Writer Wednesday: Book Spotlight on WHITE CHALK by Pavarti K Tyler

Welcome to a White Chalk Spotlight from Novel Publicity! This posts includes and excerpt, book blurb, and information about the author, Pavarti K Tyler. I just got my copy today and can't wait to read it. Look for a review coming soon.

An Excerpt

Too cold for me to be out, drenched in a thin sweatshirt, I trudged home after school. November had betrayed me with its promises of clear skies, and I’d skipped the bus.

Mr. Harris pulled up, his oversized body squished into the too small car. When the window rolled down, warm air tinged with the scent of coffee invited me in.

“It’s a little cold for you to be walking, isn’t it, honey?” He peered out the window, brows pulled high to his forehead, appraising my appearance.

“Can you drive me home, Mr. Harris?” My teeth chattered as I spoke.

“Come on, get in. But you know teachers aren’t supposed to pick up students on the side of the road.” He chuckled softly to himself.

“I know. I won’t tell anyone. Please? I’m just so cold.”

In the car, I kicked my soaked backpack out of the way of the heating vent and slid my feet out of my shoes. My toes had gotten so cold I half wondered if they’d be tinged with black—gangrene setting up shop. I leaned back and closed my eyes, letting the warmth of the car envelop me. When I opened them, I realized Mr. Harris hadn’t started driving again.

Instead, he sat staring at me. Parked in the middle of the road, his eyes roamed my body as I shivered.

Cold? Lust? I didn’t know, but the feeling of power spreading through my chest as he took in the curve of my hips made me bold. I sat up and pulled the wet sweatshirt over my head, revealing the T-Shirt beneath.

Mr. Harris shifted in his seat. His gaze fell upon my breasts and the sound of his breath sped up.

“Mr. Harris?” I asked, the temptation of seducing a teacher thrilling me.

“Yeah?” His voice was hoarse.

“Thanks for the ride.”

“What?” His body snapped to attention as he remembered where he was. “Oh, right… um….” He shifted position again.

“Really, I appreciate it.” I laid a hand on his arm and rose up in my seat, leaning forward so I could kiss him on the cheek—innocently, like kissing an uncle or cousin. But I knew it wasn’t, and when I pulled away, the dark intensity of his eyes told of desire I’d only been hoping to find.

About the Book

[caption id="attachment_3210" align="alignleft" width="200"] Click to buy on Amazon[/caption]

Evolved Publishing presents an intimate glance inside teenage angst and confusion, and one talented but troubled girl's attempt to make sense of life, in the coming-of-age tale, "White Chalk," by award-winning author Pavarti K. Tyler. [Literary, New Adult, Women's Fiction]

Chelle isn’t a typical 13-year-old girl—she doesn’t laugh with friends, play sports, or hang out at the mall after school. Instead, she navigates a world well beyond her years.

Life in Dawson, ND spins on as she grasps at people, pleading for someone to save her—to return her to the simple childhood of unicorns on her bedroom wall and stories on her father’s knee.

When Troy Christiansen walks into her life, Chelle is desperate to believe his arrival will be her salvation. So much so, she forgets to save herself. After experiencing a tragedy at school, her world begins to crack, causing a deeper scar in her already fragile psyche.

Follow Chelle’s twisted tale of modern adolescence, as she travels down the rabbit hole into a reality none of us wants to admit actually exists.

About the Author

Award winning author of multi-cultural and transgressive literature, Pavarti K Tyler is an artist, wife, mother and number cruncher. She graduated Smith College in 1999 with a degree in Theatre. After graduation, she moved to New York, where she worked as a Dramaturge, Assistant Director and Production Manager on productions both on and off Broadway. Later, Pavarti went to work in the finance industry several international law firms. She now lives with her husband, two daughters and one very large, very terrible dog. She keeps busy working with fabulous authors as the Director of Marketing at Novel Publicity and penning her next genre bending novel.

