Celebrating Debutantes 2014: Joy N. Hensley (14 Random Facts + Giveaway)

Green Skittles, show hangover, favorite holiday, and other facts about Rites of Passage author, Joy N. Hensley!

Joy N. Hensley

1. I usually write with one of my two dogs or one of my two children on my lap, despite my pleas for solitude.

2. Christmas is my favorite holiday and my husband's least favorite holiday--I once left a Christmas tree up from Thanksgiving until the 4th of July!

3. My hubby is Australian and wears a kilt sometimes.

4. Rites of Passage is my 4th book, but the first that got published. I wrote it in 6 weeks--all previous books took a year or more to complete.

5. I once hiked 600 miles of the Appalachian Trail in two months--I met my kilt-wearing Aussie husband on this hike and we decided to get married after knowing each other for just two months.

6. Green Skittles--the new flavor, not the old one--is my favorite flavor of anything ever.

7. I drink Jell-o water when I'm sick (a packet of Jell-O and twice the amount of water--heat it up and sip.Mmmmm!)

8. The first year I taught 6th grade, my kids thought I'd been in jail because I had a tattoo. I did not tell them they were wrong.

9. I once lived with a male body builder (not romantically-ew!) who left whole chicken carcasses in the sink in our apartment.

10. I'm passive aggressive enough about household responsibilities that I let one of those chicken carcasses sit in our sink for four days until I finally snapped and threw it at him.

11. I'm currently suffering a show hangover for Sons of Anarchy.

12. Right now I have seven fingernails painted--it's been this way for a few days. There are two different colors going on...and I don't remember painting them. 

13. Sometimes I don't schedule book events because that means I'd have to get dressed in real people clothes.

14. Sometimes I force myself to schedule book events because staying home alone every day in my pajamas can get kind of old sometimes.

About the Author

Joy N. Hensley is a former middle school teacher. She used to spend her twenty-minute lunch breaks hosting author Skype chats for her students. Once upon a time she went to a military school on a dare. She lives in Virginia with her husband and two children, finding as many ways as she can to never do another push-up again.

Find her: Website  * Twitter * Facebook * Goodreads

Check out Joy's debut novel!

Rites of Passage

by Joy N. Hensley

Published September 9th 2014 by Harper Teen

Blurb (Goodreads):

Sam McKenna’s never turned down a dare. And she's not going to start with the last one her brother gave her before he died.

So Sam joins the first-ever class of girls at the prestigious Denmark Military Academy. She’s expecting push-ups and long runs, rope climbing and mud-crawling. As a military brat, she can handle an obstacle course just as well as the boys. She's even expecting the hostility she gets from some of the cadets who don’t think girls belong there. What she’s not expecting is her fiery attraction to her drill sergeant. But dating is strictly forbidden and Sam won't risk her future, or the dare, on something so petty...no matter how much she wants him.

As Sam struggles to prove herself, she discovers that some of the boys don’t just want her gone—they will stop at nothing to drive her out. When their petty threats turn to brutal hazing, bleeding into every corner of her life, she realizes they are not acting alone. A decades-old secret society is alive and active… and determined to force her out.
At any cost.

Now time's running short. Sam must decide who she can trust...and choosing the wrong person could have deadly consequences.

Yesterday: Amy Finnegan, author of Not in the Script. Tomorrow: Lex Martin, author of Dearest Clementine. Check out the schedule here.

GIVEAWAY!
- swag (see photo)
- contest ends January 12th

- each entry will be checked. Daily entries requires different info/links every day. This will be checked as well so be honest!

- winner must respond on email notification within 48 hours or else we will pick another winner


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Celebrating Debutantes 2014: Amy Finnegan (14 Random Facts + Giveaway)

Merry Christmas! Even though its holidays, debutantes event is still ongoing (well, except for the major dates). Here's my featured debut author day after Christmas, Amy Finnegan!

Amy Finnegan

1. I’ve worn the wedding ring of a member of the British Royal Family (hint: she was married to the Queen’s son). I went to dinner with her once and commented on how beautiful it was, so she said: “Here! Try it on!”

2. If I could go back in time, I would read more books as a teenager (I was way too distracted by boys! But now I just consider all of the crushes, drama, and heartaches they gave me as research.)

3. I think baby goats are the cutest animals ever. I would buy one, but I like my clothes, shoes, furniture, and laptop too much.

