I read and I like with Manda

So I pinned Manda down to tell us what she does and doesn't like to read...

Over to you Manda...

READER OR WRITER?  BOTH AND PROUD OF IT.

I’ve been wracking my brains wondering how to start this blog post.  The usual spiel of ‘I’ve been a reader all my life’ seems to send readers snoring.  Instead I’m going to start with…

Hi I’m Amanda and I have been fascinated with words since I found a dictionary and became obsessed with the word laboratory.  The way it sounded, and wrote it down time after time.

Now you all know exactly how strange I appear to be, please don’t go away screaming.  I have news to impart. 

I am a wife, mother and grandmother and at the rather decrepit age of 42 I find myself standing on my soapbox talking to all who will listen about a certain subject, because I read. I read A LOT.  My appetite for reading is on par with that of my love for quiche, and Richard Armitage.  My bookshelves are lined with paperbacks and hard back.  Genres from sweet inspirational and Amish romance are there, historical, mainstream romance and erotica.  On my bookshelves there is pretty much every genre of romantic fiction.  The bottom shelves have my passion for non-fiction about the Royal families of Europe.

I have authors I remain faithful to and buy their books pretty much automatically, however, their recent ones for me have not been up to their standard, and I’m thinking to myself, ‘You wrote this?’ To me if something isn’t broken, don’t fix it.  One author (and I won’t mention names) brought out a book and added so many ingredients to it, taking it from a moreish fruit cake, to something completely inedible. 

The only genre I really do not read is suspense and murder mysteries.  I’m very naughty and read the end, find out who did it and then that’s it for me.  Apologies to the murder mystery authors. 

I apologise for digressing.  Back onto the news I have to impart.  At this stage in my life, I find myself with a slight issue.  The lack of romantic fiction featuring the older hero and heroine.  Not the high end fantasy ones, but something that will give the reader an ‘achievable fantasy’.  I have remained faithful to one publisher most of my teenage/adult life, but now I find myself becoming rather disillusioned at the fact I have to go to American sites to buy the reading material I want.  In a nutshell, as I’m growing older, I would like them to grow with me. When I would love to have the option of buying them from my own country.  Which I would do, if they were available.  I do not like chick-lit.  I haven’t found one that really grabs my interest.  I could prattle for ages about this but I won’t. Instead I ended up writing my own reading material, and I am very lucky in that two publishers have published them. 

Just because we are getting older and certain parts of our bodies are less perky and firm, does not make us any the less loveable, attractive and capable of enjoying a romance novel. As Mark Darcy said to Bridget Jones “I’m rather fond of your wobbly bits”.   Now that line is memorable. 

My perfect read is simple.  Give me a book that at the end I can have a huge grin on my face or tears rolling down my cheeks.  A quality story that takes me from one emotion to the other seamlessly with an ending that satisfies.  Rather like a warm, fluffy quiche.

See told you I was easy to please.

As well as an avid reader, I am also an author with Books To Go Now and Secret Cravings Publishing and proof-reader.

My website is http://amandajward.weebly.com/