White Chalk (Evolved Publishing) marks Tyler’s third full length novel and promises readers familiar with her work the same mind bending experience. Her other projects include: Shadow on the Wall (Fighting Monkey Press) and Two Moons of Sera (Fighting Monkey Press). Shadow on the Wall has received many awards: Winner of the General Fiction/Novel Category of the 2012 Next Generation Indie Book Awards, Winner in the Fiction: Multicultural category for The 2012 USA Best Book Awards, and Finalist in the Multicultural Fiction category for the 2012 International Book Awards.

White Chalk has been hailed as “brave”, “raw”, and “destroyingly beautiful”. In line with novels such as White Oleander, Thirteen Reasons Why and Gemma, White Chalk invites you to witness one girl’s heartrending story of confusion and desperation.

You can find out more about Pavarti K Tyler here:

Website: http://www.pavarti.com

Twitter: PavartiDevi

Facebook: Facebook profile

Blog: http://www.pavarti.com

The Renegades 24-hr Launch Party (Book Giveaway)

Hello loyal readers and guests,

You might be a longtime reader who has been reading my blogs since the days of (ahem) Myspace, or you might have stumbled across this post or been lured by free book promises. Whatever your reason for stopping by my book release party, welcome!

The day has come at last...The Renegades Release Day! You can find the ebook for $2.99 on amazon starting TODAY. Or you can participate in one of the challenges posted on the blog all day to win a free copy.

Here is how it works: I will be giving away 24 books today. Winners will be randomly drawn from the participants of each challenge. They can be completed at any time during the day. Just post a comment letting me know which of the challenges you completed. Winners will be announced Wednesday, December 11, so check back to see if you scored some free books.

Up for grabs:
For all participants: ebook copies of
The Renegades
The Superiors
The Vigilantes
Because the Night, by Kristen Strassel
Redemption by Kellie Thacker
Healer by B.N. Toler
The Legacy: Fate by G.G. Atcheson

For US residents only (sorry, I'm a starving artist and postage rates are insane):
(1) Paperback copy of The Superiors (first edition), (1) Paperback ARC of The Vigilantes (proof copy), (1) Paperback ARC of The Renegades (available in January)
Must have at least 10 entries to win these, one of which MUST be Challenge 1.

Without further ado, here is...

Challenge 1: 
Post an announcement of The Renegades release on your book blog and leave it for 24 hours. Please leave link in the comments section.

Challenge 2:
Follow my blog (or leave comment, if you already follow, for one entry).

Challenge 3:
Stop by this blog and leave a comment on their promo post of The Renegades.

Challenge 4:
Google+ this blog post.

Challenge 5:
Share a link to this post on Twitter...you can do this once an hour if you like...

Challenge 6:
Follow me on Twitter (use the icon on my blog for quickest link).

Challenge 7:
Share this blog post on Facebook... Again, can enter this challenge multiple times if you want.

Challenge 8:
Like my author page on facebook here.

Challenge 9:
Like The Superiors Series page on Facebook.

Challenge 10:
Share my cover on Instagram with the tags #renegades #booklaunch

Challenge 11-13:
Share a link to any of my books on amazon...one entry for each. Click the links below to visit their amazon page, and share from there...pin, FB, twitter, etc.
The Superiors
The Vigilantes
The Renegades

Challenge 14:
Become a fan on amazon.

Challenge 15:
Become a fan on Goodreads.

Challenge 16-18:
Add The Renegades to your to-read shelf on Goodreads. This links to my author page, where you can scroll down and see all my books, and all all three to your shelf easily.
Add The Superiors to your to-read shelf of Goodreads. (If you already have it on your to-read shelf, or you've read it and it's on your read shelf, let me know in the comments section. That's an entry.
Add The Vigilantes to your to-read shelf (same as above).

Challenge 19-20:
Share The Superiors on Barnes&Noble (they have a button to G+, FB like, or pin, or you can 'add to list' if you have a B&N account).
Share The Vigilantes on Barnes&Noble.

