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BOOK GIVEAWAY (Part One)!!!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW OVER.

Congratulations, CF Legette! You are Rafflecopter’s randomly selected winner of this giveaway! Be on the lookout for an email in your inbox to claim your prize!

Thank you so much to everyone who entered! Be on the lookout for my August Book Giveaway, in which I will be celebrating the YA authors who have most influenced my writing, as well as giving away a signed copy of my own book, THE WOOD (out August 1st from Feiwel and Friends/Macmillan).

It’s so hard to believe we’re less than a month away from THE WOOD’s release (August 1^st, baby!!!!). To celebrate, I’m doing a huge 15 book giveaway over the next three months! YEP. 15. The first bundle of books (5 total) will be given away this month, and it will be featuring books by my critique partners, Lori Goldstein and N.K. Traver, and books by two authors who had a big hand in my publishing journey, Lisa Klein and Brenda Drake. In August, I’ll be giving away 3 books that have shaped me as a writer, plus a copy of THE WOOD. In September, I’ll be showing some love to other 2017 debuts, giving away 6 YA debuts that I couldn’t put down!

So, without further ado, the books I will be giving away this month are:

To enter, please fill out the Rafflecopter form below. One winner will be randomly selected on Wednesday, July 26^th (US only). Thank you so much for stopping by and helping me celebrate THE WOOD!!!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

YA Scavenger Hunt!

THE HUNT IS NOW OVER, BUT BE SURE TO CHECK BACK IN FOR THE FALL 2017 HUNT!

Welcome to YA Scavenger Hunt! This bi-annual event was first organized by author Colleen Houck as a way to give readers a chance to gain access to exclusive bonus material from their favorite authors…and a chance to win some awesome prizes! With this hunt, you not only get access to exclusive content from each author, you also get a clue for the hunt. Add up the clues, and you can enter for our prize–one lucky winner will receive one book from each author on the hunt in my team! But play fast: this contest (and all the exclusive bonus material) will only be online for 72 hours!

Go to the YA Scavenger Hunt page to find out all about the hunt. There are five contests going on simultaneously, and you can enter one or all! I am a part of the RED TEAM–but there is also a blue team, a gold team, a pink team, and a purple team, each with a chance to win a whole different set of books!

If you’d like to find out more about the hunt, see links to all the authors participating, and see the full list of prizes up for grabs, go to the YA Scavenger Hunt page.

SCAVENGER HUNT PUZZLE

Directions: Below, you’ll notice that I’ve hidden my favorite number. Collect the favorite numbers of all the authors on the red team, and then add them up (don’t worry, you can use a calculator!).

Entry Form: Once you’ve added up all the numbers, make sure you fill out the form here to officially qualify for the grand prize. Only entries that have the correct number will qualify.

Rules: Open internationally, anyone below the age of 18 should have a parent or guardian’s permission to enter. To be eligible for the grand prize, you must submit the completed entry form by Sunday, April 9th, at noon Pacific Time. Entries sent without the correct number or without contact information will not be considered.

SCAVENGER HUNT POST

Today, I am hosting Alexandra Sirowy for the YA Scavenger Hunt!

Alexandra Sirowy is the author of the young adult thrillers THE CREEPING, the Bram Stoker Award® Nominated THE TELLING, and the upcoming FIRST WE WERE IV. Alexandra attended a women’s college for her undergraduate work in International Relations and received her graduate degree in International Studies. When she isn’t writing, she likes to travel, read, cook, eat, and get into mischief. She lives with her husband in Northern California.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Lana used to know what was real. That was before, when her life was small and quiet. Her golden stepbrother, Ben was alive. She could only dream about bonfiring with the populars. Their wooded island home was idyllic, she could tell truth from lies, and Ben’s childhood stories were firmly in her imagination.

Then came after.

After has Lana boldly kissing her crush, jumping into the water from too high up, living with nerve and mischief. But after also has horrors, deaths that only make sense in fairy tales, and terrors from a past Lana thought long forgotten. Love, blood, and murder.

Find out more information by checking out Alexandra’s website or find more about her latest book, THE TELLING, here!