4. I love sauerkraut and Boston Baked Beans. But I doubt I would like them together.

5. I have two actual teenagers of my own, neither of which is as easily controlled as my fictional teenagers. But I love them anyway (and again: RESEARCH!) ;)

6. I am allergic to chocolate. It gives me severe migraines and my throat closes off. Saddest allergy ever :(

7. While we’re on the topic of throats and food, Dr. Henry Heimlich stated in a letter to me from Xavier University that, as of 1986, I am the youngest person on record to have saved someone’s life with the Heimlich Maneuver. I was four. #legit

8. I sometimes have nightmares in which my husband does something really rude or stupid, and then I wake up mad at him. He does not understand this.

9. If I could choose just one literary character to be a real person, it would be Harry Potter. I hope I can one day create a character whom I love even half as much (though in truth, I would rather kiss one of my own fictional characters. Harry is a little awkward with that stuff).

10. My husband just read #8 and is wondering why those thoughts led me to #9. Like I said, he does not understand.

11. I hate driving in snowstorms! I was once lost for fifteen minutes in a whiteout before I realized I was right in front of my own house.

12. When I was a little girl, I did not aspire to be a published author. I wanted to be a secretary when I grew up. At least I’m living the typing part of that elusive dream, but I’d still like one of those little desk intercoms.

13. I think there should be a worldwide ban on salting sidewalks. Snails are adorable. Stop the slaughter.

14. In real life, my husband makes it easy for me to create hot guys for my novels. Guys who are also smart, nice, work hard, and treat girls with respect. Guys who make you insanely happy and never cease to make you laugh. All I have to do is model love interests after the boy sitting right next to me, and I have a perfect heartthrob. For example: I had already revised my debut novel a few times before I realized that the love interests meet in almost the exact way that I met my husband. I had been working at a new job for just a couple of days when we first spoke (though I had definitely noticed him before then), and we talked a lot. When the workday was over, I was waiting for my ride when my husband offered to give me a ride home instead. I’m not encouraging you to jump into a near-stranger’s car (!!!), but I do find it funny that I wrote this same scenario into NOT IN THE SCRIPT without even noticing that I’d done so. True love shows up in the most unexpected places.

About the Author

Amy Finnegan writes her own stories because she enjoys falling in love over and over again, and thinks everyone deserves a happy ending. She likes to travel the world—usually to locations where her favorite books take place—and owes her unquenchable thirst for reading to Jane Austen and J.K. Rowling. Her debut novel, NOT IN THE SCRIPT (Bloomsbury, Oct 2014), came about after hearing several years of behind-the-scenes stories from her industry veteran brother. She’s also been lucky enough to visit dozens of film sets and sit in on major productions such as Parks and Recreation, and Parenthood.

Find her: Website * Twitter * Facebook * Goodreads

"..gorgeously cute and romantic." - check out my full review here!

Not in the Script

(If Only... #3)

by Amy Finnegan

Published October 7th 2014 by Bloomsbury USA Childrens 

Blurb (Goodreads):

Millions of people witnessed Emma Taylor’s first kiss—a kiss that needed twelve takes and four camera angles to get right. After spending nearly all of her teen years performing on cue, Emma wonders if any part of her life is real anymore . . . particularly her relationships.

Jake Elliott’s face is on magazine ads around the world, but his lucrative modeling deals were a poor substitute for what he had to leave behind. Now acting is offering Jake everything he wants: close proximity to home; an opportunity to finally start school; and plenty of time with the smart and irresistible Emma Taylor . . . if she would just give him a chance.

When Jake takes Emma behind the scenes of his real life, she begins to see how genuine he is, but on-set relationships always end badly. Don’t they? Toss in Hollywood’s most notorious heartthrob and a resident diva who may or may not be as evil as she seems, and the production of Coyote Hills heats up in unexpected—and romantic—ways.

This novel in the deliciously fun If Only romance line proves that the best kinds of love stories don’t follow a script.

Last Tuesday: Rebecca Yarros, author of Full Measures. Tomorrow: Joy N. Hensley, author if Rites of Passage. Check out the schedule here.

GIVEAWAY!

- signed hardcover of Not in the Script + swag

- open internationally

- contest ends January 10th
- each entry will be checked. Daily entries requires different info/links every day. This will be checked as well so be honest!
- winner must respond on email notification within 48 hours or else we will pick another winner




a Rafflecopter giveaway

Celebrating Debutantes 2014: Rebecca Yarros (14 Random Facts + Giveaway)

New adult author Rebecca Yarros shares the time when she wrote her debut novel, Full Measures, and other random facts today!

