What's Rhys writing? Too many things. She's confused

 RHYS BOWEN: This year has not been easy for me to focus on writing. John had weeks of radiation, I had surgery on my knee, then bits frozen off by the dermatologist then a tooth extracted an in implant put in. Not fun!! But I managed to finish the next Royal Spyness book, called WE THREE QUEENS, and sent it off last week.

Today I'm celebrating the publication of the paperback of ALL THAT IS HIDDEN, and then we drive to Arizona in time for the launch of IN SUNSHINE OR IN SHADOW.

Oh, and I have already started on next year's stand-alone novel that has the delicious title of MRS. ENDICOTT'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE. Middle aged lady escapes her boring life for the south of France...

Whoever imagines the golden years as sitting in a rocking chair, crocheting, has not met me. I barely have time to breathe. But at least I don't have time to be bored!.

I thought I'd share a snippet from the new Royal Spyness book. You'll have to find out who the three queens are... I'm not telling. But poor Georgie. Guess what's about to happen to her.....

“So what is David going to do?” I asked. “The simplest thing would be to keep her as his mistress. Several of my ancestors have lived quite happily with this arrangement—think of Lily Langtry, Alice Keppel.”

                Darcy gave a grunted chuckle. “The last King Edward had more than his share of mistresses, I agree, but he also had a respectable long suffering wife to be at his side on state occasions. You can’t picture Mrs. Simpson receiving foreign heads of state or sitting on an elephant at a durbar.”

                “What a mess,” I said. “I’m sure he won’t give her up.”

                “He won’t,” Darcy said. “He made that quite clear. He’d rather give up the throne than her.”

“Golly.” I tried to swallow back the word too late. My attempts at curtailing my schoolgirl language were not successful in times of crisis.

“He’s absolutely besotted with her.,” Darcy continued. “ She has him completely under her spell.  When we’d got through a bottle of Scotch he kept saying, “You don’t understand, Darcy, old fellow, she’s the most marvelous woman in the world. I couldn’t live without her.”

                “So what does he plan to do?”

                “Allow the newspapers to spill the beans at the right moment, I gather. They’ve been remarkably obedient so far and kept the news of her from the public. But now he wants the public on his side. They adore him and he’s sure that they’ll want him to marry the woman he loves and thus put pressure on their local MPs. The law will be changed and he’ll live happily ever after.”

                “That isn’t likely to happen, is it?”

                “I don’t think so. If it were just civil law then maybe. But you can’t alter the doctrine of the church and he’s the official head of it.”

                “His poor mother,” I said. I had become quite fond of Queen Mary, who had sent me on various assignments for her. She was a stickler for the rules and felt the royal family should be above reproach. She had done everything she could to get her son’s attention away from “that woman” as she called her, but to no avail. His late father, King George, had been remarkably prophetic. “That boy will be the downfall of the monarchy,” he had said not long before he died.  I just prayed this wasn’t going to turn out to be a true prophesy. We had endured one war between king and parliament in our history and it had ended with the king losing his head.  Someone should remind my cousin of this.

                A thought now struck me. “Darcy, why did he particularly want you to listen to his lament? He has his own group of friends, doesn’t he, and you were never close to him.”

                “Ah.” Darcy gave a deep breath. “It wasn’t exactly me he wanted. It was our house.”

                “What? What do you mean?”

                “He knows that the moment the news breaks Mrs. Simpson will be hounded by the press. It could break before he’s ready as the American papers are already full of it. He wants to spare her the unpleasantness that could ensue. He wants her safely far from the public eye…”

                It was gradually dawning on me exactly what he was saying.

                “He wants her to come and stay here?”  I heard my voice rising.  

AHA

And Mrs. Simpson isn't the only person who will be invading Georgie and Darcy's life. It's going to get rather complicated very quickly. But you'll have to wait until November to find out more.

Oh well. Back to work. And don't forget that IN SUNSHINE OR IN SHADOW comes out on March 12, and Clare and I will be holding a launch party at the Poisoned Pen in Phoenix the Saturday before, on March 9. If you'd like a copy signed by both of us do get in touch with the store and they can ship you one.

And don't forget to check out Reds and Readers on March 12 when I'll be going live and giving away a signed copy!