EXCLUSIVE CONTENT

Hi, I’m Alexandra Sirowy author of the YA thriller and Bram Stoker Award Nominated THE TELLING, out now from Simon & Schuster BFYR. There are liars, schemers, best friends, enemies, heroes, and villains in this dark and twisty thriller, and it’s not easy to tell who is who.

I had the idea for THE TELLING while staying on an island in Washington. There were sailboats in the indigo waters, bonfires dotting beaches, and a seemingly idyllic town. I couldn’t help but wonder, what lies beneath this glittering façade? A fictive island as eerie as it was alluring took root in my head. THE TELLING is the story of two main characters, step-sister, Lana, and step-brother, Ben. They have childhoods rich in make-believe and cast themselves as the heroes of their stories. This is before. THE TELLING begins after, with a mysterious murder, a secret past, and seventeen-year-old Lana setting out to become the hero of her imagination. Welcome to Gant Island.

I hope you enjoy this glimpse into THE TELLING’s intrigue.

***

Chapter Three

It was June 8, half past eleven. Ben’s and my movie night had been interrupted. We’d eaten lobster tacos and I drank two beers, which was two more beers than I’d ever had before. Then a pissy Maggie arrived.

She and Ben started fighting—a blustery, name-calling argument. He’d broken up with her five days earlier. She wasn’t supposed to show up at our house anymore. She had to accept they were over. For good. Although I didn’t pick up on it as it played out, it was suspicious that she had a friend drop her off, only to demand a ride home. No, she wouldn’t let Ben order her a car when he offered. No, she wouldn’t sleep off her buzz in the downstairs guest room.

I’d given Ben a sleepy and inebriated frown as we stood in the hallway while she used the bathroom. “Please.” He bent nearer, the light in his eyes diminishing until his forehead touched mine. He was all I could see. “I don’t want to be alone with her. Come. Save me.”

The three of us braced ourselves against the early summer breeze as we filed along the path to where Ben’s SUV waited in our driveway. I was pouting, letting my flip-flops spray pebbles at Maggie’s heels. She scowled at me before she climbed into the front passenger seat—without even bothering to call shotgun. I sat in the back, pulled my knees to my chest, leaned against the window. “Turn the heater on,” I whined. I stuck my earbuds in and was listening to the kind of angry, screeching punk I don’t even like just to tune her out. And here’s the second worst thing I’ve ever done.

I fell asleep, and I couldn’t tell the police what happened next.

Two hours later my ears buzzed with the sharp, stuttered ding of car doors left ajar as the police tried to make sense of the blood splatter in the interior. The engine had been left running. My earbuds dangled out of the rear door, where I’d thrown them after yanking my cell free to dial 911. Each time the breeze picked up they swung, grating against the road. I’d never use them again.

The wind hissed through the pines behind Maggie and me. The police had set up perimeter lights; they stretched our shadows and threw them back at sharp angles. Mine was trying to detach from my feet; it wanted to run and hide. A police officer, his finger on the trigger of a camera, blinded me in intervals. The light flashed in my peripheral vision as a second officer captured the splatter on Maggie’s face, arms, and torso. Ben’s blood had gotten in my mouth; it was all I could taste as we waited for the detective Gant PD had called in from Seattle to direct the investigation.

Detective Sweeny started a mile down the highway, with another group of officers examining the crime scene where Maggie and I had left Ben to his attacker. Sweeny was small and wiry, cutting through the blockish male cops in uniform. She sized us up with close-set eyes as she approached. Unlike every other officer, her gaze stayed steady, ticking over the details of us like Willa absorbing a study guide before an exam. Sweeny didn’t flinch away from all that blood. We’ll be okay now, I thought.

Sweeny introduced herself. She was a homicide detective. Then she held up her hand when my expression went runny and frantic and added, “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. The detective part is why I’m here.” She asked me if I’d been able to reach my parents. They were in Seattle overnight and their phones were off, and she seemed concerned when I told her there was no one else to call. Ben hadn’t been found; the police were searching; the coast guard had been mobilized.

