Today J.A. Souders and Rockstar Book Tours are revealing the cover for REBELLION, book 3 in the Elysium Chronicles releasing in June 5, 2015! Check out the gorgeous cover and enter to win the books!
J.A. SOUDERS is the author of the
Elysium Chronicles and lives in the land of sunshine and palm trees with her
husband and two children where she spends her time writing about the monsters
under the bed, day dreaming about living in an underwater colony, and failing
miserably at playing video games.
1 winner will receive physical copies of RENEGADE AND REVELATIONS plus the eNovellas. And ASK AGAIN LATER by Liz Czukas. If you have J.A.s books already, she will do an amazon or book depository gift card of the same value. International.
So it’s been a long time since I’ve done a Sunday update and obviously it’s not Sunday. So that’s why this is the Very Un-Sunday Update.
Life has been busy because things seem to really pick up in the Fall. My kids started school and both of them were starting new schools. My daughter going to Pre-School my son going to Kindergarten. So that was kind of overwhelming trying to get into a new routine that involves both of them.
Also I love Fall and I love to spend lots of time outside my house. Apple Picking, Pumpkin Fest/Fairs/etc.. and just bumming around the Arboretum. So I don’t log that much computer time besides at work.(which is plenty since I work in IT)
I also totally need to catch up on Outlander! I have those moments where I think..should I watch Outlander or should I read this book. Lately books are winning but maybe this weekend.
I have been going to book signings and I need to post pictures. I’ve actually missed some that I would normally go to. Not because I don’t like signings anymore, I love them! It’s just gets exhausting at times to juggle babysitters and time.
So I’ve been watching and reading different blogs and I’ve noticed the trends changing in book blogs. I’m going to just bullet point my observations and you can agree or disagree with me.
Blog Drop Off
This is something I noticed people discussing back in May. Not just the disappearance of blogs but people not entering as many giveaways and such. People have become disenchanted with Blog Tours
I actually still like blog tours, I try to only sign up for ones that are for books that are on my reading list anyway. Or a book that I’m really really interested in. I also like to control my content as in Review, Interviews or Guest Post that I pick the topic. That way I know that even though it’s a tour there is still something unique on my page.
My inbox is no longer filled with Reviews but with Discussion Post instead
I’ve noticed that reviews don’t seem to dominate my inbox anymore, now it seems to be discussion post. Which I enjoy don’t get me wrong. I prefer the kind where the blog author had something on their mind and decided to write about it.
I actually really enjoy watching things change and evolve. What I can tell you about my own blog practices, if you haven’t already noticed, is that I’m pretty relaxed. When I first started blogging I thought...I want my blog to be super awesome….but then I quickly decided that...I want my blog to make me happy… Blogging for me is a hobby. I love books, I love Authors and I love the reading/blogging community.I really want blogging to be an escape and something fun to do. I hope people enjoy my blog too. I actually have a couple of idea for fun things to do that I’m excited about. I just have to get it together.
Okay so I guess this a Update/Discussion Post…….I don’t know. I’m not putting any Book Haul pics because I think I’ve lost track of what’s new. I hope to get back in the swing of updating on Sundays.
I’m also back on the, I want to change my blog design kick.
She is, hands down, the most beautiful creature on earth. But beauty can wound,
and Mya finds herself reviled and shunned by her peers. If there is even a
chance that she could start over, Mya longs to take it, no matter the risks.
So when the strange Mr. Merk offers her a new life away from home, Mya is
hesitant but hopeful. Only she didn't count on the mysterious Ross, or her
feelings for him.
BEAUTIFUL CURSE is a contemporary retelling of the myth of Psyche and Cupid.
Jen McConnel first began writing poetry as a child. Since then, her words have appeared in a variety of magazines and journals, including Sagewoman, PanGaia, and The Storyteller (where she won the people’s choice 3rd place award for her poem, “Luna”).
She is also a former reviewer for Voices of Youth Advocates (VOYA), and proud member of SCBWI, NCWN, and SCWW.
A Michigander by birth, she now lives and writes in the beautiful state of North Carolina. A graduate of Western Michigan University, she also holds a MS in Library Science from Clarion University of Pennsylvania. When she isn't crafting worlds of fiction, she teaches college writing composition and yoga.
Once upon a time, she was a middle school teacher, a librarian, and a bookseller, but those are stories for another time.
Lyra has always been ahead of the curve. Top of her class in school, a budding
astronomer, and with a best friend like Darren she barely has time to miss the
mother who abandoned her family years ago. She's too busy planning to follow in
her father's footsteps, and to become the youngest astronomer at Space
Exploration and Discovery.