Challenge 21-23
Pin The Renegades to a book board on Pinterest
Pin The Superiors
Pin The Vigilantes

Challenge 24: Free Choice challenge...creatively share my book in some way not mentioned above, and post to let me know what you did.

Please let me know what challenges you participated in by posting a comment!

Upcoming Book News

As you all know, I'm getting ready to release my third book, The Renegades. I just got my final cover art back today, and I'm doing my last read-through. I'm never satisfied!

I will post a big giveaway on December 3rd, so make sure you check back then for ebooks and paperback copies of all three of my novels as well as some other vampire novels. I will also have a promo spot over at Bit'N Books, and later, reviews on their site. Please check out their page if you're an author or book reviewer. Here's a bit about them.

Bit'N Book Promoters are a team of passionate, friendly and feisty individuals who are here to help you get your books out there. We're all authors and know how hard it is to get books noticed, so we want to give a helping hand to others like ourselves.
We provide book promotions, reviews, author interviews and kindle freebies. Our blog mainly focuses on reviews and author interviews and detailed book promotions. Both our Twitter and Facebook pages provide book promos, updates and links to what we're doing on our blog. We also regularly post kindle freebies only available on our Facebook page, along with pretty book & film quote boxes, which we design ourselves.
If you'd like our help, you can find us here:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BitnBookPromote
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BITNBOOKPROM...
Blog: http://bitnbookpromoters.blogspot.co.uk/ 

The Renegades Release Party Invite

My latest novel, The Renegades, is coming to the major internet retailers on December 3rd. The paper copy will be available in early 2014, but you can win an advance copy at the release party. You can also win ebooks and swag, as well as paper copies of the first two books in The Superiors series.

I'm excited about this! Doing a bit of last-minute editing and then it's good to go.

Please stop by in a few weeks for the release day!

Writer Wednesday: New book spotlight: Spark, by Karyn Pearson

Title: Spark

Series: The Hellfire Series

Author: Karyn Pearson

Genre: Paranormal, Fantasy

Publisher: The Writing Network

Formats Available In: Digital

Release Date: June 23, 2013

Blurb: For centuries, the powers of Heaven and Hell have been at war, locked in a perpetual stalemate. Fifty years ago, the war spilled out on Earth and the last modern age of man ended. Humanity now finds itself at the brink of annihilation, barely surviving in small pockets of civilization scattered across the globe. But even in the direst of circumstances, the human spirit lives on.

Now, in this post-apocalypse, humanity has but one choice: resist or die. In order to combat the forces of Hell, man has learned to fight, training from their youth to hunt the demons that threaten their very existence.

Twenty-five years ago, a demon hunter dared rise against an ancient demon family, the Saligia—the Seven Deadly Sins—and was cursed for her defiance. The curse appeared in the guise of an innocent: the huntress’s own daughter, Ardentia, who had been born with a demon soul attached to her own.

In the present day, Ardentia, now grown, seeks to free her mother from her curse by hunting down the demons responsible. But the road ahead will be difficult now that the demon within her has awakened. Trusting him is dangerous, especially when he can turn on her at a moment’s notice. Others have warned her that succumbing to the demon will be her own downfall.

Now Ardentia must decide what she’s willing to lose: her mother’s freedom or herself.

Excerpt:

The demon snapped his fingers and the daemonis igni behind Ardentia grew blindingly bright and white-hot, the flames reaching over forty feet high and surging straight toward her. She froze with fear, knowing that in a few seconds she was about to die, burned alive in the fires of Hell.

           

“Ardentia!” Noxius was shouting. “Run! Run now!”

           

She was too scared to move. She could not even muster up the strength to take that first step. Somehow, even if she did run away, she knew that the flames or Gula would end up devouring her anyway.

           

Distantly, she could hear the voices of her comrades, yelling for her to run, to find higher ground, but still, she could not move.

           

Noxius snarled with irritation, muttering a stream of curses in lingua daemon.

