I'm reviewing The Earl's Marriage Dilemma ...

 ... by Sarah Mallory.  Read on to find out more about this Regency romance...

There is nothing I like more than a really gripping Regency Romance when I have time to read at home.  And it's usually only over holiday weekends when I can fit in that bit of me-time required to indulge in a good book.

It was a great pleasure to pick up another of Sarah Mallory's books over the Christmas and New Year break.  What a great read this is.

The story begins with Conham Mortlake, Earl Dallamire, in a strop.  His mistress of six months has refused his proposal of marriage because, as she puts it, his fortune is 'nonexistent', his estate is 'riddled with debts', and his latest inheritance is an 'insignificant property' along with a few acres of land near Bristol!

Cutting, I thought, but of course, back in the eighteenth century, marriage was much more of a contract between families than it is today.  Unfortunately for Conham, that lady's assessment of his predicament is only too accurate, and as a wealthy widow, she can exercise a certain amount of choice.

In the deepest vortex of his strop, as he strides through the town, Conham bumps into Rosina Brackwood and steps up to help her.  As I hadn't initially taken to Earl Dallamire, I was pleased to discover that he did have some positive traits.  The chance meeting sets in place an association between Miss Brackwood and the Earl that twists and turns in its fortunes and misadventures throughout the pages of the book.

It transpires that Miss Brackwood is an excellent land/estate manager.  Conham is in much need of such expertise.  At a time when women were expected to be only wives, mothers, and managers of households, Rosina's capabilities and aptitudes make for a very refreshing character.  I immediately warmed to her and her ideas about resolving some of the issues with Conham's estate.

It was also the business aspects of this tale - can the gardens be made profitable again, can the estate become solvent - that I found particularly interesting and enjoyable as Rosina, with the help of Matt Talacre - an ex-army colleague of Conham's - and support from Conham himself.  It added an extra dimension and fizz to the relationship between Conham and Rosina.

If you want to know if there is a happy-ever-after for Rosina and Conham, then you will have to read the book.  But, I can guarantee that you will have a thoroughly enjoyable and absorbing read as you work out the answer for yourself.

You can get the book Here

I'm Off My Beaten Track in Leeds ...

... today.  Come and join me as I make a visit to an absolute gem of a place for book lovers everywhere - The Leeds Library on Commercial Street, right in the city centre.  Read on ...

If, like me, you have a 'thing' about books, then you will want to know about this hidden little gem that sits in the heart of Leeds city centre.  It's an easy few steps from the train station along Boar Lane and then take a left to intersect with Commercial Street.  The full address is 18 Commercial Street.  You can so easily miss the place because, at street level, it is nothing but an archway entrance between the Co-op on one side and shops on the other.  But there is a Blue Plaque to guide you and ensure you choose the right arch to enter through.

The old-fashioned wood and glass-panelled doors at the entrance are the first indicators of the treasure you will find inside, and not everyone can just walk in.  I was there for a specific event a couple of weeks ago with some author colleagues.

The foyer on the other side of the doors has glass cases in which some of the most treasured books held by the library are on display.  Naturally, rather than getting on with the actual tasks that I needed to do in support of the event, I dallied at the display cases.  I read the pages on display and the notes accompanying the books.  When I turned to look to my right, I was met with a wall of old books carefully placed on bookshelves that were behind protective glass. 'Darn it', I thought.  Nevertheless, I just could not pass those books by.

The foyer leads to stairs - wide stone steps that circle around and reach up to other floors with a dome to let in light above.  Eventually, we reached our destination, a large room with tables and chairs, green leather wing-backed chairs in corners and walls full of books.  Not that the books in my immediate sphere of gaze were my special interest at that point.  Above the floor where I stood was a gallery that ran along all four walls, and this was also a repository for books, old books, leather-bound and buckram-bound books, some with tooled spines, but all of them telling me I had to come and explore that space.

And I did.  In the poetry section, I found Longfellow's Hiawatha beautifully bound in navy blue leather with gold tooling for the title on the spine and the decoration on the front.  That took me back to a school adaption of the poem for stage, and for a moment, I was 9 years old again and dressed in my costume of beige trousers and tunic with a feather in my hair.  As I lost myself in the character of Hiawatha, some of my lines came back to me, 'On the shores of Gitche Gumee, Of the shining Big-Sea-Water...'

I moved to another section of the shelves and discovered buckram-bound copies of Hardy's poetry and short stories.  Stevenson's compendium of poetry, also leather-bound.  There were copies of Cowper's poetry and White's and many, many others.

Regrettably, I had to leave that haven of book history and go back down the stairs to the main room and help prepare for the event - which went well.  We all had the great privilege of meeting some members of the library, and I, for one, had some lovely conversations with some readers, too.

