I know I am not alone is saying 2017 has not been an easy year and as I sit here on a cold bleak 2nd of January I cannot help but wonder if 2018 will be any better. But I am a great believer in optimism - I hold a strange mystic conviction that come midnight on the 31st December a magic wand wipes away the mistakes and sorrows of the old year and the new day dawns bright and shiny and unspoiled. Every January I say 'This is the year I shall lose weight, write a record breaking best-seller, find the perfect work/life balance.'
Sadly, although I have many things to be thankful for, once again none of this quite came to be so I have decided to make 2018 my year instead. Happily, there are already a few things in the works that should help it along.
I am glad to say that the final book of
The Beaufort Chronicles, The King's Mother is doing well, the reviews that have come in are good, encouraging me to begin another set much later during the reign of Henry VIII ... but more on that later. All my books are available for your kindle or in paperback. You can purchase
The Beaufort Chronicles here.
As I type this the final edits are being completed on an audio version of The Beaufort Bride, with Books two and three soon to follow. I am delighted to be working with Tessa Petersen who is doing a great job of the narration and will soon be moving on to the next books in the trilogy. Also in the pipeline is an audio production of The Kiss of the Concubine; a story of Anne Boleyn. This new enterprise will open up my work to a wider audience so if you have friends or family who prefer audio, do let them know.
My other big news is that I shall shortly be joining fellow authors Annie Whitehead, Hunter S. Jones, Jessica Cale, Maryanne Coleman, Gayle Hulme, Emma Haddon Wright and Dr Beth Lynne in launching our anthology
Sexuality and its Impact on History - a collection of scholarly essays examining the truth behind romantic and sexual relationships which have shaped British history. You can read more about it on Hunter S Jones' webpage by clicking
here. The book is to be published in March by Pen&Sword Books and is available to pre-order
here.
My contribution to the anthology concerns the persistant rumours of a romantic attachment between Anne Boleyn and the poet, Thomas Wyatt. I shall be examining some of his wonderful poetry that holds so many teasing possibilities.
Whoso list to hunt, I know where is an hind,
But as for me, helas, I may no more.
The vain travail hath wearied me so sore,
I am of them that farthest cometh behind.
Yet may I by no means my wearied mind
Draw from the deer, but as she fleeth afore
Fainting I follow. I leave off therefore,
Sithens in a net I seek to hold the wind.
Who list her hunt, I put him out of doubt,
As well as I may spend his time in vain.
And graven with diamonds in letters plain
There is written, her fair neck round about:
Noli me tangere, for Caesar's I am,
And wild for to hold, though I seem tame.
I shall be blogging about this further during the coming months. in the meantime, have a wonderful New Year full of laughter and company and, of course, good books to read.
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