Inspiration in Embo
What is this thing creative people call ‘inspiration’?
A dictionary definition describes it as: the process of being mentally stimulated to do or feel something, especially to do something creative.
I like that definition. That’s how it feels to me.
In 2016, we enjoyed a trip up to the north of Scotland to a wee village called Embo, a place we’d often visited and always loved. There is a caravan and camping park up there, called Grannie’s Heilan’ Hame, and we always stay in one of their static caravans.
While walking on the beach, I was ‘mentally stimulated’ or ‘inspired’ to write a new story, which I worked on and the published novel is called Gold Plated and is available in both paperback and kindle format.
Once again, we planned a trip to Embo this year, 2023. Due to age and health related problems, I hadn’t been writing for some time, but I decided I’d pack my laptop anyway – in case! And to my great delight, being there, in Embo, it happened again. Once more, while walking along the beach, I felt that mental stimulation to get creative and I decided to set another brand new novel right there in Embo. And I’m incredibly delighted and beyond excited. 💃
So, sorry, have to dash. I have a lot of research and writing to do 😀
You can find all my other novels on Amazon Kindle or FeedaRead.
Happy reading while I’m happily writing.
🌺🌸🌺
Smorgasbord Health Column 2023 – Recipes that Pack a Punch – Breakfast and Dessert – Smoothies and Fresh Fruit Salad by Sally Cronin
A very helpful food article from Sally Cronin, who really does know what she is talking about.
In this series I have shared recipes that pack a punch of nutrition and still taste delicious beginning with some breakfast recipes.By now you know that I believe in a ‘cook from scratch’approach to preparing meals and I have followed that philosophy for over forty years. In my mid-20s I was cooking food for 110 growing children three times a day, and the focus had to be on the nutrition as well as the taste. As a nutritional therapist for the last 26 years, I have shared these recipes with my clients to ensure that they never went hungry or deficient in the essential nutrients their bodies needed to be healthy.
Last time more breakfast/brunch recipes… Frittata and Tostada
In this post something for breakfasts but also for desserts that might also be the perfect anti-aging recipe and so much cheaper than all those expensive face creams!
Smoothies and…
View original post 1,544 more words
I’m not a proper poet
I’m not a poet, but sometimes the mood comes over me and I like to write poetry. While I was writing the novel, Making it Home, I wrote this poem, wrapped within the novel. I hope you like it, but please do keep in mind I lay no claim to being a proper poet 
I close my eyes that I may see that which my heart denies
It whispers loud, I cannot hear, as into the night it cries.
Where is the love you had for me?
Where are the ties that bind?
What will the cold morn bring to me,
If the truth I cannot find?
When we were young and blithe and free
My heart caressed your soul.
If ’twas for me you tarried here
Why am I now alone?
My love was true, my heart is broke.
You care not this to know.
The journey’s done, the voyage o’er, so whither shall I go?
~~~
Making it Home
Making it Home – only 99p on Kindle.
A contemporary story about three women who live and work in Edinburgh.
One of the things this novel explores is what happens when a woman leaves the home she’s lived in for twenty-eight years and the marriage she feels she’s stagnated in for thirty-five: where does she go? can she build a new life? where and how will she ‘make it home’?
Kate’s husband, Dan, was the one who shook her into leaving. He invaded and despoiled her private territory, the place of refuge she had created. He wasn’t a cruel man, just a thoughtless one, and the novel also looks at events from his viewpoint.
Another area of exploration is the world of two shopaholics, Phyllis and Naomi: why they shop; what they are really buying, and how they can stop.
I wrote this novel after realising that many of my friends and acquaintances were reaching a time in their lives and marriages when they felt a little ‘sidelined’ by life and needed something more. Some of them turn to ‘retail therapy’, usually with little success but many problems. Some of them seek out new jobs or new hobbies, usually with more success and fewer problems. There are those who do nothing, but remain feeling unfulfilled and a little cheated by life.
The feedback I have so far received from those who have read this book, is very positive. Many have identified with the characters and tell me that this novel has helped them to re-evaluate their lives.
A brief synopsis is:
Kate had a home, but her heart wasn’t in it… or in her marriage. So she left them both.
Phyllis had a home… and her heart was in it… but she wanted something more. So she shopped.
Naomi had no home and her heart was in cold storage, frozen by grief and fear. So she shopped.
They found one another in a department store in Edinburgh – shopping.
The trouble with ‘retail therapy’ is… you can overdose.
As friendship grows between these three women, they help one another face up to their problems, realising along the way, that every heart needs a home and it takes more than a house to make one.
Making It Home
Three Books
For the past wee while, I’ve been sharing about Family Matters, and now it’s the turn of Making it Home, and then Flying Free. These were my first three published books, mostly written when my family were young, and published when four of the five had got married and flown the nest.
They took a long time to write, at first by hand, then on an old typewriter – with the help of lots of Tippex – then an old second hand computer, and eventually a laptop.
