Great Big Blog Party 15 - Julie Bonello

For today's guest, we're going travelling again - this time to a lovely Mediterranean Island where I set my book Calypso's Enchantment.

Last Thursday when I quoted from a wonderful review of The Sicilian's Red-Hot Revenge, I mentioned that you'd be seeing more of the lady who wrote that review - and today is the day. Today's Guest Blogger is a very special reviewer for me. I wanted to include Julie Bonello in my guests because she has been reviewing my books for years - but before that, she wrote to me as a reader and a fan and we've become cyber friends as a result.

Julie lives on the beautiful island of Malta and so she and I share a love of this wonderful place which I visited with my family some years ago and would love to get back to visit if I can. One thing I envy this lady for is the amount of reading she manages and the number of books she gets through! As a reviewer for CataRomance.com, Julie is always prompt and efficient in delivering her reviews - and I always hold my breath just a little when I send a new book to her. When someone has enjoyed your work as much as she has over so many years, I would hate to disappoint her. Luckily I never have!

So here's Julie -

I began my love affair with Mills and Boon romances as a fourteen year old schoolgirl when I stole one from my mother’s shelf and I got swept away by a gorgeous hero, an independent heroine and descriptive and passionate writing which thrilled my teenage heart and began my addiction to all things romantic.

Now, many years later, I’m still in love with the genre. Mills and Boons have been with me through the good times and the bad. Whenever I am ill or feeling run down, a Mills and Boon romance is absolutely essential and when six or seven years ago, I had an awful bout of flu and had absolutely nothing to read, I sent my daughter off to the library to get me a couple of romantic novels and she returned with a novel by an M&B writer whose books I had never read, but who was to become one of my favourites – Kate Walker.

As soon as I read the first page of Rafael’s Love Child, I was absolutely hooked. I loved her gorgeous Alpha hero, admired her resolute heroine and just loved the novel’s blend of potent sensuality and intense dramatic emotion. I devoured Rafael’s Love Child in a single sitting and every single book of Kate’s I’ve read is on my keeper shelf and for me, one of the greatest pleasures in life is curling up with one of her novels in a comfy chair with a cup of tea by my side and escaping into the wonderful world she evokes – a world of passion, romance, emotion and drama which sucks me in from the very first page and which I always find impossible to put down.


I adore Kate Walker’s novels, but I also admire her as a woman for she is kind, generous, smart and a passionate advocate of the romance genre. Her books are a wonderful example of how well-written and intelligent romantic fiction truly is, so raise your glasses to a remarkable novelist and a wonderful woman and here’s looking forward to fifty more spellbinding novels!

GIVEAWAY:

Julie has very kindly offered to give away a couple of goodies from Malta as a prize to a lucky winner. (Makes me wish I could enter!)

QUESTION:

Julie says:
I’d like to ask everyone what was their first Kate Walker novel as I mentioned that mine was Rafael’s Love Child. Which was the very firts book by Kate Walker that you ever read?

As always answers in the comments please. Julie will be dropping by to join in the dicussion when she can. And I'll be intrigued to see who comes up with the oldest of my books and when you read it.