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Congratulations to Kavitha Niranjan who won the World Book Day competition. A signed copy of The Perfect Man is on its way to you now!

Enjoy World Book Day. Small competition for yo to mark the occasion. Draw for signed copy of The Perfect Man (paperbak pub date 27 May) from all who retweet or like this message on my Facebook Fan page by midnight GMT

Copies of the Dutch edition of Bad Behaviour arrived at my house this morning. I love seeing my books in translation and The House of Books, who publish me in the Netherlands, always do a great job. I once worked for a Dutch bank but I didn’t learn much of the language but I can recognise a few words here and there. I hope my Dutch readers enjoy De Uitnodiging!

www.thehouseofbooks.com

love

Sheila

Hi everyone

I’ll be on TV3 Ireland AM tomorrow around 9.30am talking about the talented Jodi Picoult.

http://www.tv3.ie/videos.php?video=19466&locID=

Hi all

I’m busy writing away at the moment and just wanted to update you on the UK & Ireland pub dates for this year. The Perfect Man will be out in paperback on 27th May and Stand By Me will be released on 2 September. A sample chapter of Stand By Me will be available later in the summer…..

love

Sheila

What with the snow (frost anyway) and a sudden flurry of Christmas cards through the letterbox, I’m starting to feel in holiday mode, though I plan to do some work on the latest book this afternoon, honestly! However I’m currently listening to a bit of festive music while I type. Of course I keep stopping to sing along  though I use the word ’sing’ advisedly – I haven’t a note in my head.

Anyway I thought that, before I started this afternoon’s work, I’d have a little think back on 2009 in terms of books and how things went.

Like all retailers, booksellers have had a tough year. Fortunately books continue to be great value for money but the lack of people in shopping centres has had an effect on turnover in all bookshops. The loss of Borders first in Ireland and now the UK is a great shame. I know that many people perfer small independent bookstores to big franchises but losing any bookseller when you love books is  sad. The staff of Borders were always lovely to me whenever I called in to sign books and were very knowledgeable about their vast stock. I hope that they all find jobs worthy of their talents.

Despite the difficult times, though, many of the booksellers  I met during 2009 were gamely optimistic, mainly because most of them love books so much that they can’t imagine anyone not wanting to buy them! When I was younger I wanted to own a bookshop because I thought I could spend loads of time reading all the stock – but actually booksellers need to be fit and healthy so that they can open all the boxes and stack the shelves. During the working day they don’t have time to read books at all and so the fact that they do read so many when they get home shows the passion that they have. I would have been a terrible bookseller but I’m fortunate that I now know so many good ones!

Before I started writing I used to go into bookshops and marvel and the number and variety of books I could choose from. Now I panic at the number and variety of books by other authors on the shelves!! I wonder how on earth anyone will choose one of  mine out of the massive displays and I start counting the number of family members I have who I know will buy at least one….

However I’ve been very lucky – people have seen my books and they have bought them – and 2009 was especially wonderful for me because of the great success of Someone Special both in Ireland and the UK, and in lots of other countries too. It’s currently being translated into more languages and I hope that those of you who haven’t yet read it will enjoy it. The Perfect Man was also hugely successful – it comes out in paperback in 2010 so I’m nervously waiting to see will it be visible in the shops among everything else. I don’t think any author ever loses the sense of terror on publication day and I’m still as worried as I was when my very first book was published.

But what’s different now is that I have so many readers who get in touch so quickly and so often and who are incredibly generous and supportive. I assure you that I do read all of your comments and questions on the site and that I love hearing from you. This year I’ve had even more messages than usual, and from more and more countries too. Thanks especially to all my new Swedish readers who’ve got in touch this year – I enjoyed my visit to your country tremendously and am definitly planning a return trip. I like the idea of going in the summer when the days never end. Thanks also to those of you who emailed from Canada, Australia, the Caribbean and South Africa, as well as all over Europe. And another bout of thanks to my US readers – I do hope that I will get a new US publisher soon so that you can access my books more easily. I realise that it’s annoying for you to be buying from overseas. Obviously the recession has hampered our efforts but fingers are crossed for good news in the coming months.

I know that I’m lucky because I do something I love and I get paid for it. Obviously the bank manager likes the cheques – and so do I – but truthfully the biggest pleasure I get is knowing that you’ve enjoyed a book. All of my life I’ve loved reading and I’ve loved losing myself in a good book. I can’t tell you how wonderful it is when someone tells me that they’ve had that same experience reading one of mine!!

One of the questions people ask me a lot is what I like to read myself. And it’s difficult to answer because I love so many different types of books and so many different writers. I’m friends with many of my feloow Irish writers and so enjoying their books is a given, but this year I also liked Phillipa Gregory’s latest historical novel, The White Queen. I hated history at school but the older I get the more relevance I realise it has. However if Philippa had been writing then my knowledge of the Tudors would have been good enough not to have had received a ‘could do better’ from my history teacher when I had to turn in an essay on Henry VIII.

