Lily Malone's Blog, page 2

I got the Lego bug during Covid-19 when my family, like everyone to varying degrees around the world, was in lockdown. It started from my publisher’s challenge to its authors to have a go at #RecreateABookCover

Well, just to make things next-level, for Mother’s Day this year hubby and the boys made me a frame for my Lego cover creations, and now it’s finished (belatedly, but that’s okay) and I can hang it in my writing room for inspiration!

Not that long ago, given all the book events that have had to be cancelled due to Covid-19, Harlequin Australia gave its authors the challenge to create their own book cover just to keep us all out of trouble. #RecreateABookCover

All sorts of covers came out in the wash, and it really doesn’t surprise me. Authors are a creative lot! You can check out lots more at romance.com.au or click here.

Last weekend, my boys and I decided to recreate the cover of my latest release, LAST BRIDGE BEFORE HOME in LEGO. We had a heap of fun!

[image error][image error]You should try it for one of your favourites. Knit the cover. Crochet it. Bake it (ice it). Felt it. Paint it. Take a photo of your effort and send it to the author – I think he or she would get a real kick out of it.

Happy self-isolation to all.

xx Lily

You know that feeling you get when you finally do something you’ve been putting off for, like, years?

I got that feeling!

[image error] [image error]

Today I made my two self-published stories, Who Killed The Bride? and Who Killed The Movie Star? available as ebooks in the Amazon Kindle store, and through Kindle Unlimited.

It only took me since July 2016 to get my arse into gear!

The two stories involve the mad-cap adventures of Cally and Sienna in beautiful Butterfly House, as they try to establish their new tourism business hosting murder mysteries in the town of Cowaramup (incidentally – my home town) in South West Australia.

You can read more about the series here.

The books have always been available in print, and if you’d still like your copy in print please email me at [email protected] and I will sort that out. Each book costs $18.95 each including postage anywhere in Australia.

Links to the ebooks on Amazon.com.au are below:

Who Killed The Bride? Book 1

Who Killed The Movie Star? Book 2

From October 2019, three of my books became available in the Kindle Unlimited program on amazon.com.au

The titles are:

The Vineyard In The Hills

[image error]

and the first two books in the Chalk Hill Series:

Book 1: Water Under The Bridge

[image error]

Book 2: The Cafe By The Bridge

[image error]

[image error]The final story in the Chalk Hill series, Last Bridge Before Home will be out on December 16 in print and ebook, just in time for Christmas.

This is Jaydah and Brix’s story and it’s a cracker. It’s quite a bit darker than the earlier books because Jaydah comes from a very different place to either Ella (Book 1) or Taylor (Book 2). The one shining light in Jaydah’s life has been Brix (Braxton) the middle of the Honeychurch boys. Yes, this is a couple with history. This isn’t a book in which they fight each other (enemies to lovers), it’s a book in which they fight for a common goal. Safety.

About the book:

For Jaydah Tully, the country town of Chalk Hill has never felt like home. Home is a place to feel loved. Home is a place to feel safe. Jaydah’s home life is dark in ways the close-knit community could never imagine.

Jaydah knows that the man she loves has never understood her need for secrets. Brix is a Honeychurch, she’s a Tully – her family are Chalk Hill’s black sheep. It’s better for everyone if Brix stays away.

But Brix is a one-woman man, and when he returns to his home town to help his brother, the first person he sees is Jaydah. Independent. Private. Proud. When things are good between them they are really really good but all too soon they’re back in the old patterns, caught in the same argument: Her father. Her family. Her life that doesn’t include him.

Underneath her tough exterior, Jaydah is drowning. She has one chance to change everything. Is she brave enough to take the risk and let Brix in? Or will her father keep them apart forever?

All popular print and ebook pre-order links are here: http://bit.ly/2No8zXf 

If you know what you’re looking for and you want to go direct see below:

Amazon: https://amzn.to/2NsjoYt

Apple Books: https://apple.co/306N6n9

Booktopia: http://bit.ly/2YsQk41

Kobo: http://bit.ly/2YnjuSa

Google Play: http://bit.ly/2Lxtu7V

One of my very favourite people in this writing world wrote a great post about Keeping Mother’s Day Real… and so, inspired by Kylie Kaden I present you the story of my Mother’s Day …

My hubby is visiting his mum interstate for mother’s day this year, and that left my two boys to their own devices, and so… despite my instructions about a cup of tea in bed (to be honest, I’d rather the sleep-in), the cup of tea didn’t arrive and eventually I got up and made it myself. In their defence, I DID get that sleep-in…

[image error]Then, Mr 11 told me that the gift he’d been making at school was a #fail … but not to fear, he made me a card instead 

We have a new addition to the household and I (along with the entire family) am in love!

Meet Mango the Bearded Dragon… I now count myself officially amongst those who can use #MotherOfDragons

[image error]The Cafe By The Bridge book signing calendar of events:

Wednesday January 9 :

Big W Bunbury: 10am

Big W Mandurah: 1pm

Big W Kwinana: 2.45pm

[image error]Thursday January 10

(with Perth author, Juanita Kees)

I’m thrilled to be doing joint signings in Perth with another fabulous West Aussie author, Juanita Kees. Juanita is part of a three-in-one book bind-up called Country Suspense.

