Dear Author: Romance Book Reviews, Author Interviews, and Commentary

Dear Mrs Belmond,

When I finished reading “A Rather Curious Inheritance,” I knew there ought to be more about Penny Nichols (who is aware of the silliness of her name) and Jeremy Laidley (her sort of English cousin) after their show of interest in each other and in combining the actually rather lovely inheritance from their recently deceased great aunt Penelope. I had to wait a year and a half for it but you delivered with “A Rather Curious Engagement.” Once again you use the backdrop of plumy London, the sunny Cote D’Azur and this time add the elegance of a luxurious classic teak 1920s yacht to the story as Penny sniffs out then solves another mystery. At least Jeremy is getting good at spotting the gleam in her eye which signals he’d better get in gear to help her or risk being left in her dust.

I’m sorry to say I found it very slow to get started. You didn’t info dump about the first book to get new readers up to speed and refresh memories of those who’d read it. But the long drawn out way you …

Hope this isn’t the Running with Scissors type of book where the story is based on a real family who didn’t authorize such a story.
Canadian magazine editor and journalist Elizabeth Kelly’s APOLOGIZE, APOLOGIZE!, about a wild, brilliant, wealthy, crazy Massachusetts family, to Jonathan Karp at Twelve in a pre-empt, and to Diane Martin at Knopf Canada in a pre-empt, for publication in March 2009, by Molly Friedrich at the Friedrich Agency.

I love these titles, particularly the “On the Divinity of Second Chances.”
Kaya McLaren’s HOW I CAME TO SPARKLE AGAIN, to Kendra Harpster at Viking, for publication in summer 2009, plus reprint rights to Church of the Dog and On the Divinity of Second Chances, by Meg Ruley at the Jane Rotrosen Agency (NA).

This is a middle grade book and I hope that the tone is not too youthful as the plot sounds quite interesting.
Heather Mackey’s THE WOLVES AND THE WOOD, set in an alternate reality of the Pacific Northwest of the 1900’s, in which a girl must navigate her cousin’s world of frontier settlers as they clash with the indigenous people, the Lupine; and she must discover the mystery surrounding deadly attacks that appear to be the work of five …

Dear Ms. Belmond,

Reading “A Rather Lovely Inheritance” was kind of like stepping back in time and enjoying something by Mary Stewart. You know, one of her 50s and 60s mystery stories when the heroine gets swept up in something she never expected that’s kind of glamorous and a teensy bit dangerous and at the end, she finds romance when she didn’t expect it. I haven’t read anything like it in quite a while and I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Penelope Nichols (who’s always eventually called Penny Nichols by everyone she knows just because they can’t resist the name) is surprised to learn that she’s been included in her great aunt Penelope’s will. Penny only vaguely recalled the older woman and hadn’t seen her in years but when the wills (English and French) were read, Penny ends up being something of an heiress. In addition to a Belgravia apartment, she’s inherited the garage and all its contents of her great aunt’s Riviera villa. The rest of the loot has been divvied up between two other cousins but even before the reading is over, everyone knows there’s going to be trouble. It doesn’t take long for …