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Author Archives: Janet Mullany

The Big Ideas Contest

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Last night I went to sleep knowing exactly what I was going to blog about today.

When I woke up this morning, the idea had gone entirely. Now, I knew this would happen. It’s happened so often. What I should have done was get up there and then and create the post, or at least scribbled the idea down on a piece of paper. If I’d been mid book and fallen asleep thinking about the book and forced myself out of bed to write it, it probably would have been something pretty darn good.

So where do ideas come from? Who knows. But there are certain tricks and techniques that can help so today, I thought we’d play a game. I grabbed a few items from my office (and you have to understand that my office is rich pickings at the moment. We are doing major work to the downstairs of our house and so everything is in boxes everywhere else. I can just about get into my office and sit at my desk). So here’s my impromptu still life–a shell, a bowl, a string of beads, and two pics, one a portrait by Elizabeth Vigee-Lebrun and the other an illustration of the cat who walks by himself by Rudyard Kipling. And it’s not just for writers: comment anyway, because you might surprise yourself and you don’t have to include every item.

Tell me what these suggest to you. 
What is the relationship between (all or some of) the items, how do they fit together?

THE PRIZE: Yes, there is a prize. A copy of my brand new release HIDDEN PARADISE, a sexy contemporary which has lots of sex and stuff about paint analysis and Regency clothes (on and off). It’s not coming out until the end of September and I have just received a big box of author copies (US residents only, must be over 18 and not related to me and all the usual stuff). You can comment here or on my FB author page Janet Mullany, Author. Let me know if you tweet it too, for extra points!

I’m also doing a blog tour for THE MALORIE PHOENIX, stopping today at MK McClintock’s Blog  and The Bunny’s Review. You can see all the blog stops here at Goddess Fish. Feel free to drop in and comment on earlier stops too. The prize is a $20 Amazon gift certificate.

So have fun and frolic online. Winners announced on Sunday July 22.

 

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From Russia With Love

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Hi, Djenet Mallani here.  I’m pleased to announce that my Little Black Dress titles have been published in Russian and I had lots of fun working out which was which–unsuccessfully, as it turns out. You can see all three of them here in their old school glory on amazon.


I can read the cyrillic alphabet but if you can’t, this is called Prekrasnaya vodova. What I can’t do is speak any Russian, other than hello, goodbye, thank you, cup of tea, please. All I need to know in any language, really. This, I believe, since one of the blurbs referred to ledi Elmherst and Nikolasa Kongrivansa has to be A Most Lamentable Comedy. The man and woman are pretty good other than floating in an odd almost heart-shaped bubble, but what is that item behind them? A rolltop desk? A primitive computer? A beehive? You tell me.

So that one was pretty straightforward. Now onto mystery book #1, Schastlivoe nedorazumenie. I believe this is Improper Relations since it has characters called Sharlotta Heiden and vikontom Shadderli. He looks like some sort of eurotrash lounge lizard, she looks like his aunty, and I can’t figure out where they are. They seem to be outside but they’re on the wrong side of what I assume to be a balcony railing. They’re teetering on the outer ledge. Possibly he’s threatening to push her off if she doesn’t tell him where the drugs are.

But it’s this one, Skandalnaia sviaz, which really confuses me. Since it stars the aforementioned Sharlotta Heiden and vikontom Shadderli it seems to be another version of Improper Relations. Why does he have a small woman emerging from his butt?–or is it a disembodied head impaled on the wrought iron thing he’s sitting on? It certainly seems to be floating her boat. Is that a lampshade to the left or are they in the fabled Amber Room of the Catharine Palace near St. Petersburg? Thoughts?

So naturally I did a search on the title and came up with this gem:

Eurovision Song Contest participant from Ukraine admitted to sexual relations with a soloist of the group VIA Gra.

Okay.

Also a link to google books and Nabokov’s Invitation to a Beheading.

I’m confused. Can anyone out there speak Russian? Help?

And I’m guest blogging at Lady Scribes today, talking about the new Dedication and giving away a free download, so please come on over and chat!