           

“Idiot girl!” he hissed at her. “I’ve no other choice. I simply cannot allow us both to die here.”

           

And then an indescribable force slammed against the inside of Ardentia’s skull. She saw bright lights pop in front of her eyes, nearly blinded with pain, and dropped to her knees in a daze. Dimly, she could feel Noxius seizing control; his power coursed through her, flooding her with an unimaginable strength and power that she was incapable of using. Her hand started to reach for the reliquary dangling from her belt, only to feel an invisible hand within her snatching it away.

           

“What are you doing?” she asked weakly.

           

“You’ll thank me in a moment,” Noxius answered her.

           

Ardentia’s eyes fell shut and she thought she could hear the sound of wings being spread then close around her. If she leant to the side ever so slightly, she swore she could feel the leathery velvet of the wing brush against her cheek.

           

An intense heat passed over her; she realized that it was probably the demonic fire, having reached her at last. She inhaled sharply, preparing to scream as she burned in the hellish pyre, only to find that she did not need to. There was only heat but no flames. She was not burned.

About Karyn Pearson:

Karyn Pearson is a post-grad university student with a B.A. in Anthropology, currently living in California with her two dogs. Over the years, she has created many worlds, characters, and series, which naturally makes her head a very crowded place to be.

When she’s not writing, she can be found curled up with a book, playing video games, doing research for her books on the web, or attempting to not burn the house down with another kitchen experiment, a hobby otherwise known as cooking.

Facebook Fan Page

Google+

Twitter

REVEAL Wednesday: Book Cover Preview: The Invention of Wings, by Sue Monk Kidd

If you read The Secret Life of Bees and loved it as much as I did, chances are, you read something else by Sue Monk Kidd since then. I read The Mermaid Chair. Good, but not much can surpass Bees, one of my favorite books ever.

So, I was especially excited to have the opportunity to help reveal the cover of Kidd's new book, The Invention of Wings, coming to a bookstore near you on January 7, 2014.

Without further ado...

I cannot wait to read the next novel by this fabulous author! I love the cover already.

Writer Wednesday: #poetry Book Review: With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women by Jane Rosenberg LaForge

With Apologies to Mick Jagger, Other Gods, and All Women by Jane Rosenberg LaForge

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I've never reviewed poetry before, so when LaForge contacted me asking for a review, I thought I'd give it a shot. I've certainly read and written my share of poetry and then some.

In one of the many poetry classes I was subjected to in college, a wise professor gave me one of the best pieces of advice I've ever been given regarding the writing of poetry, and it has stuck with me to this day. My dear professor said, "You can write the most aesthetically beautiful line in the English language, but if it doesn't make sense, it doesn't work." I wish I could afford to send LaForge to his class for a semester.

Although her poetry is mostly devoid of the flowery language that so often entraps young poets, she stumbles instead on flaunting her own superior intellect. No doubt she has a fine grasp of the English language and all its intricacies, and surely she is as brilliant as she so ardently strives to convince us, (over and over, pounding it in with her convoluted sentences where meaning is smothered, obscured, and at times completely lost), but often the tangential nature of her writing leads us so far into metaphor and memory amid the soliloquy we can't remember what she's trying to say, if anything. See what I did there? Confusing, eh? Think sentences like that, with a lot more big words.

Amid the confusion, you will find a few gems, poems that make sense from start to finish and do not meander on to different topics or flounder in empty, albeit quite intelligent sounding, rhetoric. She has some brilliant insights and quite memorable lines that ring so true as to be breath-taking. It is a pity that instead of staying with the sparse clarity of those lines, she instead chose to wax overly-philosophical or abruptly change tack and end the poem with some handful of lines completely unrelated to the majority of the poem. Too many times I found myself reading and rereading the same lines trying to find some comprehension, or figure out how they related to the poem or what they meant, only to conclude that they meant little (other than that the poet knew many large words and wanted to string as many of them together as possible).

