Halloween with Ms Stuart and giveaway

CONGRATULATIONS TO HELEN HOLLICK who is the winner of a copy of SECRETS IN TIME. Thank you to all blog hoppers who came trick or treating at my door!


TRADITIONAL SCOTTISH PRAYER (for All Hallows E’en)

From ghoulies and ghosties

And long-leggedy beasties

And things that go bump in the night,

Good Lord, deliver us!

In Australia, Halloween does not have the deep seated tradition that it has in the USA or in the UK.   It is really only over the last ten years that I have noticed Halloween displays creeping into supermarkets and the occasional smart alec kids who don’t really get it, knocking on the door.  As 99% of householders would not be entering into the spirit at all, the pickings are slim!

The origins of Halloween are lost in the commercial world of pumpkins and spectres but it was originally the festival of “All Hallows Even” - the night before All Hallows Day.   Trick-or-treating resembles the late medieval practice of souling, when poor folk would go door to door on Hallowmas (November 1), receiving food in return for prayers for the dead on All Souls' Day.

  

The carving of jack-o'-lanterns springs from the souling custom of carving turnips into lanterns as a way of remembering the souls held in purgatory.  The turnip has traditionally been used in Ireland and Scotland at Halloween, but immigrants to North America used the native pumpkin, which are both readily available and much larger – making them easier to carve than turnips!

Through the magic of the “Interwebs” we are now global citizens and when my friend, English writer Francine Howarth, proposed a Halloween blog hop, I put up my hand to join her.

Francine’s idea is to encourage readers and writers to try reading something outside their comfort zone. 

So as my “treat” I am offering a Kindle copy of ‘SECRETS IN TIME' - dashing cavaliers, time travel and, most importantly, a witch…Is there anything more appropriate for Halloween?

 

Can love overcome time itself?

When Nathaniel Preston stumbles into Dr Jessica Shepherd’s garden, she is reluctant to believe he has crossed more than three hundred years to seek her help. He must help her understand why he has travelled from the midst of civil war to the quiet English countryside of the twentieth century.

But is falling in love with him destined to end in heartbreak? Jessica knows he must return to his own time and face certain death in battle.

Why has Nathaniel been sent to find Jessica? Can their love survive a bloody battle…and overcome time?

SECRETS IN TIME is currently hovering around the best selling lists on Kindle.

Meet my witch, Dame Alice…

Dame Alice stood back to allow me to enter first. Bunches of drying herbs hung from hooks and little round clay pots crammed the shelves between stoppered flagons. My nose twitched. The room smelled of sage and rosemary with the tinge of something sweet, such as honey. We had touched on the history of medicine in my studies and here was an opportunity to study it at first hand. My professional curiosity overcame any reservations I may have had about Dame Alice.

“This is extraordinary,” I said.

She shut the door behind her and indicated a heavy, leather bound volume on the table. “That is my book of receipts. The sum total of my knowledge.” She looked up at me with her grandson’s clear eyes. “It would be wonderful to be born in your time, to have your knowledge.”

“What do you know of my time?” I challenged.

“What I have seen, Doctor Shepherd. Extraordinary machines that do the work of men and horses. Magic lights and water that comes from the walls, but I have also seen unhappiness and poverty. Those things are universal to any age.”

“How do you see?” I looked around the room, wondering if she kept a crystal ball or some sort of bowl with magical divining liquid in it.

TO EARN YOUR TREAT…  Tell me what halloween costume you are wearing/ would like to wear for Trick or Treat this year (even if you are Australian and don't believe in the Halloween stuff...dream a little!)

And don’t forget to hop over to Francine’s blog, ROMANCING THE BLOG, to find other opportunities for a trick or treat.

Ms. S. in Halloween costume...the city had to be scoured to find something suitable!

Visit the other Blog participants...you will be in for a treat!

Hallowe'en Blog Hop

1.	Francine	9.	Denise Covey	17.	Susan Hanniford Crowley
2.	Marie Laval	10.	Grace Elliot	18.	Stephen Tremp
3.	NancyJ	11.	Gilli Allan	19.	Hywela Lyn
4.	N. R. Williams	12.	Alison Stuart	20.	Iyana Jenna
5.	Alison Morton	13.	Mary Pax	21.	Vala Kaye
6.	Karen Aminadra	14.	Natalie-Nicole Bates	22.	Yolanda Renee
7.	Lori Crane	15.	Douglas Boren
8.	Derek Birks	16.	Anna Belfrage