Any regular visitors to my blog will know that Bronwyn Parry has been very supportive of my own writing so I was delighted when she was nominated for a RITA Award this year. The RWAmerica Conference is in Orlando, Florida this coming weekend and the winner will be announced at the dinner on Saturday night 31^st July.  I’ll be cheering Sunday morning Australian time! I thought I’d ask Bron to talk about the RITAs so those of you who are new to the genre or haven’t heard of the award will get to know it a little better.

Bron, for the uninitiated, what does RITA stand for?

The RITA award is named after Rita Clay Estrada, who was the first President of the Romnace Writers of America, and a successful romance author. Although based in the USA, given the importance of the North American market, the Romance Writers of America is the major international organisation for romantic fiction, which makes the RITAs the premier award for the genre.

How is the contest judged?

In the first round, each entry is judged by five members of the RWA’s Published Author Network,  so it differs from some other contests in that it is judged by authors rather than readers – although I hasten to add, that authors are also readers! The finalists are announced in late March each year, and they are also judged by PAN members. The winners aren’t announced until the moment the envelope is opened, up on the stage at the gala awards night.

Who’s eligible to enter?

The RITA contest is open to both members and non-members of the RWA, for books published in the calendar year preceding the Award announcement – ie, the awards announced this year are for books published in 2009. Books must be in English, but books published outside the US (such as mine) are eligible to enter.

What does it mean to win?

Just being finalist is a thundering great honour – there can be up to 1200 entries, with potentially over a hundred in each category, so it means that five of my peers judged my book very highly. Each time I see my name in the romantic suspense category along with such wonderful and successful authors as JD Robb (Aka Nora Roberts), and Karen Rose, I almost have to pinch myself to see if I’m actually awake!

You won a Golden Heart Award in 2007 for AS DARKNESS FALLS. Describe that night for us with all the glamour and glitz. It’s the Oscars of Romance Writing!!

It’s a fantastic night – although somewhat nerve-wracking for finalists! But the experience of being a finalist in either the RITAs or the GH starts right at the beginning of the conference; every finalist has a ribbon on their name badge, and it’s amazing how everyone who sees that ribbon – in lifts, in coffee queues, wherever –asks which book, and which category, and offers congratulations. It does make one feel special!

On the awards night – the last night of the conference – the excitement starts brewing early. In 2007, I had an early dinner with friends before going to my room to ‘glam up’ – and it is fun to dress up for a special event! Finalists are seated in the front rows of a huge auditorium that seats around 2500 people – this is THE big night for romance authors, agents, publishers and other romance industry people. It really is somewhat like the Oscars – there’s even a red carpet for the finalists to walk along, and a small media contingent. Once inside, there are huge video screens above and on either side of the stage, lights spotlighting the stage, and looking from the front, seating stretching it seems forever down the auditorium. The buzz of conversation before the awards starts is so animated that you can almost see the excitement hovering in the air.

The Golden Heart awards are announced first, then the RITAs. Each category has a guest presenter, who reads the authors and titles of the finalist books, with photos on the video screens. Then there’s the envelope, and the nail-biting wait for the presenter to open it… then she reads the winner’s name seconds before it’s displayed on the big screens, the crowd breaks into wild applause, and the winner makes her way to the stage to accept the award with a brief speech.

After all the awards are announced, there’s a fantastic dessert reception, and for those who are clutching a Golden Heart pendant or a RITA statuette, there are a constant stream of hugs, congratulations, photos… until finally, late at night or early in the morning, one collapses into bed… and I know it took me a long time to sleep when I won the GH!

Unfortunately, this year I won’t be able to go to Orlando, but fellow RITA finalist Kelly Hunter lives in the same district as me, so we’re planning to get together for brunch on the Sunday morning, and tune in to Twitter and the RWA website to keep track of the announcements as the ceremony unfolds. Sunday morning in Armidale isn’t really a dress-up time, so it will be rather more low-key than Orlando, but we’re planning to have some champagne handy, just in case!

Bron, I’ll have my fingers and toes crossed for you, and for Kelly, come Sunday morning Australian time. Dark Country is up against novels by America’s finest Romantic Suspense writers and we’re very proud of you

Fleur, Fiona, Helene and I are all busy working on our next books. So, over on my blog, I’m inviting our readers to do some writing, and be in the chance to win some books.

But you don’t have to write a whole book! For my Fast Fiction contest, you just need to write a story – with a beginning, a middle and an end – in 55 words or less. Yep, just 55 words – including the (optional) title. Easy, right? Well, maybe not easy, but fun!