Rebecca Yarros

1. I wrote my debut novel, Full Measures, while my husband was in Afghanistan on his fourth deployment.

2. I lived in Germany both as a child and an adult and still consider it a second home.

3. My husband and I are foster parents currently raising the most adorable little girl!

4. A spider will turn me into a screaming toddler in two seconds.

5. I'll eat almost anything if it's smothered in alfredo sauce.

6. My schedule revolves around my 4 boys' hockey schedule.

7. I have three tattoos!

8. I write best at a coffee shop so I can't be distracted by the eight loads of laundry that always need to be folded.

9.  I'm a total romantic at heart, probably because I met my husband at nineteen, and I'm still head over heels for him.

10. Writing books has always been my dream job. 

11. I went to college on a vocal scholarship.

12. I have a serious caffeine addiction which I fuel with coffee (see number 8).

13. Our house is over 120 years old and has a bomb shelter from the Cuban Missile Crisis.

14. I totally put ketchup on my tacos. I know... but I can't stop.

About the Author

Rebecca Yarros is a hopeless romantic and lover of all things chocolate, coffee, and Paleo. In addition to being a mom, military wife, and blogger, she can never choose between Young Adult and New Adult fiction, so she writes both. She’s a graduate of Troy University, where she studied European history and English, but still holds out hope for an acceptance letter to Hogwarts. Her blog, The Only Girl Among Boys, has been voted the Top Military Mom Blog the last two years, and celebrates the complex issues surrounding the military life she adores.

When she’s not writing, she’s tying on hockey skates for her kids, or sneaking in some guitar time. She is madly in love with her army-aviator husband of eleven years, and they’re currently stationed in Upstate NY with their gaggle of rambunctious kiddos and snoring English Bulldog, but she would always rather be home in Colorado. 

Find her: Website * Twitter * Facebook * Goodreads

Check out Rebecca's debut novel!

Full Measures

by Rebecca Yarros

Published February 10th 2014 by Entangled: Embrace

Blurb (Goodreads):

A new adult novel from Entangled's Embrace imprint...

Three knocks can change everything…

"She knew. That’s why Mom hadn’t opened the door. She knew he was dead."

Twenty years as an army brat and Ember Howard knew, too. The soldiers at the door meant her dad was never coming home. What she didn’t know was how she would find the strength to singlehandedly care for her crumbling family when her mom falls apart. 

Then Josh Walker enters her life. Hockey star, her new next-door neighbor, and not to mention the most delicious hands that insist on saving her over and over again. He has a way of erasing the pain with a single look, a single touch. As much as she wants to turn off her feelings and endure the heartache on her own, she can’t deny their intense attraction.

Until Josh’s secret shatters their world. And Ember must decide if he’s worth the risk that comes with loving a man who could strip her bare.

Yesterday: Jaye Robin Brown, author of No Place To Fall. On Friday: Amy Finnegan, author of Not in the Script. Check out the schedule here.

GIVEAWAY!

- $5 Amazon gift card

- open internationally

- contest ends January 8th

- each entry will be checked. Daily entries requires different info/links every day. This will be checked as well so be honest!

- winner must respond on email notification within 48 hours or else we will pick another winner

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Celebrating Debutantes 2014: Kat Spears (14 Random Facts + Giveaway)

Apparently, she reads in the shower and, "Yes, the books get wet". This and other random facts about Sway author, Kat Spears!

Kat Spears

1) In all of my books the high school is called Wakefield High School because I hated attending that school so much. Helps me to remember what high school was like for me.

2) I dropped out of Wakefield High School in the 11th grade.

3) I grew up moving every few years.

4) I like to tell people that I dropped out of high school but not that I have a master's degree.

5) My youngest child is named for the 13-year-old main character, Ingrid, in Peter Abraham's Echo Falls Mystery Series. My daughter, like the book character, hates her name because it is unusual, but I love it.

6) I work as a bartender at Lucky Bar in Washington, DC and it is the only job I have ever really loved besides writing.

7) I don't like cats.

8) I was born in Sweden but I'm not Swedish.

9) I love to go fishing.

10) I read in the shower. Yes, the books get wet.

11) Kidnapped by R.L. Stevenson is my favorite book.

12) I don't like to write, but I love to rewrite. I have a very hard time making myself write but can sit and rewrite for hours on end without getting bored.

13) I listen to every genre of music and am unsure how I got through life before Spotify was invented.

14) I watch way too much English Premier League soccer and have even pulled my kids out of school early to take them with me to watch a match at our local Liverpool pub. Which either makes me a bad parent, or the best parent in the world.

***

About the Author

I  am a novelist, bartender, mother of three freeloading kids, non-profit management guru, and, apparently, the only person on the planet who reads in the shower. I am not a role model. My debut YA novel, SWAY, will be released in September 2014 by St. Martin's Press. Follow playlists for all my characters and the soundtracks to my books on Spotify under katbooks. Some of my characters have better taste in music than others, but if you like the character, chances are you will like their playlist.

