Novelist Lucy Dillon, from Herefordshire, has been shortlisted for The Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award in the Romantic Novelists' Association's 2019 Romantic Novel Awards.

Bestselling historical novelist Alison Weir will present the Awards for 2019 during a ceremony in the Gladstone Library in London on March 4.

The RNA’s awards are the only national literary prizes that recognise excellence in the genre of romantic fiction.

Lucy Dillon is one of six finalists in The Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel category with her novel Where The Light Gets In, published by Black Swan, Transworld.

Lorna Larkham's full of secrets: unrequited love, frustrated ambition, and some mixed feelings about her tight-knit family. Coming back to her hometown is either brave or mad. But a friendship with a reclusive artist throws an unexpected light on the truth about love and its legacy - and on Lorna herself.

This is the eighth novel set in the fictional town of Longhampton, where dogs are allowed in cafés, there are floral displays and a bookshop on the high street, everyone has a story about the town's bandstand, and despite life's problems afflicting the locals, things usually work out all right in the end. Where the Light Gets In deals with the very emotional topic of end-of-life care, and what we leave behind us - whether it's a family, or art, or stories.

It also features 'yarnbombing', a growing art form in which street furniture is temporarily decorated with knitted or crocheted shapes and designs - it's a joyful celebration of colour and craft, and brings a domestic artform into the public domain for proper artistic recognition.

Commenting about her novel being shortlisted for the awards, Lucy Dillon said, " I'm glowing with happiness. The RNA represents such a fabulously broad and knowledgeable collection of writers