Okay, so maybe I'm just not smart enough to read this kind of poetry. But I really just want to understand what I'm reading, whatever it is. As my wise professor once told me of writing, I believe to be equally true in my own reading experience. It doesn't have to be beautiful. It just has to make sense.



View all my reviews

Read an Ebook Week--Final Day!

It's the final day of Read an e-Book Week!

If you haven't entered to win a free copy of The Vigilantes, this is the last day to do it!

You can earn entries by sharing my books and pages all over the web.

Leave a comment letting me know what you did this week to celebrate. Did you read an ebook? If so, which one? Did you go to smashwords.com to find free books? What did you get?

If you're a writer, did you participate? Did you give stuff away? Join the smashwords promo? Read an ebook yourself?

If you helped me or another author out this week, let me know what you did. Any other ideas to help make indie books more visible? Share that too!

I look forward to hearing from readers, writers, and followers about what you did this week.

Look for the winner of the ARC copy of The Vigilantes coming soon...I still have to tally up entries!

Hope everyone had a great, successful week of e-reading.

Read an Ebook Week (Day 6)

It's almost over! Congrats to the five winner so far!

If you want to win a free ARC hardcopy of The Vigilantes, make sure you check out all my "Read an Ebook Week" posts to see how you can get extra entries! And don't forget to leave links to what you've done so I can give you credit. To enter to win an ebook copy of The Vigilantes, keep reading.

Today is Friday...Follow Friday! Make sure you've followed my blog, Twitter, and liked my Facebook pages (writer and book).

Here's what you can also do: enlist your friends to follow my blog (+3 entries each) and leave a comment telling me you sent them.

Get your friends to like my FB pages and leave a comment telling me you sent them.

Tweet a #FF post with my name in it: @lenahillbrand....every time you post a #FF tweet with my name, +1 entry. Every time you get someone to retweet it, +1 entry. Every time you get one of your followers to follow me, +2 entries (have them let me know who sent them, of course!) Also, share this post on Twitter, the same retweet rule applies!

Additional ways to enter on this next-to-last day of the contest:

Like, share, or add me as a favorite author on Amazon (+3). If you like The Superiors and The Vigilantes, make sure you let me know on amazon (+2 for each).

Pin one of my books on Pinterest (+3).

Add me as a favorite author on Barnes&Noble. FB like The Vigilantes and The Superiors on Barnes&Noble.


The Superiors is free for 2 more days on Smashwords! Pick it up while you can! Add me as a favorite author on Smashwords. FB like The Vigilantes and The Superiors on Smashwords. Share my books on all the social media sites on the right-hand side of the page a few inches below the FB like button.

If you have a Goodreads account: Follow the link to The Superiors and The Vigilantes. Scroll down to the bottom of the righthand column and you'll see where you can share via FB, Twitter, Pinterest and Google. Do that stuff!
Add me as a favorite author.

(For +10 bonus points, take The Superiors quiz if you've already read the book...you don't even have to get the questions right! Post a comment on the quiz letting me know your score).

As always, bonus entries for sharing this post all over the place! Share buttons below!

Read an Ebook Week Day 3 and 4 Giveaway

Have you picked an ebook to read yet?

If you're looking for free books, check out Smashwords.com and find some free books on promotion this week for free or cheap!

If you want to win a free e-copy of The Vigilantes, I'm giving away one every day. If you haven't won yet, try again. I'm also giving away an ARC hardcopy at the end of this week to the person with most entries for the whole week, so keep trying!

If you haven't entered the contest yet, find tons of ways to get extra entries in yesterday's post.

Here are some new ways today: get somoeone to follow my blog (have them leave a comment with your name on this post so I know who sent them) +5 entries.

Go follow me or get someone to follow me on twitter (again, have them send me a tweet with your twitter name) +1.

Like or get someone to like my FB writer page or book page, and get +2 for every like (have them leave a comment so I know who sent them).

Get someone to pin one of my books on Pinterest (+5 each).