I wanted to help them look. Sweeny put her firm grip on my shoulder. “The best way for you to help is to tell me exactly what transpired. Leave nothing out.”

Only Maggie knew the first half. She could lie and I wouldn’t be able to contradict her. We were a couple of miles before the narrow bridge that connects Gant Island with the Olympic Peninsula. It was the only route to take Maggie to where she lived, off the island. Maggie told the police that Ben and she were arguing. The car slowed. Maggie looked up to see why. To the right there were rocky bluffs that plunged to the island’s heaving waters. To the left there was a dark, meadowy slope that ran until a distant wall of pines.

“A man appeared in the middle of the highway,” Maggie whispered.

“Where did he appear from?” Sweeny asked. “The trees aren’t close to the road. Was he hiding behind something?”

“No. He wasn’t there and then he was. He appeared,” Maggie insisted, her voice rising.

For more about THE TELLING or my first young adult thriller, THE CREEPING, you can check out my website, Tweet me, find me on Instagram, or read about my books on Goodreads.

Alexandra

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Don’t forget to enter the contest for a chance to win a ton of books by me and many more! Check out all of the awesomeness on the Red Team:

To enter, you need to know that my favorite number is 8. Add up all the favorite numbers of the authors on the red team and you’ll have the secret code to enter for the grand prize!

CONTINUE THE HUNT

To keep going on your quest for the hunt, you need to check out the next author, Sheila Sobel! Happy Scavenging!

Pitch Wars 2016 Mentor Bio and Wish List!!!

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Hey, Pitch Wars peeps! I’m so happy you stopped by to check out my wish list! (If you don’t know what Pitch Wars is, it’s an annual writing contest put together by the fabulous Brenda Drake. If you have a polished, completed manuscript and want to know more, check out the details on Brenda’s blog).

Before we get to my wish list, here’s a little bit about me:

My YA contemporary fantasy, THE WOOD, will be published by Feiwel and Friends/Macmillan on August 1, 2017! I’m represented by the absolutely amazing Andrea Somberg of Harvey Klinger, Inc., with whom I first connected when I was a Pitch Wars mentee all the way back in the first ever Pitch Wars in 2013. If you’re at all curious about my 2013 Pitch Wars entry, you can check it out here. Although this isn’t the manuscript that landed me a book deal, it is the manuscript that helped me connect with the online writing community (thanks to Pitch Wars!), and which eventually led to me signing with my dream agent. For that story, you can check out my blog posts “My Journey to Publication, or Why You Should Never Give Up” Parts One and Two.

This year, I will be mentoring YA fiction. As a mentor, it is extremely important to me that my mentee’s vision for his or her book shines, and as such that is always my primary focus. So, while I will be giving constructive criticism on how to get your manuscript submission-ready, above all I want to help you turn your book into what *you* always imagined it could be. To do this, and to make your Pitch Wars experience as enjoyable and beneficial as possible, I will be using both my experiences as a Pitch Wars mentee in 2013 and a Pitch Wars co-mentor last year, along with my experiences from navigating the publishing waters for nearly six years now. Although I will focus on all of the elements of your book when giving feedback (plot, character, voice, description, etc.), I am especially attuned to pacing and tension. Many people will argue that the most important element in writing is either plot or character, but I will always argue that it is pacing/tension (established through well-developed internal and external conflicts). In my opinion, it doesn’t matter how unique your plot is or how interesting your main character is if you can’t keep your reader turning the pages, and all of that boils down to pacing, tension, and conflict.

For more about my style as a Pitch Wars mentor, check out my mini-interview here. And check out my previous mentee’s success interview from when I co-mentored last year here (includes a little more info on my mentoring style as well as some insight into the Pitch Wars process from my 2015 mentee).

And finally, as you all know, we are doing a Blog Hop Scavenger Hunt this year! My letter is…*drumroll*…E!

