YA Indie Carnival : Giveaway Winner & Chemistry Contest! Vote to win books!

And the winner is…..Emma Michaels! Woot! Congrats Emma,  you won 15 ebooks/paperbacks in the YA Indie Carnival Anniversary Giveaway! Thanks to everyone who entered This week you have a chance to win more books!

Today at the carnival it’s all about chemistry––the magic that jumps off the page. Each of us are posting excerpts and all you need to do to enter to win books is leave a comment here and let us know which excerpt(s) you want to vote for in our Chemistry Contest. Easy peasy. All commenters are entered to win an ebook from the author they vote for. Winner announced next week. GOOD LUCK!

This excerpt is from book 1 in The Starjump Series, TRANSFER STUDENT:

Here’s a bit about the story: Rhoe and Ashley would never be friends. Even if they lived on the same planet. But, they’ll become so much more. They’ll transfer. In a teleporting experiment gone wrong, Ashley, a Beverly Hills surfer, and Rhoe, a brilliant geek from planet Retha, swap lives when they make the same wish at the same time. They’ll have to survive each other’s lives to discover their dreams. If only it were that simple. Some wishes can’t come true. Some have to.

EXCERPT:

Yuke catches up to me. We walk side-by-side in silence through the Golden Meadow. The airboard launch, a sort of gigantic upside-down slide, peeks over a row of Truffula Trees.

“Listen, there are three things you have to remember about soaring. You’ll never soar if your mind is on the ground. Put it up on The Ridge,” Yuke says, pointing to a purple-blue mountain ahead of us. “Rhoe taught me that.”

The way he says Rhoe I know it’s happened. He knows. He really knows I’m not Rhoe, I’m…Ashley. It’s sunk in. Finally. I stop walking and can hardly breathe. It’s the first time he’s ever seen the real me, and his gaze warms me down to my frog-feet. Yuke spots the question in my eyes.

“The Ridge of No Return,” he says with a small smile, “It’s the prime place to catch air. But beware The Devil’s Grip. Soar too high and you’ll be caught in The Grip and lost to The Other Side. Forever.”

He misreads the question in my eyes. Again. I shiver thinking about The Grip and dying in the mythic ice and snow of The Other Side. I stare at my hideous frog-feet, my peds. I don’t care about The Ridge. There’s only one person I care about. One boy I’ll never have. Yuke.

“What else?” I ask, peering deeper into Yuke’s alien eyes.

“You’ve got to feel the beat of the wind in your peds. Surrender to the air. And know, deep in your hearts, no one is its master.”

I hear and don’t hear every word Yuke says. For the first time in my life I can’t speak. I can’t take my eyes off Yuke, now that he knows I’m not Rhoe. He wouldn’t be telling his best friend, an Astral, how to airboard unless he knows I’m Ashley, someone who doesn’t know much about soaring.

“Your catchers will always stop you if you fall,” Yuke says, filling the silence between us. He raises his arms above his head. Delicate wings expand out from under his arms. Thin pinkish-purple skin stretches over delicate, long bones. No feathers at all. Just smooth, glimmering skin. And it’s crazy. A week ago I wouldn’t even look twice at a guy with a big nose, but now, I’m hot for an alien. With wings.

I have to touch him. It’s beyond wanting to. The way Yuke spreads his wings makes his pecs flare and his biceps seize. He’s beyond gorgeous. The way his sheer wings take to the breeze makes Yuke more unreal than he already is to me. He’s everything I never wanted and everything I can’t live without. It feels like we’re the only souls in the universe. The look in his golden exotic eyes melts my ability to stay away from him.

“You can’t be real,” I say taking a few steps closer to him, holding my hand out to touch his wing. Waiting for him to let me. To know it’s OK. He flexes and lets his head fall back a little inviting my touch. I lay my alien fingers on his smooth taught skin, and run them over his wing’s thin hollow bones. My eyes fill with tears. His wings flutter in a breeze. He’s beautiful.

Yuke sticks his chest out and when he drops his arms his catchers vanish back into his biceps. “I can’t let you soar. Not now,” he says, the crowd cheers just beyond the trees.

Only then do I remember where we are. What we’re here to do. A band begins to play a set of songs. The crowd beyond the row of trees cheers again and again.

“I have to. I’m doing this for Rhoe,” I say.

