Travel to Ireland with Kate Walker & Giveaways

When I was  growing up, the most exciting thing that could happen as part of the school holidays was  when my mother took us all to visit her family  in my grandfather's house just outside Dublin in Ireland.  It was a major undertaking -  there were five of us sisters and my mother, all  travelling across to the port of  Holyhead Anglesey,  getting on to the ferry and then traveling across the sea to the port of  Dún Laoghaire  where the ferry docked. I had so many wonderful memories of the journey (once the sea sickness was over!) of this beautiful country where both my mother and father had been born, where they had met  and married all those years before. So it was a special delight to be able to travel back there with my husband and my own son many years later.

   It was more than twenty years since I'd visited but memories came rushing back and I found I could retrace my steps  almost as easily as if it had been yesterday that I'd walked that way before.  I  found Dublin Castle, the General Post Office where the 1916 rebellion had  started.  I walked along the Dublin Strand  and from there, tracing my  childhood footsteps,  I was able to lead my husband  to my Grandfather's house in the little village of Sandymount  where I had spent all those wonderful summer holidays.  I even walked around  Trinity College where my mother and father had met  even more years before and then  across Stephen's Green  where  the magnificent gateway has a high wide arch where the names of all the Irishmen killed in the Boer War are listed.  There's one of my ancestors there  -  my Great Uncle Charlies  - Charles Walker - who was my grandfather's younger brother.  He was only 17 when he died and as I take my name from my grandmother Katherine Walker, he was her brother in law.   As you can see, the weather was pretty typically Irish  - lots of grey clouds and plenty of rain - the sort of day that in Ireland you learn to call it a fine soft day!

In the villages we  visited the magnificent Ballyvolane House  - with the most magnificent bath I've ever seen. Fancy having  to go up  steps to get into the bath!  And from there we went to  Lismore  Castle which was used to film  Jane Austen's  Northanger Abbey.  

http://janitesonthejames.blogspot.co.uk/2008/01/lismore-castle-setting-for-northanber.html


This is also where  the ninth Duke who married Adele Astaire, Fred Astaire’s sister. The heir to the tenth Dukedom married Kathleen Kennedy, JFK’s sister. All these places had such romantic connections,  such great stories behind them,  and yet somehow,  none of them sparked off any real inspiration in me. It  was only when, because my husband insisted, we  visited the Irish National Stud in County Kildare  that inspiration finally struck and I knew I had the idea that would lead me to set my new book  in the green (and sometimes very grey! )  and beautiful Ireland.


So where did I set it? And what story did I bring home with me from my visit to the Emerald Isle ?  Ah well, you'll have to read A Proposal to Secure His Vengeance to find out that!

About Kate Walker

Kate Walker was always making up stories. She can't remember a time when she wasn't scribbling away at something and wrote her first "book" when she was eleven. She went to Aberystwyth University, met her future husband and after three years of being a full-time housewife and mother she turned to her old love of writing. Mills & Boon accepted a novel after two attempts, and Kate has been writing ever since. Visit Kate at her website at: www.kate-walker.com

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Kate Walker has a new revised edition of her writing craft book:

Kate Walker's 12 Point Guide to Writing Romance: An Emerald Guide

 

 

In this comprehensive guide, Kate Walker, an established author within the Romantic Fiction genre, covers all aspects of writing Romantic Fiction, offering budding authors invaluable tips on producing saleable works of fiction, following her 12 point guide.

 

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