Archives for April 2013

Shadows of the Hidden by Anne Riley – A Giveaway

I cannot thank you enough for your sweet, encouraging comments about the book. Your kindness means the world to me and has helped to take the edge off of my book-related angst. I’m working on another post that I’ll put up tonight, but in the meantime, I want to introduce you to my friend Anne, who has written a fantastic young adult fiction book called Shadows of the Hidden. Yay, Anne!

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See? It is very mysterious.

It was one day about five or six years ago, I think, when I was totally immersed in some mundane task (sorting paperclips, maybe? throwing away all the receipts in my purse?) and overheard my friend Anne talking to another friend of ours about sending query letters to literary agents. My head shot up like a rocket.

“HOLD ON,” I said. I knew that Anne had written a book, but I had no idea that she was so, well, GROWN UP about the whole thing. “You’re looking for an agent? Like somebody who will represent your publishing interests?”

“I am!” she answered.

And I thought that was the fanciest thing I’d ever heard.

At the time I didn’t have any plans to write a book, but that didn’t matter. I just loved talking about writing with Anne. Since then we have had approximately 1496 conversations (a rough estimate) about how we write and when we write and how sometimes we HAVE TO WRITE. Anne mostly writes young adult fiction, and listening to her talk about her ideas for plots, for characters, for alternate realities (oh yeah she does) never fails to fascinate me. And bless her heart, she’s probably had to listen to me talk about my writing insecurities more than anybody else in the Birmingham area, so you might want to keep her in your prayers.

Sure enough, Anne eventually found an agent, and it’s been so fun to sit back and watch her dream of being published come true. She has worked so hard, and she has worked cheerfully, always choosing to see the bright side at every bump in the road. I love that about her.

Here. Let me show you a picture so that you and Anne can get better acquainted.

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(HI, ANNE.)

And here’s some info about her book, which greatly interfered with my sleep two nights in a row because I could not put it down. This is a book that’s appropriate for teenagers but fun for grown-ups, too, so it’s a win for the whole family.

PLOT SUMMARY:

Natalie Watson doesn’t believe her parents are dead, even though they disappeared five years ago. Discovering the truth about their fate is one of the only things that get her out of bed in the morning. But after moving from her home in Georgia to her aunt’s boarding school in Maine, solving the mystery of her parents’ whereabouts is just one of several challenges she must face. When she’s not fending off attacks from the popular kids, she puzzles over the rumors about a strange boy in her math class–one with fiery red hair who rarely speaks.

Despite suspicions that he murdered his sister a year earlier, Natalie finds it impossible to stay away from Liam Abernathy–especially when he confesses to knowing something about her parents. Soon she’s following him into the forest, where things happen she doesn’t understand…things that shouldn’t be possible.

Natalie soon realizes her connection to Liam is deeper than she ever imagined, and not everyone she counts as a friend can be trusted. When she finds herself at the center of a centuries-old quest for immortality, she must work with Liam to stay alive–even if it means facing a truth about herself and her family that will not only shake her perception of herself, but of the entire world around her.

EXCERPT:

The grinding of a key in a lock sends adrenaline shooting through my veins. I stagger to my feet in a fog of panic and lunge for the closet door handle, catching a glimpse of Liam’s red hair just before I shut myself into darkness.

Was I fast enough? Did he see me?

The clink of metal against wood makes me jump; he must have tossed his key on the desk. I shut my eyes and try to keep my breathing even, but my lungs are working overtime and I’m terrified he’ll hear me. What am I going to do if he finds me here? What reason could I possibly give for hiding in his closet?

Hey, I’m part of the new Closet Safety committee. Just checking out your shelves. These are some solid looking brackets.

Right.

His heavy footsteps cross the room, growing nearer to my inadequate hiding place, and I press a hand over my nose and mouth. Maybe he’ll go to the dining hall for dinner and I can escape. Or maybe he wants to take a shower after going…wherever he went. Eventually, he’ll have to use the bathroom, right? And then I can make a break for it.

The closet door jerks open and Liam’s face appears. Horror explodes in my chest, but it’s instantly eclipsed by disbelief at two things—the battered state of his face and the knife in his hand. He’s holding it above his head like he’s ready to kill me.

I fall back into his clothes with a shriek.

BLURBS:

Medeia Sharif, author of Bestest. Ramadan. Ever.:

“This novel kept me on the edge of my seat. It was quite suspenseful with a unique historical twist to the paranormal. With great characters and non-stop action, it kept me hooked until the very last page.”

Krissi Dallas, author of the Phantom Island series:

“A riveting mystery filled with realistic teenage drama, suspenseful twists, and an extraordinary quest for the truth… Anne Riley is a refreshing storyteller with the ability to keep me desperately turning those pages for more adventure!”

Anne is giving away two autographed copies of Shadows of the Hidden, so if you’d like to enter, just click on the widget below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I’m closing comments on this post to avoid any confusion about how to enter the giveaway – and also to encourage you to go see Anne over at her blog (this post is one of my favorites).

I’ll see y’all later tonight; be warned that I have some thoughts about American Idol (yes, I caved and started watching again) and some other stuff, too. Hope y’all are having a great Thursday!

Only Two-ish Months Away

First of all, that title up there? Least imaginative ever. But everything I thought of was way too long (not that that’s ever stopped me before) or self-deprecating to the point of deeply awkward. So I went with bland. It seemed like the eh thing to do.

Second of all, my book (it’s called A Little Salty to Cut the Sweet, but Martha gets the title mixed up and calls it A Little Bit of Salt and A Whole Lot of Sugar!) comes out in about nine weeks. I can’t think about it / type it / say it / allude to it without wanting to breathe into a paper bag. I mean, I’ve never actually used a paper bag as a breathing aid before, but I’ve seen it in the movies several times and it looks like it’s super effective. And for the record, my runner-up hypothetical coping mechanism is to lock myself in a room and watch all the seasons of Flipping Out. Or maybe I’d watch Veronica Mars. I guess it would depend on my mood.

I’m spending way too much time focusing on my pretend emotions, aren’t I?

Third of all, some talented people who work for my publisher made me a very sassy book page, and it is now up-and-running right here on the blog. For some reason I like the fact that it’s here and not on some official author site (note: I do not in fact have an official author site, so that might make hosting a book page there sort of tricky). REGARDLESS, even though I’m basically 94 kinds of terrified for anyone to read my book, this blog feels like home to me, so it all seems more comforting and less likely to cause panic attacks if the book page is just kind of hanging out here, dozing when nobody’s looking at it and also hoping that somebody might stop by with a bucket of fried chicken or something.

(I know I’m rambling right now. But you must understand that my mind is pretty much A DEATH TRAP OF FEAR.)

So. Here’s the book page. There’s a place where you can download the first chapter if you’re into that sort of thing (it’s actually the table of contents, the introduction, and the first chapter, but I am giving you way more information than necessary because my nerves are kind of WOUND UP right now). And listen – if you have no interest in downloading the first chapter, I totally understand. A little bit of me goes a long way. Especially when I’m feeling like Judy Grimes.

Anyway, thanks for being so kind and supportive and all-around wonderful. And thanks to Tyndale for making the book page, because if the promotion of this book had been left to me, the marketing campaign would look something like this:

I wrote a book. But you don’t have to buy it. I hope I haven’t bothered you. Would you like some bacon?

The end.

edited to add this P.S. – I forgot to mention that there are some Pinterest-y and Twitter-y things at the bottom of the page…just wanted to point that out since there were some very nice people who went to the trouble of designing that stuff, and I think they did a great job. So grateful for them!