Yuke puts his hand on my shoulder. I shudder.

“And for me,” I say.

Yuke’s golden eyes focus only on mine, on the Earthling inside of this alien body.

“And for you,” I say, feeling the beat of my hearts in my throat. “We’re going to win this damn thing.”

Read more excerpts from my fellow carnis here! Be sure to vote for your favorite(s)!

What’s new at the carnival this week? Click here to find out about the latest releases/cover reveals/giveaways.

Next week at the carnival? Do you Pinterest? Inspiration for Characters & Settings.

YA Indie Carnival : The Hunt For Smoking Hot Indies Giveaway!

This week at the carnival each carni is highlighting an indie author outside of the carnival. Be sure to go to all the carni’s sites to hunt for smoking hot indie authors and their novels and ENTER THE GIVEAWAY! Details at the end of the post

I’m hosting Chanda Hahn. I got to know the wonderful Ms. Hahn through The Pacific Coast YA Writers, as a matter of fact she and I will be attending the 4th Annual NW Book Festival in Portland in a week. Chanda’s written some bestsellers and I’m profiling her latest novel today:

Mirror, Mirror, on the wall,
Who is the Fairest of them all?

In the sequel to UnEnchanted, Mina Grime discovers that all is not fair when it comes to the Fae and their tales, especially when they don’t all play by the rules. Barely surviving the Story’s first fairy tale quest, Mina still has hundreds to go before she can end the curse on her family. But a new player arises to challenge Mina while new rules revamp the game she has just barely begun to understand.
All the while, people are mysteriously disappearing, including Jared, whom Mina must finally determine to be friend or foe. And with the loss of her greatest weapon, Mina must try to outwit a deadly hunter. Can Mina survive the most difficult quest yet while protecting those she loves from falling victim to one of the lethal tales of all? Or will she become a pawn when she strikes a bargain with the Queen of Fae?

OOOO! Right? Hope this makes your summer TBR:)

Want to win Fairest? Click here to enter the HUGE GIVEAWAY! GOOD LUCK! Winner announced at the carnival next week

Ready to hunt for more Hot Indies? Click here!

Happy Indie-pendence Day Celebration of Indie Authors!

I have three great Indies to feature on INDIE-pendence Day because they’ve written some sizzling summer reads!

Have you read a great Indie title lately? Post it here, I love getting reading recs

Tiffany King is a fellow Plume and her books are fabulous because they hit at the heart of what it means to be yourself. No. Matter. What. I love this about Tiffany’s books. But I also love her writing. When I open up any of her books, it’s like she’s sitting at my kitchen table telling me a story and I love that feeling. Once you read one, you’ll want to read all of her books! Here’s a little bit about WISHING FOR SOMEDAY SOON:

Seventeen year old Katelyn Richards is a stronger person than anyone will ever know, and that is just the way she wants it. Behind her normal facade lies the reality of a broken home life. Thanks to her abusive mother, a string of deadbeat stepfathers, and an unsympathetic system, Katelyn has learned that the only one she can count on is herself. Her life’s mission has become to shield her nine year old brother, Kevin, and to give him the future that they both wish for. A life with no more abuse, no worries about where their next meal will come from, and no more wondering if they will have a roof over their heads.
When her mother moves them again, this time to a small town in Montana, Katelyn’s resolve is shaken when she meets Max, a cute boy from her new school, who gets a glimpse into her real world. Max slowly manages to break through Katelyn’s wall of distrust, stirring up feelings she never saw coming. Now with her world more complicated than she ever intended, Katelyn struggles with the decision to follow her heart into the arms of the first boy she has ever loved. A decision that could risk the promise she made to protect Kevin, and to give them the ‘someday soon’ that is so close within their grasp.

I just read FORBIDDEN TERRITORY and I have to tell you it’s a great summer read and total page-turner. There’s something in here for everyone. It’s a thriller, an adventure, a romance. I’m posting a review soon on The FORBIDDEN TERRITORY Blog Tour July 5 so I thought I’d post an interview with the authors for the Indie-pendence Day Celebration of Indie Authors! Authors Melissa Pearl & Brenda Howson are the co-authors and they live in New Zealand, where the story is set. I loved imagining the story there, in a place rarely written about in YA. Here’s a little bit about FORBIDDEN TERRITORY:

Mica and Lexy have been best friends and next door neighbours since they were eight years old. They share everything and have no secrets from each other until… Tom arrives on Mica’s doorstep – a gorgeous exchange student from England. And Lexy is smitten.

