Princess Charming Archives

News about THREE BLONDE MICE!

March 21, 2016

Yup, we have a cover for my new novel, which Diversion Books will publish in August. Why the heart of carrots? Because my “three blonde mice” heroines, Elaine, Jackie and Pat, have taken a farm-to-table vacation together in this sequel to Princess Charming, the book that sent them on a seven-day Caribbean cruise. This time they’re at a farm resort in Litchfield, CT – agritourists on a “haycation.” They not only milk a cow and make cheese from the milk, but they spend the week taking cooking classes with a famous farm-to-table chef. Here’s Diversion’s descriptive copy:

Elaine Zimmerman and her best friends Jackie Gault and Pat Kovecky venture to a farm in Litchfield, Connecticut. It’s been over a year since their last trip together, a Caribbean cruise aboard the Princess Charming, and after dealing with a murderous ex and his hit man, they’re yearning for a no-drama vacation this time. During their Cultivate Our Bounty Week, they and eight other guests will learn how to cook farm-to-table meals with Whitley’s artisan-inresidence, a renowned TV/restaurant chef named Jason Hill. Elaine, the jaded, neurotic narrator, is less than thrilled—especially because the program wasn’t supposed to include a surprise appearance by her former boyfriend Simon, who’s still the love of her life but can’t commit to her. What’s more, after milking a cow and making cheese, she stumbles on evidence that one of her fellow agritourists is out to murder Chef Hill at the resort’s Bounty Fest finale. Is the killer among the freakishly fit Manhattan couple who takes their devotion to organic, hormone-free, non-GMO food to the point of obsession? The grandmother from Wisconsin who’s a groupie of the celebrity chef and follows him to every event? The mother and son from Palm Beach who bicker over whether he should give up his law practice to open his own restaurant? Three Blonde Mice serves up a crackling romance between Elaine and Simon, a twisty whodunit involving a screwball cast of suspects and a satire of current food fads and the farm-to-table chefs who perpetuate them.

Needless to say, I’m very excited that the book is in the promotional pipeline. Now that I’m back in CT, I’ll be doing local publicity as well as national. I’ll post much more in the coming months, but I’m happy to say that Three Blonde Mice is now available for pre-order on Amazon!

Meanwhile, Diversion has just reissued five of my backlist novels, including Princess Charming, with pretty new covers that tie in nicely with the Three Blonde Mice cover. Check them out!

Re-Reading Nora Ephron

November 10, 2015

I remember the first time I read Heartburn. It had just been published and the media was in a tizzy over the fact that Nora Ephron had written such a brutally honest account of her failed marriage to Carl Bernstein, albeit in a thinly fictionalized form. I also remember being less interested in whether Bernstein was or wasn’t the sort of guy who’d “have sex with a Venetian blind,” as Ephron wrote, and more interested in how she came up with such a funny line. It was her humor, her unique voice that drew me in.

Years later, Heartburn figures into a writing ritual of mine: I feel the need to go back to it before I start a new novel of my own. I re-read it hoping Ephron’s comic timing will be contagious and that I’ll catch it. I re-read it hoping I’ll be able to seize on just the right words and phrases and turn them into a laugh. I re-read it hoping I’ll take on her blend of hard-bitten cynicism and romantic sappiness. I don’t re-read Heartburn for her storytelling, in other words, which is negligible, as nothing much happens in the book and she’s clearly not interested in plot. I re-read it for her voice.

I’ve started the second book in my “Three Blonde Mice” series, the first of which, Three Blonde Mice, will be published in August or September 2016 (still waiting to hear from the publisher) and is a spinoff of Princess Charming. In this one, Elaine, Jackie and Pat, the three best friends who take vacations together every year only to become embroiled in romance and some sort of murder-and-mayhem, go to Rhinebeck, in New York state’s Hudson Valley region. But this vacation is very different from the others, as it’s Elaine’s destination wedding to Simon Purdys, the hottie she met on the cruise in Princess Charming and who figures prominently in Three Blonde Mice. Elaine had visions of a European villa for her destination wedding, but since Rhinebeck holds sentimental value for Simon and his family, she agrees to have the wedding at the village’s most enduring inn, the Beekman Arms.

