New Year's Eve

So it's the end of 2015 and we're all set to celebrate the segue of one year into the next, and make resolutions about things we want to do differently in 2016. Right?

For me it's a yes and no to both.

I love the IDEA of seeing in the new year, but I often find it an anti-climax, and fireworks have failed to hold my interest for a few years now (plus I always think of the number of dogs panicking and running away from home with all the scary noise). 

Chances are that celebrations at the Bailey house this year will be a glass of bubbly and perhaps a sparkler on the verandah earlier in the night, and in bed asleep long before midnight.

I'm not enamored by resolutions either - they seem to have a bad track record among the general population. However, I do think it's a magical time for two things, and I plan to do both this year:

1. A recap of the year that has been. Mr Bailey and I take some time to talk about the things the year has brought, and be grateful. It's often surprising what one of us remembers and the other has forgotten from the year.

2. Make goals. These are different to resolutions, because they're not about change, they're more like plans and things we'll work towards. Also, they don't have to be limited to one year. We once made a complex five year plan that had many elements outside our control, and clinked our champagne glasses to the plan at midnight on a NYE. The whole thing fell into place 10 days after the five years was up, so we're firm believers in the NYE goals.

What about you? Are you celebrating big? Will you even make it to midnight? Do you have rituals that you follow every year? 

Whatever you're doing on NYE, from my little family to yours, I hope your 2016 is awesome! 

2015 - the year that was by Amy Andrews

2015 has been one crazy-ass year for me. It was crammed full of book releases and travel, an award or two and some work and family milestones. So, as we all look forward to what 2016 holds, I thought I'd look back at the year that was.

January - 

Release of two books. My only Harlequin medical and only print book for the year, It Happened One Night Shift and a Tule novella The Hero

February -

I officially resigned (had been on leave for 7 months) from my job as a paediatric intensive care nurse after 21 years. A big, scary decision but one that felt like its time was due and I'm pleased to report that, so far, it seems to have been the right one. The big change I've noticed more than any other? I wake now between 6 and 7 most mornings. This is UNUSAL IN THE EXTREME for me. After being a shift worker for 27 years I thought being tired all the time was the norm. Now, I'm usually awake before my husband (although never out of bed!) who looks at me when he wakes and demands to know who the hell this "new" woman is!

My little brother became a TV star as one of the "sharks" - investors - on Channel 10's Shark Tank. He's now been nominated for a Logie.... None of us can really get our heads around it, including him :-)

March - 

Release of Ask Me Nicely. This is the sequel to my USA Today bestselling Brazen from Entangled Publishing - No More Mr Nice Guy - and I had been overwhelmed by the number of people who'd contacted me re Sal getting her story. So.....Sal got her story!

May - 

Release of Limbo, my weird, funny, quirky, woo-woo, disgraced PI meets ex-rock-chick-cum-cadaver-make-up-artist story that pretty much no-one read. Sob! Such a shame but that's the nature of the business. I suspect readers just thought it was too different. Regardless, I love it and loved writing it and sometimes, as an author, you just have to write the story that's calling you. I'll be writing the second book next year because Joy and Dash are too strong to ignore.

June -

Release of Seduced by the Baron, the 4th in the Fairy Tales of New York series that I wrote with three other fab authors - Kelly Hunter, Lucy King, Heidi Rice - for Tule Publishing. We all had a great time basing each of our stories on a fairy tale - mine is Cinderella.

No More Mr Nice Guy was nominated for the HOLT Medallion and was an Award of Merit recipient.

July -

I was very luck to travel to New York for the annual Romance Writers of America conference. It was my first time ever travelling overseas by myself but I managed just fine and was gone for only 8 days! Talk about a whirlwind! But again, due to having all my diurnal rythms back to normal by not working shift work anymore, it was the least jetlagged I've been in a long time! Oh and NYC was its divine self! The crowning glory was going to the Harlequin Black and White cocktail party for its authors at the Waldorf Astoria - its a real pinch-me night that one :-)

August -

Release of The Colonel's Daughter which was the Scorpio edition of the Zodiac Series from Entangled Publishing. It was my first ever bodyguard story and although that book kicked my butt in so many ways as I was writing it, I was so pleased to have the opportunity to finally write a trope I've always wanted to tackle. I love me a good bodyguard story!

I also won the Romantic Book of the Year Award at the Australian RWA in Melbourne with my digital title Risky Business published by Escape (digital arm of Harlequin here in Australia). This book was the first single title I ever wrote and was one of those that almost made it so many times. I scored my first agent off it, it was taken to acquistions here in Oz by a major print publisher etc etc but it just never seemed to get across the line. It was thrilling and rather vindicating several years and many we-love-it-but rejections later to know readers loved it so much to present it with this much coveted award.

