I finalled!

The 2015 Australian Romance Readers Association (ARRA) Awards have been announced. These awards are where members of ARRA nominate and vote on the books they most enjoyed during the previous year.

I'm delighted to have made the finals list in five categories:

Favourite Historical Romance
The Spring Bride by Anne Gracie

Favourite Continuing Romance Series

Chance Sisters series by Anne Gracie

Favourite Australian Romance Author 2015

Anne Gracie

Favourite Cover from a romance published in 2015

The Spring Bride by Anne Gracie

The Strongest Heroine from a romance published in 2015

Jane Chance in The Spring Bride by Anne Gracie

You can see the full list of finalists here:
The awards will be presented to the winners on March 19 at a special dinner in Sydney. You can book here.

Thank you to ARRA for organizing these wonderful awards, to the readers who nominated my books (and me) and congratulations to all the other finalists.

The Spring Bride ~ enter the hero

Here's a short excerpt from my new book, The Spring Bride. In it, you meet my bad-boy hero, Zach, for the first time. (Whitehall is where the government offices were.)

"Sir?" A clerk poked his head into the Honorable Gilbert Radcliffe's discreet Whitehall office. From the outer office, Zachary Black watched, faintly amused by the clerk's excessive caution. Surely he didn't look that dangerous? 

"Yes, Evans, what is it?" Radcliffe sounded preoccupied, busy.

"There's a man here asking to see you." The clerk lowered his voice. "Demanding to see you."

"And?"

"The thing is, sir, he's a gypsy."

"A gypsy?"

"Yes, sir. Dirty and disreputable-looking. I would have shown him the door, only the fellow asked for you by name, sir, insisted you'd want to see him, and wouldn't take no for an answer." He added doubtfully. "I could try to have him removed, if you insist, sir, only he's quite large and I fear it would be. . . difficult."

"An ugly customer, eh? Well then, send the fellow in. I'll deal with him."

The clerk turned to Zach, and stepped back to let him pass. "Watch yourself, gypsy. Mr Radcliffe might be a gentleman but he won't put up with any nonsense."

Zach winked at him, and sauntered into the the office, saying in a roughly accented voice, "Gen'leman give me a message for some toff called Mr Gilbert Radcliffe--that you, is it? Said I was to give it only to 'im. Said Mr Radcliffe would give me a gold guinea for it."

The Hon. Gilbert Radcliffe leaned back in his chair, regarding his visitor through narrowed eyes. His gaze took in the the darkly bristled jaw, the worn, faintly foreign clothing, the muddy boots, the shabby sheepskin coat with the faded but outlandish embroidery— and most damning of all, the small gold earring. "Gold, is it? For a scoundrel such yourself?"

"Gold, 'e promised me." Zach edged closer. "And gold is what I'll 'ave."

Gilbert Radcliffe wrinkled his nose. "Faugh, that smell. . . Have you been sleeping in a barn?"

Zach's mouth twitched, but he whined in an aggrieved voice, "I come a long way wiv this message, I 'ave."

"Shall I call someone and have the wretch removed, sir?" said Evans from the doorway.

"No, no." Radcliffe waved him away. "Bring a pot of tea and two cups." 

The clerk gave him an incredulous look. "Tea sir?"

"And some biscuits?" Zach added hopefully. "Ginger ones?"

The clerk gave him a dirty look and glanced at Radcliffe, who nodded. "Yes, and biscuits—ginger if you have them. And shut the door behind you." When the clerk had gone, Radcliffe looked at Zach and shook his head. "He probably expects you to steal the spoons."

Zach gave him an indignant look. "I'll have you know, Gil, I haven't stolen any spoons for, oh, weeks."

To pre-order The Spring Bride:

BarnesandNoble  

amazon.com 

IndieBound  

The Book Depository   

Booktopia   

Bookworld  

The Spring Bride -- another snippet.

Here's another little snippet of The Spring Bride, out on June 2. I posted several others on my facebook pages and on twitter.

There are two slightly longer excerpts on my website.  

Enjoy.

