I can’t say that 2011 was a classic reading year for me. So many train wrecks and meh books. But I read a lot, and even in a good year I’ll have something to celebrate. Sooo, here we go.

Here it is, my best read books in 2011.  Some of these still stand out in my mind and were easy to decide on, and others I really had to think about. Out of so many books, it was hard to decide, so I picked the ones which are worthy of the keeper shelf.

This is the second year in a row I’ve not been able to decide which of two terrific books should be my No. 1. So I have a tie once again. Last year it was two fantasies that made the top spot. This year one of those authors has maintained her position, but she’s now [...]

I have to start by wishing my US friends a happy Thanksgiving. I keep being asked if we celebrate it in the UK, and yes, in a way, we do – getting rid of a troublesome and difficult to administer colony with no obvious assets, other than somewhere to send the criminals and a nice [...]

I’ve been testing quite a few recently, so I thought I’d show you how I got on. These are the free ones, because a) I’m a cheapskate and b) Why pay for something when you can get it legitimately for free?

More and more I’m seeing authors who are confronted with readers saying “this is wrong,” reply, “it’s only fiction,” which they seem to think means they can make up anything they want to.

I’ve been good. I’ve been really, really good because some of the people I know and care about are involved in this. But here we go, foot in mouth. Again.

Interesting times afoot. Dennis Potter must be smiling from heaven.

I read an article today by an a guest on an agent blog that I follow. She said that writers should find their “voice” and their writing identity and stick with it. A well-written article that gave the accepted facts about writing for major publishers.

A strange anomaly. I wrote to Mills and Boon about it, but they haven’t replied yet. There’s a new series from Mills and Boon Modern called Bad Blood Collection. They’re part of the May releases in the UK, and can be bought as a collection on Amazon.co.uk (be warned, though, it comes as one ginormous [...]

The first day – Tuesday This isn’t really officially the first day, but it’s the day people start arriving and getting stuff organized. I checked out of my Hollywood hotel today and came over to the Westin Bonaventure. An impressive hotel with an awful lot of concrete. The lobby area is nicely designed, but there’s [...]

The recent screening of “Downton Abbey” on US TV has created a storm on the blogs about entail, what it is and why. Reading the comments has proved deeply illuminating, about the way the entail is understood by an American audience. So I thought it might be a good time to try to explain a [...]

Like our Gwen, the last year has not been all that peachy keen for me. Actually, the last three years have been full of crappiness from betrayal by so-called friends resulting in the loss of my job, among other things, to filing for disability, which has led to my recent move from a county boasting [...]

I’ve done a fair few things since I joined the writing world. I’ve edited (don’t do it anymore – the pay wasn’t brilliant and it detracted from my own writing time), I review and I write. And, of course, I read. When Syb asked me if I wanted to review for TGTBTU more regularly, I [...]

My thoughts on RomCon are all over the place. If you want an extremely detailed minute by minute playbook, this is not where you’ll get that. RomCon? Well, I’d do it again. I’ve never been to any conferences/conventions before 2010, but this year I’ve hit up RT, Lori Foster’s get together, and now RomCon. I [...]