Tomorrow I will post a poetry blog as usual. Share it via FB, blog, twitter, Google+1 for additional entries (as always, post a comment letting me know you did those things so I can add your entries to my random drawing).

Read an Ebook Week (#Giveaway) Day 2

Want to win a free copy of The Vigilantes?

Well, you can. I'm giving away one every day this week. Congrats to yesterday's winner!

You can find the first book in the series for free on Smashwords this week: The Superiors.

ALSO, at the end of the week I will be picking the person with the most entries for the whole week (not random selection like the daily winners) to receive a paperback copy of The Vigilantes. So keep coming back and helping me promote this great event to get people reading Ebooks and independent authors!

Today, to win a copy of The Vigilantes, I've added extra chances to win. Here's how:

Like yesterday, share this post via Twitter, FB, Blog, Google+1. One entry per post, +5 for blogging this. Please leave links in the comments section to your posts. Also, if you ask people to retweet, I will check your twitter post and give you an additional two entries for every person who retweets your post or reposts your FB link!

Additional chances to win if you do these things: Add me as a favorite author on Smashwords (under my picture, it will have a list of people who added me as a favorite author. Below that, there's a link that says "add author as favorite." Also, there's a button on the top left that says the same thing. Click on either one to add me (+2 entries).

While you're on my page, click on, The Vigilantes (or follow these links). On the lefthand side of the book page, there are tons of ways to share that book: Twitter, FB like, Stumbledupon, Reddit, Digg, or bookmark on Delicious. If you have one of these, it's a +1 each time. Tomorrow do the same for my other book, The Superiors. And download it for free while you're there!

Happy ereading!

Read an Ebook Week! (#Giveaway)

Hello fellow readers and writers,

In case you didn't know, this week is "Read an Ebook Week." What does that mean?
It means you should read an e-book!

It also means many other exciting things like:
I'm giving away a free ebook of The Vigilantes every day for the rest of the week!

I'll post with new details throughout the week, so check back often and try to win the free copy for that day.

Here's how you can win: Throughout the week, I will post about Read an Ebook Week. When you see those posts, check out what's going on for chances to win. I will add new ways to get extra entries as the week goes on.

Sunday: Go to the bottom of this post and share it on Twitter (+1 entry), Facebook (+1), Google Plus-One (+1), and your blog (+5), or Pin one of my books on Pinterest (+3). Also, if you link my blog to yours (add it to your list of websites) that's +10 entries. Make sure you leave a comment letting me know what you did, with links to your posts & blog. I will message you on Twitter if you win, or you can leave your email address in the comments if you don't have Twitter.

If you don't win a copy, you can still get The Vigilantes for half price on Smashwords.com for the promotion they're having this week. They are having a huge promotion! Tons of books are 25% off, 50% off, 75% off, or FREE. Make sure to go check it out. If you don't have an account, it's free to sign up, and you can download ebooks in any format so they work on whatever digital reader you have.

ANNNNNDDDD...remember how I said a bunch of books are FREE this week? Well....The Superiors is one of them. So, if you win The Vigilantes and you haven't read the first book in the series, you can get it free on Smashwords all week. And if you get The Superiors free and want a great deal on the second book, it's half off.

Check out the site and see what books you can score all week long. Yay for ebooks!

On a personal note, I will finally be finishing an ebook or two that I've been meaning to read for a long time. Look for an ebook review at the end of the week.

New Year, New Book!

Hey guys,
As a lot of you already know, I just released my second novel. YAY! The Vigilantes came out on Kindle, Nook, and at the Smashwords store last week. It should be out in paperback later this week. I'm so excited about it and happy to share my journey with all of you. To learn more about The Vigilantes look for it on amazon.com, smashwords.com, or barnesandnoble.com. Or find it on Goodreads. If you haven't read the first book in the series, The Superiors you can read find it on the righthand side of my blog and also find out all about it by clicking any of the links in my blog tour.