Suddenly both girls are keeping secrets. Mica is hiding news about Tom’s English girlfriend and Lexy hasn’t got the heart to tell her best friend that her brother Eli, the guy Mica is mad on, thinks of her as only a friend.

After a massive fight, the girls decide the best way to mend their friendship is to spend some quality time together. And what better way than to go camping away from their parents and why not invite along the guys they are crushing on.

So the four teenagers embark on a geo-caching expedition into New Zealand’s native bush expecting a long weekend filled with flirtatious fun; instead secrets are exposed as they stumble across a hidden marijuana crop and its gun-wielding watchmen. Forced apart they spend the next forty-eight hours racing blindly in opposite directions as they fight to find each other before the hunters do. FB fan page: www.facebook.com/MicaLexySeries

Melissa is a fellow YA Indie Carnival Author and I’m thrilled that she took the time today to ask the questions I had on my mind after I read FORBIDDEN TERRITORY.

LAHE: You and your friend Brenda Howson co-wrote FORBIDDEN TERRITORY. Can you talk about the process?

MP: It was a very easy process to be honest. Brenda and I have been best friends for over a decade. We think the same and work the same way. When we get together to plan a book it just seems to flow. About three weeks ago we met up to plan out Forbidden Waters (Bk 2). It took us the day and was SO much fun. We seem to spark ideas off each other and the story developed so easily.

We also know each other’s characters really well, so it makes it easy to plan out scenes. We did this initially writing diary entries. I wrote Mica, and Brenda wrote Lexy. We got to know our own character and the other person’s character really well.

LAHE: Did you write the Mica chapters and Brenda wrote Lexy’s or….?

MP: Yes. I am in charge of Mica and Eli. They are my creations and I take charge of those chapters and scenes. If I need Mica or Eli to do or say anything particular in one of Brenda’s scenes, I just let her know and vice versa.

We also edit each other’s scenes really thoroughly and make adjustments as necessary. We got together for an editing weekend a while back and actually read the entire book aloud together. I read Lexy’s chapters so Brenda could hear what her character sounded like through someone else’s interpretation…. and she read the Mica chapters. It was really helpful.

LAHE: The story is about two best friends, what was the inspiration for the story?

MP: Brenda and I have spent a lot of time on holiday together with our husbands. We all get on really well. We have done three trips around the South Island of New Zealand. SOOOOOOO beautiful!! We fell in love with Te Anau when we were there so setting the story in that town was easy. We also did a girl’s weekend down there and hiked some of the nearby trails so we could get a feel for the bush.

We were actually out geo-caching (the four of us) when one of us said it could make a really good story. We can’t remember who said it, but it sparked all these ideas and by the end of the day Mica, Lexy, Eli and Tom had been born then placed in the bush finding a treasure they never meant to discover.

LAHE: Have you ever found yourself lost in the bush?

MP: Once – when I was nine and only for a really short time. I ran ahead a little too far and missed the turn off. I soon found myself totally alone. It fully freaked me out!! All the forest noises are much louder when you think you’re lost

Check out more great Indie reads from these fabulous authors/reviewers/readers!

