Let Me Ask You...

I'm going to be overhauling the blogs and website in the next few weeks, and I'm unsure what to do with this blog. It's not a blog I post to daily, because honestly, I just don't know what to write about. My writing blog I post to almost daily, as I can talk about writing forever. But here? I'm at a loss. Do you guys really care about my day to day life? Pictures of the cats? Stuff that strikes me as funny? I've never been a journal keeper, so I'm not sure what to say even if I did post daily.

I don't want to abandon the blog completely, because I like having a venue to chat with readers and let them know what's going on with me and the books. But I also don't want to bore you guys to tears with stuff no one really cares about. Since I don't think everyone who comes here wants to hear in-depth stuff about writing, it doesn't make sense to just combine the two blogs. But if this one becomes a simpler "news and the occasional event" blog, I'm okay with that. Folks can always leave comments and I read all of those, so I can still keep in touch with everyone.

So, I've put up a poll for the next two weeks to see what visitors want to hear about. You can choose as many as you want, but if you can pick the top two, that would be great, as I'd know the most important things. Feel free to expand in the comments section, or offer suggestions if I don't have it on the poll.

And hey, if you guys have ideas about stuff you'd love to see on the website, let me know. It's been up about a year now, and I've learned a lot about what I need and what readers like.

Anything I can do to make the site or blog better?

I'm all ears.

A Couple of Fun Interviews

I was interviewed over at the Debut Authors Blog recently, so pop on by and peek around.

You can also hear me share my geek side at the gaming blog Grinding to Valhalla.

And I'll have the next book challenge post up today. Just been one of those weeks where I haven't had much time to post!

2010 Book Challenge #7 & 8

This week started a long run of Kate Brian's "Private" series books. I'm a big fan of these, so seeing them all lined up on the shelf makes me very, very happy. And better still, when I went to get the cover images for the blog, I found out that book #11 Scandal, comes out tomorrow! (squee!).

Inner Circle
By Kate Brian
Ages: 14+

The Private series is a fun suspense/drama mix that centers around Reed, a blue-collar gal who gets a scholarship to Easton, one of the top boarding schools on the East Coast. She's way out of her league here since almost every student is super rich or famous, or both. The dorm to be in is Billings House, and the "Billings Girls" are the creme de la creme of the already fabulous. Reed will do anything to get into Billings, and let me tell you, these girls really make her work for it. I don't want to go too much into what this particular book is about so as not to ruin the series for anyone picking it up, but there's always a juicy mystery or two going on (frequently involving a murder), and Reed gets herself into some crazy situations. This series is definitely a PG-13 one though.

Legacy
By Kate Brian
Ages: 14+

If I wasn't already a huge fan I might have been put off by this one. I've always liked Reed, even though she doesn't always make the choices I think she should, but in this one, she really turns into an unlikable girl. (The stuff she does to her boyfriend, Josh! Ack! How could she?) I strongly suspect that was Brian's plan, though, and now that Reed has learned that absolute power corrupts absolutely, she'll start her hard road back to being the likable her and correcting the mistakes she made this book. Although ow she's going to get out the mess she lands in at the end of Legacy is beyond me.

This week's books:
Ambition, Kate Brian
Revelation, Kate Brian

I also have a book to read for someone in my crit group, so there's a good chance I won't get either of these read this week. But I'm still reading, only something that won't be published until next year or so. (It's the second book to a series a friend of mine just published this past January, (Servant of the Underworld) Aztec noir. Very cool stuff.

And I heard about another cool book this morning that I threw on my wish list, called The Line, that sounds like it's right up my alley.