Review Wednesday: The Help by Kathryn Stockett

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


3.5 stars



I read the first half of this book and listened to the second half on audio. I liked the parts I read much better. At first, it was a little hard to get into since it's written in dialect. But once I got into it, I really enjoyed reading it. When I listened to it, I just wanted to get it over with, so I'm not sure if I didn't like the reader of if the book just lost my interest.



I thought it was a good exploration of the relationships between women, both the supportive side and the cattiness. I've heard that a lot of people are angry about a white author trying to capture the voice of black women, or they say the book is stereotyped, or that it glosses over a horrible situation. I didn't really feel that way at all. I think it portrays black people in a very positive light, but I never had a maid or knew anyone who did, black or white, so I can't really say if the book is accurate or not. And it certainly does not gloss over racism and give us a happy Mammie figure. I liked all the characters in the book, although Skeeter's parts were somewhat dull compared to the others.



I also didn't know much about the maid culture of Southern families before civil rights, so that was interesting. I'd heard of rich white families having black wet nurses during slavery, but I didn't know so many maids raised white children even in the 1950's and 60's. So the historical aspect of the book interested me.



I liked that this book, unlike so many in women's literature, did not focus on romance. I'd recommend to anyone sick of reading romance novels disguised as something else, and for pretty much all women in general. A good modern historical fiction book.



View all my reviews

Review Wednesday: Fading into Magic by Vone Savan

Fading Into Magic by Vone Savan

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


This was a valiant effort from a new independent author. I was drawn to it because of the wonderful, whimsical cover art. The story itself is engaging, exciting, and fast-paced. It has some romance, some tragedy, some action...all the usual paranormal ingredients.
The main character seemed a little undeveloped, but I still rooted for her. The plot was a little predictible, but I find that's true of almost all YA paranormal romance. The girls in this book seemed more like 10 than 17, though. At the beginning, I kept checking back to make sure I'd done the math right--I don't see 17 year old girls running everywhere and yelling to each other all the time, calling each other 'honey bunny' and stuff like that. I'm not sure the author is very aware of what high school girls are like.

While the plot didn't have any holes or leave anything to be desired, the writing style was very elementary and hard for me to get into. Some of the dialogue was hokey, the inner monologues often sounded like lectures for the reader, and the writing itself was very beginner. It was a good book, and with a professional editor who knew the writing business, it could have been very good. All the adjectives and people yelling things drove me a little nutty, though. I'd recommend a few books on writing for this author, and expect great things from him if he gets his books into industry-standard form.

An intriguing read that I'd recommend for Middle Grade/Young Adult readers of paranormal romance.



View all my reviews

Perseverence

When people talk about what a writer needs, it always seems to go something like this:

1. an idea
2. an ability to string together a sentence (with talent helps, but is certainly not necessary).
3. time to write
4. passion
5. dedication
6....

I'm here to add one thing to the list: perseverence.

Yes, this is certainly mentioned in blogs and topics where the goal is finding an agent and a publisher. But even if you're not querying or looking to get published, a giant dose of perseverence is mandatory.

First of all, you have to stick with the story. Sure, I have a dozen stories I started that are now anywhere from 30 pages to 150 pages. But if I'd stuck with them, they might have been something. Now they never will be. Maybe some of them didn't really need to be written. Some of them were abandoned for another more pressing idea. Some of them just took too long and I ran out of steam. That's bad. I don't want to abandon a story that has potential just because I lose interest in it. But sometimes it happens to me. First drafting is like a fever of creativity--if I don't capture it when it's fresh, it gets stale and sometimes fades. That's why I can do an entire first draft in a week or two, and why it's not uncommon for me. Of course, having a job does tend to get in the way of that. Too often real life obligations crowd out writing time, and the story goes stagnant for me.

