited discussion of the new text-to-speech feature of the Kindle2. As an author, I totally support the Author’s Guild’s drive to protect authors’ rights in this matter, but as a reader, I have to say this feature is totally cool. The speaking voice doesn’t get the proper inflection of speech all the time, but it does a pretty good job. You can listen to a sample HERE.
I can also download my manuscripts, if I want to, and have them read to me!
I’m sure I’m going to love my Kindle2!
4. My new bookcovers are up on my website, as are two sneak peeks, one of my Undone estory, The Unlacing of Miss Leigh, and the other one is of my novella “Justine and the Noble Viscount” in The Diamonds of Welbourne Manor (also starring Amanda McCabe and Deb Marlowe!)
Okay, I couldn’t resist showing them to you.
So how about you? Any more weather stories to tell? Are your jonquils up? (mine are, but not blooming yet). Does anyone else have a Kindle? Do you love it? Does Diane have every gizmo in creation? Ask me!