Future books:
Paradise Lost, Kate Brian
Privilege, Kate Brian
Black Angels, Linda Beatrice Brown
Jhegaala, Steven Brust
The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
Princess in the Spotlight, Meg Cabot
Princess in Love, Meg Cabot
Heist Society, Ally Carter
Empire, Orson Scott Card
A War of Gifts, Orson Scott Card
Deep Dark and Dangerous, Mary Downing Hahn
Deadtown, Nancy Holzner
Crank, Ellen Hopkins
Mainspring, Jay Lake
How to Ditch Your Fairy, Justine Larbalestier
Tomorrow, When the War Began, John Marsden
Gods of Manhattan, Scott Mebus
Hellgate London - Exodus, Mel Odom
The Adoration of Jenna Fox, Mary E. Pearson
The Scent of Shadows, Vicki Pettersson
How I Live Now, Meg Rosoff
Holes, Louis Sachar
Wicked, Sara Shepherd
Games of Command, Linnea Sinclair
The Harrowing, Alexandra Sokoloff
It's Kind of a Funny Story, Ned Vizzini
Uglies, Scott Westerfield
Spin, Robert Charles Wilson

And the Name of Shifter Two is...

Part fugitive, part hero, fifteen-year-old Nya is barely staying ahead of the Duke of Baseer’s trackers. Wanted for a crime she didn’t mean to commit, she risks capture to protect every Taker she can find, determined to prevent the Duke from using them in his fiendish experiments. But resolve isn’t enough to protect any of them, and Nya soon realizes that the only way to keep them all out of the Duke’s clutches is to flee Geveg. Unfortunately, the Duke’s best tracker has other ideas.

Nya finds herself trapped in the last place she ever wanted to be, forced to trust the last people she ever thought she could. More is at stake than just the people of Geveg, and the closer she gets to uncovering the Duke’s plan, the more she discovers how critical she is to his victory. To save Geveg, she just might have to save Baseer -- if she doesn’t destroy it first.

This cover is near and dear to my heart, because I got to do something very few authors ever get to.

I designed my own cover. There's a full breakdown of the story over on the writing blog for those who want to know the nitty gritty behind it. There are also samples of the covers I mocked up to give to my editor. (I'd re-post here, but it always seem so silly to say the same thing on both blogs since a lot of folks read both).

I'm really excited about it, and can't wait to see the galley proofs. Since the cover is ready, I'm hoping they're full ARCs like The Shifter was, because those look like real live books. Somehow that makes it feel all the more real. And I get to squeeze them to my chest and jump up and down squealing in glee.

Yeah, I'm a goof.

Come Say Hello!

It just dawned on me that I forgot to tell y'all I was doing a book signing! (bad me)

So if you're in the Georgia area, come stop by tonight between 6 and 8pm at The Avenue Forsyth Barnes & Noble.

It's Exceptional Child Week this week, so there are lots going on with the local schools, and they'll be other events at B&N as well.

2010 Book Challenge #5 & 6

It was a good reading week, as I finished two and got halfway through a third. (Traveling and staying in a hotel room gives you lots of time to read). Two excellent books, and I even got a few new ones to add to the list.

The Name of This Book is Secret
by Pseudonymous Bosch
Ages: 8+

This book surprised me, because I usually don't like books that break the fourth wall and talk directly to the reader. I often find them distracting. But Bosch really proves that if you do it well, you can do anything. His narrator tells you the secret tale of two kids (but he can't tell you their names, so he makes some up) in a town (that he can't tell you where it is, so he says to use your town) trying to find a terrible dangerous secret (which he doesn't want to tell you about, but he's so bad at keeping secret he just has to.)

Wonderful voice, great plot, delightful characters, this book was a treat to read. Clever and fun.


The Compound
by S.A. Bodeen
Ages: 14+

Had I not been presenting on a panel the next day and needed to be wide awake, I would have stayed up until the wee hours to finish this book in one sitting. It was so hard to put down. But I did wake up early to read the final chapters and was almost late for breakfast. This one's a major contender for favorite book of 2010, and I'm only a teeny way into my list.

When Eli is nine years old, his nuclear-war obsessed billionaire father rushes their entire family into the "Compound" the fallout shelter Dad built so his family could survive a nuclear attack. Six years later, things are not so great in the Compound and Eli faces some terrible choices. I'd say more, but I don't want to give anything away or it will ruin this fantastic book. This one might be a little intense for my younger readers out there.