1.	Jessie Harrell	26.	Amy Durham	51.	Brooke
2.	Karen Amanda Hooper	27.	Donna McDonald	52.	Nickie Anderson
3.	Susan Kaye Quinn	28.	Hallee Bridgeman	53.	Rick Daley
4.	Laura Pauling	29.	Diane Strong	54.	Cherie Reich
5.	Connie Keller	30.	Hayden Braeburn	55.	Dalya Moon
6.	Sandra Ulbrich Almazan	31.	Remy @ Reading with A Broken Heart	56.	A.E. Howard
7.	Cindy Hogan	32.	Katherine Lowry Logan	57.	JM Madden
8.	Lisa Nowak	33.	Jesse V Coffey	58.	Christine Fonseca, Author
9.	RaShelle Workman	34.	Teresa Reasor	59.	Jamie Manning, Author
10.	Stacey Wallace Benefiel	35.	Susan Ricci	60.	Laura Diamond
11.	Magan Vernon	36.	Ashna @ Wanted Readers	61.	Nicole Singer
12.	Liz Long	37.	Cate Dean	62.	Indie Children’s Authors Connection
13.	Angela Brown	38.	Anna Kyss	63.	Heather Simone
14.	Heather McCorkle	39.	R.M. Prioleau	64.	Cory Putman Oakes
15.	Megg Jensen	40.	Deanna Roy	65.	Jenny Krueger
16.	Christy @ Captivated Reading	41.	Courtney Vail	66.	Carolyn Brown
17.	Kimber Shook	42.	Michael Whetzel	67.	Gin @ Addicted to Words
18.	Kai Strand	43.	Mackenzie Morgan	68.	Beth Dolgner
19.	ali cross	44.	Paige Aspen	69.	Paranormal Book Beat
20.	Stephanie Queen	45.	Suzan Tisdale	70.	Medeia Sharif
21.	Laura A. H. Elliott	46.	Dani @ Refracted Light	71.	Bisi Leyton
22.	DeAnna Knippling	47.	Doug Solter	72.	Michael Abayomi
23.	Meredith Bond	48.	Alli (mrscaptkirk51)	73.	C.K. Bryant
24.	Patricia Lynne	49.	Ramblings of an Amateur Writer	74.	Erynn Newman
25.	Karen Victoria Smith	50.	Pamela DuMond

YA Indie Carnival : Fireworks, scenes with sparks!

What books have you read lately that sizzle? Any indie titles? I love getting great read recs! This Monday I’m participating in Indie-PENDENCE Day and it’s all about blogging great Indie Reads:) Stay tuned! Today a the YA Indie Carnival we’re celebrating the 4th with some fiction fireworks I want to post an excerpt from Winnemucca, a small-town fairy tale since it’s book birthday is coming up on July 9! Winnemucca opens with Ginny awakening to her own intuition for the very first time when it “talks” to her through her feet. In this scene, Ginny’s intuition begins to move from her feet to her fingers:

The night that changed my life started off like every other. I listened to my strings’ stories in the same corner booth at The Pit. Dolly stacked glasses at the bar. If it were up to me alone, I might have missed my transformation. But, lucky for me, the boys in the band kept their ears open and knew when I’d taken the turn.

“Play that again,” Matt said, putting his hands on his hips, holding a drumstick in each hand. The boy-genius drummer for the house band, The Midnight Men, glared at my fingers, instead of my twins, so I knew he was serious. His boyish grin made me smile too.

I took a deep breath and tapped my feet to try and calm them. I imagined my bedroom back home, sitting by my picture window, the wild oats rippling all pink and purple in the wind. And when my heart stopped racing, I hunched over my vihuela, willing my fingers to do what they’d done to make Matt notice. But, the story didn’t come out the same.

Matt gulped down some Budweiser and placed his damp fingers over my eyes. A chill poured through my eyelids, invaded my skull and settled in my slightly twitchy feet. “Play it again,” he said. Something about the darkness calmed the twitchiness.

“Again,” he said still covering my eyes.

I strummed faster. As if the faster I played, the clearer the strings’ story would be. But, something unfamiliar flavored the harmonics. 

Matt let me go and took a long drink of his Budweiser.

I felt like some idiot fan of his, grateful to be noticed at all.

“Here,” he said throwing a bandana on my lap. I picked it up and waved it in front of me, all dark blue with tiny white stars. It smelled like the wash on the line and reminded me of the eternity I’d spent in my own grime. It had been even longer since I cared. But I cared more than ever because Espy might walk in the door any minute.

Matt slipped the bandana out of my fingers, rolled it up and tied it around my head to cover my eyes the way my folks did with Anna and me and our friends at our birthday parties, just before they spun us in circles and turned us loose, bat in hand. Lizzy and I would make bets about who’d burst the piñata first. God, how I missed Lizzy. Even told Him so, hoping I’d baked the murderer out of me by now. Hoping He’d see fit to bring Lizzy and I back together again, somehow. Lizzy kept me company in the darkness, like she always did.

“Sometimes, the only way to hear what’s on the inside is to make the outside disappear,” Matt said. One boot hit the cement harder than the other on his walk back to the stage.

I played the riff blindfolded. And the earth’s rhythm played with my fingers, and a growing and a blooming and a withering visited them. Part music, part message from beyond. At times I couldn’t tell which was which. Even though my words sat with my heart in my throat, the ripening eased in me. For the first time. So after I played my very own song again for the third time, I pulled the stars off my eyes wanting to capture it forever, but I had no idea how.

