Guess What the Cat Just Let Outta the Bag?

Last Friday, I got my first paycheck. Could it be that I am finally moving out of perpetual Micawberism to something a bit more...pocket-moneyish? Seems like. The first week of nannying went quite well and my two wards and I even wrote and illustrated bed-time books for them. That was, after all, Lila's (5) first condition upon hearing I was an author: "Can Miss Rachel help me write a book? She can write the words and I'll draw the pictures." And so we did. This masterpiece is entitled: The Princess And Her Dragon and is about a royal who is afraid of the dark and the brave and "huge-big" dragon named William who is given to her as a gift to puff fire all night so she won't be without light. Lila dictated to me and most of the words were her own. (Including the rather pithy line: "And she was no longer afraid because she had the moon and the stars and fire and she knew that light was on her side.") In case you were wondering, for Lila, this was rather autobiographical. All except the dragon part. She specifically asked to write a book to read before bed so she would not be afraid.

I am excited for two reasons:

#1: I ought to be getting Elisabeth Grace Foley's Mrs. Meade Mysteries Vol. I today and I am looking forward to being able to read these stories in paperback edition. I am in the middle of three books right now so I can't start straight away, but I shall soon!

#2: Anne Elisabeth emailed me this morning and we have an official release date for Five Glass Slippers! Not certain whether it was meant to be public but I tweeted and spilled the proverbial beans before giving it much thought so, you will all be able to purchase this amazing collection of stories on

June 14th, 2014

And you know what's even cooler about this news? You can officially pre-order Five Glass Slippers on Amazon.com! Also, go add it on Goodreads too! I know it's an amazing book because I let myself read the first chapter or two of each story and not only are the stories rather wonderful, but the book itself is precious in terms of interior design. You'll simply have to wait to find out what's what because I obviously cannot show you the galley-proof I also received in my inbox. If I've been a bit in regards to my own writing, it is only because I'm still editing Anon, Sir, Anon and it's going slowly because of work and on top of this, I'm about to start formatting a friend's debut novel and I'm in the depths of reading a certain amazing epic that, for all its virtues, must be read on the computer and is undoubtedly long (Wonderfully long, but length means time). So all that means that even if I knew what my next project was going to be, I have no time for it yet. So there. If you are interested to learn more about the various Cinderellas in Five Glass Slippers, you must head over to the blog dedicated to just such things and check it out! I cannot wait for June to come around so you can all read The Windy Side of Care...truly, I have a feeling you're going to like Alis... And now for some entirely random items on the list of things that you didn't need to know but will probably be interesting all the same:

Hand massages feel divine

Someone actually made the scones from my last post 

 If I was a character from LotR, I would be Sam, evidently

Agents of SHIELD's latest episode just about killed me

I am apparently a good public speaker

I am fonder than ever of Wodehouse

Our team is officially over 100% funded for our trip to Romania!