Guest Post AND Giveaway - Jill Mansell - Millie's Fling!!

I am absolutely thrilled to bits to welcome guest blogger and author Jill Mansell to A Bookworm's World today!

Hi Luanne, and many thanks for inviting me to write my first ever guest blog! I do so hope you enjoy Millie’s Fling, which is set in Cornwall in the UK. Cornwall is one of my all-time favourite places – it’s so beautiful and it’s where we used to spend holidays when I was a child. The sun, the surf, the amazing beaches and the smugglers’ caves – I loved everything about it. We used to stay in quaint country cottages back in those days and shell-collecting was the highlight of my holiday. Then years passed and in due course I found myself a grown-up with kids of my own. Where else to go than Devon and Cornwall? But this time we stayed at holiday camps, in caravans, with hundreds of other children all around and non-stop entertainment day and night. It would be some people’s idea of hell, but it suited us down to the ground.

So to set a book in a place I love is always a joy, because in a way it’s like spending time back there and smelling that glorious sea air again. Newquay has changed over the years, but I’m still writing about the town I love and remember from my precious holidays. It has one of the best surfing beaches in the UK, although sadly I never did learn how to surf. If I were to visit it now, I’d be looking out for Millie and her friends, for the houses they lived in, the imaginary places they visited.

And now to the book. It really was the most brilliant fun to write. I don’t even know if you have novelty telegram services in the U.S. – maybe you don’t – but they’re always a talking point! When I worked in the neurological hospital, one of our consultant neuropsychiatrists had a visit from a strippagram on his birthday, done very tastefully, no nudity, but an unforgettable photo-opportunity. I still have the pictures! Another time, one of the nurses received a singing telegram from a gorgeous guy dressed as a fireman who scooped her up and ran around the hospital with her in his arms. I decided on the roller-skating gorillagram for Millie because unglamorous is always funnier than glamorous. But it’s a career jam-packed with wonderful opportunities for the novelist – so many things can happen, so much can go wrong...for a comedy writer like me, the possibilities are endless!

So, to all of you out there reading this, have any of you ever been on the receiving end of a singing telegram/strippagram/rollerskating gorillagram??? Was it funny? Was it embarrassing? Did you want to run away and hide or did you love it? Tell me – I’d love to know!

About the Author:
Jill Mansell is one of the UK’s premiere contemporary authors who has written nearly 20 romances with multi-generational appeal and has sold nearly 4 million copies of her books in the UK. Releasing her latest novel this Fall, Millie’s Fling, Mansell’s writing style can be best described as “Sex & the City meets Bridget Jones’s Diary.” She worked for many years at the Burden Neurological Hospital, Bristol, and now writes full time. She lives with her partner and their children in Bristol, England. For more information on Jill in the UK, please visit http://www.jillmansell.co.uk/, and for info on her US releases, go to http://www.sourcebooks.com/spotlight/jill-mansell.html!

Thank you so much for stopping by Jill! (In case you missed it, you can read my review of Millie's Fling here - I loved it!) And I know you will too! Courtesy of Sourcebooks, (thanks Danielle!) I have two copies of Jill's latest North American release - Millie's Fling to giveaway. To be entered, just answer Jill's question at the end of her interview! Ends Saturday Sept 26th at 6pm EST. Open to both Canada and the US.