A Pinch of Salt: New Book Announcement

And now for something completely different…

Happy New Year! I’m starting it off by announcing a new book, A Pinch of Salt, which will be out in early March. (If the name is familiar, it might be because I posted an excerpt from the unedited version a couple of years ago, and some of you may have read seen it on the story boards; I posted it around 2016, if I remember correctly. Both have since been deleted.)

Unlike the other books I’ve published, this one is a modern. It is a Pride and Prejudice-Top Chef/cooking competition mash up, which might sound like an odd combination, but it made perfect sense to me as I was plotting the story. I love to cook, and I have long been a fan of cooking competition shows. Given this, I starting thinking about how some of our favourite characters would act if they were contestants in such a show. The result is A Pinch of Salt. In short, there are ten contestants—naturally including our dear couple, Elizabeth Bennet and ‘Will’ Darcy—and they are forced to spend a lot of time together, some more than others as they are eliminated one by one. Some people form friendships, others create trouble, and there is a lot of talk of food. While there are definitely serious aspects of the book, it is also meant to be somewhat lighthearted.

The book is set in Canada, where I live. The competition itself is filmed in Calgary, Albert.

For those of you who read the story on the boards, I have completely edited it—no surprise—and modified some of the challenges. In doing so, I tried my keep the spirit of the story, especially the essential aspects.

Who are the contestants?

1. Elizabeth Bennet
2. Charles Bingley
3. Sterling Bramwell
4. Colin Collins
5. Will Darcy
6. Anne de Bourgh
7. Tom Fitzwilliam
8. Caroline Hurst
9. Charlotte Lucas
10. George Wickham

Will, Sterling, and Tom are related. Sterling is married to Will’s paternal cousin, Rebecca Darcy, and Tom is his cousin on his mother’s side, just as in canon. They are all very good friends. Elizabeth and Charlotte live in the same small town (fictional Meryton, Ontario) and are best friends. It’s possible that Colin is overly enamoured of his boss, Catherine Hunsford, and that Anne has little to say for herself; she is one of Austen’s silent characters, i.e., one who does not actually speak in the novels.

A televised show needs hosts and judges, and for them, I went outside of Austen and to…my cats! I used the names of family cats present and past, as well as those of my daughter’s Guinea pigs. Where possible, some of their traits show up in the book’s characters. I had a lot of fun writing A Pinch of Salt. J

I’ll be back at the start of February to reveal the cover and share an excerpt. A Pinch of Salt will be released on 4 March, and in a post release week, I’ll tell you more about who inspired me when writing the ‘extra’ characters, complete with photos!

I’m so excited to be releasing A Pinch of Salt!

Thanks for reading. Have a wonderful day.