Sadly, I had to leave those fabulous surroundings eventually, and the management wouldn't let me move in!  This is not surprising, really, when you consider that The Leeds Library was founded in 1768, and its extensive collection holds books from that date and throughout the succeeding decades.  In addition, it is the oldest surviving subscription library in the UK.  When you take that into account, it seems quite fitting to me that the library has been housed in a Grade II listing building that has been carefully preserved since 1808.  Let's hope it remains here for the continuing future.

You can find out more about, or arrange to visit, The Leeds Library Here

The event I attended was Tea and Trenchcoat Trio, and you can find details of other events I'm involved with on my Website  

Please welcome friend and author, Raphael Sóne ...

... to the blog this week.  Hi Raphael, and thanks very much for making time in your busy schedule to be here.  Tell me, what is your current release?

RS The Corisco Conspiracy.  It is subtitled A Memoir of William Shakespeare.

AW That sounds intriguing!  What first got you into writing and why?

RS I’ve always enjoyed learning languages and reading about them.  It was a short step from that attraction to falling in love with literature, particularly English literature, and ultimately dreaming of becoming an author.

AW Your book is historical fiction, but it features the namesakes of real people from history. Was all of your story imagination?

RS Far from it.  My novel is a sub-sub-genre: biographical historical fiction.  (One reviewer has called it “fanfiction.”)  The narrator and protagonist is William Shakespeare.  Naturally, most of my other characters are his real-life contemporaries.

The speculations that the Bard might have been a crypto-Catholic are well-founded.  Hence, my novel is fiction only in so far as I imagined him to be a Jesuit secret agent in the employ of the Spanish navy.  He lived in turbulent times and produced some of the greatest works in world literature.  Yet virtually nothing is known about his private life.  Picturing him in the Catholic underground of Elizabethan and Jacobean England isn’t a far-fetched idea.  Chris Marlowe was a government spy.  Will Shakespeare could very well have been a “counterintelligence operative.”

AW Fascinating.  Have you tried your hand at, or dabbled in, other genres or writing for other forms of media?

RS Yes.  I wrote published poems and one award-winning play as a pastime in my salad days.

AW  Ah.  'Salad Days, when I was green in judgement'.  A quote from Antony and Cleopatra, I think!  Famous authors such as Roald Dahl and Dylan Thomas had special spaces for writing. Do you have a writing ‘shed’ of your own?

RS No.  No writing nook for me.  My muse is a gypsy.  That fact and my having done some acting as a young man are reflected in the way I write.  Actually, what I do would be better described as composing.  I “compose” on the go – wherever and whenever the spirit moves me.  When I sit at my desk, it is not to think, but merely to type whole passages or dialogues that I have already “written” in my mind.  To me, writing is a series of daydreaming seizures. And I am as likely to have one in a rowdy sports arena as in the hermetic silence of a cell in a monastery.

AW And finally, what would your eight-year-old self think and say about you and your achievements today?

RS Better late than never.  But it would have been wiser of you to answer your true calling from the time, around the age of six, that you discovered the pleasure of curling up with a book.

AW I guess eight-year-old you was a tough little guy back then!

about the author ... Raphael Sóne is the bardolator who writes the Musketman Shakespeare blog.  He was born and raised in Cameroon, attended Bishop Rogan College (Buea) and received his postsecondary education in Canada, where he has lived for most of his adult life. The Corisco Conspiracy is his first historical novel.  It was originally entitled The War Memoirs of William Shakespeare.  Raphael lives in Mexico when the wind is southerly, and in Canada when it is northerly.

about the book ... When Spain invaded Protestant England in 1588, William Shakespeare, then aged 24, was a Catholic spy employed as a recruitment officer by the Spanish navy.  The Corisco Conspiracy is his riveting firsthand account of the chain of misadventures that led him from the Spanish Armada, by way of West Africa, to the Gunpowder Plot (the conspiracy of the title), of which, it turns out, he was the mastermind.  In her review of the Bard’s memoir in Oxford Prospect Arts, author and historian Doctor Julia Gasper says it is “Bold and inventive far beyond any other version of Shakespeare’s life.”

You can follow Raphael on Goodreads and, in his guise as Musketman Shakespeare, on Facebook  Instagram Twitter and his Blog

You can get the book on Amazon and from the publisher Austin Macauley and other online booksellers.

Rivers of France ...

Image by Loyloy Thal, Pixabay

… I’m beginning my trip along La Loire here in Digoin today. Come and join me …

Digoin is a small town of around 8,000 inhabitants.  It sits in the département of Saône-et-Loire with the river La Loire flowing on the edge of the southern border of the town.  La Loire, at this point, and for a fair distance northwards, pretty much creates a natural border between Saône-et-Loire and its next-door neighbour, Allier, named after yet another great river of France.

