You know how much I adore England .... today's guest is an English rose living in Texas. Please join me in welcoming Ann Summerville as she celebrates the release of THE BERTON HOTEL:
At the end of the millennium, Lily found herself driving toward a small Texas town where her great grandmother had disappeared over fifty years ago. Expecting to escape from yet another relationship in California that hadn’t ended well, the first person she meets is a charming Texan with brown eyes and blond hair. While trying to avoid anything that might resemble a romantic encounter, Lily gets to know the citizens of Crystal Wells and uncovers a lot more than her great grandmother’s disappearance in 1935. A mystery buried deeper than one of the local wells may bring to light more secrets than Lily has bargained for.
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| 1911 Photo of Woodmen of the World Convention in Mineral Wells, Texas houstorian.wordpress.com |
Kim: Tell us a little about yourself!
Ann: I grew up in London and lived in Cornwall for about ten years before moving to the U.S.
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| Ann's picture of Cornwall |
Kim: What do you miss most about England?
Ann: When I lived and worked in London I loved wandering around the backstreets and researching history. I read any book I could get my hands on by Jean Plaidy and Anya Seton and tried to find places mentioned in those books. (There isn’t anything very old here in Texas.) Moving from the city to a small village on the coast of England was a big adjustment. Everyone moved at a much slower pace. We lived in a cottage on the cliffs overlooking a beach that had three miles of sand when the tide went out. Village life is so different. Everyone has a connection and there is such a sense of camaraderie. I used my experiences moving from London to Cornwall in my book A Graceful Death, which is the first book in the Lowenna series. (Lowenna means joy in Cornish).
Kim: In one sentence, how would you describe your latest book, THE BERTON HOTEL, to someone who knows nothing about it?
Ann: The Berton Hotel delves into the mystery of a woman, who disappeared in the 1930s from a prominent Texas hotel, and her great-granddaughter’s quest to find out what happened to her.
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| The Driskill Hotel - a historic hotel in Austin Look closely as the vintage cars! |
Kim: Where can we find out more about your book?
Other e-reader formats are on
Smashwords.Com at this link.
Kim: What is your favourite character in THE BERTON HOTEL?
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| americancowboy.com |
Kim: What is your favourite character in THE BERTON HOTEL?
Ann: I grew attached to all the characters, but I think Truitt is my favourite because despite the changes around him, he stays constant and neither tries to impress anyone, nor change to fit in. He is confident without being conceited and who doesn’t love a cowboy?
Kim: What’s new for 2012?
Ann: I’m currently working on the third book in the Lowenna Series, Gwinnel Gardens. It’s about overgrown gardens in Cornwall that the villagers are uncovering and of course there will be a murder that Gia and her friend Holly will be involved in solving.
Thank you, Kim for inviting me to SOS
Aloha, I look forward to dropping by frequently to see what you’re up to in
sunny Hawaii.
Mahalo, Ann, for joining us! You are always welcome in Paradise! THE BERTON HOTEL connects Lily to her family's past. My children had that opportunity during my mother's recent visit - she entertained us with stories of her post war childhood. In honor of my mother, I am giving away an English gift pack to one randomly selected commenter. To enter the giveaway, |
| If the Berton Hotel is booked, consider the Barton B&B in Falmouth, Cornwall. |
1. Leave a comment about a something you learned about your family - my mother shared how her grandmother grew up in a two bedroom cottage in Kennford with six other siblings. Her grandfather tended sheep that frequently passed the village. I believe they were married in the church below.
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| St. Andrew's Parrish Church in Kennford ukrobertslack.blogspot.com |
2. This giveaway is open to all readers.
3. Comments are open through Saturday, January 7, 10 pm in Hawaii. I'll post the winner on Sunday, January 8.
Mahalo,
Kim in Hawaii
Speaking of hotels, check out my blog of historic hotels on Waikiki Beach at ALOHA ON MY MIND at this link.
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| The Royal Hawaiian on Waikiki Beach |
As a young girl my Grandmother was an under-nanny in an English Castle. I can't remember the name of it. Not royalty, but certainly high society.
ReplyDeleteWhen my FIL died in July, we learned a lot about his past that he never wanted to share. Hew as an amazing man.
ReplyDeleteMy grandparents came from the Ukraine and homesetted in Saskatchewan. Their tatch roof house is still there. This was in the 1890's.
ReplyDeleteI learned that my mother had to drop out of high school to help her family during the depression.
ReplyDeleteKim, thank you for inviting me. I love all the pictures you added.
ReplyDeleteAnn
Sadly I never got to meet my father's parents. My paternal grandfather died in the 1980s when I was just a young girl.
ReplyDeleteMy paternal grandmother died when my father was but a boy, so he doesn't even know what she looked like, there are no pictures. However, I do know my dad's father could play any brass instrument and was in a band.
