Guest Post – Five Interesting Things About Dreaming Of Venice by T A Williams

I am super happy to have been asked to feature another brilliant guest post from the wonderful T A Williams as part of this fab blog tour organised by PR Extraordinaire Faye Rogers.

Dreaming Of Venice was released on the 24th April 2017 on e book and is set to be a brilliant adult fiction romance novel with a beautiful setting and a little comedy.

Today T A Williams tells us a little more about Dreaming Of Venice…..

Find love, friendship and prosecco – in the magical city of Venice.

Life is tough for Penny. A dead end job in a London café, a boyfriend in Australia (what could go wrong?) and an art career going nowhere. But then Penny is approached with an extraordinary proposition.

It isn’t going to be easy but, if she can pull it off, she will turn her life around and at long last see the fulfilment of her dream – to visit Venice. And, just maybe, find true happiness with the handsome man of her dreams.

But can dreams come true?

Five Interesting Things About Dreaming Of Venice

I have to confess that Venice is one of my favourite places in the whole world. Choosing to set a book in that enchanting city was, therefore, a very logical step and it gave me the chance to wallow in my memories of a city that is without question unique in the world.

So, five interesting or surprising things about the book, eh?

It may come as a surprise to readers to find that our heroine, Penny, doesn’t actually get to Venice until about halfway through the book. Of course, she’s constantly dreaming of visiting Venice (hint: the clue’s in the title) and everything in the first half of the book is leading inevitably to that glorious moment when her plane comes in low over the lagoon and lands at Marco Polo airport. From then on, it’s Venice all the way.

I always try to put a big black dog in all my books (it’s a long story and I won’t bore you with it here), but with Venice there was a problem. You see, dogs need space to walk, to explore and, <polite cough>, to poop. Venice has very little in the way of grass or open spaces for dogs so I decided to insert the black Labrador into the first half of the book that takes place in England. Hence the canine exercise and poop problem was averted.

The hotel in Venice where Penny goes to stay is the world-famous Hotel Danieli. If you’ve ever seen a movie called The Tourist with Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie, you will recognise it. The Danieli has hosted princes, presidents, celebrities and, two years ago, me. My wife and I got a really good deal just before last Christmas and had the chance to sample the lap of luxury for ourselves. Fabulous, and not in the least bit snooty as I had expected. A great historic, beautiful hotel with helpful, friendly staff. If you win the lottery, try it!

I’ve wanted for some time to write a book dealing with the phenomenon of love at first sight. Does it exist? As far as Penny is concerned, at least at the start of the book, the answer is very definitely NO. She even comments on it. “Surely it’s impossible. I mean, the man could be a mass murderer or, even worse, a house agent or something.” As the book develops, she finds herself hearing about it time and time again. Could it really be a thing?

Finally, when she gets to Venice, Penny spends half her time there getting lost. I can quite honestly say that this is not just poetic license. It really happens. I like to think I have a reasonably good bump for direction, but my wife and I regularly got lost in the maze of narrow alleys that make up the old town. It’s a truly fascinating place where you can feel the history oozing out of the brickwork all round you. Set off for a walk and who know where you will end up?

So, in conclusion, although I am in no way sponsored by the Venice Tourist Board, my advice to anybody reading this would be to start saving up. It’s not cheap, but Venice is unique and unforgettable. I hope at least some of its charm spills over into “Dreaming of Venice”.

You can buy a copy of Dreaming Of Venice here

Or why not add it to your Goodreads here

You can also find previous posts from T A Williams on Tales by clicking on the below links….

The Research Behind Chasing Shadows

About T A Williams

My name is Trevor Williams. I write under the androgynous name T A Williams because 65% of books are read by women. In my first book, “Dirty Minds” one of the (female) characters suggests the imbalance is due to the fact that men spend too much time getting drunk and watching football. I couldn’t possibly comment. Ask my wife…

My background, before taking up writing full time, was in teaching and I was principal of a big English language school for many years. This involved me in travelling all over the world and my love of foreign parts is easy to find in my books. I speak a few languages and my Italian wife and I still speak Italian together.

I’ve written all sorts: thrillers, historical novels, short stories and now I’m enjoying myself hugely writing humour and romance. My most recent books are the What happens… series. What happens in Tuscany reached #1 in the Amazon.uk Romantic Comedy chart and What Happens on the Beach, the last in the series, came out in July. Chasing Shadows is still romance, but with the added spice of a liberal helping of medieval history, one of my pet hobbies. I do a lot of cycling and I rode all the way to Santiago de Compostela on a bike a few years back. This provided both the inspiration and the background research for Chasing Shadows.

I’m originally from Exeter, and I’ve lived all over Europe, but now I live in a little village in sleepy Devon, tucked away down here in south west England. I love the place.

You can find out more about T A Williams on his website – www.tawilliamsbooks.com

Or why not follow him on twitter – @TAWilliamsbooks

Or on Facebook here

Blog Tour

You can catch up or follow the rest of this fab blog tour at the following stops!

A huge thank you to T A Williams for a fab guest post.  Also a huge thank you to Faye for asking me to be part of the blog tour and for organising this post.

Have you read Dreaming Of Venice?  Are you intrigued?  Have you ever been to Venice?  I would love to hear from you!  Why not leave a comment using the reply button at the top of this post or tweet me on twitter using @chelleytoy !

Happy Reading!