Friday 16 October 2015

Travels with my laptop.

La Roche Bernard, Brittany, France

My laptop, my notebook and me.

This year has been a year of rattling along roads, sailing seas and flying skies. It's been months of packing and unpacking, flinging cases into cars, trains and planes. Together, my notebooks, my little Hewlett Packard Mini laptop and me (and Pete of course!), have covered many miles and written many, many words.
But now we're home and we're not going anywhere for some months. 
So, with a fair wind behind me, the third in The Camelot Inheritance series should be finished and published by spring 2016. Originally I'd promised by the end of this year... but hey, life happens.
Pete and I always aim to travel as cheaply as possible, so this means no package holidays but as D.I.Y as we can manage.

In the early summer we popped down to west Cornwall to do a spot more research for the third book.
St. Michael's Mount, Cornwall
...An essential weekend at St. Michael's Mount and the village of Marazion, the setting for Book 3 and one of my favourite places in the world. Every time I go there, I cannot get over how fortunate we are to live near here.
West Cornwall
It happens to be here in Cornwall that the Poldark series is filmed and Doc Martin is set. It's a wild and beautiful landscape, infinitely inspirational and climatically changeable... and the perfect place to set 'The Camelot Inheritance' series; after all it does have a spot of magic in it.

The little-known Tamar Valley
And then on the border between Cornwall and Devon is the beautiful Tamar Valley, a gem of a place. So peaceful and far from the holiday crowds.

But this was all close to home. 
We've also been to the north of England, on the edge of the Peak district and to the south, to Bath - a setting used by Jane Austen.

We've been in Brittany, northern France...


La Roche Bernard, on the border of Morbihan and the Loire Atlantique. A gorgeous little town.
La Roche Bernard, Brittany
And then down to Marseilles in the south...


The Old Port Marseilles
The Old Port, Marseilles
 and while there visited the old port. 
We dawdled past shops hidden up narrow alleys, selling soap, suitcases, perfume, olive oil and wine and cheese. I'm not a travel writer, but if you happen to have the opportunity to visit this city, you must take in this wonderful spot.
One of the more original shop fronts.


And then we happened upon a piece of street theatre, several floors up... on the outside of an apartment building. I couldn't watch (!) but a huge crowd, braver than me had gathered, and they watched. I can't imagine Health and Safety allowing that in Britain (there were no wires or nets), but it was magnificent. And so,so French.



Our ultimate destination was Porquerolles, a tiny island facing Provence, for a belated holiday after a busy year.

http://www.porquerolles-provence.com/voyage-porquerolles
How to find Porquerolles

We took the train along the coast from Marseilles to Hyeres, and the ferry from Hyeres to the island. 
As it turned out we were fortunate to be able to visit in September because the island is a nature reserve; unspoiled, but much visited.
The seas are crystal clear and the sand soft. Few cars are allowed and few 'proper' roads cross the island - bikes and feet are the way to get around.
It was a perfect place to write but to be honest as long as there's somewhere to plug in my HP, almost anywhere is a perfect writing place.
Our hosts were the immensely kind Claude and Veronique (we loved their studio). It was a week to treasure... and we will. Thank you Claude, thank you Veronique.
One of the beautiful bays in Porquerolles.
The seas really were these colours.

But the very best thing about this year hasn't been the sand and warm seas... May I introduce our brand new granddaughter.

Gorgeous eh? 
Enough said.
Until the next time x











  

Monday 31 August 2015

A fairy-tale island

The magic that is St Michael's Mount in Cornwall, UK

I was going to introduce you to more of Cornwall's magic in the last post, but was sidetracked by talking about Netgalley. This post, however, is to be dedicated to the Mount, the backdrop for the third in The Camelot Inheritance series.

I love this place and could visit it many times over... in fact I think I will be popping down there again very soon, West Cornwall has a personality all of its own; quite beautiful and, at times, mysterious.

The Mount is situated off Cornwall's north coast towards the very tip of the county and Britain.

Mount's Bay, Cornwall
Mounts Bay, home to St Michael's Mount

Sunday 9 August 2015

Inspirational Cornwall - the stuff fantasies are made of.

Sun + Cornwall = A truckload of ideas

Sometimes it's important to take time out and chill, and it's so much easier when the sun is shining and the sky is wall-to-wall blue.
Cornwall is gorgeous at any time of year, even when it's raining and blowing a gale, it always has its own special sort of magic. However on a day like yesterday, it has a sort of Enid Blyton feel about it; a sort of living childhood memory.
Spot my home town, Liskeard, in Cornwall's heart.


Sunday 5 July 2015

Shortlisted and nominated!

To have one nomination is amazing, to have two is quite wonderful.

I was delighted and amazed to have 'The Time Smugglers' shortlisted for the 2015 International Rubery Book Award.
To find out , just a couple of days later, that both 'The Golden Sword' and 'The Time Smugglers' were nominated for the 2015 Holyer an Gof awards was incredible.



Sunday 28 June 2015

Rosie welcomes Gold Award winner - Julia M Forster

Author of Shadow Jumper

It's my pleasure to welcome Julia to this blog and to share the privilege of getting to know her. It's always a delight meeting other authors and having the opportunity to share their work with all you guys who drop in -but in this case you're hitting gold because Julia carried home a Gold Award from, The Wishing Shelf Independent Book Awards.



Wednesday 13 May 2015

Prizes, prizes, prizes...

The Giveaway winners are...

This is just a brief post to announce the winners of both #giveaways for 'The Golden Sword'.


http://authl.it/B00ANP31XA


From a massive field of 2025 (!) entries for my Goodreads giveaway, three winners have been picked at random. 
I find this part really exciting - there's something wonderful about being able to connect with my readers. 
Bring it on!

Saturday 18 April 2015

Rosie Morgan welcomes Rebecca Ferrell Porter

Award winning author, Rebecca Ferrell Porter, talks about her work... and other things.




I'm delighted to welcome Rebecca to my blog. She has just won a silver medal from The Wishing Shelf Awards for her second book - Cairn: A Dragon Memoir (Legends of the Aurora ~ Book 2).

Sunday 8 February 2015

Merlin's Cave - a magical experience!

Merlin's Cave in #Cornwall.

Merlin features in book three of 'The Camelot Inheritance' series (yet to be published), so of course I had to visit this famed place.

http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/daysout/properties/tintagel-castle/directions
Looking up to Tintagel Castle

Thursday 20 November 2014

There be dragons

An author-visit and a gallery of dragons 

Let me share an afternoon at Quethiock School with you :)

Quethiock School is a fabulous little school in Cornwall. I was delighted to make an author visit there and to spend a very happy afternoon with many wonderful children. They had imagination coming out of their ears and were so well behaved. Suffice it to say that if every school was run with the love and dedication of this one, the world would be a better place!

Rosie Morgan, Quethiock School, Author visit

Thursday 25 September 2014

Rosie Morgan welcomes award winner, Gwen Dandridge.

Meet Gwen Dandridge -

Awarded the Awesome Indies Award for outstanding fiction.

It’s my very great pleasure to feature Gwen and her work as the first of my special posts this autumn.


Pete and I left France last week and are now back in my beloved Cornwall  in the UK. 
The summer lingers on, although the leaves are turning and the evenings are cooler - and we’re stacking the wood pile ready for the first evening with the wood burner for company.
But that’s quite enough about the weather because I want to introduce you to Gwen - and her work.