Sue Fortin's Blog, page 8

Officially known as Publication Day, unofficially known as ‘Happy Dance Day’ – of which I shall be doing a lot.

I am delighted that my second novel with HarperImpulse is released today in digital format, with paperback to follow shortly.

Thank you for all your support; as always, very much appreciated.

Helen has had to leave everything she’s ever known behind; her home, her family, even her own name.

Now, returning to the UK as Ellen Newman, she moves to a small coastal village, working as a nanny for Donovan, a criminal psychologist. Attractive, caring and protective, this single father and his sweet daughter are a world away from Ellen’s brutal past. She thinks she’s escaped. She thinks she’s safe.

But something’s wrong.

Strange incidents begin to plague her new family, and their house of calm is about to become one of suspicion and fear. Who can be trusted? Who is the target? Who is closing in?

Buy Links

Amazon.co.uk

Kobo

iTunes

GooglePlay

Sainsbury

Filed under: Book launch Tagged: Closing_in, HarperImpulse, New_Release, Publication_Day, Romance, Sue_Fortin, suspense

suefortin:

Very honoured to be listed in such great company. Big congratulations to every one who was published, especially my Romaniac pals, Laura E. James and Celia J Anderson.

Originally posted on The Romaniacs:

As you may know, The Romaniacs all met through the

RNA

‘s

New Writers’ Scheme

back in 2011. Since then we’ve all made great strides in our writer careers and, amazingly, last year three of us achieved our ambition of becoming published authors. This has meant ‘graduation’ to full membership with the RNA and sees us eligible for the

Joan Hessayon Award

; the winner of which is to be announced at the RNA summer party in London on 22 May 2104.

Celia J Anderson – Sweet Proposal

Laura E. James – Truth or Dare?

Sue Fortin – United States of Love

We are in fabulous company and wanted to wish everyone the very best of luck. We are looking forward to the evening very much and to meeting up with all the other attendees, especially the other new writers.  Here is the full list of nominations.

Alison Maynard

Eileen…

View original 36 more words

Filed under: Uncategorized

The day has finally arrived!! Nikki Moore’s debut novel with HarperImpulse – Crazy, Undercover, Love – is released as an ebook today, 24th April 2014.

If you like pacy, sexy romance and fancy a long weekend in Barcelona with a smoking hot guy this one’s for you!  Want to know more…?

When uber-feisty career girl Charley Caswell-Wright takes on the assignment as PA to the gorgeous Alex Demetrio, CEO of Demetrio International, she’s there under entirely false pretences; to get her life back on track. Having lost the job she worked so hard to earn, she’s determined not to give it up so easily, especially when she didn’t deserve to lose it in the first place.

Mr Dreamy CEO is her only chance of clawing back her career – and her reputation. So she has to keep things strictly professional… boy, is she in trouble!

To buy Crazy, Undercover Love as an ebook:-

Amazon – http://amzn.to./1gdpOxb

Google Play – http://bit.ly/1rTMrQw

iTunes – http://bit.ly/1mkzpHP

Kobo – bit.ly/QlpKpC

Sainsbury’s -http://bit.ly/1hoD1bj

Or to buy it as a paperback on pre-order, released on 26th June:-

Amazon – http://amzn.to/1rTKGmB

What people are saying about Nikki’s other stories…

The Love Letter and A Day in the Life… HarperImpulse short story collection Be My Valentine, with Teresa F Morgan and Brigid Coady, attracting 4 and 5 star reviews.

‘I loved all 5 stories and will look out for more books by each author.’

CometBabesBooks, Amazon

‘Whilst I enjoyed all of the stories, I particularly liked Nikki Moore’s … her voice as an author really resonated with me and I can’t wait to read more of her work.’

Kate Beeden, Goodreads

Nikki’s short story A Night to Remember in the Mills & Boon/Romantic Novelists Association anthology Truly, Madly, Deeply which has also attracted 4 and 5 star reviews.