When a star goes missing Lyra is determined to get to the bottom of it
only to discover her braniac dad is the mastermind of a top-secret
government experiment. They promise to build a perfect world, one galaxy at a
time, but with every tweak of the present, a bit more of the future starts to
crumble.
Lyra has to go undercover to reveal the truth and let humanity decide if
the consequences are worth more than wishing on a star.
Eventually the day came when the voices in Kelley Lynn’s head were more insistent then her engineering professor’s. So instead of turning to her Thermodynamics book, Kelley brought up a blank page on her computer screen and wrote. Somewhere along the way she became a Young Adult author.
Kelley was born and raised a Midwestern girl. She’s not afraid to sweat and fills her free time with softball, soccer and volleyball. (Though you probably don’t want her on your volleyball team.) She occasionally makes guest appearances as a female vocalist for area bands. Music plays a large role in her writing process as well as the characters and plot lines within her stories.
You can find Kelley hanging out at her blog, titled in her name, as well as the group blog she shares with her fellow critique partners, Falling for Fiction. Kelley is a member of the Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators.
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Wait for You and Be with Me comes a daring tale that pushes boundaries . . .
At 21, Calla hasn't done a lot of things. She’s never been kissed, never seen the ocean, never gone to an amusement park. But growing up, she witnessed some things no child ever should. She still carries the physical and emotional scars of living with a strung-out mother, Mona—secrets she keeps from everyone, including her close circle of college friends.
But the safe cocoon Calla has carefully built is shattered when she discovers her mom has stolen her college money and run up a huge credit card debt in her name. Now, Calla has to go back to the small town she thought she’d left behind and clean up her mom’s mess again. Of course, when she arrives at her mother’s bar, Mona is nowhere to be found. Instead, six feet of hotness named Jackson James is pouring drinks and keeping the place humming.
Sexy and intense, Jax is in Calla’s business from the moment they meet, giving her a job and helping her search for Mona. And the way he looks at her makes it clear he wants to get horizontal . . . and maybe something more. Before Calla can let him get close, though, she’s got to deal with the pain of the past—and some very bad guys out to mess her up if she doesn't give them her mom.
As I lay there, trying to swallow a loud, obnoxious yawn, I remembered something he’d said when we first met, about life being too short. I imagined he had firsthand experience with shortened lives while he was serving. That mentality came from experience. I got that now. Could even understand it, but there was something I didn’t understand.
“Why?” I asked.
There was a beat. “Why what?”
Jax sounded tired, and I should shut up or point out that I was now tired and could sleep, so he could leave. But I didn’t. “Why are you here? You don’t know me and . . .” I trailed off, because there really wasn’t anything left to say.
A minute went by, and he hadn’t answered my question, and then I think another minute ticked on, and I was okay with him not answering because maybe he didn’t even know. Or maybe he was just bored and that was why he was here.
But then he moved.
Jax pressed against my back, and the next breath I took got stuck in my throat. My eyes shot open. The sheet and blanket were between us, but they felt like nothing.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Getting comfortable.” He dropped an arm over my waist, and my entire body jerked against his. “It’s time to sleep I think.”
“But—”
“You can’t sleep when you talk,” he remarked.
“You don’t need to be all up on me,” I pointed out.
His answering chuckle stirred the hair along the back of my neck. “Honey, I’m not all up on you.”
I freaking begged to differ on that point. I started to wiggle away, but the arm around my waist tightened, holding me in place.
“You’re not going anywhere,” he announced casually, as if he wasn’t holding me prisoner in the bed.
Okay. The whole prisoner thing might be melodramatic, but he wasn’t letting me up. Not when he was getting all kinds of comfy behind me.
Oh my God, this was spooning. Total spooning. I was spooning with an honorary member of the Hot Guy Brigade. Did I wake up in a parallel universe?
“Sleep,” he demanded, as if the one word carried that much power. “Go to sleep, Calla.” This time his voice was softer, quieter.
“Yeah, it doesn’t work that way, Jax. You have a nice voice, but it doesn’t hold the power to make me sleep on your command.”
He chuckled.
I rolled my eyes, but the most ridiculous thing ever was the fact that after a couple of minutes, my eyes stayed shut. I . . . I actually settled in against him. With his front pressed to my back, his long legs cradling mine, and his arm snug around my waist, I actually did feel safe. More than that, I felt something else—something I hadn’t felt in years.
I felt cared for . . . cherished.
Which was the epitome of dumb, because I barely knew him, but feeling that, recognizing what the warm, buzzing feeling was, I fell right asleep.
# 1 NEW YORK TIMES and USA TODAY Bestselling author Jennifer lives in Martinsburg, West Virginia. All the rumors you’ve heard about her state aren’t true. When she’s not hard at work writing. she spends her time reading, working out, watching really bad zombie movies, pretending to write, and hanging out with her husband and her Jack Russell Loki.
