Oooh, the loveliness.

Ooops, I forgot it was my turn to post. Sorry! And the bad news is that an overdose of joy and excitement at the weekend has left me far too excited to frame a coherent sentence. Here is a brief summary of the headlines.

• I have a title for book 2. The story of Angelo and Anna is going to be released in January 2008 and will be called 'The Italian's Captive Virgin'. Oh yes. I have ten months to get used to saying the word 'virgin' to elderly relatives and teachers at school without blushing.
• I have a book. A real book, with a hard, shiny cover (I think these are library copies) with a verrrrry glamorous couple welded together on the front and MY NAME right there beneath the bit where it says 'The Italian's Defiant Mistress'. Apparently this means that people other than Eva and my lovely editor in Richmond are soon going to be able to read the stuff I've written. This is very exciting, but it also makes me feel a bit like I've swallowed a porcupine.
• As if that wasn't enough, I spent a fabulous Sunday afternoon at the very beautiful home of Susan Stephens (Presents author, Modern-xtra author, extreme glamour goddess, top hostess and all round exceptionally Nice Person) as she gave a party to say goodbye to Amanda Ashby (writing guru, soon-to-be-published literary genius, like-minded domestic slattern and total gem). The saying goodbye bit was all a bit too sad to dwell on, so for the most part we didn't and we got on with what writers do best; we talked about writing (At least, I think that's what I do best. I always find writing so easy to talk about and yet so oddly difficult to do.) Annie was supposed to be there too, but was struck down en route with The Head and couldn't make it, so it fell to me to eat, drink and talk enough for two scribes. This wasn't too onerous a task as the party included Amanda Grange-- the beauty and the brains behind Darcy's Diary and Mr Knightley's Diary, and Pat one of Amanda's famed 'witches' who was every bit as lovely and entertaining as I'd expected from reading Amanda's blog! But as a novice in the Presents stable it was particularly thrilling for me to meet another longstanding Presents heroine of mine-- Kate Walker. Eeeeek!!!!! Thanks to the fact that she is as generous as she is warm, wise and wonderful I was spared the humiliation of asking for her autograph on the back of a Sainsbury's receipt or something when she gave me one of her books and signed it too. Double Eeeeekkk!!!
• So, not only am I currently reading and nearly finished Susan Stephens 'One Night Baby' (gorgeous cover, contents even more gorgeous, plot twist that made me gasp), I now also have on my tbr pile a Kate Walker 'At the Sheikh's Command' (signed-- with my pen!) and hot off the press, Sue's new Modern Xtra 'Dirty Weekend'. And herein lies the cloud behind the lovely, shimmery silver lining of my weekend-- what should I pick first? I'm thinking I might have to employ a similar technique to the one I used on Sunday when faced with the pavlova and the chocolate pudding. Both at once...