‘My favourite story was A Night To Remember. I think what drew me to this … was its resonance with real life. I’m not going to spoil the story but I could feel the emotions spilling out of the page – it was beautiful.’

Beckie, http://www.beckiesbookmix.blogspot.co.uk

‘A Night to Remember – Beautiful, devastatingly so.’

Cheryl M-M, Goodreads & http://mmcheryl.wordpress.com/

 Nikki Moore lives in beautiful Dorset and writes short stories and sexy, pacy romances. A finalist in several writing competitions including Novelicious Undiscovered 2012, she graduated from the Romantic Novelists Association New Writers’ Scheme after four years and and has contributed to their magazine Romance Matters. She has far too much fun attending the annual RNA conference and has previously chaired a panel and taken part in a workshop at the Festival of Romance.

She blogs about some of her favourite things – Writing, Work and Wine – at www.nikkimooreauthor.wordpress.comand believes in supporting other writers as part of a friendly, talented and diverse community.

You can find her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/NikkiMooreAuthor or on Twitter @NikkiMoore_Auth and she invites you to pop in for chats about love, life, reading or writing!

 

Filed under: Book launch, Guests Tagged: Crazy, HarperImpulse, New_Release, Nikki_Moore, Publication_Day, _Undercover_Love

I’m delighted to be able to announce that my second novel, Closing In, is to be  published by HarperImpluse, and will be released on 15 May. Initially, in digital format but paperback to follow soon afterwards.

I’ve prepared a book trailer to show you the cover and give  you an idea what Closing In is about.  So, if you have less than a minute to spare, I’d love you to take a look.

Sue

x

Filed under: General blog Tagged: Closing_in, Cover_reveal, HarperImpulse, Romance, Sue_Fortin, suspense

Bonjour!

This month’s French blog post comes from a week we spent in L’Ardeche region of France a few years ago.  The Ardèche is a 125 km long river in south-central France and I had hopes of completing one of my ambitions in life – to white water raft.  Unfortunately, we managed to visit the region in one of the driest summers, when the river was very shallow and very gentle.  I had to be content with paddling and swimming instead.  Still, it was a lovely day and white water rafting remains on my  bucket list.

A natural arc stretching 60 m wide and 54 m high

Driving around the area, there were lots of points to stop at and admire the beautiful scenery.

 

The caves were fascinating to visit. A series of gorges which form a 30k long canyon running from Vallon-Pon-d’Arc to Saint-Martin-d’Ardeche.

 

The Ancient Theatre of Orange is one of the best preserved of all the Roman theatres and still hosts many festivals and shows. When we visited, the British Indie rock group, Franz Ferdinand were preparing to play there that night.

 

Here’s a little bit of Franz Ferdinand to finish off with (can’t believe this song was as long ago as 2004)

 

Filed under: French Friday Tagged: France, Franz_Ferdinand, French, French_Friday, holiday, L'Ardeche, Orange, Pont_d'Arc, Roman

My turn on Written Fireside!

Part 1 : Lori Connelly

Part 2 : Lynn Marie Hulsman

Part 3 : Angela Campbell

Part 4 : Zara Stoneley

On Valentine’s – Part 5

‘I take it you’re okay with dogs?’ asked Cat as Mongo barged the door to the cabin open and loosing traction on the wooden floor, skidded to a halt at the side of the sofa.

‘Hey there, girl,’ said Jed, ruffling the dog’s ears.

‘Mongo’s a boy,’ said Cat. ‘Be careful, he doesn’t usually like men.’ She thought back to Paul and how neither hound nor man had been fond of each other to say the least.

However, Cat wasn’t prepared for Mongo’s reaction. Amazingly, her faithful, protective canine, clearly delighted in the attention from his new pal, proceeded to lick Jed’s face and ears. Jed laughed and from his crouching position was bundled over to the floor by the over enthusiastic greeting.