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New Year’s Resolutions, Alpha Male Hero Style

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I must say that Ms. Jewel is a tough act to follow. Because as much as I ever think about what to post in advance–I try, but it doesn’t always happen–I was thinking of writing my new year’s resolutions too. Mine are the same as usual, which means I can safely ignore them:

  • Write more, whine less.
  • Move more, eat less.
  • Be nicer (I was on painkillers for a time over the holidays and everyone, particularly my nearest and dearest, mentioned what an improvement it was).

So since I am writing my first ever alpha male hero (not one of the glasses-wearing, eternally weepy guys I am so fond of), I give you …. the new year resolutions of an alpha male.

  • Try not to stride so much, am tired of bumping into walls, furniture, horses etc.
  • Less fisting. Ahem. This is in the accepted romance parlance as in clenching of fists (get your minds out of the gutter).
  • Will not use garden implements or cutlery on hair. No kidding, in a recent Facebook discussion someone admitted their hero forked his hair. And then there’s all that raking.
  • Will give up sleeping with beautiful but willing women who remind me of my mother my nurse my father can only give me empty satisfaction savage joy revenge oh what the hell unless my duties as a top spy require it.
  • Talking of which I’ll try to figure out exactly what I’m supposed to be doing as a spy because it’s all pretty vague and I’m too busy with female company to actually do anything, although I am sure Lord M will call me to account some day.
  • Will ignore plain wallflowers, vicar’s daughters, pretty female servants, uppity bluestocking type women etc. even if they’re really  begging for a good so they may find a suitable husband of their own class.
  • I will get over my father, mother, first true love and the terrible thing they did many years ago which has forever scarred me.
  • I will find a meaningful hobby that does not involve women, gambling, or drink.

What sort of meaningful hobby do you think the alpha male will find? Any other suggestions for his new year’s resolutions?

Posted in Frivolity, Regency | 13 Replies

A chocolate experience

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I went to a historical program this week, but it was much better than Diane’s and also appropriate to Amanda’s on Valentine’s Day (and Carolyn, sigh. Carolyn, do try and get your mind out of the gutter). I’ve finished my chocolate–I ate half of them at five minutes after midnight and the other half that evening of the 14th and here’s the evidence.

But I digress. I went to a chocolate program at Riversdale House Museum and although I was volunteering I didn’t spill anything on anyone and I managed to eat a fair amount too. There were some awesome chocolate fans there who ate their way through four centuries of chocolate and probably would have been good for more.

You can find the recipes at Cooking Up the Past, the FB page that Riversdale’s Food Historian runs, and which has some great stuff on it.

So, chocolate. First it starts off as a tree with a fruit, with seeds (pods), from which you extract the nibs (the things that look as if a mouse has visited). It’s a very labor intensive product and you can see a video made by the foodways historian at Williamsburg on a site devoted to the history of chocolate in North America, American Heritage Chocolate. There are some more recipes and also products if you wish to try some authentic cookery.

Chocolate is NOT sweet. You have to add sugar and I found that the historic recipes had a bitter kick to them rather like coffee–cacoa does have a high caffeine content. This is why chocolate was a popular breakfast drink–we used a latte machine to froth up spiced and (slightly) sweetened chocolate in hot water and added in milk to taste just as you would with coffee. This 1731 chocolate pie, one of the delicacies served at the chocolate event was deliciously bitter.

Into the nineteenth century, things got sweeter. Here’s a whole plateful of chocolatey thrills, including ice cream, a layer cake with chocolate icing, chocolate pudding, a heart-shaped cocoa biscuit, a cake with chocolate icing and some chocolate candy.

We went into the twentieth century with tollhouse cookies, and into the twenty-first with white chocolate and chocolate flavored with chili. Yum. Then we kitchen staff did the dishes. If you’re anywhere near the Washington, DC area, check out the schedule of events at Riversdale: there’s a complete weekend of women’s activities on May 5-6, The 1812 Woman, one of the many events commemorating the war of 1812.

So let’s talk about chocolate!

And go visit The Bookish Dame who’s given Jane Austen: Blood Persuasion a great review today and is giving away a copy!

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