The contest closes on Friday 16th July, and the wonderful Valerie Parv, one of Australia’s most loved romance writers, has agreed to be the judge. The prizes include one of my books, and Helene’s Border Watch, and the beautifully whimsical book, The Wisdom of Yo Meow Ma by another of my talented friends, Joanna Sandsmark.

So, get your pens out and start thinking about those entries, and then hop over to my blog and post your entry in the comments!

It’s been a good week for the authors here at Australian Outback Romances and Mysteries!

Fleur, Fiona and I have all been enjoying the after-effects of autumn rains… we’re all in dry parts of the continent, so rain is (usually) a good thing, and it’s great to inhale the scent of damp soil and see new green growth emerging. (Helene, being in the tropical north, gets more rain than we do!)

Fiona has sent the completed manuscript of her second book in to her publisher – who is reading it and loving it! Congratulations, Fiona, on achieving another milestone! Helene is also busy putting the finishing touches to her next manuscript – I can’t wait to read both them!

In award news, Fleur’s Red Dust has been shortlisted for a 2010 Australian Book Industry Award for Newcomer of the Year (debut writer). Congratulations, Fleur – that’s a huge vote for your books from booksellers! Winners will be announced in Sydney on 30th June – we’ll be keeping our fingers crossed for Red Dust!

And I was notified yesterday that Dark Country is a finalist in the Daphne du Maurier Awards, in the Single Title Romantic Mystery/Suspense category. The Daphne du Maurier contest is run by the Kiss of Death Chapter of the Romance Writers of America, and it’s a wonderful honour to be a finalist. The winners will be announced on July 29 at the Chapter’s annual Death by Chocolate party at the RWAmerica conference in Orlando.

German publishing house Blanvalet (a division of Random House) has now published translations of Fleur’s Red Dust (as Wilder Eukalyptus), and Bronwyn’s As Darkness Falls (Schwarze Dornen), with Fleur’s second book, translated as Unter den Sternen des Südens, due out in February next year.

Aren’t those covers wonderful? They’re very different to the Australian editions, but just as eye-catching!

The Blanvalet website is great, and includes previews of the first chapters of each book for download. The relevant links are:

Wilder Eukalyptus (translated by Claudia Geng) – Download Leseprobe

Unter den Sternen des Südens (translated by Claudia Geng) – preview not yet available, but check the Blanvalet book page later in the year

Schwarze Dornen (translated by Carsten Mayer) – Download Leseprobe

So, a big welcome to our German readers, and huge thanks to Claudia Geng and Carsten Mayer, the awesome translators!

Fiona’s and Helene’s books aren’t yet available in translation, but we’ll let you know when they are.

A few weeks back, Helene, Fiona, Fleur and I decided to have some bookmarks printed that feature a book from each of us, so that when we’re talking to readers about books, and recommending each others’, we won’t have to go scrambling for paper and pen to write down titles and author names! I collected my share of the bookmarks from the post office today – and I love how they’ve come out They’re printed on glossy board, with two book covers on each side, and look like this:

If you’re a librarian, a bookseller, conference organiser, or in a bookgroup, and you’d like a bundle of bookmarks for your readers, just use the form below to let me know your address and how many you’d like, and I’ll send some out to you.

Now, I need to go and start reading some more books, so that I can use my new bookmarks in them

Readers in southern NSW will have a chance this month to meet Fleur McDonald, author of ‘Red Dust’ and the newly released ‘Blue Skies’, as she visits Wagga, Goulburn, and Dalgety:

• On 27 April, from 1-2pm, Fleur will be signing Blue Skies at Book City in Wagga Wagga;

• Also on 27 April, from 6.00 – 8.00pm, she will be giving a talk and signing Blue Skies at Angus & Robertson in Goulburn;

• Then on 28 April, she’ll be giving a talk, signing and conducting a writing workshop at the Dalgety Women’s Day.

So, if you’re near one of those areas, do take the chance to say hello to Fleur and get your copy of Blue Skies signed (I’ve read it, and can recommend it!) And Fleur, I hope you enjoy visiting this side of the country, and the southern bit of my state!

Welcome to the new website for Australian Outback Romances and Mysteries. We’re four Australian authors who write novels set in Australia’s wonderful landscapes – from the lush tropics of north Queensland, to the sweeping plains of the Western Australian wheat belt.

We each write with our own style and focus, but as many of our readers are enthusiastic about Australian-set books, and read them much faster than we can write them, we’re happy to be able to recommend each other’s books!

For heartwarming sagas of life and love on the land:

And for gripping romantic suspense, set in Australia’s wild places: