Today we have the lovely Nicky Penttila here
telling us about her latest book.
Where can your readers find you?
Where’s your favorite place to hang out online? Twitter
Tell us about your latest book, including its genre.
A Note of Scandal is a romantic historical novel
that takes place in London just after Waterloo. To help a struggling
soldier-friend, Miss Olivia Delancey sells her musical composition to Will
Marsh, a hard-driving newspaper publisher, and then falls for him.
Unfortunately, he is the first of a new breed of newspaper man – the kind who
report just the facts, not the spin and never lies. Olivia struggles to keep her secrets from this unsuitably alluring
publisher, and Will fights to find the truth without losing his hold on this
bright-eyed angel who has descended into his life. Who will win?
What can we expect from you in the future?
Next month my first novella comes out, Babysitting the Billionaire.
After writing historical for a while, it was fun to switch gears and write the
way regular people talk today! I hope readers enjoy Washington, DC, as a
setting, too, because I've got plenty more
stories to tell about it. I also
have in the works two regency historical stories in unusual settings:
Manchester, England, and Galicia, Spain.
Do your fans' comments and letters influence you in any way?
Yes! Comments help me keep going, especially when I
get stuck in low gear. Comments also help me decide which story to tell
next; my sisters-in-law love to read romance but prefer contemporaries, and
kept telling me so, and look what happened.
Why did you decide to write romance novels?
I spent almost two decades writing and editing for newspapers, where
so many of the stories don’t have happy endings. A relentless diet of sad news
can wear you down. So when I started learning to write fiction, happy endings
were a requirement.
Who has influenced your writing?
I was glad to discover Carla Kelly’s Signet and Harlequin historical
romances. She showed me there
really was a market for Regency characters who weren’t strictly Society types
and for stories that take on the current issues of the day as well as tell a
beautiful love story.
After you've written your book and it's been published, do you ever
buy it and/or read it?
Sure – I buy each one in one e-version or another, to see how they
look “in the wild.” And I must admit I do have to refer to it to recall details
like hair and eye color and what makes up each character’s specific voice. I
think because of my reporting experience, when I had to become an expert in
social policy one day, write an article, then next day fill my brain about
space travel and write another, then next day learn about modern art, etc., I
have a tendency not to hold onto many details. Apparently, there’s only so much
working memory at my disposal!
Which comes first, the story, the characters, or the setting?
It’s been different every time. Olivia in A Note of Scandal was
a secondary character who called out for her own story. Babysitting the
Billionaire grew out of a visit to the Building Museum in Washington,
seeing the workers prepping for a big party and wondering who would be
attending.
What do you enjoy most about writing?
Solving the puzzles – getting in words something I see or touch or
feel. Also, happy endings!
What do you hope readers take with them after reading your work?
Life is a wondrous work in progress, and we all get second chances.
Please fill the blanks with your favorites!
Dessert: Key lime pie
City: London
Season: Fall
Type of hero: Honorable, strong, complicated but he knows he is and
has a sense of humor about it
Type of heroine: Smart, resilient, adventurous, a little dreamy and
schemey
Book:
Genre: Sensual romantic historical
Author: Nicky Penttila
Publisher: Evernight Publishing
ISBN: 978-1-77130-026-1
Page Count: 253
Buy links:
Excerpt:
Major Avery pushed Will’s shoulder to the left. “There, toward the
window. Lecturing that vision in blue silk.”
Will saw the woman first. Her delicate elbow was trapped in a
black-furred mitt of a hand, apparently that of Mr. Jeremy Mellon, M.P. He had
angled himself as if pushing her toward the muddied wall. As he leered over
her, she stood very still. Though she stood in profile to him, Will could tell
even her eyes remained still. The weak light from the smoke-fogged window
gained luster, passing through the gold-blond ringlets framing her face. All
her attention was on Mellon.
“Can you believe that waistcoat?” Avery snorted. “Is it puce?”
Will pulled his gaze away from the lady to take in her companion.
“Plum. Latest thing.” His gaze flicked back to the lovelier form.
“Drinking in dear Cousin Olivia?” Avery accepted a mug of over-yeasty
ale from the passing barkeep.
“Olivia Delancey?”
“The Honorable. And once my intended. Seems I’ve cocked that up, as
well.” He sipped the foam off the top of the ale. “Too bad I can’t invite you
to sup with us tonight. Should be a right circus.”
“She hangs so on his words.” Will frowned, and then caught himself.
She was not the story; that florid piece of political beef beside her was.
“Can’t you see? Look at her chin. The edge, there, under her ear.” It
was pale, but even at a distance he could see a slight tremor. A crack in the
chiseled beauty.
“She’s ill?”
“White-hot angry, my friend.” Will tore his gaze from the porcelain
lady to raise an eyebrow at him.
“Trust me,” Avery said, “she has had that tiny flaw since she was a
dandled babe.”
“Taken advantage of it, have you?” Will’s eyes narrowed, oddly
protective. Avery put up his hands in mock surrender.
“Only a very small snake.” He grinned. “Down the back of her dress, at
a tea party.”
“And all she did was set her chin?” Ladies were cold, he knew, but
that sounded downright frigid.
“At first. Then the screaming started.” Avery pushed into the crowd.
“We’d best remove the poor man from danger, don’t you think?”
Though the room was small, they made slow progress through the swells
of men reeking of sour beef, stale beer, and sweat. Wishing to avoid even the
appearance of aggression, so swift a complaint to launch against newsmen, Will
allowed Avery to lead. But he did not take his gaze from the lady. Mellon’s
hand had crept up to her shoulder. Was he pulling her closer?
Will’s hand fisted. He might need to punch his quarry before
interviewing him.
“Mellon.” Avery stepped between the couple, allowing the society jewel
to take a step back, arm intact. Will stopped short beside her.
When her attention was elsewhere, her round, full lips dominated her
face, the bottom line of the lower lip parallel with the soft oval of her jaw
line. But no one would notice the rest of her face, or the fragile cream of her
skin, when she turned her gaze on them. Eyes like sapphires, expensive and
rare. And crackling with anger.
“Avery. A major now? Felicitations.” Mellon latched onto his new prey,
pumping Avery’s hand up and down as if to draw water. “I know you’ll agree with
me.”
“I have no doubt. What was the question?”
The Diana of Westminster turned her gaze to her cousin. Will forced
himself to look away, toward Mellon. His reason for being here.
Then she spoke, and ruined his best efforts.
“Mr. Mellon has been … informing me … of yet another weakness of my
sex.” Her musical voice dripped honeyed venom. “We cannot create.” She flicked
an eyebrow at her cousin, sharing an unspoken joke.
Nicky Penttila lives in
the DC metro area, after working for newspapers in Hartford, San Francisco, and
Baltimore. She loves honorable (if a little complicated) heroes and adventurous
(if a little dreamy) heroines who may not solve all the world’s problems but
not for lack of trying. She is a omnivorous reader, any book is fair game, but
she always returns to her first loves, historical fiction and science
fiction/fantasy.
A woman who lost everything.