‘What was that you said about Mongo not liking men?’ Jed’s chuckle turned into a full blown laugh. It was infectious and Cat found herself laughing along too.

Eventually, Jed managed to extract himself from under the dog. ‘I think a drink all round is needed. Mongo you could do with a bowl of water and I could definitely do with a beer.’ He stood up and looked at Cat. His eyes seemed to rest on hers longer than necessary as he asked her if she wanted a drink.

Cat gulped, her throat suddenly feeling dry.  ‘A beer would be great,’ she managed to eek out. As she watched Jed amble over to the kitchen area and prepare the refreshments, she took time to analyse her feelings. Was she nervous because of being in close proximity to another man; another man who she couldn’t deny was mighty attractive or were her nerves down to her own insecurities? Paul had knocked her confidence sideways, even talking to another man when she was in his company, would incur his wrath. It had got to the point where she had avoided talking to anyone of the opposite sex when Paul was about.

She gave herself a mental shake. Why was she even thinking like this? For a start, Jed wouldn’t be interested in her. She was, after all, just a family friend of his mate’s. He had made it perfectly clear that summer, that she wasn’t even on his radar.

‘You look miles away,’ said Jed, breaking her thoughts and coming to sit on the sofa beside her. Fortunately, he didn’t press her for an explanation and continued to talk, offering her one the beer bottles in his hand. ‘I can’t see any painkillers so I guess a beer is as good. If not better.’  They chinked bottles and sat in a comfortable silence for a moment, enjoying the refreshing amber liquid.

‘So, without wishing sounding corny,’ said Jed, ‘what brings you out here to the lodge all on your own, well, apart from Mongo here.’

‘Oh, you know, this and that,’ said Cat. ‘Just nice to get away from it all.’

‘And by it, do you actually mean someone?’

Boy, he was perceptive. She looked at him, sat next to her. His eyes once again, holding a steady hypnotic gaze on hers. She nodded. ‘Something like that.’

‘A lot like it, I’m guessing,’ he replied before looking away and taking a long swig on his bottle. He turned to face her, resting an arm over the back of the sofa, his fingers grazing the tips of her hair. ‘Whoever, he was, obviously didn’t appreciate what he had. I might have made that mistake once upon a time.’

Cat gulped. The pain in her shoulder eclipsed by the hammering of her heart as it threw in an extra beat. ‘What do you mean?’ Her voice was practically a whisper.

To be continued next week by Mandy Baggot

Filed under: Written Fireside Tagged: On_Valentine's, Written_Fireside

Bonjour!

I’m a big lover of France and all things French,  I even managed to get myself a French surname. :-)

I am planning to write a book set partially in France, so I have begun to gather bits and pieces together to inspire and inform me.  I thought I would share some of my French research each month.

Serent is a lovely rural town in Southern Brittany. This will be the location for the part of my book which is set in the early 40′s during the German occupation.

Serent, Morbihan

Our holiday cottage is approximately 2 miles from Serent and we have spent many a happy holiday there.  It is still very much a rural and farming area. The cottage is over 150 years old and would probably have belonged to a local farm worker.  Originally, there would have been an earth floor so livestock could be brought in at night for shelter. The iron rings used for tethering the animals to are still embedded in the interior wall of the cottage. I’m pleased to report that a travertine stone floor now replaces the earth one and there is not a goat in sight! I am using the cottage in my book but may employ my artistic licence and change it slightly – I need an attic which the real one doesn’t have.

This rustic red is very typical of the area

A le mois prochain!
Sue
x
Filed under: French Friday Tagged: Brittany, France, French, Morbihan, research, Serent, writing

To celebrate the launch of our anthology Romaniac Shorts, myself and my other lovely Romaniac girls are taking it in turns interviewing each other. Laura did a secret draw, World Cup style, and Lucie and I were picked to ask each other the questions.

£1 – proceeds to Dyslexia Action and the RNA. Click image for Amazon link.

