A few weeks ago, lovely saga author Susanna Bavin, who also writes as Polly Heron and Maisie Thomas, featured a couple of pieces I wrote for her blog about the importance of location when I’m writing, both as a setting and an inspiration. There are lots of photos in the articles – just click on the book titles to get an idea of the backgrounds to The Margate Maid and The Secret Child.
There will be another piece early in 2023, covering The Lost Sister, before the new book – The Smuggler’s Secret – is published. It is set in Kent, too, but based around the towns of Deal and Walmer. The cover is below – hope you like it! And it’s available for pre-order now – just follow the link.
The publishers have given my first triolgy, set in Yorkshire, a lovely update with some fresh covers – and new titles, too. So don’t be confused – I haven’t just written three new novels!
Ella’s Journey is now A Daughter’s Hope, Alice’s Secret is A Family Secret and Sarah’s Story has become A Country Scandal. I hope you like the way they look as much as I do!
Sending Christmas wishes for a calm, safe and peaceful festive season, as the end of 2021 approaches.
Thank you to all of those who have bought my books, listened to them on audio or borrowed them from the library. Your support has really mattered, as it has to all authors, and I very much appreciate every single review and rating.
I’m looking forward to the publication of the final part of The Margate Maid trilogy in January – I do hope you will enjoy reading it.
Here we are – the cover of the final part of The Margate Maid trilogy, out in hardback, ebook and audio on January 27th 2022 and available for pre-order now. You’ll have to wait a bit longer for the paperback, until July.
I’m looking forward to hearing what readers think when they get their hands on the final part of Molly’s story. For myself, I’m sad to say goodbye to the family, but I’ve already started on a new series, set a little way along the coast, and I hope you’ll be able to enjoy reading it in 2023 (right now that seems like a very long way off!)
Well, it has been a while since I posted but I haven’t been slacking! I’ve finished the first draft of a new novel – the start of a new series – and hope to be able to share more news about this soon.
I’ve also seen the cover for The Lost Sister, the final book in The Margate Maid trilogy – you’re in for a treat when it hits the shelves in January!
And recently I was interviewed for a new show, Paperback Writer, on my local radio station, Deal Radio. Richard Sirot, the lovely host of the show, has had a great many interesting and well-known people as guests, most recently Wayne Sleep, Patti Boulaye and Deborah Moggach for this show and his other, In My Life, so I was in illustrious company. It was great fun to do and you can hear the interview here
And here they are, a box of books from the publisher, Piatkus. Always exciting to see them! I’ve been busy with the final copy edits on the next book, the last one in The Margate Maid trilogy, which is due out in January 2022. And I’ve been writing a new book – I’m 95,000 words in and nearing the end!
For now, though, the focus is on the paperback and sharing the second part of Molly’s story with as many people as possible. The early reviews have been lovely and very encouraging:
‘a very compelling story full of twists and turns . . . Held my interest to the very last page’
‘I read The Secret Child in two days, and while reading it I wanted to curl up in a sunny wild flower meadow and drink blackberry wine. That’s the sort of feeling it leaves you with.’
‘Loved reading this . . . It was a page turner that I finished in just a couple of days!’
‘Such a wonderful book, full of history, romance and the realities of life in the 1800s. . . . I’d highly recommend this book to anyone looking for an uplifting read.’
Here we are in April – and it’s over a year since restrictions began and lockdowns were introduced. Far better words have been spoken about this than I’m able to conjure up, but the first social gathering – socially distanced, in the evening of the last week of March in a friend’s garden – was a joyous occasion and a forceful reminder of what we have been missing.
I had another book published during lockdown – The Secret Child, above, with publication day flowers – the second part of The Margate Maid trilogy.
Other than that, I did a lot of walking – daily, when I could manage it, even through the Beast from the East no. 2, which arrived in early February just three days after glorious sunshine and blue skies (above). Bitter winds and a high wind chill, plus ice and snow, guaranteed I had the sea front path to myself – or maybe my winterwear frightened everyone away.