It’s hard to believe I’ve been an Indie for a year now. To celebrate Winnemucca’s book anniversary I’m holding a $25 gift card giveaway, you can check it out here.

Want more fireworks? Check out what’s sizzling with the authors at the YA Indie Carnival here.

Click here to find out what’s new at the carnival this week!

Happy 4th from all of us at the carnival!!!

YA Indie Carnival: A recipe for Nasty YA Characters

Whew, I’m a little late with my post this Friday. Hope you all are having a fantastic beginning to your weekend. I love Friday afternoons at home with a good book They are so rare!

Today we get nasty at the carnival and I have to say that I love nasties in YA fiction. They are fascinating. I needed a little help beefing up my nasty in my WIP and got inspired by a great book The Blue Fairy Book. Have you read it? My daughter gave it to me for my birthday last month and I finally got to reading it over the past few weeks. I found a fabulous little story in The Blue Fairy Book called The History of Jack The Giant Killer. OOOO! Isn’t that a GREAT title? And I kind of made a recipe for nasty YA Characters based on what happened in the story:

Ingredients:

1 Hero: Jack

1 nasty [terrible enemy]: A giant [add liberally, the more the better]

1 terrible place : Gloomy cavern at the top of a mountain

1 crazy quest: to kill the giant

Story combines the above to have the hero set some sort of trap for the nasty. The hero becomes separated from anyone or anything that might help him/her but ends up trapping/killing/taking care of the nasty. Other nasties seek revenge for their lost buddy and take the hero to a creepy lair. Usually the nasty puts the hero to some sort of test/torture. The hero outsmarts the nasty and ends up saving not only himself, but usually the entire world too or ends some sort of enchantment or  does something that’s never been done before. YAY!

It’s fun looking at stories to see how they’re structured. Especially when nasties are involved So, who would I nominate for consideration in the YA Nasty category? So many come to mind. Well, there’s this the man who shall not be named right? Ultimate bad guy. Here’s a few of my favorite nasties: In The Dust of 100 Dogs by A. S. King, the dust and a pirate are the bad guys. GREAT BOOK. I really enjoyed this book. In Feed by M. T. Anderson the enemy is the “feed.” Weird I just picked two books named after their nasties. Is there a pattern here? Of course sometimes our own worst enemy is ourself and this is something I like to explore in my books. What do you think? Who’s your favorite YA NASTY?

Now check out what the other carnis have to say about NASTY YA Characters here!

Here’s what’s new at the YA Indie Carnival this week!

Next week? Fiction Fireworks!

YA Indie Carnival : The Best Fathers in YA Fiction & Great Reads For Dad

This topic makes me laugh. I mean, I sat down to write about fathers in YA Fiction and could barely come up with any that I’d call great. I mean parents in MG & YA Fiction are notoriously absentee, in one way or another. I found this article The Parent Problem in Young Adult Fiction pretty interesting. This is my favorite quote from the article where the essayist Julie Just, the book editor of the NYT at the time and now an agent at Janklow & Nesbit, discusses Neil Gaiman‘s CORALINE:

“Gaiman’s ultimate message is that parental perfection is an illusion. Real parents may ignore you and serve bad food, but at least they won’t rip out your eyes and leave you to rot behind a wall.”

LOLz, made me feel better about not being able to come up with more dads to recommend. Yeeesh! There’s some great YA books mentioned in Julie’s essay, so you might want to check them out. I’d love to know who you’d give BEST FATHER IN YA FICTION!

So who do I think of when I think of best YA Dad:

My first thought goes to Charlie, Bella’s dad in The Twilight Saga. You’ve heard of that series right? I love Charlie. He’s super busy, like lots of dads, especially dads raising a teenage girl on his own. Charlie’s not really able to say what’s on his mind, like most busy dads. I mean he’s kind of perfect for me. In the end he loves Bella enough to let her go, which is basically the challenge moms and dads face in the teenage years. So, Charlie gets my vote. and I think the story is stronger for the relationships developed between Bella and her parents.

But, there are others….Some other great YA dads would be Mr. Bennet in PRIDE & PREJUDICE and Atticus Finch in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD.

I’d love to know yours….