On my mother's side, my grandmother was a messenger during WW2 who got caught by the Nazis, who strung her up and put a lighter beneath her feet in a vain attempt to get her to talk.
My grandfather spent 3 years in 2 different Nazi concentration camps, Dachau being one of them. He had a numbered tattoo on his arm, used for identification purposes. He smuggled out a knife and fork from the camp because he didn't think anyone would believe it really happened to him.
Understandably, did not really want to talk about what happened there. But I'm glad I got to spend many summers with them as a child.
Sorry about the epic proportions of this comment - I didn't mean for it to be so long!
Great interview and question! It is ironic that we learn about our relatives after they have passed rather than during their lifetimes.
ReplyDeleteMy paternal grandfather was a farmer who was elected to be the tax collector in rural Mississippi.
Sue
As a descendent of some of the first settlers in America, most of my stories have been discovered through my geneological research. For example, I had a great-grandmother whose parents were scalped and killed by Indians in present day Nashville. She was kidnapped and held for two years before being sold back to one of the settlers for 273 deerskins. True story from the history of Tennessee in the state archives. She was one tough cookie!
ReplyDeleteWhen I was 12 my mom told me that I had a brother who was 2 years older than me that she had given up for adoption after she had been attacked and got pregnant. When I got older she talked about the baby she gave up and I asked her if she would one day like to meet him. she was scared but said yes, if he wanted to.
ReplyDeleteSo 8 years ago I started writing to different adoption places online that help you find people. I filled out the online forms with all the information I had and got a phone call form one place telling me that my brother had filled out the same forms a few years before looking for his mother.
So 7 years ago after searching for a while we were able to track his wife down and found out her was in the army and deployed to Iraq.
When he came home after being injured in a bomb blast he and his wife came to meet us and my mom was so happy that he wanted to get to know us all. About 2 years later he and his wife divorced and he moved to Las Vegas to be closer to us and he was really glad he did because he really got to know mom before she died this past june.
My Mom went through nursing school during WWII, when the fedeeral government gave scholarships specifically to increase the number of nurses in the U.S.
ReplyDeleteThanks for an interesting post.
Amazing stories.
ReplyDeleteAnn
I learned that my grandfather bought a house for his parents and after he and my grandmother were married they lived my great-grandparents who charged my grandparents rent.
ReplyDeleteI learned that my grandfather worked for a Belgium bank and received a nice medal when he retired.
ReplyDeleteMy grandparents were Hungarian immigrants and at one point while living in West Virginia they Americanized their last name to Shepard. It didn't last long but I have my mom's report cards from grammar school while in WV and some of them are Shepard instead of Yuhasz. I have the Yuhasz Coat of Arms and Yuhasz does mean "shepherd".
ReplyDeleteMy mother's grandfather was a fisherman in Sicily. He was lucky enough to own his boat. Her father's family were farmers and her dad had a small farm here. It was nice during the depression because they always had food. My father's dad owned a small grocery store in Mississippi and my dad owned one too here in PA when I was a baby.
ReplyDeleteAnn and Kim, that was a wonderful interview and I love the pictures.
ReplyDeleteAnn, you know I love your book The Berton Hotel but somehow I learned even more in this interview. Good job.
Can't wait to read more about Gia and her friends.
Sharon
No interesting stories like everyone else has - these are great and so interesting. I'm hoping my daughter will do some research one of these days.
ReplyDeleteI also meant to say that I live fairly close to Mineral Wells - the first picture.
ReplyDeleteI learned that my grandma had my mom at home, and the doctor came and transported my mom in a shoe box to the hospital. We went to her hometown in South Dakota a few years back, and she showed me the house where she was born. Kind of neat.
ReplyDeleteAll my grandparents were from Sicily. They all were from large families back then. My mom's mom died after having many children and my grandmother helped raise them along with his father's second family. They had arranged marriages but my great grandfather let her turn down the first man for the one who became my grandfather. He was going to America!!
ReplyDeleteWhen my husband and I were married we had very little furniture and my Dad gave me an old bench he had. It had initials carved into it I asked him where it came from. He said it had been passed down in his family but didn't know more but that one of his ancestors had been the headmaster of a school in Connecticut. When I went on Ancestry last year to find out more about our ancestors I traced his family back to Kingston, NY and with a little research found out that one of his grandfather's brothers had been headmaster of Kingston Academy in Kingston, NY! After that I decided to also follow my mother's side of the family and found out her grandmother was a Moon and thru her I was related to Eathan Allen!
ReplyDeleteI just found out that the Kingston Academy is still open and hope to get a chance to visit and hopefully find out more about our family heritage.
i got so many story from my grandmom especially when our country has been colonized by japan, so terrible. And other story is about mistic's story, so that she was prohibits us not to go anywhere then tell me about our old tradition and show me the old money that cant be used anymore ;)
ReplyDelete