Author Interview: Lucy Ashford!

[FIRST AUTHOR INTERVIEW EVAAA! 

Can you tell I'm excited?]

[I'm sorry this is up so late- EXAMS, especially the A levels are a super horrible.]

So as a part of the Royal Wedding Blog Tour from Mills & Boon, I have on my blog today Lucy Ashford! She's going to be answering some questions about love, her short story The Problem With Josephine, and, yeah, you guessed it- weddings!

1. Are you married? If yes, how did you and your husband fall in love? What made you think... 'He’s the one!'?!

I’ve been married for a long time. We met as students . He was tall, dark and handsome and played the guitar - wow!

2.Why did you choose this particular setting for your story {The Problem with Josephine}?

I was working on my latest historical novel for Mills & Boon, ‘The Return of Lord Conistone,’ in which my hero is in the thick of it fighting the French. I needed to find out what Napoleon was doing then – in the spring of 1810 – and the answer was that he was getting married for the second time, in Paris – a truly sumptuous affair! I read more, and discovered that Napoleon’s first wife Josephine was causing rather a problem...

3.Describe your perfect wedding!
 
When we got married we had hardly a penny to our names. But my dream wedding would be on a Greek island, Rhodes perhaps, in the late spring, with fabulous beach scenery and history all around.
 
4. When did you realize you wanted to be a writer? How did you go about it?

I think I was about six, to be truthful! I’ve always written, and always read masses of novels and history. I studied English Lit at university, and my first serious venture into writing was a Mills & Boon competition, for their historical line. I was thrilled to be a runner-up. Didn’t make publication with that one, but I kept trying! The trick is, I think, to decide on a genre, read and study your favorite authors in that genre, and never give up.

5. What’s your most favorite book ever?

‘Vanity Fair,’ by William Thackeray. A wonderful, sardonic portrayal of life in the early nineteenth century. And his description of the battle of Waterloo is simply unforgettable.

6. A good piece of advice on love for all your readers?

Believe in it. 

 Read the book review I wrote for her short story, The Problem With Josephine HERE.

Leave a comment answering questions 3 and 5 and you can get two extra entries for the The Royal Wedding Giveaway I'm having here- which shall end June 8th, so enter while you still can!

xx

CLG

Thats me, thats MA CITAAAYYY BICHEZZZZ

Someone made this video of awesome. Oh wait, Team Awesome did. Anyway, this is me. Where I'm from. The place I'll always have a love/hate thing with. Please watch/comment [on this post]/jizz [if you're from KHI.] KARAACHAAAIII CITTAAAYYY. xx CLG

Giveaways! [You know you love 'em]

Two super awesome giveaways going on at the moment.
One on this blog, YES I'M SERIOUS.
Click HERE to enter to win a book and other yummy things.
The other:
Click HERE, to go to The Bloody Bookaholic's blog and enter to win a LOT of books- she has OVER FORTY to choose from!

Good luck!
xx
CLG

Slightly Emo with a dash of Humor and Cheese.

This is the theme song of my life at the moment. If you like singing along: This is for you, random followers who do not enter my giveaway which I was super excited about. :C [YOU STILL HAVE TIME TO MAKE THAT FROWN.... ---> :C .... TURN UPSIDE DOWN! ----> C:] Click here. Also for you . You know who you are. Um. CHEM A LEVEL FINAL EXAM TOMORROW! I wrote a story with a SUHAG RAAT SCENE [wedding night scene] ;). Shall post it up here most deff soon. Though I'm thinking about cutting it out since you know. Gotta keep this shit PG and shit. 1.49 AM. Ugh. WTFAMIDOINGHERE. But you know. Kisi sai ab kya kehna. x CLG ps- Im jk, its not. This is :

GIVEAWAY! A Royal Wedding Prize Pack!

As a part of the Mills & Boon Royal Wedding Blog Tour, the wonderful people at Mills & Boon are giving one lucky blog reader the chance to win an awesome Royal Wedding Prize Pack!

One lucky person shall win:
Mills & Boon Royal Tea with, a lovely, limited edition mug,
and an awesome Mills and Boon book: A Royal Wedding!

The Tea:
(from the email I received)

To complement the Wills & Kate mug, Mills & Boon have commissioned innovative tea shop Yumchaa to blend an exclusive loose leaf tea called Mills & Boon Royal Tea. The tea has been blended with bespoke ingredients that reflect aspects of the royal engagement. Ingredients include: Black Kenyan Tea to celebrate the couple’s Kenyan engagement, Blackberries from Kate’s home town of Bucklebury, Blue Cornflowers to represent the royal family, Silver Candy Balls and Red Candy Hearts for love.