Her dreams of becoming an author started in algebra class, where she spent most of her time writing short stories….which explains her dismal grades in math. Jennifer writes young adult paranormal, science fiction, fantasy, and contemporary romance. She is published with Spencer Hill Press, Entangled Teen and Brazen, Disney/Hyperion and Harlequin Teen. Her book Obsidian has been optioned for a major motion picture and her Covenant Series has been optioned for TV.
She also writes adult and New Adult romance under the name J. Lynn. She is published by Entangled Brazen and HarperCollins.
Title: IN A HANDFUL OF DUST (Not a Drop to Drink #2) Author: Mindy McGinnis Pub. Date: September 23, 2014 Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books Pages: 384 Formats: Hardcover, audio, eBook Find it: The only thing bigger than the world is fear.
Lucy’s life by the pond has always been full. She has water and friends, laughter and the love of her adoptive mother, Lynn, who has made sure that Lucy’s childhood was very different from her own. Yet it seems Lucy’s future is settled already—a house, a man, children, and a water source—and anything beyond their life by the pond is beyond reach.
When disease burns through their community, the once life-saving water of the pond might be the source of what’s killing them now. Rumors of desalinization plants in California have lingered in Lynn’s mind, and the prospect of a “normal” life for Lucy sets the two of them on an epic journey west to face new dangers: hunger, mountains, deserts, betrayal, and the perils of a world so vast that Lucy fears she could be lost forever, only to disappear in a handful of dust.
In this companion to Not a Drop to Drink, Mindy McGinnis thrillingly combines the heart-swelling hope of a journey, the challenges of establishing your own place in the world, and the gripping physical danger of nature in a futuristic frontier.
In a Handful of Dust is the companion novel to Mindy McGinnis's Not a Drop to Drink. Which I thought having the story take place ten years after the original is a perfect fit. These books are not for the faint of heart, so don’t expect to get people skipping through prairies with glee on their faces. The thing that I love about the books, about this book is that it’s about relationships and people's interactions. If something horrific happened, how would we be around each other. Would be ban together as neighbors or attack one another. We see a lot more of what is going on in the world since our adventures take us way beyond the pond.
Okay so for some reason I kept picturing everyone wearing 1870s era clothing. I don’t know why, maybe it’s how they talk. Maybe it’s because they have to struggle in the same way. I had to keep looking at the cover of the book to remind myself that this an alternate future. People did at one point have water that came out of facets and vaccines for diseases. Which is another thing I really like about the book. That is part of the plot and it makes sense. It’s kind of like there being an outbreak of whooping cough. If we can’t vaccinate anymore how do we stop things from coming back. Also when medicine and things have always been easily accessible people forget how/where they came from. I just think it’s one of those books that makes you think and consider what would happen. Which makes it really cool.
It also still speaks to the fact that the world can be cruel. Not just because of other people making it that way but just for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. The book opens up sad so in a way it can only get better...right…. Lynn and Lucy end up taking a cross country hike and we see both the good and the bad. Some very bad flipping crazy stuff as well. I’m still kind of like, this reminds me of a horror movie I saw as a kid. Just so many heart breaking things but great things too, like for instance Fletcher. I loved him the minute he stepped onto the pages. I didn’t care if he was bad or good.
I really loved Lucy. She is like a different version of Lynn. She’s managed to maintain a little bit of innocence and softness. That doesn’t mean she is stupid, she is still a survivor. She changes and develops throughout the whole book and I love how she has this faith and hope in things turning around. I just wanted things to turn out for her.
It was fun to be with an older Lynn. I didn’t expect to have so much interaction with her but I really liked it.
I like how the book ended. It might have not been perfect but it’s right. I enjoyed how the world was bit out across the united states. I like that they travel through the midwest. You don’t often get to see what’s out beyond in a book like this so I thought it was a little more unique and pretty cool. The writing is great and absorbs you. A good mix of characters both good and bad. I think if you are a fan of the first book you won’t be disappointed.
I also think that you can read this book without reading the first book. This is really Lucy’s tale but you are not really filled in on Lynn’s backstory just snippets. So that can go the way of you should read the first book so you understand Lynn. To you can read the second book on it’s own and don’t feel like you are left out on an inside joke.
Mindy McGinnis is an assistant YA librarian who lives in Ohio and cans her own food. She graduated from Otterbein University magna cum laude with a BA in English Literature and Religion. Mindy has a pond in her back yard but has never shot anyone, as her morals tend to cloud her vision.
1 signed Hardcover of IN A HANDFUL OF DUST US Only