Check out the other carnis and see their best YA Fathers here.

And, here’s what’s new at the carnival this week!

YA Indie Carnival : Fiction Round Robin

A big thank you and a round of virtual *cheers* to fellow carni K.C. Blake for coming up with this fun idea and also for coordinating all of us! Thanks K.C., check out her fabulous books here!

What’s a fiction round robin? Well, we decided to have some fun and send one paragraph of one of our stories, could be from a new release or a WIP, and we sent it down a chain of carnis to write a story, one paragraph at a time, based on the first paragraph of our story. It was a blast when I got my story back and read how  the carnis took it in a whole new direction Here’s the first paragraph of my WIP and the story the carni’s wrote followed by a little bit from the original story:

At sixteen, Liz slept with the mask like most babies sleep with blankets. It had been her source of strength since a grandma she never knew sent it to her on her twelfth birthday with a note that said, The Fairy Queen, XXOO Isolde Richaleau. And so, Liz kept the mask hidden from everyone. From every guardian, poser mom and dad, from her case worker, her teachers and from people who tried to find a way in. Liz knew long ago that the only thing she could control were her dreams and those became more and more vivid as she grew.

It was all she could think about lately. What made it worse was that in every dream, she could see the boy’s eyes, full of pain and sadness behind the mask. There was something else about him she couldn’t quite nail down, but she didn’t want to think too hard on it. No reason to dwell on dreams. Not when she had plenty of her own secrets to keep.


“Seriously, are you all right?” Maggie asked, nearly running in her attempt to keep up with Liz’s long strides.


“I’m fine Mags,” Liz replied.


“Did you see the new boy today?”


“What new boy?”


”I don’t know his name or anything. But he’s a little strange.”


“In what way?” Liz asked absentmindedly as they entered their classroom. Liz took a seat, not really caring either way about Maggie’s answer.

Maggie slid into the seat beside Liz and responded under her breath, “I guess you’re about to find out.” She nodded towards the teacher’s desk where a guy was handing their teacher the obnoxious florescent yellow paper required for all new students. Liz lifted her gaze from her desk to see what Maggie was talking about. The guy was tall, over six feet even with his shoulders hunched over. He wore faded, ragged-out jeans and a black tee shirt that was either vintage washed or washed so many times it now looked vintage. His hair was dark, nearly black, and hung straight down the side of his face to his cheek bone. There was something about his profile that felt familiar but Liz knew they’d never met before. She continued studying him, not hearing Maggie trying to get her attention nor the ringing of the tardy bell. The boy turned to face the classroom and froze. Liz brought both hands to her lips to stop the scream from exploding out of her mouth. She may not have known the boy, but she recognized those ice blue eyes.

‘Oh my God! It can’t be,’ Liz thought. ‘How can this possibly be happening?’  The new boy’s painfully sad eyes were the very ones she’d been dreaming of every night for weeks…the ones she craved after she awoke each morning.

YA Indie Carnival: Listopia Demystified

Today at the carnival we’re all posting about Listopia. What’s Listopia you say? Well, if you’re on Goodreads, as I am, you’ve heard of it, right? Listopia is a great way to beef up your TBR list, mine is literally overflowing with amazing books, but I’m always looking for a great read. Listopia lists are one of the ways I find that perfect read for the beach, for a broody fall day, for a little something scary, etc…

Here’s how it works. Click on any book, for this example I’ll use 13 on Halloween. Scroll past the friend reviews and if a book is on a Listopia list, it will be listed in the section “Lists with this book” 13 on Halloween is listed in Best Cover Fall/Winter 2011 and Middle Grade Novels 2011  once a book is on a list, the more votes it gets the higher up on the list it is. It’s that simple. It’s a win-win for authors & readers. Authors get some great exposure for their books and readers get some great ideas for what they might like to read.

Some of the lists are hilarious too. Winnemucca is on the Feet! list:) LOL! And it’s also on the Adopt an Indie November 2011.  Check out all these lists to find some amazing reads for the beach this summer. And when you do, there’s a great box for you to search for the exact list you want, just enter your search term, say beach reads and a whole bunch of fun lists will appear for you to check out. Have fun in Listopia Land

Check out what the other Carnis have to say about Listopia here.

Check out what’s new at the carnival this week here.

