Doesn't summer go by quickly! It hardly seems a moment since I was planting my garden and now I'm harvesting. I'm not an intensive gardener, but I enjoy it, and I have to plant my scarlet runner beans. They're a pole bean that's the commonest sort in England, but impossible to buy here. They really only produce in July and August, so I pick them daily then -- and they seem to grow inches over night! -- and freeze what we don't eat.

If you're a North American gardener and like to experiment, I suggest trying some. The scarlet flowers are very pretty and hummingbirds love them. The beans are delicious. You'll have to give them something to grow up, and they can grow eight feet high or more, and it's essential to pick them young. They get tough and stringy when old.

Enough of gardening, though you might have noticed that in my books my characters often have something to do with a garden in season. Perhaps I'm writing about gardens here because the last three haven't offered much scope. Winter Fire was set in December, and the closest to garden activity was gathering in the Christmas greenery. Skylark was in the autumn, so didn't have much scope other than picking flowers for Hal Gardeyne's grave. And the book I've just finished, A Most Unsuitable Man, follows on from Winter Fire in the same season. I'll definitely be writing about summer next!

Next will be Simon St. Bride's book -- the Rogue who's managed to hide from me. He's being predictably shifty as I try to capture his story, but I'll get him on the page for you eventually.

I'm beginning to look ahead to the readers cruise in October. I hope to meet some of you there. If you've already booked you'll know that I'm hostess for a gambling night. We'll be exploring some of the games played in a Georgian gaming hell.

Here's a repeat of the upcoming booklist, new and reissued.

Nov 2004 WINTER FIRE (reissue)
Dec 2004 DANGEROUS JOY (reissue)
Jan 2005 SOMETHING WICKED (reissue)
Feb 2005 A MOST UNSUITABLE MAN
Aug 2005 FORBIDDEN MAGIC (reissue)
Jan 2006 LORD OF MIDNIGHT (reissue)
Mar 2006 Simon, I assume.

I suspect many of you are Anglophiles, as you like reading books set in England. Did you know that you can listen to the wonderful BBC? You can listen in real time, of course, but also catch some old programs including plays and books.Click here to go there.

To get a feel for English life, why not sample The Archers, a long-running radio series about country life? Or listen to The Norman Way about the Norman Conquest, background to my medieval novels

All best wishes,

Jo
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