Sally Quilford's Blog

Apologies for taking so long to get around to starting the Dear Quillers column. I’ve spent the last few weeks chasing my own tail. Sadly one of our westies was taken ill and died, which, any pet lover will know, is just as painful as losing any member of the family. I also had a birthday bash on Facebook which went very well. I’ve been for physiotherapy for my Achilles Tendonitis and have to go back in 3 weeks to see how the exercises are going and then to sort out my shoulder. But now onto Dear Quillers. If you remember, Sue Barnard won my first competition on the blog, with her question: Books cannot live by romance alone - so what advice can you offer for helping to construct a convincing and compelling sub-plot? Some romance publishers don’t want any sub-plot and do indeed live by romance alone. Mills and Boon novels are wonderfully constructed to deal with just the emotions and conflict between the hero and heroine. The Romantic Novelists Association Awards are...

<br /> I'm pleased to announce that The Last Dance , the first in the Bobbie Blandford series, is now available to download from Amazon. The above link takes you to Amazon.co.uk, but it can also be downloaded from local Amazon sites all over the world. It is 1960 when WPC Bobbie Blandford starts her new job as the only woman at Stony End police station. As she chases down runaway cars, errant teenagers and attempts to investigate the murder of businessman Lionel Mapping, she is unaware that it will raise questions about her father's death and a life that Bobbie had forgotten. What does it all have to do with handsome doctor Leo Stanhope and just who can she trust in a male dominated world?

I'm pleased to announce that my latest novella, A Place of Peace, is now available to download for Amazon Kindle. At only 77p, and at only 27k, it makes for a reasonably priced and quick summer read. When Nell goes to stay on the beautiful Barratt Island for three months, she hopes to escape the shame she left behind in England. She soon meets gorgeous police chief, Colm Barratt, and scheming socialite Julia Silkwood, whose husband seems to be failing quickly. With Nell's over-active imagination running riot, she fears she could lose Colm forever.

This is the absolutely delicious cover for the Ulverscroft/Large Print version of my saga, The Steps of the Priory. I could never have imagined I would be the author of such a beautiful looking book. At 85k, it is also the longest book I've ever had put into print, making it an extra special pleasure for me. It will be in libraries from 1st August 2014, so please do ask for it at your local library. The ISBN is: 9781444820737 If you would like the longer and fruitier version, it can be downloaded for your Kindle today for the bargain price of 77p. I've kept putting off writing the next book in the Harcourt Saga, but seeing the amazing Ulverscroft cover has made me itch to get started on it. The next book in the series will concentrate more on the girls, Charlie and Ronnie, introduced briefly in the first book, and a secret they share that could tear the whole family apart. But there will also be big changes for Becky and my favourite character, Bobby will find love bu...

As my post about romantic intrigue said, I spent last weekend at the RNA conference in Shropshire. It was a wonderful, but exhausting weekend. The exhaustion not helped by the fact I have since found out I have Achilles Tendonitis - that explains much of the hobbling anyway - it wasn't the wine after all! The conference is a very buzzy time, with so many people to talk to. I liken it to speed dating where you get roughly three minutes with everyone. And even then I didn't get to talk to all the people I would have liked to talk to. But I'm a person who needs some alone time, so I made sure I left space in the itinerary to go back to my room and just be quiet for at least an hour. If you haven't been to an RNA conference or similar and are thinking of attending one, this is the best advice I can give you: Make space in the itinerary for some peace and quiet. People aren't offended if you disappear for a while - or if they are offended then they're not worth kn...

I'm a great believer in never deleting anything one has written. Even if it was rubbish, we learned something from writing it. I've often dusted off old ideas and reused them. This has led to one short story sale and at least one novel sale. The other day I was looking at something else I could dust off, and maybe just put up on Kindle. I was reminded of a novel I wrote in my first year doing NaNoWriMo. It was called The Cunning Woman and was an Elizabethan murder mystery, with a heroine called Kate Hepburn. I remember my late lamented pal, Neil Marr* of BeWrite Books ringing all the way from France to tell me (amongst other things) that I'd never get away with a heroine called Katherine Hepburn as it was too gimmicky. At the time I thought he was wrong, and told him I could never change the heroine's name. It was the one I'd chosen for her and therefore sacrosanct. Yes folks, I was that annoying newbie writer who thought I knew it ...

