Oct 302018
 

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Last year in June I decided I wanted to write a shorter LesFic novel with a romantic storyline. I had a little idea for a straightforward lesbian Alice in Wonderland meets Shirley Valentine, set in a wonderful holiday destination that I know really well — South Africa, specifically Cape Town.

Well, those were my famous last words.

I did manage to knock out a first draft of what I thought was a pretty straightforward LesFic holiday romance, but when I read it, I hated it! It felt like it was missing something key. I tried very hard to get enthusiastic, so that I could get on and write the next draft… but, I just was stuck.

As I started to reread my first draft again, I began thinking up all sorts of plot twists which then buzzed and fluttered around my brain and I almost had to sit on my hands not to start rewriting immediately. I sat with this, mulling away for about a month last summer, while I was in Lesbos and then the Maldives, where there was enough to distract me and keep me focussed elsewhere.

But, when I got back to the UK to start re-drafting in earnest, before my research recce to South Africa, I couldn’t resist the inevitable and soon my simple holiday romance took a more sinister turn. Before I knew it a psychological drama emerged, with plot twists and turns I could never have envisaged at the start.

Although “Alice” was always intended to be another one of the Toni Mendez adventure, it really was meant to be a straightforward romance!

I think I have to come to terms with the fact that I am incapable of writing a lesbian romance without complicating the plot!!!. Meanwhile, I had another idea for a short series of Maldivian romances, based on the island where Toni and Lizbeth go on holiday just before “Alice” in their timeline, but even those have turned into something more complicated and mostly darker… so, watch this space!

You can find out more about “Alice: A Woman’s Flight for Freedom” here >> http://Dukebox.life/Alice

 

 

Oct 232018
 
Risk - NIEA Finalist Awards WINNER

Starts Tuesday 23 October on Amazon!

Risk - NIEA Finalist Awards WINNER

Risk: Three Crime-fighting Women Risk All for Love, Lust and Justicve.


Winner of the “National Indie Excellence Award – Finalist

Get your copy at http://Dukebox.life/Risk!

 
 

Oct 162018
 
RISK National Indie Excellence Award
RISK National Indie Excellence Award

RISK gets FINALIST National Indie Excellence Award.

So I discovered to my great joy that “Risk: Three Crime-fighting Women Risk all for Love, Lust and Justice” has been awarded “National Indie Excellence Award Finalist”.
I am so chuffed.

This is what they say about the FINALIST award:

“A WORD ABOUT OUR AWARD DESIGNATIONS

Different contests have different designations. We have structured the National Indie Excellence® Awards (NIEA) so that only one book per category may be designated a “Winner”, however, often there are more than one book in a category that truly stand out and we believe these too deserve recognition. While it makes the job of our judges a little harder, we are dedicated to celebrating excellence in self-published books so NIEA also has the “Finalist” category.

Books recognized as Finalists are outstanding. The differences between the Winner and Finalist are often so minute that the call might have gone either way. The bottom line is that gaining recognition as a Finalist is a high honor and something about which any author can and should be justifiably proud.

Readers appreciate NIEA Winners and Finalists as worthy of their attention and their book-buying dollars.”

National Indie Excellence Award

Get your copy here: http://Dukebox.life/Risk Button_GetItNow_400x90

To get more updates and news about promotions and freebies please join my personal VIP mailing list: http://Dukebox.life/Subscribe

To see other finalists visit: https://www.indieexcellence.com/12th-annual-finalists

Oct 102018
 

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The publication date for “Alice”, my new psychological drama set in Cape Town, South Africa, really could not be any more fitting. I couldn’t have planned this better if I’d tried, and believe me I did try! I had great ideas about how I was going to publish “Alice” towards the end of 2017. But, no matter how much effort and sheer will and determination I mustered, I could not, for some reason, get “Alice” to progress any faster than it has. And that has been a good thing too, because now publishing “Alice” can coincide with and mark the momentous occasion of my 20 year anniversary of leaving South Africa – to go backpacking in Europe and get a bar job in London!

I never intended to leave South Africa permanently on that day, all those years ago. I was just going on a round-the-world trip abroad, to see what the world outside SA was like. So my reason for not having returned yet…? Well, I’m still looking for that bar job and unless I find an agent or a publisher soon, I will have to redouble my efforts in that regard!

Despite having been away for two decades, my heart has never really left South Africa. It is a beautiful country with so much to offer despite its troubles and challenges of the past, present and near future. Every few years I return gladly, to visit my friends and family and relish in the familiar landscape, sunshine, and fresh sea breeze – a pet hate from when I was young and living in the path of the brisk South Easter.

And when I now have the pleasure of meeting a fellow South African abroad, regardless of how long they have been out of the country, there is an instant, unbreakable, visceral bond because they know, they feel and understand in their bones what it means to be South African — something impossible to explain.

The one thing that saddens me when I return to the UK is that I’m unable to share my beautiful country and all that is has given me with my foreign friends. If I won the lottery, that is what I would do: take all my friends on an extended trip to Cape Town, Camps Bay, up the garden route, through game parks, to Victoria Falls, peep in at Kimberly, stop off at Bloemfontein, and venture up to Namaqualand….

In many ways, writing and publishing “Alice” is an attempt to do just that in the smallest, humblest of ways. By telling a story set in Cape Town, Camps Bay and the Cape Flats I hope to give my friends and readers a tantalising glimpse of my beautiful and complex country and what it’s like to live there.

Although the characters, businesses, organisations and legal entities in my book are entirely fictional, most of the locations are based on and inspired by existing places. Later, I aim to write a post giving a little insight into my research trip to Cape Town last year, with some photographs and images that inspired the fiction.

So, until then, be sure to get your copy of “Alice” here: >> http://Dukebox.life/Alice

 

 

Sep 162018
 

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Great news… From the 23rd of September 2018 I will be running a COUNTDOWN promo on Amazon for “Alice: A Woman’s Flight for Freedom”.
So diarise that date and get over 70% off on your ebook copy.

 

Please join my mailing list so you don’t miss out in future!

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Aug 212018
 

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I am so honoured to be participating in EllCon 2018 – European Lesfic Literary Conference in Bristol on the 23rd and 24th of August this year. It promises a full programme (http://ellconmeet.org/programme/) of all sorts of entertainment and fun, including panel discussions, author readings, book signings and informal chats with all the exciting lesfic authors present.
You can find out more about the even here:

Some of the authors who will be joining in: http://ellconmeet.org/authors/
My Author page: http://ellconmeet.org/blog/author-spotlight-sam-skyborne/
Ticket information: http://ellconmeet.org/registration-and-payment/
The Venue: http://ellconmeet.org/venue-information/
And last but not least the EllCon mission: http://ellconmeet.org/mission/

 
>>> Be sure to connect with me at http://Dukebox.life/Subscribe to hear more news and see pics from the event.