Doesn't it sound super delicious?! I mean.. candy and fruit in plain ol' tea? Makes me wish I could win this baby.

The Mug:
(from the email I received)

With the entire nation swept up in the romance of a royal wedding, who better to create a commemorative china mug than romance experts Mills & Boon. Playing on the iconic publishers’ famous brand name, the mug reads Wills & Kate on one side and Mills & Boon on the other.






The Book:


A Royal Wedding
by Trish Morey / Caitlin Crews / Nina Harrington / Raye Morgan

Everybody loves a royal wedding! And we have four… Dr Grace Hunter seeks an ancient text beneath the castle of Count Alessandro Volta and finds the dark, reclusive count’s brooding intensity very seductive. Stolen away years ago, Princess Lara is offered an ultimatum by new King Adel. Return to her kingdom as his Queen or pay back the bride price! Feisty Lara refuses, but remembers how Adel used to make her heart race… When Kate takes a job in Africa and meets old flame Simon, she’s shocked to discover he’s an honorary king. She’s sure the sun has gone to his head when he says she’s his perfect queen! Prince Andre plans to see his ward, lovely Princess Julienne, married to his cousin, restore peace to their country and move on. But Julienne disagrees. Making her escape from the convent, she turns Prince Andre’s world upside down…

Unfortunately, at this time this giveaway is only open to people living in the UK or people who have an address in the UK where the book will be sent to.[If you don't have a UK address, maybe you have friends living there or relatives? Send the prize to their house, and maybe they could mail it to you?]

Here are the rules/things you should know, to ENTER:

1. You must be a follower to enter.

2. You must fill the form below.

3. You must have a UK address.

4. Extra Entries:

-Tweet about this giveaway = +1

-Blog about this giveaway = +2

5. There will be 1 winner to win all three things.

6. Contest ends: 8th June 2011!

FILL THE FORM BELLOW TO ENTER!






I totally feel all professional now. ME, having publishers contact ME and having giveaways on MY BLOG? Win, Win, Win. :D
{And I hope you win.}

GOODLUCK GUYS!

xoxo

ChickLitGirl

The Problem with Josephine by Lucy Ashford- Review!

To celebrate the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Miss Catherine Middleton, Mills & Boon are releasing a fabulous e book collection, featuring seven royal romance short stories through the ages.

I was lucky enough to be sent The Problem with Josephine by Lucy Ashford, which is one of the seven stories, for review:

Lucy Ashford

What its about:

It’s springtime in Paris and Emperor Napoleon is about to marry Archduchess Marie-Louise of Austria. All around the city Napoleon’s courtiers are preparing for the spectacularly lavish wedding. Everything must be just right… Ordered to remove all portraits of Josephine, the Emperor’s first wife, seamstress Sophie has to track down a talented artist called Jacques. He promises to carry out the commission, but only in return for a kiss for every hour he works…

My thoughts:

This is a sweet little love story, perfect for when you just want to have a little awww-true-love-still exists smile on your face and a gooey feeling inside of you!

Sophie is the head seamstress in Napoleon's palace and has dilemma which only a very talented, yet cheap artist- (since money is tight)can solve!
So she seeks out the rakishly handsome and super hot Jacques who, {surprise, surprise} wants his payment... in kisses!

I liked this story. It was sweet and totally fluffy and soft.
Jacques was so hot! Plus you just HAVE to love a guy who is creative.
Artists FTW!
It was also good to know that Sophie did not fall in love with Jacques because of his money/wealth, but because she genuinely liked him and had SPENT TIME with him. In a lot of romance stories, there's just a lot of sex and BOOM you're in love. But even though the getting-to-know-each-other part felt a bit rushed it was nice to see the main intimacy happened AFTER they had fallen in love!

The background, of Napoleon's wedding is pretty cool. I loved reading about all the artsy tidbits buried in the story  about the various artist and paintings!

On the fluffy short story scale i give it  2.85 stars! And if you're crazy romantic then 3.5 stars!

Thankyou to the lovely people at Mills and Boon once again for sending me a review e book!

You can also check out the rest of the Royal Wedding Collection by Mills & Boon by clicking here!

xx

CLG