I was halfway through American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld before I realised it was based on the life of Laura Bush. To be honest that sort of spoiled it for me – up until then I’d found it engrossing but afterwards I couldn’t get Laura and George out of my head. The end is a bit rushed and we never get to see how it is that Charlie (the George character) builds up the support to run for President. But the first half of the book is absolutely wonderful! (I do like how she writes; her first book, Prep, was a great ‘coming of age’ novel).

I finished the Steig Larsson trilogy with The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest and was very satisfied at how it all worked out, though I did think that it could have been edited a bit more. Unfortunately these days I tend to read books with an eye to the editing as well as the story! I also enjoyed The Piiano Teacher by Janice YK Lee which was hugely evokative of Hong Kong during WW2.

And now I realise that nearly every book I’ve read this year has been set in the past – including the book I’m currently reading, Child 44, by Tom Rob Smith which is set in the 1950’s Soviet Union. Gripping stuff so far – I’ve always enjoyed those Cold War era books.

Included in my big pile of books yet to read is Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel and The Angel’s Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon (more history!!) as well as Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver and Too Big to Fail by Andrew Ross Sorkin (well, I had to have a financial crisis book in there somewhere…)

But back to the writing….I’m editing Stand by Me and making notes about the novel after that. Each time I finish a book I think ‘never again’ and then something clicks inside and I can’t stop myself. I’ll keep you all up to date on the progress of my books during 2010 and do please continue to keep in touch with me too.

You can also become a fan on my Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sheila-OFlanagan/76757075181?ref=ts or follow me on Twitter http://twitter.com/sheilaoflanagan (I’m not a daily tweeter but every so often I do a flurry!) and, of course, keep checking the website for news or extracts of books.

Thank you all for your support and your company in 2009. Have a lovely, lovely Christmas and holiday season and a spectacularly wonderful New Year.

love

Sheila

Hi everyone

Lots of you have been asking when the paperback version of The Perfect Man will be released. It’s now scheduled for 27 May 2010 – and I’m hoping that as many of you buy it as Someone Special. And that you enjoy it even more……

I have a publication date for the book I’m working on now too. It’s called Stand By Me and it will be released on 2 September 2010. I don’t have any cover image for it (there’s a while to go yet!) but will post it as soon as I have. And I’ll also post a sample chapter on my website www.sheilaoflanagan.com when it’s been licked into shape a bit more!

love Sheila

I thought it was about time I gave you a longer update on what’s going on for me now as it’s a while since I’ve sent a message to everyone (mainly because I forgot how!!!).

In terms of being out and about this is now a quiet time of the year which means I’m back at the computer writing again and there’s more info on that below. But first of all thank you all so much again for the double No 1 for Someone Special earlier this year. It was probably the most exciting moment for me in my entire writing career as it really is a thrill to see a book in the number one slot in Ireland and the UK at the same time. Thanks also to all of you who left messages and emailed me to say how much you enjoyed it. I really appreciate hearing from you. The hardback and trade paperback editions of The Pefect Man are available now in ireland, the UK, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. They should also be availabe in Dubai, Singapore, Malaysia and the Caribbean. It will be available in Canada in November.

Irish & UK readers – don’t forget to enter The Perfect Man cruise competition! I’m so looking forward to finding out which one of you wins and I promise that you’ll have a great time. Details are at: www.headlinecompetitions.co.uk/cruise

The writing news is that I’m working on the next book, Stand By Me, which will be out later next year. It’s a big, family story and it’ll cover over 20 years. I haven’t written a book that spans a generation since Dreaming of a Stranger and I’m really hoping that you’ll like Domino’s story and how she copes with the things life throws at her…..I’m really enjoying writing about her and the people in her life even though it’s very challenging getting the timeline right! But I like to do different things when I’m writing and make each book special in its own way. I’m always nervous about talking about a book before it’s published in case I jinx it but my fingers are crossed that you’ll enjoy Stand By Me.

I’m also working on a book for the Quick Reads series. These are similar to the Open Door series in Ireland as they are book for people who’ve come to reading late in life and who would struggle with a typical full-length novel. They’re much shorter (about 20,000 words) but I hope that I’ve written a good story which anyone can enjoy. That won’t be published until 2011 but because the right story came into my head I decided that the thing to do was get it down straight away.

To keep fit I’m back playing badminton – though if last night was typical of how I’m going to play for the rest of the season I should hang up my racquet now!!! I couldn’t keep the shuttle inside the lines and I felt so sorry for my partners who normally expect a bit more accuracy from me. Hopefully I’ll get better as the season goes on (can’t honestly get any worse) and our team will do well.

Thanks to all of you for keeping in touch through the website and Facebook Fan pages. It’s a great way to keep up to date with where I’m at and it’s always lovely to hear from you. I’ve set up a new discussion on the Facebook Fan page – what character from my books are you most like? I’m really interested in finding out what people say!

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Sheila-OFlanagan/76757075181?ref=ts

Talk soon

love

Sheila

Congratulations to Aniko Szabo from Hungary who is the winner of a signed copy of The Pefect Man. I hope you like it Aniko!

Happy reading

Sheila

I dropped into the BBC Radio Ulster studios to talk about The Perfect Man

BBC Radio Ulster Talkback Interview (mp3)