September -

Release of the first in my Outback Heat series - Some Girls Do - through Tule Publishing. This was a series I'd been kicking around for a while and had decided to self publish until I ran the idea past Tule. It was blessed with great titles and great covers and I'm so proud of this series!

October -

Release of #2 in Outback Heat - Some Girls Don't. Poor Selena got a bit of a bollocking from reviewers because she chose her career over her man - twice! I won't apologise for her - I love her single-mindedness which if it had been in the hero would have been seen as strong and macho. That's just the way she came to me and I had to be true to her. C'est la vie.

Release of #3 in Outback Heat - Some Guys Need A Lot of Lovin'

Release of a novella - Glutton for Punnishment - in the Seven Sins anthology with 6 other fabulous authors. It was my first forray into BDSM (lite!!) and into self-publishing. It's been pulled now and we'll all be individually publishing our stories in the new year.

November - 

Release of #4 and final book in the Outback Heat series - Some Girls Lie.

My daughter finished grade 12. Anyone who's ever had their last child finish high school will know the amazing sense of relief it brings. She was also awarded the VET (Vocational Educational training) student of the year for doing two TAFE courses as well as her year 11 and 12 workload. Both of my kids are onto the next phase of their lives now and I'm immensely proud of how they've turned out. Just wish my Mum was here to see them!

December

My husband turned 50, I turned 46 and my daughter will turn 18 on New Years Eve!

So, there you go. Crazy-ass or what? Totally raving bonkers mad. I surpassed 50 published books and felt like writing and social media ruled my life! Next time I say I'm going to say yes to anything that comes along, someone please slap me! I've been taking it easy these last few weeks though and catching up on reading which has been bliss and I'm planning on having a much more sedate year in 2016.

What about you guys. Ever had one of those non-stop weeks/month/years? Whats your top tip for saying no, something you can see I'm very bad at....

PS - My new-to-me author find for the year was Madeline Ash - y'all should go out and read her stuff. It's brilliant!

PPS - if you want to stay abreast of my (much less crazy) release schedule in 2016 you can join my mailing list here.

Merry Christmas!

A peaceful Christmas to all

Happy Christmas to all the LoveCat readers and the LoveCats themselves. This is my first Christmas as a LoveCat and I'm both honoured and delighted to be part of this wonderful blog.

This year is a very quiet Christmas for me and my husband. Our daughter, our only child, is away from us for the first time in her twenty-two years. She's staying with friends in California, a long way from Sydney. They are the nicest possible people so she is in very good hands. But we miss her... 

Her cat Tabitha howled and cried outside her closed bedroom door last night. When I let her in she saw daughter wasn't there, cried some more and slunk out in misery. Of course I consoled her and she slept happily on my pillow. That I didn't have a very good sleep is beside the point, isn't it!

Fortunately we will have the company of two nieces and three great nieces on the actual day. It will be the first time for years we haven't cooked Christmas dinner, as the younger generation is taking over this year.

I'm sharing my all-time favourite Christmas photo. Three years ago my darling old cat Albert found my sweet great niece, then two, admiring our Christmas tree. He ambled over to keep her company and I quickly got this shot. It was his last Christmas, he crossed the rainbow bridge six months later aged twenty-two.
I'm spending Christmas Day with this same  lovely niece - and her hamsters!

Christmas is usually huge for us in terms of entertaining. For years we held a party on Christmas Eve and then woke up and did it all again the next day. It's quite nice to be quiet. But perversely I feel a little let down that I'm not stressing out with all that's to be done!

All over the break, I'll be working on a book due early in the new year for Harlequin Romance so won't have time to miss daughter (lie, I miss her already and she's only been gone two days!)

As a writer, Christmas is lovely for me this year with two new Christmas stories out. My novella Millionaire Under the Mistletoe is part of the wonderful LoveCats boxed set Hot Christmas Nights, seven brand-new holiday-themed romances. Also from me is my Harlequin Romance Gift-Wrapped In Her Wedding Dress which is heavily Christmas themed.

What about you? Are you celebrating your usual Christmas or doing something different this year? I'd love to read your comment! I'm giving away a free download of Hot Christmas Nights to one commentator.

Christmas movies that I must watch......

With only a week to go before Christmas, I thought about the movies that I consider my 'must watch' over the Christmas break. Every year I try to watch at least one of these.....

Love Actually......

This one has become something of a Christmas classic.....the intertwining storylines are so cleverly done, the stories range from uplifting to heartbreaking. Who can forget Emma Thompson walking around her bedroom to the haunting sound of Jonie Mitchell and trying to keep it all together for the sake of her family. Or Bill Nigh and his Christmas CD performance. Brilliant!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2y-8vxObugM

Sleepless In Seattle....