Now, without further ado,

My Wish List

I have always been a very eclectic reader, and as such I have a very wide range in genres I’d like to see. First and foremost, as a girl who grew up fascinated with all things paranormal and who has seen every single Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode about a dozen times, I am a huge fan of speculative fiction. I’m your girl for pretty much anything that falls under the fantasy umbrella (including fantasy, paranormal, contemporary/urban fantasy, supernatural, Gothic/horror, and magical realism) with the exception of high, Lord of the Rings type fantasy (not because I don’t like the overall story elements of LOTR—please send me elves and dragons and wizards, etc, if done in a new, unique way!—but because I have a hard time staying interested when there are too many odd place and character names and background information/family trees to keep track of). I am also a fan of light science fiction such as the Across the Universe series by Beth Revis, but I am not your girl for super high-tech science fiction such as The Martian by Andy Weir.

To give you an idea of the types of stories I love, here is a list of some of my favorite fantasy/speculative fiction books:

The entire Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling (I’m kind of a superfan)
Vicious by V.E. Schwab
The Shiver trilogy, The Scorpio Races, and The Raven Boys series by Maggie Stiefvater
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
The Girl of Fire and Thorns by Rae Carson
The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer
The Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare
The Diviners by Libba Bray

(Also, one of my favorite adult paranormal/urban fantasy authors is Karen Marie Moning, so if you have the YA equivalent of her style, please send it my way!)

I am also a huge fan of fun contemporary fiction and contemporary romances. Emphasis on the word fun. My 2015 mentee’s book, OUT OF LEFT FIELD, is a fun, fast-paced contemporary about a girl pitching for her high school boys’ baseball team (and it was soooo good you guys. Check out her entry and the ridiculous amount of agent interest she got here.) While I do appreciate darker contemporary topics (and do believe they are important to have even in a “fun” contemporary, since darkness is a part of life), I am not your girl for anything to do with cancer or stories revolving around a main character’s impending death, simply because I’m way too emotional to handle it. In other words, please don’t send me anything even remotely resembling The Fault In Our Stars by John Green. On the flip side, I could handle something resembling Dead Poet’s Society (one of my favorite Robin Williams movies), where the main focus of the story is much more on character relationships and on characters finding themselves, and where a character’s death serves to highlight a bigger issue. However, for me to fall in love with a story like this, there has to be a lot of heart behind it (I don’t like to cry while reading if I can help it! I cry enough at movies as it is, I don’t need to cry from books, too. That being said, if your book is something truly special, I’ll break out the tissues for it).

For some more insight into the kinds of contemporary stories I gravitate toward, here are my all-time favorites:

Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins
Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell
The Moon and More, Along for the Ride, and Saint Anything by Sarah Dessen
Red by Alison Cherry
The Heist Society series by Ally Carter
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares
The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan
Someday, Someday, Maybe by Lauren Graham

(Also, please send anything resembling Gilmore Girls and/or Friday Night Lights).

As a history major, I also enjoy historical fiction, especially alternate and/or supernatural history, time-travel, and anything to do with American history (with favorite time periods being: the American Revolution, the Edwardian era, WWII, and the 1950s and ’60s). Some of my favorite historical books include:

Wolf by Wolf by Ryan Graudin
Walk on Earth a Stranger by Rae Carson
Winter Garden by Kristin Hannah
The White Queen by Philippa Gregory
Outlander by Diana Gabaldon
The Help by Kathryn Stockett

(I would also love to find a book resembling either Band of Brothers or The Patriot).

And finally, I am a huge sucker for romance. Whether it’s the main focus of your story or one of several elements, if there’s romance in your book, I am that much more likely to be drawn to it! However, don’t let a lack of romance stop you from sending your book to me if it hits any of my other wish list items (Vicious by V.E. Schwab, for example, is one of my favorite books of all time, and I wouldn’t exactly call “romance” one of its main elements). I also love a well thought-out mystery and surprise twist endings.

So, to recap, I’m mentoring YA this year, looking for: speculative fiction; fun, fast-paced contemporaries; historical fiction; romance; and mysteries (or some crazy mix of all of the above!). I am NOT looking for high-tech science fiction; high, LOTR-type fantasy; or John Green-esque contemporaries.

If you think we might be a fit, please send your submission my way! I look forward to reading!