Catch up with Sunday Times bestselling, award winning romance author, Sue Moorcroft!

Welcome back, Sue!

Thanks very much for inviting me, Val.

The last time we chatted was back in 2016 when you had made some monumental decisions as to what you were doing with your writing/tutor time.

You were setting out new goals for the future. Now the future is here: what has worked and, if anything, what did not?

Things have gone very well. I have to pinch myself, sometimes. Since I began working with my agent, Juliet Pickering of Blake Friedmann Literary Agency, everything has taken off. I’ve been with Avon HarperCollins for ten books, with more in the pipeline, and I’m published in about fourteen other languages and territories. I’ve been to number 1 in the Kindle UK chart, I’m a Sunday Times bestseller, and I’ve been in the Top 100 US Kindle chart and the Top 50 in Germany.

There have been challenges and setbacks along the way, of course, but I can’t think of anything that ‘didn’t work’. Although I continue to write a few short stories and two-parters, I’ve achieved my ambition of living on the earnings from my novels.

Huge congratulations, but also it is success that is well deserved!

Covid has affected everyone, directly or indirectly. How have you coped with lockdowns and keeping healthy?

I’m lucky that I have a garden and I live near a park. I’ve been able to continue writing because it means going to another place in my head every day, where people hug and kiss and mix freely. That’s not a bad state of mind in which to spend fifty or sixty hours each week. I’ve stuck to the guidelines and kept healthy, thank you. On the downside, my classes at the gym have collapsed, I haven’t seen some of my best friends for ages and I haven’t been able to go abroad. But I’ve been much more comfortably circumstanced than many so I live the best life I can.

What are you working on now?

I’ve just completed the edits for my winter book, Under the Mistletoe, which is set in ‘my’ village of Middledip and features Laurel who left the village when she was sixteen but now has to go back. The reason she left is still living in the village. I’m also in the middle of the first draft of my summer 2022 book. It’s set in France, which I chose because I’ve set a book there before and have my photos and memories for reference. A big park features heavily which, funnily enough, bears quite a resemblance to the one I walk around several times a week. The book’s about blended families and cybercrime. The cybercrime element is stretching my powers of understanding …

What goals do you have for the next five years?

Keep writing, keep selling – and hope I can sell more!

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Sue Moorcroft is a Sunday Times bestselling author, has reached the #1 spot on Kindle UK and top 100 in the US. She’s won the Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award, Readers’ Best Romantic Novel award and the Katie Fforde Bursary. Published by HarperCollins in the UK, US and Canada and by other publishers around the world.

An Interview with Cindy Kirk

My guest this month is prolific American author Cindy Kirk. Cindy is a writer who loves romance and has written many special editions for Harlequin.

When did you first discover the joys of story-telling or writing your own stories down?

I’ve loved books and stories for as long as I could remember.  If I didn’t like a book’s ending, I’d make up my own.  The same held for movies or televisions shows.  For a long, long time I thought that everyone made up different endings.  I wrote my first “book” when I was thirteen.  It was a romance, of course, with a happy ending!  I let one of my teachers read it and I could tell she didn’t think it was very good.  It was a devastating blow to my young writer’s soul.

Which novels inspired you, or you would rate as your all time favourites?

LaVryle Spencer’s Bitter Sweet and Separate Beds; Susan Elizabeth Phillips’s Dream a Little Dream and Nobody’s Baby But Mine; Lisa Kleypas’s Travis Series, Julia Quinn’s Bridgerton Series.

Could you share your journey to becoming a published author with us?

I wrote five books, it was the fifth that sold, 3 years after I started writing in pursuit of publication.  The book that sold won a contest.  The first prize was a critique of the entire manuscript by Harlequin editor, Patience Bloom.  She not only read it, she bought it.  And 15 years later, she’s still my editor!

What advice would you give to a new writer who has not made it into print yet?

To continue to hone your craft.  When I started writing, I began attending regional conferences for writers. Every year I attend the Romance Writers of America‘s National Conference and soak in all the wonderful information on how to write a better book.

Why romance?

I love a happy ending!  Not only in books but in movies.  I want to cheer for the hero or heroine, see them become stronger, learn life lessons, then be rewarded.

How did the ‘Jaunty Quills‘ develop?

I was writing also for Avon (Harper Collins) when a group of Avon authors decided to get together and start a blog.  At the time I was the only contemporary author.  The group has morphed over time to include authors from all different romance genres and publishers.  It’s been fun every step of the way.

What is the essence of a Cindy Kirk novel?

It’s a fun, enjoyable read with a dash of humor.

What is next for Cindy?

More books in my Jackson Hole series for Harlequin.  A return to Harper Collins with a novella that will release in December 2014.  And, who knows? That’s the beauty of writing.

More from Cindy