ARC Winners!

we have a winner!!!!!!!!!!!!
actually, we have 2.

thanks to all who entered the giveaway for an ARC of DEAD ENDS. i was pretty blown away by the response. the two winners were chosen by my favorite random number generator, Random.org!

i know i promised to announce the winners here on the blog, but i hadn't banked on clever email addresses that don't make every winner's name clear. since i don't want to give anyone's email address out here, i'll give you the winning numbers instead.
#10 and #92

10 & 92, you each got an email from me. CONGRATS!

for those who did not get an email from me, GOOD NEWS! you can still win a copy of DEAD ENDS on goodreads. there will be 5 winners, and the contest is open for another month. click here to enter!

thanks again!

Win an ARC of DEAD ENDS!

COVER!

CONTEST!

CAPITALIZATION!

In honor of some very important news today, I am writing this post with all the proper letters capitalized. (Well, hello there, shift key! Remember me?)

Today is the day I get to share my new cover for DEAD ENDS, coming September 3, from Bloomsbury. (Yes, I give you permission to just scroll down now for the reveal.)

I am in love with this cover. Each time I look at it, I see another layer of the story - the road, the backpack, the grit, the way a true friend can lift you up, the way we sometimes hit a wall even when it looks like the whole wide world is right in front of us... It's just perfect.

So, to celebrate this perfect new cover, I simply must give away an ARC! See the contest details below! (It's easy peasy to enter, I promise.) But first, without any further drumroll, I give you the cover for DEAD ENDS!

 

Dane Washington is one suspension away from expulsion. In a high school full of “haves,” being a “have not” makes Dane feel like life is hurtling toward one big dead end. Billy D. spends his high school days in Special Ed and he’s not exactly a “have” himself. The biggest thing Billy’s missing? His dad. Billy is sure the riddles his father left in an atlas are really clues to finding him again and through a bizarre turn of events, he talks Dane into joining him on the search.

A bully and a boy with Down syndrome makes for an unlikely friendship, but together, they work through the clues, leading to unmarked towns and secrets of the past. But they’re all dead ends. Until the final clue . . . and a secret Billy shouldn’t have been keeping.

Add DEAD ENDS on Goodreads!
Pre-order it here, or here, or here, or wherever else books are sold!

OR... WIN an advance copy by filling out the form below. Two winners will be selected at random.

UPDATE: THIS CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED. The entry form has been removed. Thanks to all who entered!  2 Winners to be announced Thursday morning and contacted via email. :)

Thanks for celebrating with me! *Happy Dance*

The Next Big Thing

thanks so much to Diane Zahler for tagging me to participate in THE NEXT BIG THING blog chain!

if you haven't heard of it, The Next Big Thing is a campaign that started in Australia and spread all over the world. essentially, authors and illustrators answer a series of short, speedy questions to introduce their next project, then they tag another author to answer the same questions the following week. not sure how long it's been going, but it sounded like fun, so here's my Q&A:

1) What is the working title of your next book?
Dead Ends.

2) Where did the idea come from for the book?
It started with a series of conversations between two characters who I could not get out of my head. I had to write the book twice to figure out their story!

3) What genre does your book fall under?
Contemporary YA.

4) What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
I can never answer this question! It's hard for me to imagine any actors playing my characters. Good thing I'm not a casting director!

5) What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?A bully and a boy with Down syndrome form an unlikely alliance when they team up to find one of their missing fathers.

6) Who is publishing your book?Bloomsbury.

7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
One month. I wrote it during NaNoWriMo! (note: I spent almost a year rewriting it.)

8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
Another question I have a hard time answering. I always try to tell a story I haven't read before, so if there is a similar book out there, I haven't read it yet.

9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?I knew I wanted to write a story from the perspective of a bully, and when the second character came to me, I had to think long and hard about his voice. He felt very unique to me, but it took some time before I figured out he had Down syndrome. I had recently witnessed a teenage boy with Ds having an argument with his dad in a store, and I think something about that fight stayed with me and worked its way into the character.