Find her: Twitter * Goodreads

"Hilarious and cute" - read my full review here.

Sway

by Kat Spears

Published September 16th 2014 by St. Martin's Griffin

Blurb (Goodreads):

In Kat Spears’s hilarious and often poignant debut, high school senior Jesse Alderman, or "Sway," as he’s known, could sell hell to a bishop. He also specializes in getting things people want---term papers, a date with the prom queen, fake IDs. He has few close friends and he never EVER lets emotions get in the way. For Jesse, life is simply a series of business transactions.

But when Ken Foster, captain of the football team, leading candidate for homecoming king, and all-around jerk, hires Jesse to help him win the heart of the angelic Bridget Smalley, Jesse finds himself feeling all sorts of things. While following Bridget and learning the intimate details of her life, he falls helplessly in love for the very first time. He also finds himself in an accidental friendship with Bridget’s belligerent and self-pitying younger brother who has cerebral palsy. Suddenly, Jesse is visiting old folks at a nursing home in order to run into Bridget, and offering his time to help the less fortunate, all the while developing a bond with this young man who idolizes him. Could the tin man really have a heart after all?

A Cyrano de Bergerac story with a modern twist, Sway is told from Jesse’s point of view with unapologetic truth and biting humor, his observations about the world around him untempered by empathy or compassion---until Bridget’s presence in his life forces him to confront his quiet devastation over a life-changing event a year earlier and maybe, just maybe, feel something again.

Yesterday: Courtney C. Stevens, author of Faking Normal. Tomorrow: Jaye Robin Brown, author of No Place to Fall. Check out the schedule here.

GIVEAWAY!

- hardcover of Sway

- open internationally

- contest ends January 6th
- Kat and I are NOT responsible for any lost or damaged package
- each entry will be checked. Daily entries requires different info/links every day. This will be checked as well so be honest!
- winner must respond on email notification within 48 hours or else we will pick another winner
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Celebrating Debutantes 2014: Courtney C. Stevens (14 Random Facts + Giveaway)

Faking Normal author, Courtney C. Stevens, shares the book she's read 36 times(!), her favorite television series, the experience that validated the stories in her head in a powerful way, and some other cool things on her 14 random facts today!

Courtney C. Stevens

1. I have (currently) read I am the Messenger 36 times. It is the only book I’ve reread that much. Although, I read through the entire Harry Potter series ten times.

2. I went to Space Camp when I was in sixth grade and it still informs the way I look at the universe.

3. I won the Scholastic Arts and Writing Award Gold Award for fantasy when I was a senior in High School. This experience validated the stories in my head in a powerful way.

4.  I am 5’4” and I was a high jumper and also a forward on the basketball team. Once upon a time, I had some ups. Now, I’m a climber. (A different way to have some ups.)

5. I grew up in a little town in Kentucky called Bandana. (It was named after gypsies.)

6. I love Legos.

7. My favorite television series of all time are Alias and X-Files.

8. When I was a kid my Nana had a barber shop hair dryer chair in her laundry room. My cousin and I called it The Rocket Chair because we ran many, many missions to Mars with that space helmet.

9. I am the Assistant Regional Advisor for the Midsouth region of SCBWI (Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.)

10. My favorite place in the world is Prince Edward Island. Because … Anne of Green Gables.

11. I’ve seen many Broadway musicals/plays, but the ones I see over and over are: Peter and the Star Catcher, In the Heights, Rent, and Wicked.

12. Pablo Neruda is my favorite poet. I also love Rumi.

13. I am unnaturally obsessed with being efficient.

14. I have climbed the Great Wall of China twice. 

***

About the Author

Courtney C. Stevens grew up in Kentucky and lives in Nashville, Tennessee. She is an adjunct professor and a former youth minister. Her other skills include playing hide-and-seek, climbing trees, and being an Olympic torch bearer. Faking Normal is her first novel.

Find her: Website * Twitter * Facebook * Goodreads

"simple but...incredible" - check out my 5/5 stars review here!

Faking Normal

(Faking Normal #1)
by Courtney C. Stevens

Published February 25th 2014 by HarperCollins Children's Books

Blurb (Goodreads):
An edgy, realistic, and utterly captivating novel from an exciting new voice in teen fiction.

Alexi Littrell hasn't told anyone what happened to her over the summer. Ashamed and embarrassed, she hides in her closet and compulsively scratches the back of her neck, trying to make the outside hurt more than the inside does.