I went to Rhinebeck and the “Beek,” as the inn is affectionately called by locals, to research my book and will post pictures of my trip there and to neighboring Hyde Park, where I visited the FDR library and museum, the Vanderbilt mansion and other historic sites. But in the meantime, I’m finding my way into the novel, into the plot and characters, into the head of Elaine, the narrator.

Which is why I’m re-reading Heartburn. Elaine is a neurotic New Yorker who’s every bit as romantic as she is embittered. She’s so much fun to write because she’s such a woman of contradictions. And she’s funny – at least I try to imbue her with funniness. She doesn’t tell jokes. She doesn’t attempt to crack people up. She’s funny by virtue of the situations in which she places herself, often tripped up by her own neuroses. By re-reading Ephron, I hope I can learn once again how to make Elaine sympathetic and relatable, sarcastic and self-deprecating, hapless and clever and, above all, a woman who makes us laugh.

I Have a New Look!

November 3, 2015

For my new web site redesign (if you’re still getting the old site, hit refresh), I wanted something fun for my author photo. I went on Fiverr, an innovative site where graphic artists from all over the world show their portfolios and you can choose an artist to create a cartoon, a logo, whatever you want. The artist I chose took the photo below….

…and turned it into a colorful pop art version. It’s not Andy Warhol, but it makes me smile and I hope it does the same for anyone visiting my site. The books are meant to be entertaining, so why shouldn’t my photo reflect that, right?

I’ll be getting a fresh start with my novels too. My wonderful agent, Ellen Levine at Trident (her author, Marlon James, recently won the prestigious Man Booker Prize for his novel, A Brief History of Seven Killings, just saying), made a deal with the smart, savvy publishing upstart, Diversion Books, for me. Not only will Diversion publish my new novel, Three Blonde Mice, a spinoff of Princess Charming that will kick off my “Three Blonde Mice” series, but they’ll also re-release 11 of my backlist novels with new covers and a marketing campaign. They plan to release Three Blonde Mice in August or September 2016, and the 11 older novels will come out over the next few months – all in both print and ebook editions.

And before I leave the subject of my web site redesign (thank you, Helen Baldwin, for making it happen!), I should point out that it features a way to sign up for my newsletter. I didn’t use this feature on my previous site, so I’m excited to be able to reach out to anyone who’s interested in signing up.

Bottom line: it’s all good around here.

And Look What Else Surprised Us

May 8, 2015

As I’ve said, I’m not a garden person so I don’t know what plants, trees and shrubs will turn out to be until they reveal themselves in the spring. This cherry tree at the front of our property was a happy surprise. It’s so pink and joyful that it makes me smile every time I look at it.

And the house itself is coming along. Yesterday the mason came to repair the brick patio. The day before that the plumber came to repair the outdoor shower. On and on it goes, but we took a break from all the headache-inducing stuff and had our first dinner guest last night. Michael broke in the new BBQ with a terrific chicken with pesto and I made a ton of roasted vegetables (Yukon gold potatoes, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower and carrots – very colorful) and a salad with mixed greens, endive, tomatoes, cucumbers and walnuts in a mustard vinaigrette. Yum, if I do say so myself. Our guest brought us a wonderful house present: a large wooden bowl he’d made himself. He’s a very talented woodworker so I’m thrilled to have one of his signed creations and can’t wait to make a big salad in the bowl.

On the book front, my agent and I decided to change the title of my novel before the manuscript went to editors for submissions this week. Instead of going out as Farm Fatales, the spinoff to Princess Charming is now called Three Blonde Mice, which is also the name of the planned series the book will kick off. I just hope editors love it as much as I do. We shall see……….

I Saw These in My Yard Today!

April 29, 2015

Before the daffodils appeared, the property was pretty barren. No, it was sadder than barren. Thanks to the brutal winter in New Preston, CT, there were tree branches, dead leaves and all sorts of debris covering what I hope will be flower beds. Having just moved into this house, I don’t know what will bloom until it actually does.