But the river is not the only reason to visit.  Close to Digoin, the Canal du Centre–opened in 1792 and 122 kilometres in length–meets the Canal latéral à la Loire–opened in 1838 and 196 kilometres in length.  In addition, there are two crossings over La Loire, a road bridge and a canal bridge.  That particular piece of engineering is my real reason for stopping here.  The only access to the canal bridge is either by foot or by boat.  Luckily, the campsite isn’t too far away, and I can take a leisurely stroll through town on my way.

At the heart of the town is the church, Notre-Dame de la Providence.  Romanesque-Byzantine in style and completed in the late nineteenth century, it was built to replace the original and cramped romanesque church that once stood here.  Some later additions–the tympanums-the heavily carved scenes above the three entrances were completed in the 1970s.  In terms of age and history, this particular religious edifice is far newer than the places I usually visit.  But, architecturally, it is of interest.

As I meander through town, I find a baker's and, lunch today is strawberry tart, which I will eat over by the river.  My stroll takes me through Place de la République.  A large square that is fairly quiet.  Come here in August, and the story will be very different.  This square becomes the focus for the Escargot de Bourgogne festival.  You can eat snails for a whole three days if you wish and the town will be full to overflowing with people.  Personally, I’ll pass on that.  Not that I have anything against snails per se; I just don’t want to eat them!

From the Snail Fair, you can continue down the main street, and eventually, you will come out on Place de la Grève.  En route, you will pass the Tourist Office, and it’s worth calling in to get the local leaflet with its detailed map for a walking route through town.  Place de la Grève runs along the river, and from here, you have a fabulous view of the canal bridge.  But, for centuries, this little town has been known as one of the most important ports in Burgundy.  On a map dating from the 16th century, you can find Port of ‘Goin’.  Regrettably, all that remains of that illustrious past is the name of the street.

Walk a little further on towards the canal bridge, and you will find what remains of an old ceramics warehouse.  In the nineteenth century, Digoin was renowned for its ceramics and earthenware.  At the time, the canals and the river supported the delivery of supplies of clay and materials to create the pottery goods that were then distributed using the same watery routes.

A little further along the river, you can access the canal bridge.  It is supported by 11 arches at a height of 12 meters above the water and a length of 243 metres.  The engineer Adolphe Julien was responsible for its design.  It took three years to build and was finally completed in 1837.  Here we are in the twenty-first century and two European wars later, and craft, mostly for pleasure today, are still crossing this amazing piece of engineering.

This post links with my earlier post from last month, which you can read Here

If you want to know more about the brother river Le Loir, check out the first post Here 

I'm very pleased to announce ...

... that, after much searching, I have finally found a new publisher. Read on for more details ...

Last year, Darkstroke Books decided to leave the publishing business.  They formally closed the company on September 30th.  My Jacques Forêt series of mysteries were written, pored over, edited and published during my eight years with them.  Darkstroke also provided me with opportunities to try my hand at other types of writing.  The Dark World series of charity anthologies they instigated and published became the perfect place for Le Corbeau Blanc and Treading - two short stories in very different genres.  The first is a monologue spoken by the spirit of a white raven (yes, I know, really weird!), and the second is a historical mystery about Deal Porters on the docks in London.  I doubt I could have placed either of those pieces of writing anywhere had it not been for Darkstroke.  To say that I will miss everyone at Darkstroke is a massive understatement.  I cut my writing teeth with that publisher and alongside a cadre of excellent authors.  Luckily, I remain connected to my previous colleagues through social media and occasionally catch up with some of them in person, too.

But things change.  Being faced with finding a new publisher was very daunting.  I rarely, if ever, walk away from a challenge, no matter how difficult it may seem at the outset.  As a result, I am very pleased to say that I have signed a contract with Northodox Press.  The company describes itself as 'an independent publisher established in 2020, based in Sheffield and Manchester.'  Their stated mission is 'to elevate northern voices and represent the diversity of writing from Northern England.'  As a Yorkshire lass, born and bred, there was no way I could walk away from that!  I am overwhelmed that Northodox think that my cosy little mysteries are worth their investment.  I am also looking forward to what I hope will be a long and fruitful working association.

In practical terms, all of this means that my Jacques Forêt stories will be republished over the coming weeks and months.  I will, of course, update readers about the publishing schedule once it is finalised.  A new contract also means that the seventh book, Meyrueis, will be published later this year, and the following two books now have a publishing home as well.  I can not begin to describe the sense of relief that I feel knowing that Jacques, his son, his colleagues and the villagers of Messandrierre are in the safe hands of Northodox Press.  For me, there could not have been a more fitting start to 2025.

If you are also a writer who lives in, or is from the north of England and want to know more about Northodox, then check out their website Here

If you want to know more about Meyrueis, please watch this space and, in particular, look out for my April Author Challenge.