When Bodee Lennox, the quiet and awkward boy next door, comes to live with the Littrells, Alexi discovers an unlikely friend in "the Kool-Aid Kid," who has secrets of his own. As they lean on each other for support, Alexi gives him the strength to deal with his past
, and Bodee helps her find the courage to finally face the truth.


A searing, poignant book, Faking Normal is the extraordinary debut novel from an exciting new author-Courtney C. Stevens.

Yesterday: Andrea Hannah, author of Of Scars and Stardust. Tomorrow: Kat Spears, author of Sway. Check out the schedule here.

GIVEAWAY!

- copy of Faking Normal
- open to US only
- contest ends January 5th
- Courtney and I are NOT responsible for any lost or damaged package
- each entry will be checked. Daily entries requires different info/links every day. This will be checked as well so be honest!
- winner must respond on email notification within 48 hours or else we will pick another winner
a Rafflecopter giveaway

Celebrating Debutantes 2014: Andrea Hannah (14 Random Facts + Giveaway)

Of Scars and Stardust author, Andrea Hannah, shares us her obsessions, best time to write, things she do when she's stuck in writing, and others--on her very own 14 random facts!

Andrea Hannah

1. I used to collect unicorns when I was little. I never grew out of it.

2. I can only write in absolute darkness and silence. 

3. I taught in Africa between semesters in college, and while I was there a monkey stole one of my juice boxes, chugged it, and ran away. I have it on video.

4. Yellow is my favorite color. 

5. I have a pug named Amos who is the most disobedient dog on the planet. 

6. My husband and I met in high school. 

7. Before I wrote Of Scars and Stardust, I wrote a book about people who could hop from dreams to reality. I still kind of like that book.

8. I’ve had some kind of mishap in every country I’ve traveled to: lost train tickets in France, emergency medical visit in South Africa, wrong guest house in Rwanda, on and on.

9. When I’m stuck with my writing, my favorite things to do are to go for a run outside or clean up the leaves and branches around my backyard. Something about touching earth helps to clear my head.

10. I dislike watermelon-flavored anything.

11. Both of my kids have something nature-related in their names. 

12. If I’ve heard a book is emotional or scary, I always look up spoilers before I read it to prepare myself. 

13. I journal almost everyday.

14. I’m obsessed with the following things: robots, dinosaurs, old school Nintendo games, horses, and astronomy. If any of those things show up in books or movies, I’m sold.

***

About the Author

Andrea Hannah lives in the Midwest, where there are plenty of dark nights and creepy cornfields to use as fodder for her next thriller. She graduated from Michigan State University with a degree in special education. When she's not teaching or writing, she spends her time running, traveling, and attempting to keep her pug out of the refrigerator (unsuccessful to date).

Find her: Website * Twitter * Facebook * Goodreads

Check out her baby!

Of Scars and Stardust

by Andrea Hannah

Published October 8th 2014 by Flux

Blurb (Goodreads):

After her little sister mysteriously vanishes, seventeen-year-old Claire Graham has a choice to make: stay snug in her little corner of Manhattan with her dropout boyfriend, or go back to Ohio to face the hometown tragedy she's been dying to leave behind. 

But the memories of that night still haunt her in the city, and as hard as she tries to forget what her psychiatrist calls her "delusions," Claire can't seem to escape the wolf's eyes or the blood-speckled snow. Delusion or reality, Claire knows she has to hold true to the most important promise she's ever made: to keep Ella safe. She must return to her sleepy hometown in order to find Ella and keep her hallucinations at bay before they strike again. But time is quickly running out, and as Ella's trail grows fainter, the wolves are becoming startlingly real.

Now Claire must deal with her attraction to Grant, the soft-spoken boy from her past that may hold the secret to solving her sister's disappearance, while following the clues that Ella left for only her to find. Through a series of cryptic diary entries, Claire must unlock the keys to Ella's past—and her own—in order to stop another tragedy in the making, while realizing that not all things that are lost are meant to be found.

Yesterday: Sara Raasch, author of Snow Like Ashes. Tomorrow: Courtney C. Stevens, author of Faking Normal. Check out the schedule here.

Edit 12/20/14: Oops! Looks like I've forgotten to add something...

GIVEAWAY!

- signed copy of Of Scars and Stardust
- contest ends January 6th
- Andrea and I are NOT responsible for any lost or damaged package
- each entry will be checked. Daily entries requires different info/links every day. This will be checked as well so be honest!

- winner must respond on email notification within 48 hours or else we will pick another winner
a Rafflecopter giveaway