Hello, Lucie, and welcome to my new blog. You’re my first guest and what better guest to have than a lovely Romaniac lady!

Wow, I am truly honoured. Thanks so much for having me.

Right, here we go with the questions …

You recently won the New Talent Award at the Festival of Romance, how has this impacted on your writing career?

Do you know what, I still can’t actually believe that I won. I was up against some very talented writers and I truly didn’t think I would be in with a chance of winning. I was praying for runner up at best. It was such a magical moment when Sammia Hamer  (Avon, Harper Collins) called out Head over Heart. And to top it off, I was with fellow Romaniacs as well as new friends I had made that day.

Since winning, it has been a bit of a whirlwind. I received a fair bit of interest in HoH at the festival after it was announced and came away with a few email addresses and requests to see the full manuscript. I crossed my fingers and followed through with sending it out. And unbelievably, a matter of weeks after I had won the award, I was signed up to the Kate Nash Literary Agency and am now represented by Sarah Taylor. Sarah has been incredibly enthusiastic about HoH and its future, so we will see what the future holds.

What are you working on at the moment? Can you sum it up in just a couple of sentences?

At the moment I am working on my next full length novel. It is currently untitled but to sum it up, I would say it is the story of a young woman who takes the brave decision to escape from an abusive relationship. She returns to her hometown to start fresh but after years of abuse, it isn’t as easy as she thinks to live normally again. And there’s also the added complication of her best friend’s brother… 

Can you explain how your writing process works? What comes first? Plot, characters, setting, theme?

This is a hard one as I feel I am still relatively new to writing and so I tend to be trying lots of different techniques to see which works for me. With Head over Heart, it was the main theme which came first. HoH follows the story of young widow, Sophie, who is trying to learn to love again but finds herself constantly swimming against the tide.

Before I even thought of writing that book, I had a dream. In the dream, I was the passenger in Sophie’s husband’s car accident. I saw how she was widowed. For weeks after that dream I couldn’t shake it off. That woman’s story needed to be told … and so Head over Heart was born.

However with the novel I am working on at the moment, I had an idea of the characters first, but this was alongside the theme which is domestic violence. So maybe I do predominantly work from the theme.

Yes, let’s go theme! I do like to go around the houses sometimes to get to where I want to be :-)

If you could have any author, living or dead, and any character from a book over for coffee and cake, who would you choose and why?

My ultimate hero (I should really say heroine) is JK Rowling, I would most definitely invite her over for coffee. I would also have wine, Gin and Baileys on offer too, if she preferred, but I suppose it would depend on what time of day I held my gathering. Anyway, yes, definitely JK Rowling. It was reading the Harry Potter books that really made me think about my writing seriously. I think those books are fantastically well written and I remember saying to my friend, “If I can write something and it makes someone else feel, what I feel when I read those books, It would be amazing.”

Even though I have many icons now within the writing industry, she was my first real icon. And to this day I would still absolutely love to meet her.

And finally, the all important question, what cake would be on offer?

Ooooh, well, I am not a chocolate cake type of person, believe it or not. I love chocolate bars, chocolate drinks and even ChocLit books … but chocolate sponge cake … nope. I would have a Victoria sponge on offer. And it would be shop bought because I am rubbish at baking!

Thank you, Lucie, it’s been great fun interviewing you.  Remember to save some of that cake for me!

Thank you so much for having me, Sue. It’s nice here, isn’t it? Very homely.

Oh, and saving cake? You will have to explain that concept to me as I’m afraid I don’t get it… saving… cake… nope, it’s ludicrous. Who has cake leftover to save?

www.luciewheeler.wordpress.com

www.theromaniacs.co.uk

www.facebook.com/lucie.wheeler1

www.twitter.com/lucie_wheeler

Filed under: Guests Tagged: Festival_of_Romance, Interview, Kate_Nash_Literary_Agency, Lucie_Wheeler, Romaniac_Shorts

Happy Dance Day means Happy Publication Day!