Today’s excitement after yesterday’s visit from the electrician is the power washing of the front and back brick walkways and patio, the hanging of bathroom towel bars, the paint touch-ups of gouges in the walls caused by the movers and the unpacking of still more boxes. I don’t remember being so immersed in minutia.

But the house is coming together. It doesn’t feel as alien as it did last week. I’m not waking up in the morning with that “Where am I” feeling. I’m learning the house’s creeks and groans. (It’s an old house or, as our building inspector called it, “an experienced house.”) By this weekend, I predict we’ll be hanging artwork, and once that’s done we can turn our attention to the landscaping. The grass needs TLC and there are trees and shrubs to plant. We don’t have any outdoor furniture but we’re going to look at some used Adirondack chairs owned by a client of our contractor (she’s got a big house by the lake and she’s downsizing). And a neighbor invited us over for tea later (she’s British).

What about writing? I admire authors who can write with workmen around. I’m not one of them. I’m not good at chaos. I need order and organization and a fixed schedule. I need the certainty that someone won’t be knocking on the door any minute with a set of tools and an invoice. I need peace – a few hours of it anyway. The good news is I finished Farm Fatales, the spinoff of Princess Charming, before I left California. So once my head clears, I’ll figure out the next book. And the one after that. I will not let this move or this house or this pervasive sense of disorientation sidetrack me….unless, of course, I end up writing about that.

When Research Is a Pleasure, Part 7

August 2, 2014

In Part 2 of my farm-to-table food journey for research, I wrote about Arethusa Dairy Farm in Litchfield County and how ridiculously delicious the milk, cheese and butter that come from Arethusa’s prized cows are. It only made sense for Arethusa’s owners, the brains behind Manolo Blahnik stilettos, to launch a restaurant adjacent to the dairy and to recruit a chef who would best utilize their products. Arethusa al tavolo opened last summer and was an immediate hit – a fine dining eatery that offered the freshest, highest quality ingredients in innovate menu items but without the pretentiousness and stuffiness of “fancy” places. I became a fan from my first bite of the lobster and avocado appetizer.

Michael and I went back a few more times last summer, and al tavolo never disappointed. When we were in Connecticut this time around and I was determined to learn about chefs at the forefront of the farm-to-table movement, I had a perfectly good excuse to revisit the restaurant. The only catch was getting Chef Dan Magill, who makes magic in the kitchen, to sit down and talk to me. Luckily, Chef Dan was a prince among men, generous with information and recipes and philosophies of cooking. He was the opposite of the diva type you read about or see on television food competition shows but rather down-to-earth, funny and, most importantly, earnest about his craft. He doesn’t come out front to shake hands and take bows. He works the line with the other cooks, turning out perfection night after night, as does his pastry chef, April Massey. He started in the business at age 14 as a dishwasher and after putting himself through culinary school took jobs that allowed him to observe the best chefs in the food world. (He did a stint with Daniel Boulud, for example). Now, he’s come into his own at al tavolo and, despite the accolades, his head is still on straight.

Having grown up on the North Fork of Long Island and fished as a kid, he’s partial to cooking the freshest seafood around – “sea to table,” he calls what he does in the kitchen. But he’s also known for his duck and Michael raves about his lamb and beef. And he’s all about Arethusa’s dairy products, of course, and there’s not a single appetizer, entree or dessert on the menu that isn’t swoon-worthy because of those products. I mean who wouldn’t want to dive into this? We’re talking ice cream straight from the cows, people.

I’m back in Santa Barbara now and not exactly stuck in a culinary wasteland, but the challenge will be to put together all the info I gathered in Connecticut and create an entertaining story for my novel’s characters.

Oh, did I mention that the novel will be a spin-off of Princess Charming?

Yup, I’m bringing back Elaine, Jackie and Pat for another vacation together. They’re going to be “agri-tourists” in Connecticut, staying at a fictional resort on a fictional farm and getting into all sorts of trouble as they milk cows, take cooking classes, interact with the chefs and other guests and – you guessed it – solve another mystery. Who will be marked for murder in this one? Stay tuned.