Rivers of France…

…I’m beginning my journey along the river La Loire today. Read on…

Last July I started this new series with the idea that I would champion the ‘His and Hers’ rivers of France. My first post, which you can read Here, took readers along the length of Le Loir. Today, I’m back with the commencement of a journey along the length of the sister river, La Loire.

At 1,006 kilometres (that’s 625 miles) in length, La Loire is the longest river in France. It is also a fleuve rather than a rivière. A fleuve is a river that flows into the sea. A rivière flows from its source into one or more other rivers or fleuves. In that respect, La Loire has got points over her little brother! The river drains over 45,000 square miles of land, which represents more than a fifth of the country's total area. In addition, she gives her name to six different départements, but she flows through a total of twelve of them on the journey from her source in the Cévennes to the Atlantic Ocean at St-Nazaire.

La Loire rises at 1,350 metres (4,430 feet) above sea level on one side of Le Gerbier de Jonc in the département of Ardèche in the north-eastern quarter of the fabulously rugged scenery of the Cévennes. The nearest town is Ste-Eulalie. At this point, the river is a shadow of its more mature self. From the Cévennes, the river flows pretty much north until it reaches Orléans, where she takes a left-turn and continues her route to the northwest
corner of the Bay of Biscay.

At its source, it’s a particularly disappointing pool of brownish water. The river meanders down and around the mountain in a mostly northerly fashion. Because of the varied geography of the route of the river it is divided into sections. The upper reaches stretch from the source to its confluence with the Allier. This is the least navigable part of the river, which runs through a steep, narrow valley that is heavily wooded. The middle section runs from the confluence with the Allier across a much broader alluvial plain to the confluence with the river Maine. The final section is from the Maine to the estuary, where the river flows into the sea. It is these latter two sections that I will be travelling along for the most part.

For my next post, I will be taking you to Digoin, a small town that sits on the river La Loire, a little before meeting the Allier on one side of Nevers. I hope you will join me on February 4th

If you would like to read my journey along Le Loir, just click the links below…

Châteaudun  Vendôme  Vendôme part 2  Montoire-sur-le-Loir  La Flèche and Durtal

Another year begins ...

... and it will undoubtedly bring new challenges, opportunities, and perhaps some disappointments, too.  But January is also a significant turning point.  I believe it was the Romans who portrayed their god Janus as having two faces – one looking back and the second looking in the opposite direction.  He was seen as the god of beginnings, transitions and gateways.  Indeed, in the city of Rome there is a large archway, Arco di Giano, that once stood at one side of an open space.  Janus also presided over the beginning and ending of conflict.  During war, the city gates were closed, and when peace returned, the city gates were re-opened.  For me, January is a time for reflection and an opportunity to consider what the future might bring.
Last year was difficult, both professionally and personally.  Professionally, I had to find a new publisher for my books after Darkstroke made the difficult decision to quit the industry.  The search for new representation for my stories took a lot of time and effort throughout 2024. Finally, I am very pleased to say that I am hoping to have some exciting news in the very near future.
Personally, 2024 brought sadness, worry, and the loss of two close friends.  Regrettably, this new year is already tinged with some of the same melancholy.
Despite that, there is a whole calendar of time ahead, and I’ve put in place some great plans.  The #RiversofFrance series of posts will continue, and I will be taking readers along the length of La Loire.  We will begin our journey before the end of this month.  There will be fabulous châteaux to visit, scenery to explore and plenty of little towns and villages with their own odd bits of history hidden in the streets and buildings.  And no doubt there will be visits to various pâtisseries along the way!
Other authors will occasionally visit the blog.  In February, I will be introducing you to Raphael Sóne, author of The Corisco Conspiracy.  I will follow that up in March with a guest post from Bill Yarborough who will be telling us all about his latest book.

As always, I have some really interesting books for review.  The first of these is The Lost King of France.  Look out for that post in February.

There will be news about Jacques Forêt's next case, Meyrueis.  This is the seventh mystery in the series, and it has been lodged in the back of my mind for far too long.  Finding a new publisher took precedence last year.  As I'm now back at my writing desk, look out for my writing challenge in April, when I will be posting daily about books, writing, and Jacques's next story.

In addition, 2025 is shaping up to be a busy year with various bookselling and book-speaking events.  The first of these is on February 5th.  I hope you will be able to join me, Gianetta Murray and Ann Wedgwood as we discuss cosy crime writing at Leeds Central Library at 6:00 p.m.  It would be really great to see you there if you can make it.  The link to book your place at the event is Here   

As always, the #FranceFridayPhotos will continue throughout this year and beyond, interspersed with shots from #OffMyBeatenTrack travels.  In that respect, I have some interesting locations already planned for visits.

To start this year's series of photos, the shot above is the river Sarthe at Sablé (72) in northwestern France.

It's great to be back and I hope you will continue reading the blog ...