Michelle Styles:

As part of the New Voices competition and the reopening of Haltwhistle Library celebrations, I'm giving a workshop on creating a Page Turning Read. 10:30 -11:30 am Saturday 18 September.
I believe it is free. There are 25 places. You can telephone the library to find out more.

Hopefully I won't be talking to an empty room!

I'm working away on the Online Read and it is challenging but tremendous fun. You have to create a serial and realise that readers might read the last chapter before they read the first one. Each chapter needs to be about the same length and there isn't much room for waffle! Also it needs to be formatted in a specific fashion, but I will worry about that after the story is finished.
The great thing for me is that I get to revisit the world I created for A Question of Impropriety and Impoverished Miss, Convenient Wife.  The Online Read is because the books are being published in HH Direct in December/January.  But first it has to be written and it needs to be amazing...

The first name out of the hat was Joanne Cleary.

The answer was the windows!  The Spanish version also used the wrong picture and you can see why my senior editor was apologetic. It is a very lovely rose garden...but somehow I doubt Ivar and Thyre would have seen it. My sr editor knows that the readers of Historical do notice things like that and it does bother her. It is one of the reasons why she is such an excellent senior editor.


The feel of the cover is wonderful (mostly I notice the couple, philistine that I am!) and it does capture the feel of the book.  And I do like the new M&B look. I saw the new Historicals out in Tescos yesterday and they were screaming  Buy me! Lovely jewel like covers.

In other news:
Today is my workshop in Knaresborough for New Voices. I really hope it goes well and that the people who go enjoy it.

My editor was in touch yesterday. She has okayed my ideas for the second book which is exciting and is looking forward to seeing my partial of the first book in the new contract. I have promised it for next week. It will get there. My editor is lovely and I do like working with her.

I'm giving a workshop for the New Voices competition. My workshop will be held at Knaresborough Library on Wednesday 1 September from 7 pm -9 pm. The first hour will be devoted to What is a M&B novel and the second is a hands on bit about Creating a Page Turning Novel.  The cost is £2.50 and includes a glass of wine or something. You can telephone  0845 300 5112 for more information and to book a place.
I understand that places do remain but I won't be speaking to an empty room.
To support the workshop, I am appearing on the Russell Walker show on BBC Radio York on 31 August. I am hoping that my voice doesn't shake or quiver and that I can put my points across in a lucid manner!

I am also giving a one hour workshop Creating a Page Turning Novel at the new Haltwhistle Library on Saturday 18 September 10:30 -11:30. I think it is free but there are no refreshments.

Next Friday -- 10 October, I will be going up to Berwick upon Tweed to give a two hour workshop on writing romance as part of the National Year of Reading. Apparently the ticket sales are going well. So I guess it won't be just the librarian, my daughter and I...
Anyway, I am looking forward to it, but also feel a bit like I have just emerged blinking into the sun after doing my revisions (or more accurately rewrite)
I have also started revising/editing my Governess one. I am going to try to be methodical about this one. I am tempted to get a Story Board and a stack of index cards. Is this a procrastination technique or merely a reaction to not having seen a huge hole before I submitted the Viking?
Or will I get the cards, decide that it is too much like hard work and go back to the method that works for me? Because my books tend to be about 15/16 chapters long, it should in theory be easy to divide the board up my way.
Several of the big flaws with the Viking -- were the hero/heroine leads, and the laying of way too much pipe. In other words I over complicated the back story and made the main characters react to events rather than cause them. Characters in a book make their lives happen. Would I have realised this with index cards?
I know that such measure are not good when I am writing the first draft. There is really very little that can come between a writer and the blank page. Writers eventually have to write. But after that, lots of things can be done. I figure that I might as well give it a go. I know several writers who swear by such measures.
In other news:
The honey has been harvested -- 22 pounds. It was a poor year. The beehives now have to be made ready for winter -- with mouse guards and the annual treatment for varrora.
The pumpkins are about ready to be harvested as are the tomatillos. Tomatillos are green tomato like fruit that are used in making green chile sauce. They are very sharp in flavour and very easy to grow. The chile crop is decent this year but again because of the lack of light, the plants did not fruit as well.
And I have started to have fires in my new fireplace. Instead of having blue hands as I type, the fire now crackles merrily. Of this could lead to procrastination -- stirring the coals, putting more fuel on, burning index cards etc etc.