As last year, it was a delight to see spring start to arrive. In March, there were lambs by the stream in Bishopsbourne.
Kingsdown Woods held violets, wood anemones, primroses and even clumps of late snowdrops.
In the garden, lime green euphorbia and pots of violas lifted the spirits even on the dull days, while the end of March brought my first tulips to life.
When the sun came through, it was glorious. The last week of March brought sunbathers in bikinis to the beach… Temperatures in the twenties all too quickly fell to something at least ten degrees lower – Easter snow is forecast! But after that unexpected taste of summer, and with the opening of ‘non-essential’ shops and outdoor eating and drinking to look forward to in April, spirits are rising at last.
I’ve failed to document the last couple of months in my usual fashion, so I’ve run them together with the usual focus on the photos. I can’t keep track of which tier we were in and when, but in December the shops around here were allowed to open, while pubs, cafés and restaurants stayed closed. I put my tree up at the start of the month and hung a Christmas wreath on the door in an attempt to lift the mood. My log burner was fitted – I was hugely grateful for it in the weeks to come.
I began to plan a new novel and alighted on a local street as the focus for part of it, intrigued by the narrowness of both roadway and houses (on one side) and the variety of the buildings on the other.
In common with the whole country, I was focused on the promised window for Christmas celebrations, since everything else in our area was banned. The plug was pulled on that just a few days before – the rainbow over the sea on 23rd December and the arrival of large print copies of The Margate Maid were a couple of moments of brightness at a tough time.
With my planned trip to London cancelled, I did at least manage to see friends who had recently recovered from the virus on Christmas Day. And the family gathered in London and India via Zoom. The period after Christmas, always a difficult one, was redeemed by walks, edits on Book 3 of The Margate Maid trilogy and the prospect of being able to spend a couple of days with family at last. When it wasn’t wet it was cold, but we got out to the beach all the same, and Ellis even had a picnic!
January continued cold and wet, along with gales and a couple of named storms. Publication day for the paperback of A Maid’s Ruin was windy but sunny – a good day for a bracing walk along the beach to Broadstairs. And a glass of something fizzy to celebrate the following evening.
Spring flowers and lovely publication day flowers from my publisher, along with noticeably lighter afternoons, held the hint of better days to come as January rolled on.
A truly spectacular sunrise on a frosty Sunday morning had me out of bed and on the beach by 7.30 am – it was hard to do justice to the subtleties of the ever-changing colour in the sky with my phone camera, but the feeling of witnessing an amazing event stayed with me throughout the day.
The sunny skies on a beach walk the next day hide the fact that the paths were still slippery with ice at 10.30am and the shingle was actually frozen solid on the shady sides of the holm oaks on the beach.
Other than a slight dusting, which vanished by breakfast time one day, we escaped the snow which blanketed other parts of the country. Ellis, though, was surprised and delighted by his first experience of the white stuff.
Storm Christoph was still blowing on the morning of publication day, the 21st day of the first month of the 21st year of the 21st century! Click for links to a couple of lovely publicity posts put out by bloggers – something to sit down to with a cup of tea, perhaps. There was a lot of book love on social media and a mention in My Weekly magazine, too. Plus a review for the Historical Novel Society.
I’ve finished writing the whole trilogy – the second book, The Secret Child – is published in March, so now the excitement is over it’s back to edits on book three. And I’m 10,000 words into a new story – I’m looking forward to seeing where these new characters will lead me.
A surprise courier delivery today – the paperback version of A Maid’s Ruin, available for pre-order now via your local bookshop (support them if you can in these difficult times), WH Smiths and Waterstones online as well as Amazon.
The second part of the trilogy, The Secret Child, comes out at the end of March so if you read the first book now you won’t have too long to wait to find out what happens next!
Lynne Francis 