And then, if I get the first draft done before the creativity runs dry, I have to go back and edit. Sometimes, I put this off for, oh, a year or so. Because I hate one of the editing steps. I call it my 'passive voice' edit, where I go through the entire novel trying to root out all those was'es and am's. I can put this off for months. I can start a passive voice edit and finish it six months later. I will try any means of procrastination to avoid sitting down and rooting those little buggers out. It's the head-lice case of the writing process. Nit-picking, fine tooth comb, all that stuff. Adding and deleting scenes is a breeze, perfecting the voice of each character, all that is fun stuff. But that dreaded edit makes me want to scream. But if I do it, if I stick it out and plow through, the book is better. It has to be done.

So now I'm going back to editing. I'm going to stop procrastinating. I will persevere.

Coffin Hop giveaway winner!

Hey guys!

Thanks for checking out my coffin hop blogs. The winner of my contest is Jennifer S. I will be emailing you shortly. Congratulations!

And thanks to everyone who entered. I will follow your blogs back if you've followed mine. Happy November. I hope everyone had a spooky, eventful Halloween! Mine was!

Review Wednesday: How to Save a Life, by Sara Zarr

How to Save a Life by Sara Zarr

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


Okay. I've calmed down from my disappointment at the ending, and I am ready to give my review. First, though--when did they put a girl on the cover? In my ARC copy, the benches are empty!



My review...well, I read Story of a Girl a while back and just fell in swooning love with it, and consequently, its author. But...I was so bummed that this one wasn't as good!



I love the author because she is very simple in her writing style. That's still here in this book. So are the FOR REAL characters. You feel like you know them. They are awesome. They are your friends. They talk like real people, act like real people, are screwed up. They've got issues. I like reading about issues. In this book, one of the issues is something that's on my gag list--child molesting. So that was a little ick for me. It's not very graphic, though, unlike some other YA books that are just too much for me. I put the book aside for a few days once I got some pretty strong hints about that aspect, but I picked it back up and finished most of it in a day. It's a quick read, and the heavy issues are there, but they aren't rammed down your throat in a vomit-inducing kind of way. I like that. Subtle is the name of the game in good YA. YA that is graphic just for the shock factor really makes me mad. It's almost like the authors are just trying to get on a banned-books list, or to shock kids by telling them in graphic detail about stuff that, honestly, kids should not know about. Not in that much detail. ANYWAY, sorry for the rant. The point is, this book sidesteps the graphic while giving you all the impact of the issue.

The next thing I just loved about this book was the relationship between Jill and her father. So wonderful, and real, and OMG--he didn't even molest her! Sometimes I think YA authors want us to think that all fathers are secretly pedophiles. Jill's father is dead, but awesome. However, Mandy's stepfather is...something. Not a pedophile exactly, since she's 17 or 18 when the abuse takes place. And she has mixed feelings about it, so...anyway. Her mom's boyfriend molests her, and she takes it because she never gets attention from her mom or anyone else. Mandy is...psychotic. Like, hilariously crazy. That made it a little more bearable to read, because there was some relief from the squig factor.

I read a few reviews that said they didn't like either of the narrators. I loved Jill. She was so real, so pissed, so flawed. It was harder for me to like Mandy. She was sort of...bland. And the way they suddenly became friends seemed, well, sudden. The guys--I think I have a book-crush on Dylan. I LOVED him. Why didn't HE get a happy ending?

What I didn't like about this book: the ending. Predictable, and kind of lame. Honestly, I'm severely disappointed. Sara Zarr is an author who tackles real subjects with bravery and delicacy. I expect so much more than the ending I got. It was completely unrealistic, and way too happy. I'm all for a happy ending, but not if it doesn't fit the material. That's how this one seemed. Sure, I'd like everything to end up shiny happy in real life. But the point is, it doesn't. Mandy never had to pay for any of her mistakes. Sometimes that happens. But not in the way it happens in this book. I just got to the end and said, "WHATEVER! That would NEVER happen." It was a major letdown.



character: yay! plot: meh. ending: boo.



Recommended for YA readers who like lots of character development and not a lot of action.



View all my reviews