The Story Behind The 'Skint Old Northern Woman' Newsletter by Trisha Ashley

Many years ago I started up a newsletter called Skint Old Northern Woman (after the magazine Charlie and her sisters set up in Every Woman for Herself.) You can tell it was a long time ago, because I actually posted out a lot of them and the ones I did email I had to send in little batches or my server thought I was a spammer. This got a little time consuming when we reached the thousand mark... 

It was a way of saying thank you and keeping in touch with all the kind readers who supported me through the ups and downs of my career.

The newsletter group slowly grew and grew...but I never forgot the names of the early subscribers, many of whom I now know on here or twitter.

And some of them I also know via Amazon books - and that is the wonderful thing. Some of those early subscribers were already published authors, some were writing but not yet published, and others just readers, but dreaming....

Then, as the time of the ebook blossomed, I began to see more and more of their names as published authors and thought 'There you are - well done!'

Lately, my kind publisher has put out my newsletters for me, with my input - and now I'm over my op and getting my act together, I hope to contribute a whole lot more - and I'm still that same Skint Old Northern Woman inside - who else would I be?

Trisha Ashley

Trisha Ashley's Sunday Times bestselling novels have twice been shortlisted for the Melissa Nathan Award for Comedy Romance, and Every Woman for Herself was nominated by readers as one of the top three romantic novels of the last fifty years.

Trisha lives in North Wales. For more information about her please visit www.trishaashley.com, her Facebook page or follow her on Twitter.

Creature Comforts

Trisha Ashley’s new novel, CREATURE COMFORTS, is out this week and we thought we would take the opportunity to ask her about any creatures she has owned over the years – and if any of them ever made it into her novels!

In Creature Comforts the heroine, Izzy, has broken off her engagement to her feckless fiancée Kieran and returned to her childhood home – the sleepy village of Halfhidden. She soon realises that life in the village is anything but peaceful – for one thing she’s living with her mad aunt Debo, who runs Debo’s Desperate Dog Rescue.

One of Debo’s rescue dogs is a black Newfoundland called Babybelle, who is supposed to live outside with the other dogs, but slowly insinuates her way into the house and the affections of Izzy, who until then hadn’t even realised she wanted a dog.

Trisha says: I have always loved dogs. When I was first married we got a dog from a rescue home in Liverpool. Sasha looked like a little fox and wasn’t housetrained or used to people, so she was a challenge, but she lived for thirteen years. After that we had a King Charles spaniel called Steffi, after the tennis player, Steffi Graff. She inspired Flossie in Every Woman for Herself and was very loveable, but had the intelligence of a cushion. If I called her, she would look around to see who I was speaking to and then gaze blankly at me as if to say “Me?” When I went out I would leave her spread-eagled in her bed, all four paws in the air, and when I came back several hours later she would be in exactly the same position, looking at me as if to say, “Oh, hello. Have you been anywhere?” She was the perfect pet for a writer!

For many years I had an Amazon Blue Fronted Parrot, too, who featured in Good Husband Material (only I changed him to a grey parrot). He would swear in Spanish and liked to bite men (a perfect character trait; you couldn’t fault that!) although he would always laugh afterwards! When I was a student I looked after him for a week and then somehow he stayed on. He was elderly, half-blind and he couldn’t fly, but he used to spend most of his time sitting on the outside of his cage where he could get a good grip and lean out to bite people. Sadly, after over thirty years together, he died just before I moved to Wales.

My current dog, like Babybelle in Creature Comforts, is a rescue dog, who was originally adopted by my son, Robin. When Robin went away to university, I said I would look after Dog (as I call him online: he is a very private dog and insists I refer to him by his title alone) and now he lives with me. He was the inspiration for Flash in Chocolate Shoes and Wedding Blues. Dog is completely mad and drives me totally crackers, but I love him dearly and wouldn’t be without him!

Dog in the bluebells

A Satsuma and a Sugar Mouse by Trisha Ashley

A SATSUMA AND A SUGAR MOUSE

When I was a little girl I always knew that at the bottom of my stocking would be a delicious-smelling, loose-skinned Satsuma, a handful of nuts (why?  I was hardly likely to be able to crack them with my teeth!) and a sugar mouse.

I’m sure the sugar mice for the Rhymer’s annual Mouse Hunt in Every Woman for Herself were made by Em the traditional way, using uncooked egg white for the fondant, but I’ve devised this simple recipe using only icing sugar and tinned evaporated milk.  You can add a little liquid glycerine for a slightly softer fondant. I just form my mice by hand, but you can get plastic and silicone moulds for them, too.

Trisha Ashley's Sugar Mice

Ingredients

6oz/175g icing sugar

A tin of evaporated milk

Sugar balls for the eyes

Thin string for the tails

Food colouring, if desired

Half a teaspoon of glycerine (optional)

Method

Put the icing sugar into a bowl and slowly add the evaporated milk a teaspoonful at a time until you can form a fondant dough.  If you overdo the milk, just add more sugar till you get the right consistency.

At this stage, you can divide up the dough and add a tiny drop of food colour to each batch, kneading in well. I like to leave half my mice white and colour the rest pink, but one year I made green peppermint mice.

On a board sprinkled with icing sugar, form the fondant into small pear shapes, pinching one end into a pointy nose and two rounded ears. Press in little silver sugar balls for eyes. 

For a traditional tail, pierce the back of the mouse with a skewer and then push in the end of a short piece of thin string. (Caution: do not eat the string unless you are seriously short of roughage.)

Allow to dry and harden, then store in a box or tin lined with greaseproof paper till needed. 

               



Every Woman for Herself is available from: Amazon UK and Amazon US
www.trishaashley.com

Every Woman For Herself

It's been a busy week for Trisha Ashley. Thursday saw the publication of Every Woman for Herself, Friday was the day of the launch party with the Novelistas and on Saturday Trisha was signing copies of her book at Hinton's of Conwy.

Trisha Ashley

The cake!!!

The goody bags!

The Novelistas

at the launch party

The Novelistas

at Hinton's of Conwy bookshop

When Charlie’s husband Matt tells her that he wants a divorce she has to start from scratch. Suddenly single, broke and approaching 40 she is forced to return to her childhood home in the Yorkshire moors.

Living with her father and eccentric siblings could be considered a challenge but soon Charlie finds her new life somewhat refreshing. Now that she’s single she’s got no need to dye her roots nor to be the perfect wife and she can return to her first love- painting.

But just as she begins to feel settled, handsome, bad-tempered actor Mace North moves in down the road and starts mixing things up for Charlie in more ways than one …

Every Woman for Herself

Out Now!

Photos copyright: Trisha Ashley, Juliet Greenwood & Louise Marley