My top five romantic spots in Paris, City of Love
In this favourite destination for romantics, love is all around…
Category: Travel
The Taj Mahal, a symbol of enduring love
In Agra, India, on the banks of the river Yamuna, stands this Wonder of the World.
Poetry Week: ‘Travel’ by Robert Louis Stevenson
A call to travel, and to experience cultures: ‘I should like to rise and go…’
Source of life: the mighty Nile of Egypt
Song of the Nile, my new novel, is set in Upper Egypt, where the River Nile is a timeless part of the landscape and a crucial part of history and culture.
The Great Libraries of Alexandria
The new Bibliotheca Alexandrina is a treasure of my birthplace: Alexandria, Egypt. Not only is it beautiful and significant in and of itself, but it commemorates the Great Library of Alexandria built in the 200s BC, one of the most important libraries of all time. How could I fail to be inspired by such devotion to books?
New Year’s Eve traditions around the world
New Year’s Eve is a cause for celebration in many cultures: the end of the old and the start of the new; a clean slate; a time of hope. What traditions do you follow?
Welcome to Cádiz
The day I first visited Cádiz I just knew I must situate a love story there! The Moors compared the city to a ‘dish of silver in a bowl of blue’, so vivid are the colours there. It is a lovely city; the most beautiful in Spain, I think, and so today I want to introduce you to it briefly.
Travel as a means of challenging my heroines
‘For me, experiencing different cultures and their people is as essential a part of life as reading and writing. That is why all my novels are infused with a passion for travel…’
Favourite Parisian haunts: the cafés where history was made
‘Two cafés with long and prominent histories, Café de Flore and Les Deux Magots in Paris: inspirational, fascinating and a chance to brush shoulders with the ghosts of the greats…’
A place with music of its own: Villefranche
The story in my novel Concerto begins in a place I know well: Nice, in the French Riviera, a little way along from my summer home. The hero of the novel, Umberto, is Italian, and so it makes sense that he spends time in this part of France, so close to the French–Italian border.
The magnificent villas of Lake Como
When I decided upon Italy as the setting for my new novel, Concerto, I knew at once where I would set the story: beautiful, timeless Lake Como. More specifically, I knew the story would unfold in a villa, since the area is famous for these grand, belle époque residences with magnificent gardens of rare trees, exotic flowers and broad lawns, and narrow pink or mellow yellow stone staircases leading down to the edge of the lake.
Finding inspiration in literary tourism
On an ordinary street in Dumfries, Scotland, beside the River Nith, lies an extraordinary house. Moat Brae, which was built in 1823, is a quite
Lake Como: a ‘spot blessed by heaven’
At the heart of my latest novel, Concerto, is a great composer, Umberto Monteverdi. At least, Umberto was a great composer, until he lost his
Proud to be published in beautiful Macedonia
Publishing my novels has been quite the adventure for me, and by far my favourite aspect has been connecting with readers. At first, my readers
Welcome, Saint Basil: New Year traditions in Greece
What does the New Year holiday mean to you? Counting down to midnight, perhaps, and raising a toast to a prosperous new year; watching the
10 Christmas traditions from around the world
It’s the most magical time of the year – for children, of course, but for adults too who are infused with the spirit of Christmas.
Favourite settings from my fiction
‘We travel, some of us forever, to seek other places, other lives, other souls.’ So wrote novelist Anais Nin. What a perfect explanation for the
‘To travel is to live’ (and, for me, to write)
‘How vain it is to sit down to write when you have not stood up to live.’ So wrote Henry David Thoreau. When I was
Setting romance in inspiring settings
What ties together all of my novels? Romance, of course; but more than that, each is set in an inspiring place. My debut novel, Burning
Havens for bookworms: Literary hotels
In Liverpool, you can stay in a hotel modelled on the Titanic; in London, in an imitation Hogwarts; in Montana, in a Hobbit house… Themed
Seville’s Plaza de España, the most beautiful in Spain?
Did you know that the plaza – a large, open urban public space, especially a square – originated in Spain? The Spanish built them to
Gigantes, cabezudos and castells: very Spanish spectacles
Whenever I visit Spain, top of my ‘to do’ list is going to a festival. The Spanish love festivals: it’s a wonderful reason to come
Taking inspiration from the Andalucían almadraba
My latest novel, Legacy, is set in Cadiz, a city in Andalucía that is almost entirely surrounded by sea. This is the view from my
A visual tour of my novels’ landscapes
Earlier this week, I was hunting in my files for a photograph when it struck me just how many images I was browsing through. Since
An inspiration for my Andalucían Nights series: Gaudí’s architecture
In my latest novel, Legacy, the love story begins when the hero and heroine cross paths in Barcelona. I very much enjoyed setting the scene
Stepping back into the Roman Empire in Andalucía
There is so much that drew me to the Spanish region of Andalucía when it came time to choose a setting for my romantic trilogy.
Flamingos: striding into the imaginary
Here’s a little quiz question for you: Which bird features in my novel Burning Embers, set in Kenya, and my novel Indiscretion, set in Spain?
The Moorish legacy in Andalucía
Each of the Spanish regions has its own unique culture and history; but for me, the most beautiful and fascinating of them all is Andalucía.
10 unforgettable vistas in Cádiz
The city of Cádiz features in each of the novels in my Andalucían Nights trilogy. It’s such a vibrant, luminous city, it was an easy decision
Reading – and writing – around the world
Have you ever thought about the nationality of the authors whose books you read? Do you read books by writers from all different countries, or