"Princess Charming" Gets Its Own Sale

May 30, 2013

It’s summer and what better time for a beach read than right now? To celebrate, we’re giving Princess Charming, my novel that takes place on a seven-day Caribbean cruise, the special sale treatment. From June 3-9, the ebook edition, normally $4.99, will be available at all e-tailers for 99 cents – a very sweet deal if you ask me!

Princess Charming is about three best friends (the “three blonde mice,” they call themselves), all divorced, who take vacations together every year. This time they decide to take a week-long cruise aboard the Princess Charming, a ship not unlike Carnival or Royal Caribbean. (I’d love to give the book to all those poor passengers that were stranded in the recent cruise ship disasters. They probably need a good laugh.)

The plot thickens when the heroine, Elaine, overhears a ship-to-shore conversation between two men. The connection is full of static and it breaks up toward the end, but she does find out that somebody’s ex has hired a hit man to kill one of the blonde mice on the ship. Elaine’s a little neurotic to begin with, but this news nearly puts her over the edge – literally. Which of the women is about to be murdered and which of the men on the ship has been hired to do the deed? It couldn’t be Simon, the hot guy she’s fallen for, could it?

Michael and I took a seven-day cruise on Royal Caribbean’s Sovereign of the Seas in order to research Princess Charming, and while I’ll never be a “cruise person,” I did get lots of juicy material for the book. I hope it’s as much fun to read as it was to write.

Winter Sale!

February 4, 2013

White sales are great and shoe sales are nice and who doesn’t love discounts on merchandise of any kind. So why not have a sale on my ebooks? February 1st kicked off our special “Winter Sale” on my 11 novels that were launched in ebook editions over the summer. For a limited time only, we’ve dropped the prices from $4.99 to $2.99, so there’s never been a better time to curl up with a Kindle/Nook/iPad and read.

Thanks to those who’ve been fans of my romantic comedies and have been spreading the word to others. And to those who’ve never read one of my novels, I hope you’ll get started!

Four More Novels Go Digital!

July 17, 2012

Last week, I had the pleasure of reporting that six of my backlist titles were finally available in ebook editions. Today, I’m here to announce that four more novels have been converted and are available at e-tailers: Lucky Stars, The Secret Ingredient, Name Dropping and Princess Charming.

That leaves only Female Intelligence, which should be joining the others in a few weeks.

Very exciting for me to have these books in their new editions with their colorful covers and reasonable prices. Spread the word!

Sneak Peek At My New Ebook Covers

February 16, 2012

As the Pointer Sisters used to sing: “I’m so excited and I just can’t hide it!”

The reason for my excitement? The launch, possibly as early as next month, of the brand new ebook editions of my 11 novels that have been out of print and, therefore, never before available as ebooks.

The novels have gotten a facelift too, thanks to extremely talented designer Lilien Hoffman, who has created both a colorful look for my “brand” as well as eye-catching images for each book.

Want to see what will be appearing on an Amazon or BN.com page soon? Scroll down for a sneak peek…

Are these covers gorgeous or what?

Royalty Checks Are Among Life's Great Pleasures

April 18, 2011

I got one in the mail today – a royalty check, that is. It wasn’t much money, but it was based on the German sales of my 1997 novel “Princess Charming” and it made me smile.

I love that the book is still selling after so many years. I love that it’s still selling in Germany, even though I’ve never been there. I love that it was inspired by John Jakes, the bestselling author whom I had the privilege of promoting when I worked in publishing. (John once said to me, “Write a book about a cruise. Cruises are funny material.” So the novel is set on a ship called the Princess Charming.) Most of all, I love that I get paid to write.

Receiving a check for something I’ve written is as big a thrill now as it was when my first novel was published in ’94. There’s such a huge sense of satisfaction knowing that someone was entertained by my words.

“Princess Charming” was optioned for a feature film way back when it was first published, and I had visions of the actresses who would play the three best friends embarking on the ill-fated seven-day cruise to the Caribbean. But nothing ever came of the project except a mediocre script, as so often happens in Hollywood. I guess it could still happen if a studio would remember the enormous success of “The First Wives Club.”

In the meantime, I’ll just be happy with my little royalty check from Germany and hope that one of these days I’ll travel there and say thank you.