Guest Blogger Julia Knight - Mary, Mary...

Quite contrary. That is me in a nutshell, or so my mother tells me. Ask me to do something, and I’ll probably say yes. Tell me to…and well, let’s hope luck is on your side. I’m not sure why—I may have an ingrown stubborn gland or something. My husband’s favourite phrase (well, after “It’s beer o’clock”) is “I suppose there’s no point me saying ‘No you can’t’, is there?”

So when it came to writing an historical, as opposed to my previous fantasies—where women can behave how I say so, lol—it was a bit of a bind. Because, well, in many eras most women had to do what they were told, or else. Which is why I always loved/identified with Scarlett O’Hara perhaps, because she wouldn’t be told either (and yes it gets me into trouble same as it did her! Though not quite the same trouble). And Boudica, who went to war rather than be told, or Cleopatra, who mostly did the telling. So when I had the idea to do a pirate romance, while I was standing on HMS Victory and drooling over sailors in uniform, I knew it had to be the heroine who was the pirate. Because if I’d have lived then, there is no way I’d have been doing as I was told…

Now, Catherine Harcourt, my Wicked Lady in my latest Samhain release, is not me. I tend not to steal things, like ships. Or jewels. Or anything, in fact. I’d probably cut myself if I tried to use a sword, and klutz that I am, I’d almost certainly blow my own foot off with a flintlock. I don’t go around in disguise so I can fleece someone of money. When I see an attractive gent, my first thought is not how I can use him to steal something else (preferably involving taking him to bed at some point). I do not plot and scheme, except for my books. But we do have one or two things in common. Catherine also will not be told. By anyone. And under our prickly exteriors, we’re both rather gooey in the middle.

So do you identify with any historical figures, fictional or otherwise? Who really gets under your skin?

And so to the blurb.

Nice girls love a sailor. Naughty girls are quite partial, too.
When a man she thought she loved offered Lady Catherine Harcourt a life wrapped in a velvet bow, she took it. That life wrapped her in velvet chains. Now her status as a respectable widow allows her virginal alter ego, Cecily, to relieve milksop-for-blood dandies of their riches and go back where she belongs. The sea—aboard her pirate ship.
The one knot in her sail is Paul Ambury. Daring, irresistible, and a lieutenant in the Royal Navy. Yet the temptation to indulge in his gorgeous body—all in the name of the plan, of course—is too much to resist.
Paul has known his share of empty-headed society women, and fiercely intelligent Catherine doesn’t fit. When he wakes up adrift in a longboat after a blazing night together, he knows why. She took him for a fool—and took his ship.
Plus, the evil little genius has him neatly trapped. If he reveals why he lost his ship, he faces court martial. If he does his duty, he must find her and hang her—the one woman with whom he’s fallen in love. Damn it…

Julia Knight is married with two children and the world’s daftest dog. She lives in Sussex, UK, and when not writing she likes riding motorbikes, watching wrestling (it’s the muscles, sweat and baby oil combo) and exploring new ways to get a giggle out of life.

To learn more about Julia Knight, please visit www.juliaknight.co.uk.

And for the last, I’d like to say thanks for having me.