Literary Jargon – McGuffin When I was at the RNA conference over the weekend, I met a lady who was not a writer, but was just there to accompany a relative. She made the point that there was a lot of jargon and acronyms being bandied about over the weekend, and she had no idea what all of it meant. It occurred to me that we do that a lot, in any group. My closest friends and I have a code and mythology that means nothing to anyone else, but which as friends we only have to use to open up a discussion of every good time we’ve ever had. Families also have their own different words and phrases that have built up over the years. When I first trained to work in the voluntary sector as an advisor, I was told about how jargon can be used as a means of excluding others and making them feel like outsiders. Of course, groups of family and friends should have their own mythology. That’s what makes the friendship/relationship. But for something like writing, especially new writers, we...

My RNA Conference Talk – Love and Death in Romantic Intrigue There’s been so much interest in the talk I did at the RNA Conference over the weekend of 11 th -13 th July 2014, I thought I’d try and summarise it here for everyone. So this blog post will discuss (as it did in the talk): How I came to write Romantic Intrigue What is Romantic Intrigue? Romantic Intrigue Examples Romance Tropes Crime/Intrigue Tropes Combining the Two – How Would you Do it? Tips on intrigue and dealing with death in romantic fiction. Who Publishes Romantic Intrigue? And I am more than happy to answer any questions in the comments afterwards. How I came to Write Romantic Intrigue Don’t worry. I’m not planning to go back in my writing career to Year 1 in High School when I had a poem published in the school magazine. I’ll only talk about it in so much as it applies to this talk and writing romantic intrigue. As my regular blog visitors will know, I had some success with...

It occurred to me that I ought to catch up with where I've been and what I've been doing since I closed down my last blog. I shan't go into why I shut it down. That's past now and it's time to move on. I can't remember if I'd passed my driving test before I closed it down, but in case I hadn't announced it, I did indeed pass my test on 3rd February 2014 at the ripe old age of 50. I now the proud owner of a dinky little Peugeot 107, and it's given me a new lease of life. The reason it's taken me so long to start a blog again is because I've had some health problems, as well as being busy with RNA committee stuff. The health problems included a rather unpleasant growth on my lip, which had to be removed and biopsied. I'm glad to say that everything is fine and there were no hidden nasties. On the plus side I also organised my first Romantic Novelists Association Summer Party, and it turned out to be a great success (phew!) I deny brib...

In what I hope will be a regular feature, I will be sharing new Romance releases with you all. Not just my books, though I'll be announcing those too, but books by my romance writing pals. So I'm delighted to announce the release of Joanne Phillip's newest novel, Cupid's Way Cupid’'s Way – the new romantic comedy from Joanne Phillips When Evie Stone’'s grandparents enlist her help to save their home in Cupid'’s Way, Evie is happy to oblige. On the cusp of her thirties, and still disappointingly single, Evie’s so-called dream job with a firm of architects has been driving her crazy for months. What she needs, even more than a new man, is a challenge. But saving Cupid’'s Way won’'t be easy. A perfectly preserved Victorian terrace, surrounded by modern estates and retail parks, the street is a proud oasis of quirky characters, cobbled pathways and communal gardens. Unfortunately, it also sits on prime development land worth millions. D...

I'm pleased to announce that the winner of a signed copy of Take My Breath Away in my first giveaway on this new blog, is Sue Barnard . As I couldn't choose between all the great questions asked, I read them all out to hubby, and though he thought all questions were very good, he thought Sue's question: Books cannot live by romance alone - so what advice can you offer for helping to construct a convincing and compelling sub-plot? just had the edge. I shall be answering that question and the others over the coming weeks in the Dear Quillers feature on this blog. Thanks to everyone for taking part, and I'm sorry, as always, that there could only be one winner.

For my first giveaway on this blog I am offering a copy of the Large Print version of my romantic intrigue, Take My Breath Away . Inspired by the film Cleopatra, and written especially for My Weekly Pocket Novels to commemorate the 50th anniversary of that film in 2013 (and also my own 50th birthday), Take My Breath Away is a murder mystery and romance. I have one signed copy to give away, but I'm afraid you're going to have to work for it. I'm trying to amass questions for my Dear Quillers feature on the blog. So leave your questions about writing romance, or writing in general, in the comments section below (on this blog post only please), and the one I decide is the most interesting when the competition closes will win the book. I will, however, use every other question posted for Dear Quillers. Just to be clear, these questions need to be about the craft or business of writing romance or writing in general, and not about my personal writing life. You can read the...