So bought myself a new frock and some killer heels (rather appropriately) and had a high old time in the exceedingly posh surroundings of One Whitehall Place on Monday for the RNA's Pure Passion Awards. Great to see the legendary Penny Jordan picking up a special award (she's written 180 books, how is that even possible when she looks so young!!) and while I will confess to rooting ever so slightly for my Presents pal Abby Green in the Love Story of the Year stakes (absolutely adored Bride in a Gilded Cage), I was chuffed to see Louise Allen pick up the award. I have it on very good authority that her book The Piratical Miss Ravenshurst is terrific so will be adding it to my TBR list. Also much enjoyed Jojo Moyes pointed speech when she picked up The Romantic Novel of the Year trophy for her book The Last Letter from Your Lover. She noted the way commercial fiction was patronised by the BBC's World Book Night panel (and yeah Jojo, I was screaming at the telly too) and pointed out that 'just because a book is commercial doesn't mean it isn't good'. Too right!
Anyway, after much yaking with fellow authors Fiona Harper (who very kindly let me pinch the photos from her blog), Ms Abby, Natalie Rivers, Julie Cohen and Philipa Ashley (I think we defo had the best table!), some fine canapes and rather too much champagne (not even going to mention the Flaming Meringues, folks, but needless to say they deserved their upper case status), Tuesday was a little bit of an anti-climax. Always tough to return to a manuscript you think you've finished, even if the revisions this time were surprisingly minor. Still, my editor, who I had a chat with at the Pure Passion do had spotted a few problems and as always once I got stuck in (and had a couple of paracetamol), I found it surprisingly satisfying to come up with solutions...
Have now sent the ms off again, with that fiendishly clever lose-end-typing-up epilogue attached (I love writing epilogues -especially if my couple have finally co-operated and actually deserve their happy ever after). So am off to Barcelona for a couple of days to celebrate tomorrow with my very best mate where we plan to do lots of drinking, partying, swimming in our hotel's roof-top pool (assuming it's not snowing) and doing some late-night tapas while admiring the local talent (from checking out the Barcelona football team, I'm expecting the men to be very easy on the eye).
I will of course also be researching the city for a future book... because I'm a consummate professional, me.
4 comments:
It was great to quaff champagne with you!
Have fun in Barcelona, you lucky thing.
Barcelona huh? Nice for some. :-)
You too Julie!
So Jackie, have I made you jealous? Ha, my job is done! (Mind you, if I come back and my ms has pinged back to me, maybe not!)
Ah, research. It's a tough job, but someone has to do it! Have fun!
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