10) What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?
Even though there is a character with Down syndrome, this is not a story about Down syndrome. It's just a story. And one of the characters just happens to have that trait.

the Next Big Thing chain continues with Anne Greenwood Brown! Look for her post next week.

festival of books

school visits, panels, and workshops - oh my!

i just got back from the Tucson Festival of Books and thought i'd share some of the highlights.

my weekend started with a visit to St. John the Evangelist Catholic School, where i met some incredibly bright and inquisitive students.

do ignore my crazy facial expressions! ;)

then it was off to the festival, where i got to present a workshop with awesome author Tom Leveen!
here's me and Tom putting on our "serious author" faces at the signing afterward:

 

well, Tom looks serious anyway. i kind of look like i'm doing my "mean girls" face.

then Tom and i joined the AMAZING A.S. King for a panel, and i tried not to be fidgety sitting next to an author i admire so much.

...tried and failed, that is!
this is me fidgeting with the case for my glasses:

and fidgeting with my hands under the table:

but A.S. and Tom are way too much fun, and i didn't stay nervous for very long. i had an absolute blast talking to the group. can't wait to go back next year!

love from london

Good morning!
or, to all you lovely folks over in London, Good afternoon!

BUTTER hopped the pond today to make his UK debut.

and what a welcome!!

i woke up to this review in The Telegraph. (link! click it!) and some amazing well-wishes.
i'm also excited to say BUTTER is a book of the month at the Victoria Station branch of WH Smith!

thanks to author Mo O'Hara for snapping this shot!

more British BUTTER fun to come with a blog tour later this month! (click on the banner below for details.)

but for now, i just want to say to my news friends overseas,

Thanks for making a girl (and her characters) feel welcome!

 

best lines OSCAR edition

5 days to OSCAR, and for the first time in years, i'm genuinely excited about the show.
so many good contenders this year!

and i'm thrilled to say part of what makes some of the best picture nominees so amazing is the writing. in honor of the fabulous scripts that made it to the big screen this year, i thought i'd do a movie edition of Best Lines today - featuring my favorite one-liners from a few of the top nominees.
2 WARNINGS:
#1 - there is an f-bomb in one of these quotes.
#2 - said quote may make you spit liquid out of your nose with laughter.

LINCOLN:
-  "Trust? Gentlemen, you seem to have forgotten that our chosen career is politics."
-  "I could write shorter sermons, but when I get started I'm too lazy to stop."
-  "Shall we stop this bleeding?"

DJANGO UNCHAINED:
-  "Your boss looks a little green around the gills."
"He just ain't used to seeing a man ripped apart by dogs is all."
"But you are used to it?"
"I'm just a little more used to Americans than he is."

ARGO:
-  "If we wanted applause, we would have joined the circus."
-  "Brace yourself. It's like talking to those two old fucks from The Muppets."

WRECK IT RALPH:
-  "What's going on in this candy-coated heart of darkness?"

MOONRISE KINGDOM:
- "Our daughter has been abducted by one of these beige lunatics!"
-  "Why do you always use binoculars?"
"It helps me see things closer. Even if they're not very far away. I pretend it's my magic power."

and finally, the line i have quoted so many times in my terrible Scottish accent, Handsome has banned me from saying it around the house:

BRAVE:
-  "I am Merida, and I'll be shooting for my own hand!"

what were some of your favorites? who do we think is going to win in the script-writing categories?

social media slacker

it's been 4 days since my last tweet.
17 days since i've posted on facebook.
21 days since i've blogged.

...one week since you looked at me, cocked your head to the side and said "i'm angry" five days since you laughed at me...
sorry. couldn't resist a little Barenaked Ladies interruption.
and yes, if you know that song, it will now be in your head all day.
you're welcome.

i'm posting my sorry social media stats to illustrate what happens when i'm writing. i'm always tinkering with something, but usually that something gets tossed into the "No!" or "maybe later" files with other partial manuscripts. then it's back to the interwebs!
but this thing happens when i break through the 10,000-word barrier, and suddenly i'm a woman obsessed - tossing aside everything BUT writing.
and that includes social media.

i used to stress about this. i used to worry that if i wasn't being loud online, then no one would hear about my books. i actually put more pressure on myself to tweet than to write.
...until one day i looked up and realized i hadn't reached "The End" on anything new in more than a year. somewhere along the line, my writing time had turned into email-tweet-post-promote time.

i still don't know if any of those things help sell a book, but i know this much: they won't help you write the next one. so i've learned to give myself permission to be a social media slacker every now and then. and if you're like me and find yourself choosing between writing and tweeting, then i give you permission too. a few weeks of internet silence won't kill your career. blank pages just might.

and so ends another post about my love-hate relationship with social media. i will tweet it. i will facebook it. and then i will crawl back inside my writing cave and not worry about it.
...at least for a few days. ;)