Big W Armadale: 10am

Big W Belmont: Noon

Big W Riverton: 1.3opm

Wednesday January 30

Books in Bars : with Collins Booksellers Bunbury

(More details soon)

Sunday March 31

Australian Romance Readers Association book signing at Lathlain Function Centre, Perth, 1.30pm-5pm. Tickets $15. A full list of signing authors and all information is available here:

[image error]

I hope to see you out and about in Perth in 2019!

xx Lily

[image error]

[image error]Do you read the Dedication and Acknowledgement pages in the books you buy? I’m not sure I ever used to, but I do now. Since I was lucky enough to get my own book on a shop shelf, I now love reading the little bits about the people involved in helping that author type The End on their story.

Jules and Belinda are who I dedicated my newest book, The Cafe By The Bridge, to.

Julesy is a childhood friend, who just recently got married to her childhood sweetheart. She’s inspired a few of my heroines in books: Christina from my debut story His Brand Of Beautiful had a fair bit of Jules about her, and Taylor from The Cafe By The Bridge has a fair whack of Jules in her too.

Mostly, it’s the clothes that does it. Christina could sew all sorts of things: clothes, cushion covers, patchwork over a hole in a tent. Taylor is an op-shop queen who puts all combinations of clothes together to make personal and individual works of art. That’s my mate Julie-ann to a ‘T’.

Miss Belinda is a more recent friend. Bel is a former work colleague, and as our work friendship grew we each discovered the other shares a mutual love of orchid hunting. But Bel’s status as ‘orchid-hunter-extraordinaire’ took the next step a year or so ago when she posted a picture of The Queen Of Sheba orchid on Facebook.

I actually thought this orchid didn’t exist anymore. I was pretty sure it had been crowded out by forest and habitat clearing, and by collectors (or thieves) trying to transplant it to grow elsewhere.

Little did I know the Queen does still exist in small hidden pockets in the wild and even near to my own backyard (the South West of West Australia). When Belinda posted this photo, (coincidentally at a time when I’d been writing an orchid scene into The Cafe By The Bridge) I actually changed the dialogue in the story to make sure I had my information right.

The Dedication is different to the Acknowledgements. Acknowledgements are where you can write a long list of ‘thank yous’. It’s kind of your moment where you can (on paper at least) step up to the stage to accept your Oscar for Best Actress and thank everyone who has helped you get the book together, including your Mum, your first teacher, your swimming teacher, your neighbour, the person who once offered you their seat on a bus…and of course for an author, it’s a chance to thank the many wonderful READERS who like your stuff!

I love writing Acknowledgements. Acknowledgements rock. Here’s a little taste of mine in The Cafe By The Bridge.

[image error]

Not long to go now for The Cafe By The Bridge, Book 2 in the Chalk Hill Series. Can’t wait to see it out and about. I love Abe’s story, and I hope you will too!

Thanks Jules & Bel for inspiring me to write it…

xx Lily

It’s been about two years in the planning by an amazing team of WA authors and an equally amazing team of volunteers, but the inaugural West Coast Fiction Festival has now been run and won during an incredible weekend in Perth. And I am so very stoked to say ‘I Was There’!!

[image error]I almost wasn’t there… because I nearly got lost on the way to the Rendezvous Hotel in Scarborough, driving up at night and relying on my trusty print-outs of various road maps (because me and my phone don’t talk to Google. We barely talk to each other). I didn’t get to put my feet up until about 22.19 (yes I like to be specific about these things but the photograph helps!)

The goal of the WCFF, apart from connecting readers and writers, was to raise money for the awesome Australian charity, Share The Dignity. And so we did! $18,000 to be exact which is enough to buy two vending machines for women’s sanitary hygiene products for Perth.

For me, the WCFF was always about the chance to catch up with authors and friends who I don’t get see much of, living 3 hours south of Perth and on the West Coast of this awesome country of ours. Authors and Readers from across Australia made a weekend of this event and flew across – and it was awesome to meet them. Particularly for me, Len and Carolyn Klumpp, and Janine Kimberley, who have all been long-time Facebook friends.

On the writing side of things, I got to meet Josephine Moon and Clare Connelly, along with Lisa Ireland and Perth local, Holden Sheppard. We’re all ‘agency mates’ with Haylee Nash at The Nash Agency, and this photograph of us having a beer after the festival cracks us all up each time we see it.

Amid highlights, I have to mention how great it was to meet Len and Carolyn Klumpp. Len is a wonderful supporter of Australian authors, and we share a love of two lots of Eagles footy teams. West Coast Eagles in AFL for me, and the Manly Sea Eagles (NRL) for Len. You know in those crazy Facebook quizzes that pop up now and then? I always remember somewhere years ago one of these said which of Len’s friends would he be most likely to share a jail cell with… and Len’s answer was Lily Malone – which I think is hysterical. Having met Len, I reckon we’d have an awesome time in a jail cell!

[image error]

Another highlight (there were many)… I got to sign a book for Jane Harper’s best friend, aka Tracey G. These three ladies, Jacie (on the left), Tracey (blondie in the back of the photo) and Sarah (on the right) were so much fun to chat books with, and to sign books for.

[image error]

Amanda Barrett runs the fabulous Mrs B’s Book Reviews. We’ve never met – so it was great to meet Amanda (on the right below) and her friend and fellow reviewer, Nicole.

[image error]

With the WCFF wrapping up Saturday afternoon, it was time for lipstick & dancing… so we all frocked up (well, not Len, Phil or Craig … but everyone else) and had a blast with The Velvet Amps. AND I met a new best friend (no, not Jane Harper although I am sure she is lovely!) I met Erica Tonkin from Collins Booksellers in Bunbury… but none of our photos came out because there was obviously too much dancing going on with waaaay to much camera shake!

I also met Pamela Cook and Alissa Callen and Helene Young – who are every kind of lovely