The Author Photo

I'm gearing up for the promo as my book, The Spring Bride finally goes on sale. Some authors adore the whirlwind of promo, the blitzing of social media channels, the public "look-at-me-buy-my-book." The rest of us go there reluctantly, channeling Lady Macbeth and muttering, "Screw your courage to the sticking point and we'll not fail."

I'm in the latter group. I do my best to embrace the world of social media, and most of the time I enjoy it. Not when it comes to telling everyone to to buy my book, though.  My natural tendency is to do that from the bottom of a deep well, while wrapped in a blanket and wearing a gag. A  natural salesperson I am not. And I know I'm not alone in that.

Mary Jo Putney once told me writers' conferences are full of introverts pretending to be extroverts. Many writers on social media are much the same. It's a bit easier, because you can do it from the comfort of your cave, hiding behind the computer screen, doing what you do every day anyway, creating a world and characters — only the character you're bringing to life is you. Authorly you — the one who is interesting and glamorous and lives a fantastically exciting life. Not the one who lives in track pants and trainers, who never goes anywhere because, well, that's how you write books, dammit! 

But it seems people —publishers — expect you to project some kind of image. And to this end, they require you to provide — horror of horrors!— an Author Photo!

Read the rest of this post here:

An Evening of Fantasy & Romance

Like to read? Talk books and writing and storytelling? Meet authors? Come join me and three of my writing buddies in Melbourne on June 18th at Dymocks Bookstore in Collins St in the heart of Melbourne. 

It's free, but you need to RSVP for the event at www.trybooking.com/HXNC Bring along a printout of your ticket to win a book pack including 2 signed titles from each of us!

Hope to see you there.

An Anniversary & a Giveaway

The word wenches — the historical romance authors I regularly blog with — are celebrating their 9th anniversary. That's a long time in blogland.

We're celebrating with a series of posts about our first ever book, and with a giveaway. Eight winners will win one of these books, and one winner will win all eight of the books!

To enter the giveaway contest click here: http://bit.ly/WordWenchesGiveaway

Regency Dresses

Yesterday I was putting together some thoughts for the cover conference for the cover of my next book, The Spring Bride. I'm still writing the story, but in my case, because Im not a speedy writer, the cover is always finished long before the book.

They'd asked for some suggestions, and so, because the title is The Spring Bride, it'll be no surprise to you that there will be a bride on the cover. And it will be spring.

So I went looking for a few regency-era dresses for Jane, my bride.  Daisy, her sister, will be making the dress for her. Jane remembers her mother telling her about a beautiful pink dress she wore the day she met her future husband, and so Jane wants to get married in pink. It doesn't have to be all pink -- a cream dress with a few touches of pink would be fine.

Pinterest -- otherwise known as The Endless Tunnels of Gorgeousness. A place so easy to get lost in. Honestly, I could spend all day looking at stunning regency clothes. But I did manage to resist all the other gorgeous period collections. And I came up with a few possibles: So what do you think?

We'd need to make this one a little less apricot and paler for Jane, but I love it as is and I love the embroidered net overlay.

Such a pretty dress and the touch of pink roses around the hem and train are gorgeous. Not sure about the ninja scarf around the bride's face, though. :)

I loved this one with its lace overlay — this was very popular on FaceBook when I showed it.

Of course we'd need to do this in pink instead of blue, but otherwise, it's lovely, isn't it?

This was popular on Fb, too. I'm not so sure about the leaves. I do like the idea of appliqued and embroidered leaves, but these are a bit big for my taste. But the fabric of the gown is beautiful.

A lace veil or possibly a shawl. It's Spring, after all, and in England, so the weather won't be guaranteed sunny.

Or how's this if the weather is a bit nippy — a gorgeous cream pelisse, fastened with shell buttons.

I'm nowhere near writing that scene yet, so it might not be any of these dresses. In the meantime, oh dear, I might have to wander down The Endless Tunnels of Gorgeousness. I can justify regency clothes  because it's 'research' but there are luscious clothes from all eras, and all kinds of other beautiful things.

Which I must and shall resist. She says firmly. 

Really!

Do you have any favorites from the ones above?