This week's books:
Inner Circle, Kate Brian
Legacy, Kate Brian

Future books:
Ambition, Kate Brian
Revelation, Kate Brian
Paradise Lost, Kate Brian
Privilege, Kate Brian
Black Angels, Linda Beatrice Brown
Jhegaala, Steven Brust
The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
Princess in the Spotlight, Meg Cabot
Princess in Love, Meg Cabot
Heist Society, Ally Carter
Empire, Orson Scott Card
A War of Gifts, Orson Scott Card
Deep Dark and Dangerous, Mary Downing Hahn
Deadtown, Nancy Holzner
Crank, Ellen Hopkins
Mainspring, Jay Lake
How to Ditch Your Fairy, Justine Larbalestier
Tomorrow, When the War Began, John Marsden
Gods of Manhattan, Scott Mebus
Hellgate London - Exodus, Mel Odom
The Adoration of Jenna Fox, Mary E. Pearson
The Scent of Shadows, Vicki Pettersson
How I Live Now, Meg Rosoff
Holes, Louis Sachar
Wicked, Sara Shepherd
Games of Command, Linnea Sinclair
The Harrowing, Alexandra Sokoloff
It's Kind of a Funny Story, Ned Vizzini
Uglies, Scott Westerfield
Spin, Robert Charles Wilson

Home Again

Hi all, I'm back!

I had a great time at the South Carolina Book Festival this past weekend. My husband and two friends of ours joined us, so we made a little weekend away out of it.

Saturday we wandered through the exhibitors hall and bought a few books, and got to meet author Faith Hunter. My husband's is a fan of hers, so he had a lot of fun talking with her. She was gracious and sweet and even gave out free jewelry with every book purchase. I got a pair of beautiful blue and purple stone earnings, my husband got the first book of her new series. And we hooked our friend on her current series. (and we got cool buttons that said "Have Stakes Will Travel")

Later that day I spoke at the YA panel with authors Gigi Amateau andLinda Beatrice Brown. It was a good panel since we're three very different authors in both stories and voice, so it interesting to see how we approached writing and storytelling. I'd already read Gigi's book, and I picked up Linda's book, Black Angels, a Civil War historical about three children walking from North Carolina to Virginia after their plantation is burned. Moderator Jane Zenger asked some great questions and kept the panel rolling. (And my husband was sweet enough to sit in the back so he wouldn't make me nervous)

L-R: Linda, me, Jane, and Gigi

We got to mingle with the other authors Saturday night at dinner, and then on to Sunday.

We didn't realize the Sunday panels started at 11:30 and not 10am like Saturday, so we were there way early and the convention center was closed. Our friend Rich suggested walking over to the local bookstore to kill time, so we happily agreed to follow. Little did we know it was 37 miles away, in 10 degree temperate, uphill both ways. (Okay, I'm exaggerating, it was more like six blocks and 43 degrees, but it was up hills and it was cold). When we got there, it turned out his phone had lied to us and there was no bookstore in sight, even though Google maps swore there was.

Me and my feet were not pleased.

Well, we couldn't exactly stand there shivering, so we hiked back to the convention center, ears frozen, noses dripping. By then the festival was open and they were selling coffee and tea, which we descended upon like attack piranhas. To punish Rich, we checked him into the coat check area until we forgave him. Best dollar we spent all weekend.

Rich in Time Out

Once we thawed, I had the second panel of the weekend, Science Fiction vs Fantasy: What's the Difference? with James O'Neal. This was another fun panel, even though moderator Curtis Rogers was a sci fi fan and I was outnumbered 2-1. But I held my own and represented fantasy admirably. I accidentally left my camera in the car, so I didn't get pictures of this one.

It turns out James is a regular at a mystery writers' conference called Sleuthfest, (he also writes crime novels under the name James O. Born) which happened to be the same weekend. A good friend of mine was at Sleuthfest, and she knows James, and wondered why he wasn't there this year. How funny that he was on a panel with me! Small world, huh?

Overall, the weekend was fun and I sold out of books the first day (yay!). It was a much quieter ride home since we were all exhausted (and my feet hurt), but I've recovered now.

I did read a great book while I was there, and I'll talk about that tomorrow with this week's Book Challenge Update.