I'm do love a good Meg Ryan Rom/Com. This is my favorite. interestingly, Meg and Tom Hanks only had a couple of minutes of screen time together....and yet the chemistry is still there.

Die Hard.....Okay, so not a traditional Christmas movie.....but it's set around Christmas and there's Christmas music....and Bruce Willis at his best. (And Alan Rickman) I love the romance in this one too....

It's a Wonderful Life.....my all time favorite Christmas movie.....and still very pertinent. Jimmy Stewart at his best!

Do you have a favorite holiday movie? I'd love to hear any suggestions.

Merry Christmas to all and a safe and happy holiday!

Focusing on the Positive - a Year's Blessings - Annie West

 Almost the end of 2015 and I decided it was time to think about the year almost gone and wave it goodbye in style. 2015 has been a mixed year for our family with joys and fun and sadness and crises all mixed together. That's life of course but some years seem a little more 'lively' than others. My initial instinct is to wish the year farewell as soon as possible as there were events I know I won't want to reminisce about. But then I stopped to take stock of the many truly wonderful things we'd been blessed with in that time and how very lucky I am.

First up I live in a democratic, free, peaceful place where I can pursue the work I love, have enough to eat (far too much in fact), get top quality healthcare, education services, and whatever community support I need. We have a comfy home in a quiet setting and if the kookaburras or channel-billed cuckoos choose to wake me in the early hours with their raucous noise, so what? All those things I take for granted every day are enough to make me grateful. Then there are the extra bonuses. Far too many to share here, but believe me, I've been thinking about them. Here are just a couple at random:

1) My garden. Stepping outside and seeing how the tree ferns are faring in the summer heat, saying good morning to the blue tongue lizard who guards our vege patch, or enjoying the green space, is enough to rejuvenate me.

2) Friends. Those I see often and those I only catch up with at conferences. Or those I connect with only via social media or emails because we live on the opposite sides of the world.

Michelle Douglas and Rachel Bailey at the RWA Conference

3) My first gondola ride! I first visited Venice when I was a skint student and my eyes watered at the cost of a gondola trip. This year my daughter and I had a very short but very special stay in Venice and I finally found out what it was like to float around the city in my own private barge for an hour.

4) Winning a Romantic Book of the Year Award. Romance Writers of Australia is a very special organisation for me and probably the reason I ended up as a published author. You can see by the smile on my face how wonderful it felt discovering 'Damaso Claims His Heir' had not only finalled but won!

5) Visiting the UK and (very, very briefly, Ireland) to catch up with very special family and friends and also the Harlequin Mills and Boon team who look after me and my books. There were some indelible memories made, new books plotted, new experiences, places and faces and catching up with 'old' friends who are very dear.

Not only a welcome sign but bubbly too at the editorial office in London!

 6) Time out with family. Perhaps the best thing of all.

Family picnic spot in the Hunter Valley.

There are so many other things I could add here but this isn't the place for an exhaustive list - just a taste.

How about you? Did you have a fabulous year in 2015? What are your top 6 things for the year, or your top 3? Or are you already looking ahead to something special in 2016?

Pop Stars and Small Towns

When writing a novel, I often find some of my own experiences or loves sneak into the books. In my latest release – Her Small Town Christmas Wish – which is part of the Lovecats Boxset, two of my favourite things have made it into the story.

I love pop and disco music. Love to listen to it and love to dance to it.  When I need a pick me up, I play Earth Wind and Fire’s September. You can’t help but feel good after hearing that tune. 

Taylor Swift concert in Brisbane

Much to my friends’ amusement, I’ve followed Kylie Minogue’s career. She’s about the same age as me and I loved bopping around to her songs when I was younger. My daughter loves Delta Goodrem and Taylor Swift (went to Taylor’s amazing Brisbane concert last week – wow!), so I have lots of their music in the car too. So, as a tribute to young pop stars, my heroine is an Aussie who moved to London and made it big in the pop world.

Byron Bay

The other love that crept it into the story is Byron Bay. My fictional town of Turtle Beach is reminiscent of the town I live in. Coastal, lush and surrounded by sugarcane fields and acres of coffee and macadamia plantations. Place is always very important in my stories.

So, if you are looking for a fun and passionate Christmas read, pick up a copy of Hot Christmas Nights and read fantastic stories by my fellow Lovecats including Rachel Bailey, Michelle Douglas, Louisa George, Helen Lacey, Stefanie London and Kandy Shepherd.

We have the Boxset on sale at the moment for just 99 cents. To get you in the mood, here’s the blurb for Her Small Town Christmas Wish:

When superstar songbird Giselle Harrington is forced to return to her hometown, she’s faced with a house full of terrifying childhood memories. Jake Carlton has never forgotten his teenage sweetheart and now that she’s back, he’s determined to have a second chance to convince her to stay.

Wishing you all a fabulous holiday season.