Delighted, excited and proud to be able to say that The Romaniacs have today published their ebook anthology.

Romaniac Shorts
‘Fashionably Brief’

It’s only £1 and all proceeds are to be split between

the RNA and Dyslexia Action

Written with passion, emotion, humour and warmth, The Romaniacs present a fashionably brief selection of twenty-two short stories and flash fiction. A story to suit every mood, from the lightness of first love to the sometimes dark realities of life, it’s touching, eclectic, and definitely Romanical.

Thank you everyone for your support – it’s very much appreciated.

Sue 

x

 

Filed under: Book launch Tagged: Amazon, anthology, Catherine_Miller, Celia_Anderson, Debbie_Fuller-White, Dyslexi_Action, Ebook, Jan_Brigden, Laura_E_James, Lucie_Hamilton, Publication_Day, RNA, Romaniac_Shorts, short_stories, Sue_Fortin, Vanessa_Savage

I have been invited by ChocLit author and Romaniac pal, Laura E James, to take part in a blog hop where we answer a few questions about our writing process. Laura posted last week; it’s fascinating to see how everyone works. You can go to her blog by clicking HERE.

In the meantime, here’s how I do it …

1. What am I working on?

I am currently working on my third full length novel called, Where It All Began. The premises or theme, if you like, of the story is what mothers do for the love of their child; it looks at the extremes of that love and the reasoning behind their actions, both good and bad. There is, of course, some romance and a bit of a mystery.

2. How does my writing differ from others in that genre?

Ooh, a tough question. First of all what genre am I writing in? Romance. Suspense. Mystery. Crime. Women’s fiction. Yes, to all of those, I suppose.  When I was writing my second novel, Closing In, which is currently with my publisher, I was often asked the genre. My reply was that it’s a mixture of romance and crime, so I coined the term ‘crimance’. Where It All Began has those elements too, so I’m carrying on in the same genre of ‘crimance’. How does it differ? I can only say is that I write it my way, with my voice.

3. Why do I write what I do?

That’s a more easy question. I love reading thrillers, whether they are police procedural, suspense or mystery, I really enjoy that sort of story. Equally, I enjoy reading about relationships; all that love and stuff! Combining the two is what I get the most pleasure and satisfaction out of when I’m writing.

4. How does my writing process work?

My process has developed over time. These days I like to come up with a theme or a premise first. Once I’ve got that then I can start creating scenarios, mysteries, conflict. The characters seem to come along simultaneously. Sometimes, especially at the early planning stages, there is such a mish-mash of ideas going on in my head that I’m sure if you look at my thoughts, they would resemble an old fashioned jumble sale circa. 1975, about 10 minutes after the doors have opened, where everything is a complete mess, items tossed around, discarded, picked back up again, put in the wrong place and every now and then you find a gem of a buy for 10p. By the time the sale is over, you’ve come away with some great items and some not so great ones. In the safety of your own home you can sort through and decide what to keep and what to put back in for the next jumble sale. Well, that’s my writing process.

Jumble Sale of Thoughts

Next week, I’m passing the baton onto my fellow Harper Impulse author, Teresa Morgan who blogs as The Wittering Woman and this is what she says about herself.

I was born and bred in Surrey, but since 1998 I have lived in sunny Weston-super-Mare, North Somerset. I live with my two sons – trying very hard to hold onto my Surrey accent!

I am at my happiest baking cakes, putting proper home cooked dinners on the table (whether the kids eat them or not), reading a good romance, or sitting at my PC emptying the thoughts from my head onto the screen.

I love writing contemporary romance, creating heroes readers will fall in love with. Men who in reality, let’s face it, just don’t exist.  I love creating stories with a touch of escapism.

Filed under: General blog Tagged: crime, Laura_E_James, Romance, Sue_Fortin, suspense, Teresa_Morgan, The_Romaniacs, United_States_of_Love, writing, Writing_process