YA Indie Carnival: Location, location, location–where we like to go in books

Today the carnis are blogging about where we love to go in books. Like most readers, I love to go to places I don’t expect. I love to see regular places in new ways and feel transformed. Setting is powerful and I like when it’s used like a character. I try to do this in my own writing. Some of my favorite books have done this so well like THE GRAVEYARD BOOK by Neil Gaiman, and AMERICAN GODS by Neil Gaiman. In CITY OF THIEVES by David Benioff, setting is used to help ramp up the tension and take us to WWII Russia. Cheri Lasota take us to the beautiful Azores in ARTEMIS RISING. Who will ever look at a train station the same way after HUGO CABERET by Brain Selznick? These are just a handful of fabulous reads that take me where I love to go in books. How about you?

In WINNEMUCCA, Ginny’s road blood ripens on an enchanted road trip which begins when her feet start asking her questions she doesn’t want to hear and take her to a place she never expected to go to find her answers. She’s walking along Highway 33, a deserted two-lane road in the middle of the San Joaquin Valley:

I covered my ears to drown out their trouble-making questions, but all I heard were my own.

What happened to Bobby and me?

Why was I listening to my feet?

Had I lost my mind?

A dirt devil twisted over a fallow field in the tired sun and spun my thoughts backwards to the second in Tar Canyon when Bobby’s eyes met mine and I knew only death would separate us. My Big, Fat, Lie-of-a-Life churned in my gut like the dirt devil. I doubled over, more alone than ever before, and I tied myself into a knot so tight I could hardly breathe. I’d been wrong about Bobby. Wrong about a lot of things.

When I caught my breath and lifted my head, the sun ricocheted into my eyes. Devil’s Rope twisted around the top of the chain-link fences that secured Avenal State Prison. I had no idea why my feeet marched me there. It didn’t look like the kind of place a practically married, straight-A student would find the answers her feet demanded. But the ripening like to surprise me.

In TRANSFER STUDENT we see our world through the eyes of a boy alien named Rhoe and see Rhoe’s home planet, Retha, through the eyes of Ashley, a Beverly Hills surfer after they swap lives when Rhoe’s science fair experiment goes wrong:

Ashley decides to airboard to save Rhoe’s reputation even though she’ll risk her own life on planet Retha, a parallel planet to Earth with lower gravity and a little less technology:

Yuke lets go of my hand. I walk up to the launch platform with him and the two Astrals in our heat. We all shake hands. The same handshake Yuke taught me before. For fortune. I still feel Yuke’s hand in mine when I catch him whispering to the other riders.

The muscles in my arms tense. I place my board over my head and run off the platform. Yuke launches right after, followed by the other two Astrals. My feet dangle and I gasp, caught in the gentle cradle of a rising wind. I tug at the board to bring it close and whirl around, nowhere near as graceful as the golden-sparkle riders of the first heat. I set my frog-feet down on my board, adjusting the suction as I lean to any side that pulls me hardest. Dizzy, I have a hard time knowing up from down, like when I get munched int the surf.

YA Indie Carnival : The Kindergarten Ghost & Other Spine-Tingling Short Ghost Stories

So happy you stopped by the carnival this week. I’m really excited about our entries because we’re all sharing a little bit from our WIPs…cue Frankenstein music, a little thunder and mad scientist laugh *mwahhahahah* What’s up next for me? I’ve got lots of stories in the offing this year that I’m really excited about. 14 ON HALLOWEEN will release Sept. 1st. And I’m working on a memoir of my dad’s experience as a Japanese POW during WWII when he was captured at the age of eighteen. This is actually coming along after years and years of work. I’m going to do a post about the process because it’s been very different than the writing process I use with my fiction. It’s thrilling, actually. Today I’m going to share with you the first story from The Kindergarten Ghost & Other Spine-Tingling Short Ghost Stories, a collection of six short ghost stories, that will be available mid-July. The collection is for kids of all ages and I’d recommend it for ghouls 13 and over:) Eeeeep!

The Kindergarten Ghost

Mary was a quiet gal. She loved reading and sewing and teaching Kindergarten at Cypress Elementary School. An avid gardener, she was happy that the district in which she taught named all their elementary schools after trees. No one she met seemed surprised to hear that Mary was a kindergarten teacher. Her constant smiles, endless energy and devotion to children made that an obvious career choice.

But lately, Mary felt restless.