The journey from idea to publication has become a lot quicker for me since then, but the careful crafting of each book has hardly changed. Always caring to give potential readers my best, I’ve always done many editing drafts and rewrites, and always had them proofread, so the biggest difference in the time is the physical process of transferring thoughts to manuscripts ready to be published.
It’s a bit like introducing people to your children. These are my three oldest. I hope you get to meet the others through time.
They’re all clean reads, as in no swearing, graphic sex or violence. There is however, plenty love, friendship, passion and intrigue in them all.
So, would you like to know more about Making it Home?
Watch this space 
Author Profile
Kindle:
http://author.to/ChristineCampbell
Paperback:
Stronskavaal House
Although my latest novel, Stronskavaal House, follows on from The Reluctant Detective series, it can be read alone. You’ll soon get to know the characters even if you didn’t yet read the series, so don’t hesitate to read it right away.
As with all my novels, it is Contemporary fiction, classed as Women’s Fiction, but I have many gentlemen who thoroughly enjoy reading my novels too. Available both in Amazon Kindle and as a Paperback, it is also a ‘clean read’ without swearing, sex or violence, although there is romance. So who will fall in love in Stronskavaal House? Can you guess?
Some of the things readers are saying about The Reluctant Detective Series:
“I purchased the entire Reluctant Detective series on Kindle to read on holiday. I became thoroughly engrossed almost immediately. The characters are well drawn and the story is very engaging. Recommended holiday read!”
“The books are brilliant. There is pathos, humour and a clever story line that never fails to amuse or twist in ways you don’t expect. The one issue I had with the three of these books was the difficulty in putting them down, I thought the first book couldn’t sustain the pace or originality in a sequel let alone two but it did. You feel you have made friends with the characters, even some of the rogues , you meet on the journey.”
” I just couldn’t put the 3rd book down. I was desperate to see how it ended so was stirring the soup with the book in my hand! Off to bed early to read in peace and quiet and, of course ,when it was finished I wished that I had made it last longer. Now, that is the sign of a really good read. It would make a great T.V. series. How good would that be?”
In Stronskavaal House, you’ll meet those same endearing characters and follow Mirabelle as she helps solve a new mystery, and if there is anybody out there who knows of a good TV producer looking for a new series…
See you ahead, folks … 🌺🌸🌺
Jigsaw
Neist Point
I love jigsaws. Always have, ever since I was a little girl. But for a while now, and for various reasons, I’ve found it difficult to do traditional jigsaws, so I started doing jigsaws online on my iPad. The only drawback of doing them this way is that, at least on the App I use, the scenes are never named.
What joy then to come across a view I know. Neist Point Lighthouse is one of the most famous lighthouses in Scotland and can be found on the most westerly tip of Skye near the township of Glendale. But even more exciting for me than doing a jigsaw of a place I know – it’s also a place I have written about in my latest novel. How much fun is that?
Some of the characters in the novel, Stronskavaal House, have visited Neist Point and discuss its merits, which include fabulous views from the top of the cliffs as well as the lighthouse itself being an interesting old Stevenson lighthouse.
Stronskavaal House is available both in Kindle and Paperback formats.
Why not join Mirabelle and her friends and family on the beautiful Scottish Island of Skye, and read where else they visit and what else they get up to. There’s a mystery and a romance to read about as well as the chance to get to know the characters and the Island.
Meanwhile, I’ll continue to enjoy doing my online jigsaws, keeping an eye out for other scenes I know or have written about.
NEW Release!!
Yes, it’s here at last! After all the glitches and difficulties– mostly of my own making – I’m delighted to announce that my latest novel, Stronskavaal House, has come through unscathed, looking sprightly, and is now available to buy on Amazon Kindle and as a paperback.
This is a second follow-up book to the Reluctant Detective series, featuring most of the same characters, including the main characters Mirabelle and Sam. It could be read as part of the series or as a stand-alone. It is set partly in Edinburgh and partly on the Island of Skye, where Sam was born and brought up, and where he and Mirabelle met.
Mirabelle and Sam’s daughter and granddaughter, Summer and Rosie, live on the Island of Skye in an old guest house owned by two friends of Mirabelle’s, Kay and Esme.
Esme and Kay have ambitious plans to build an extension to Stronskavaal House but they are beset by no end of problems and they begin to fear the work is being deliberately sabotaged. But by whom and why?
Could it be prejudice against incomers to the community?
Or is there a different, far more sinister reason?
While Mirabelle is visiting, she and Esme join forces to investigate the mystery. What they uncover has far-reaching effects on all of them.
Don’t forget, you can buy your copy now, on Amazon Kindle or as a paperback.
Enjoy!
The Waiting Game
I did it!! I pressed the appropriate button and my print-ready novel has been submitted to the publisher.
Stronskavaal House is on its way 🎉💃🎉
Now I must be patient until the publisher lets me know I can order a copy to check over, make sure it’s all in order – and when/if it is, I’ll be able to release it into the world.
Meanwhile, so that I can wait patiently, I’m getting on writing the next novel 🤦♀️ I know, I know! I said this would be my last but – what can I say – I’m a writer 🤷🏼♀️
I might do a bit of napping too 😴
cicampbellblog 