The winners of this year's Festival of Romance Awards were announced yesterday evening at a gala occasion in Bedford to open the weekend-long Festival of Romance. The winners were:

Best Romantic Read:

Dearest Rose by Rowan Coleman

Best Historical Read:

The Silent Touch of Shadows by Christina Courtenay

Best Short Romance:

Dancing with Danger by Fiona Harper

Best Ebook:

Miranda's Mount by Philipa…

Fancy A Little Bit of Fun?

Come to Safkhet Publishing’s booth on November 17 at the…

A market research company is looking for women who are active romance readers (6+ books per year) and who own an eReader (Kindle, iPad etc) to take part in some research about enjoyment of the genre. The focus group is being organised by SCB Partners and participants will discuss what they love about reading romantic fiction.The focus group takes place this Tuesday evening, 30 October, in Hammersmith, London and those taking part will…

Bestselling Irish author Maeve Binchy has died peacefully in hospital yesterday following a short illness. The 72-year-old author sold more than 40 million books worldwide during her career and touched on relationship issues that struck real resonance with her readers. Several of her books were adapted for the screen including the Circle…

Never Coming Home

Evonne Wareham

Choc Lit, March 2012

 …

 Chocolate Shoes and Wedding Blues

Trisha Ashley

Avon, May 2012…

Jane Lovering has scooped this year's Romantic Novel of the Year award for Please Don't Stop the Music from a strong shortlist that included novels by Christina Courtenay, Katie Fforde, Caroline Green and Rosie Thomas. The panel of judges described Jane's voice as "fresh and new with an unexpected hero", and included…

Hi all!

I'm currently planning some new content for my female fiction website, Trashionista, and wondered if any of you lovely ladies here fancied taking part in some features?

Over the coming months I'll be looking for authors to submit writing-relateing tips, stories about their own experiences in writing and publishing and quite possibly some 'yay or nay' features/debates.

If anyone is interested in taking part, please let me know! Just thought I'd give…

Authors, publishers and literary agents gathered at a plush venue in central London yesterday afternoon for the announcement of the RoNA Awards. Guests sat down to pink champagne and pink canapes at the sumptuous ceremony compared by Peter James and Jane Wenham-Jones. Announced first was the Harry Bowling Prize, a prize for unpublished writers for a novel with…

"I am so, so, so thrilled," Jan Jones blogged after hearing that her novel The Kydd Inheritance had been shortlisted for one of this year's Romantic Novelists Association Awards (RoNAs). Her comments echoed the mood of many of the shortlisted authors. "Absolutely thrilled," wrote Jean Fullerton on her blog at the news that her novel Perhaps Tomorrow had been…

An American blogger has landed her first book deal with erotic fiction publisher Xcite Books after winning a competition to find new talent. Xcite Books launched its first ever writing contest at the Festival of Romance in the UK last October in the hope of finding a writer and book that embodied the spirit of erotic…

Snowbound on the Island, my short seasonal novella, was published a few days ago and is…

The perfect heroes for warming things up in the cold weather are lumberjacks, reports a trend watch blog at RT Book Reviews, the US's biggest romance magazine. "With their plaid shirt-covered brawny arms and luscious beards, it’s no wonder these men are icons of masculinity," RT Book Reviews…

In a blog published today by the Telegraph newspaper, Scottish author Allan Massie pays tribute to the "extraordinary talent" of the late romance author Penny Jordan who died recently. Penny Jordan wrote over 190 romance novels during her long career. Writing mostly for Mills and Boon, she was one of the world's best known romantic fiction…

A US writer of science fiction and fantasy has launched a scathing attack on romance novels. Cale McCaskey, who describes himself on his blog profile as a "sexy, single, white male" claims that romance novels are "purposely meant to be a lessor work."  "If an author classifies their own story as romance, that tells me that even they don't think much of it," writes McCaskey in his blog, dated…

Select an exciting read for your Christmas Kindle, put your feet up and enjoy Alina and Harry's trials as they fall in love. Who would ever have thought that her father would threaten to kill Harry simply because his name was Scott? or that the infamous Border Reivers would get involved? But…

Just listening to Steve Wright on BBC Radio 2 this morning and he mentioned a survey done of people who had fallen in love "at first sight" i.e. on their first date. They were asked what signs they had experienced that made them think that they had fallen in love straight away. Six things emerged that were reported. I am afraid I didn't hear who carried out the survey. These were:

-- a shiver down the spine

-- feeling an emotional connection, like you know the person well (even…

Hope that it's OK for me to post this, here, but it's a great comp, just right for writers of romantic fiction. And who can resist the lure of money and chocolate?

Choc Lit are looking for short stories of up to 1,500 words in which the central theme is chocolate – eating it, drinking it, cooking with it, or anything else. Let your imagination take…

The inaugural Romance Reader Awards were presented at a gala ball on 22 October attended by authors and publishing executives in the romantic surroundings of Hunton Park in Hertfordshire.

The Romance Reader Awards winners were presented with trophies from sponsors Total-E-Bound and Choc Lit. The winners were:

 …