The Blonde in the Gondola

Orna O'Reilly, author of The Blonde in the Gondola, recently released her new book in July 2019. 

It’s been a long haul getting here, but, at last, my very first novel is coming out this month. It’s a romance called The Blonde in the Gondola and it is set in the wonderfully romantic city of Venice.

In late 2012 I closed my interior design business in Galway and moved to Italy a few months later with the express purpose of fulfilling a long-held dream: to write a novel. At that point, I had no idea what the novel would be about, nor where it would be set, but, in the meantime, I began to write a blog about living in Italy. It’s called Orna O’Reilly: Travelling Italy.

Moving to the Euganean Hills, south of Padova in the Veneto region of Italy, I found myself a stone’s throw from Venice. As I was constantly writing about all things Italian, I found myself regularly visiting Venice to take part in blogging events, where I met many expats living in that magical city. Before long, I decided that my first work of fiction should be set there, with plenty of winter fog to add to the atmosphere.

As part of my in-depth research, I interviewed a real-live gondolier. This was highly interesting and I have incorporated many of the tales that handsome “Marcello” told me during our lengthy chat, sitting on his gondola, moored at the side of a canal in the Santa Maria del Giglio area of Venice. It was fascinating to hear his take on being a gondolier. He told me about his family and stories about fellow gondolieri and their lifestyle in general.

Of particular interest to me was to find out whether or not the tales of romance surrounding these gondolieri were really true or merely fiction. “Marcello’s” responses were very interesting indeed! Perhaps his lucky wooden beads, which he wore on his wrist, may have been responsible for his success, but that’s just speculation on my part! I was struck by the fact that he was unusually blond and blue eyed among the typically dark haired, brown-eyed gondolieri.

I managed, through a friend, to organise a visit to a beautiful, lived in, palazzo on the Grand Canal. It is privately owned and I am sure the owners would be amazed to see their palazzo so accurately described in my book. I used this spectacular home as a reference point for my descriptions of the interior of Palazzo di Falco.

My model for Casa Antica, where my heroine lives during her time in Venice, is a little house on a side canal near a beautiful and unusual bronze statue of the Madonna with an umbrella.

The (allegedly) haunted house which looms over my heroine as she struggles to find her way through the back streets in the dense Venetian fog has – according to the locals – a spooky past.

As I was an interior designer for many years, it was more-or-less inevitable that my heroine should be an Irish interior designer. But there the similarity ends, I promise! Though, as she drives through Dublin’s leafy suburbs, I feel as though I’m behind the wheel myself.

Over several years, beginning long before I moved to the Veneto, I spent a great deal of time in Venice and had already done lots of research and exploration while in that magical city. I have tried to do my very best to ensure that my descriptions of life there are as accurate as possible and I hope that I have made no grievous errors along the way.

(c) Orna O’Reilly

The Blonde in the Gondola

Olivia has everything: a handsome husband, a thriving interior design business, and a privileged life in Dublin.

Janeis married to an Italian aristocrat, and wants for nothing, except, perhaps, a loving husband, who seems to devote his life only to their young daughter.

But, when misfortune and tragedy strike both of these beautiful women, it becomes inevitable that they will be thrown together in Venice, where they pit their wits against each other for the love of the same man, and a handsome, blond gondolier becomes the catalyst for a fight to the finish, involving conspiracy, betrayal and death.

Order your copy online here https://pegasuspublishers.com/books/orna-oreilly/the-blonde-in-the-gondola

You can follow Orna’s blog on https://ornaoreilly.com/

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