Shamless Plug...

So...today is just any other day for most folk. Wondering about where might sell petrol and Easter eggs.
Perhaps you're in work, planning how to kill the boss with only a teaspoon and a mousepad. Or perhaps you're at home with the kids, wondering how to keep them entertained for the rest of the holidays with only a teaspoon and a mousepad.

Well stop.

Today is not just any other day.

Today is the publication day of my fifth book!

I know, I know, the excitement in the air is palpable. Amazon has crashed twice through sheer demand and WHSmiths are handing out hot drinks to those who have been waiting patiently in line through the night...

Or not.

Either way, I thought I'd tell you lot about it because, frankly, it's the most interesting thing that is going to happen to me today and at least it will save me wittering about the state of the publishing industry, or the evils of Facebook.
HB x

Get Connected.

Last week I was watching Carol Vorderman on Room 101 and found myself nodding away like one of those plastic dogs you see at the back of cars.

I don't know about you but I don't find the current format of Room 101 as entertaining as the old one. Turning it into a game show, with three slebs competing, just seems to dilute it and no one gets enough time to really air their predjudices, which is what I always really liked about it. Soundbite culture gorn mad, I tell you.

But I digress. I was (despite the format) agreeing vigorously with the lovely Carol, when she expressed her complete lack of understanding of the attraction of Facebook. Like her, I just don't get it. I mean I understand how it works (well almost) but not what it's for...

Maybe I'm missing something, but I just don't see the point of it. Your friends already know you right? They know your 'status' cos they were at your bloody wedding and clubbed in for the trouser press! They know you have two kids cos they took the piss out of you when your feet were so swollen in pregnancy you had to wear white plastic flip flops from Debenhams!

What your friends don't need to know, or don't want to know frankly, is that you have just baked a banana cake, or the gas man is coming round at ten, or that you are going to spend the morning ironing. Sharing the minutae of your existence is surely the preserve of the deluded? I for one cannot think anyone is interested in the comings and goings of my days. Often I am bored, so why in God's name would I inflict that on anyone else? When the husband asks what I've been up to I only give him the edited highlights. More than the briefest of comments and he starts to glaze over and check the footie scores on his phone.

Thus it was the heaviest of hearts that I finally succumbed and joined up. To be fair, I had no choice. My agent, my editor and more importantly the lovely Jamie-Lee who is in charge of my PR all told me in no uncertain terms that It Was Time. I have a new book coming out in April and I needed to get connected. To stick to my guns started to feel churlish.

So I'm on. I'm hooked up. I'm part of the matrix.

Actually, now that I am, I have no idea what to do. I feel like someone who arrives at the party far too late and far too sober to join the conversation. I have thus far put two things on 'my wall'. Neither of which were that interesting! At this rate I will be forced to inform the ether that the postman has just delivered a pair of Liverpool curtains for my son.

So. If any of you lot are on FB could you please be my friend (was there ever a sadder request from a woman in her forties?) ? I cannot promise anything but gratitude.

Guest Post: authors Michelle Jackson and Juliette Bressan talk about co-incidences and collaborations

Juliet Bressan and Michelle Jackson are two authors who have three best selling novels each to their name. Now they have joined forces and collaborated on a new work of non-fiction entitled ‘What Women Know’ which is an insightful book of wisdom and knowledge gathered from interviewing women from all around the world. We asked them how they met…
“Sometimes we call it coincidence, fate or destiny when we meet someone. But in our case it was definitely all three. We both were at similar points in our lives. Shortly after reaching the age of forty, we were searching for something but not sure how we were going to achieve it and we met on a writer’s course in the Irish Writers Centre - Juliet was trying to finish her first novel and Michelle was trying to explore different genres in writing while waiting to hear back from a publisher about her first novel.
With only a few months between us in age and many similarities in our personal circumstances we bonded instantly. Both working for nearly two decades in the caring professions of medicine and education – both with two children and both in our second marriage – the coincidences unfolded over a gin and tonic on our last night together when the course was finished. We exchanged emails, said that we would keep in touch and the coincidences kept coming. Shortly after the course and within a week of each other, we both signed by the same publisher. It was wonderful to have the support of someone in the same situation as when embarking on a new path in life and our similarities became an important part of our adventure.
About a year ago, over one of our lengthy telephone conversations on a miserable rainy July evening, we were having a rant about the state of the country and the mess that many people were finding themselves in and came to the conclusion that it was up to the women in the country to do something about the situation that was ultimately a testosterone-driven recession caused by men in suits in banks, property development and politics. So we asked ourselves what could we do about it? And the one thing we could do was write a book to help women who are experiencing the brunt of the recession to feel better about themselves and to see what wisdom and resources they carried around with them to help others in the same situation.

We started by emailing and talking to our friends; asking them if they had a piece of advice or wisdom that they could share with another women. We kept notes and started a blog but we needed something more to reach out to more women. The idea mushroomed when we took our questions and set them up on a Facebook page.
By this time we had discussed our idea with Hachette publishers who loved what we were doing and offered us a contract. The book started to write itself and more and more women from around the world came on board and told us their knowledge and wisdom. The funny thing was how similar women were – whether writing to us from Canada, Libya, Australia or any of the European countries. Our friend-base spread and we had women telling other women to join our page and share their wisdom. We’d built an on-line community without realising it and these women were becoming friends with each other.
It was a marvellous feeling, knowing that a friendship which had started in small workshop in Dublin city had morphed into a wonderful feel-good campaign bringing women around the world altogether – and this, we hope, is only the beginning. The book will be for sale in Ireland and the UK initially but from the start it has a global input and this is how we would like to see it develop and grow.”
“What Women Know” will be published in October 2010.

The Winner is...

Congratulations to .....

JULIE P

who is the lucky winner of a signed copy of Fiona Robyn's The Letters! Please email caro_rance (at) hotmail.com with your address, and we'll get it winging its way to you.

The Letters is available from Amazon and Snowbooks, or your local bookshop. Also look out for Fiona's next book, The Blue Handbag, which is out now in hardback and will be published in paperback in August. Visit Fiona's website to find out more.

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We've got a couple more prize draws lined up for April, so keep visiting and commenting for your chance to win.

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