CHRISTMAS WITH… Jennie Jones

 

Bestselling Australian author, Jennie Jones joins us to chat Christmas, her silly season survival tips, and her goals for 2016….

 

What are your plans for Christmas 2015?
This year I’m not going to eat chocolate (I’m going to eat gooey meringue and thick fresh cream instead).

 

Tell us about a usual Christmas in your home?
I still love doing up a big stocking for our daughter, who is 19 now, but I figure she still enjoys the stocking stuffed with gift wrapped pressies as much as I love buying, wrapping and stuffing them!

 

Any gift in particular that you’d love to see wrapped under the tree?
A new desktop computer please.

 

What is a typical Christmas lunch and/or dinner at your house?
It’s a lazy day after a morning of cooking. It’s a lunchtime meal for us and regardless of the heat, it’s always a roast. Usually chicken as we’re not turkey lovers. But there’s also ham and a joint of beef for Boxing Day.

 

Tell us, what is the one dish that gets served every single year? Is there a story behind this?
Potato au gratin. Yum – fresh cream, lots of cheese and garlic. This is our favourite dish and you can serve it with hot or cold meats and even salad. It’s great to have a choice of either roast potatoes or this creamy potato dish. I discovered this recipe when I was in drama school (and very poor) and thought it decadent yet cheap! It’s a mainstay in our house.

 

Essentials for an Aussie Christmas…
Air-con, champagne and a good movie to watch in the evening when everyone’s eaten way too much.

 

Your best Silly Season survival tip?
Don’t do your food shopping on Christmas Eve.

 

What will you be reading this Christmas?
I’ll be reading Home to Bindarra Creek by Juanita Kees, Summer and the Groomsman by Cathryn Hein and Close to Home by Lisa Ireland. I’ll slip in Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende and anything by Lisa Kleypass, Victoria Dahl or Kate Hewitt.

 

What have been your big achievements in 2015?
Apart from having three books published this year which was thrilling, I’ve also written two full length novels and half of another.

 

What are your plans/goals for 2016?
I have a rural story coming out in 2016 and before and after that I’ll be polishing up those two and a half stories.

 

 

12 Days at Silver Bells House
Jennie Jones

Kate has twelve days to find herself. With Christmas Day and her thirtieth birthday approaching, the best thing a city-chic fashion designer who no longer has a raison d’etre can do is nullify herself in the country. But when she gets to her holiday home in Swallow’s Fall she finds an unexpected roommate: the new owner of Silver Bells House, Jamie Knight. Master Builder. And Jamie doesn’t want a guest.

Kate Singleton has twelve days to find herself. With Christmas Day and her thirtieth birthday approaching, the best thing a city-chic fashion designer who no longer has a raison d’etre can do is nullify herself in the country. With Chardonnay.

When trouble strikes, the country presents her with Jamie Knight – a gallant but uncommunicative He-Man who drives an excavator and rescues her, her shoes, and her case of Chardonnay from a boggy field.

The adventure should be over – nothing but a good story to tell to her friends in the city – but her saviour turns out to also be an unexpected roommate, the new owner of Silver Bells House, Kate’s holiday home.

Forced together and dragged into the community Christmas spirit of the town, Kate and Jamie flounder their way through mistletoe, kissing games, carolling choirs, and a bone-deep yearning for community and acceptance.

Can the enchanting Silver Bells House and the holidays bind them together? Or will love get lost on Highway B23 back to the city?

PLUS a bonus: At the end of this story, turn the page for a newly added bonus copy of 12 Bells and a Baby, a short story based five years after Kate and Jamie start building their dream in 12 Days at Silver Bells House.  “Every big thing in Kate and Jamie’s lives happens in a heatwave, and today is no exception.” 12 Bells and a Baby published in 2015 by Escape is from the anthology It Happened at Café Nix.

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