Blog Tour: If You're Gone by Brittany Goodwin

 

If You're Gone by Brittany Goodwin
Genre: YA Contemporary
Release Date: June 20th 2016 Edge of 22 Publishing
Summary: If You’re Gone traces a trying summer for rising high school senior Lillian White as she struggles to cope with the sudden disappearance of her boyfriend, Brad Lee - reported missing the morning after his graduation ceremony. When law enforcement dismisses the case and classifies Brad as voluntarily missing, Lillian becomes desperate to prove that he couldn’t have just walked away. Not from his friends. Not from his family. Not from her.Launching her own investigation into the darker side of her small North Carolina town, Lillian begins to uncover secrets from Brad’s past that force her to question everything she thought she knew about him and their relationship. "Soul-stirring... Truly one of the most innovative voices to come along in a while. Goodwin has weaved an engaging web of deceit and intrigue that embodies not only her storytelling prowess
but highlights her visionary filmmaking abilities in novel form." (Justin Price, creator of 'Future' SVOD channel) If You're Gone will be available June 20th, 2016 from Edge of 22 Publishing.

Book Links:

Goodreads

Amazon

Meet The Author:

About the Author Brittany Goodwin is an author, screenwriter and director, best known for the internationally distributed faith-based feature films, Secrets in the Snow and Secrets in the Fall, which have both been awarded the highest honor of five Doves from the Dove Foundation. Brittany lives outside Nashville, TN with her husband and every growing number of rescue pets. She enjoys traveling with her husband and dogs, DIY projects, quoting John Hughes films, playing (and winning!) movie trivia games, and binge-watching Investigation Discovery Channel. A self-proclaimed armchair detective, Brittany is an active member of many Missing Persons blogs and Facebook pages, which inspired the topic of her debut YA novel, If You're Gone.

Author Interview:

1) what inspires you to write?

I love stories that make me feel something, whether it is books or movies, and I’m always coming up with new ideas for characters and situations I think people will relate to or take something away from. I’m not sure if that really answers the question… but I guess I am inspired by human emotion!

2) what is the hardest thing about being a writer?

For myself, and probably many other writers, I have to say rejection. It can be so discouraging and stifling. You feel like you have created a beautiful product only to send it off to literary agents and publishers who won’t give it the time of day, or who give you generic reasons why they aren’t interested in it, and it can be so frustrating! When submitting If You’re Gone I received about a dozen full and partial requests out of nearly EIGHTY agents and publishers I sent it to. (I’m almost embarrassed to admit that number, but I don’t think I am the only writer out there who has nearly hit- or exceeded- triple digits on their list of submissions!) Every day as those rejections kept rolling in I had to force myself to keep editing and keep working on new projects, despite the lack of interest. It was tough but my persistence paid off in the end!


3) what do you do when you get writers block?

My biggest struggle has been what I call “writers paranoia”. I always have a story running through my head, but sometimes I am scared to put it down on paper because I worry it won’t come out as good as what’s in my mind. It sounds crazy, but it has affected me so many times. I have finally gotten to the point where I just force myself to start writing, almost like stream of consciousness, and then I’ll walk away from it and re-read it later. At least if it’s terrible I know what went wrong and I can try again.


4) what advice would you give to aspiring writers

When I had an inbox full of form rejections I had to keep reminding myself “it only takes one”. After a LOT of patience and perseverance, I was lucky enough to get contract offers from a few different indie publishers! I have found that a lot of writers put their novel on a shelf when they hit their target rejection number (or just can’t stand another “No”) and move on to something different. My advise to aspiring writers is- don’t let anyone else’s opinion about your work change how you feel about your work. If you took the time to write something because you felt it was important enough to be written about- self publish it, blog it, just put it out there! A lot of writers might disagree with me, but I encourage all writers to remain passionate about their writing regardless of what Agent X has to say about it. 


5) do you have a street team or an email readers can subscribe to receive updates on upcoming releases, etc.

Yes! I don’t post on Twitter a lot but anytime something exciting is happening you better believe I will blow up your news feed! ☺ My Twitter handle is @thewritebritt. Also, if you go to edgeof22publishing.com you will be prompted to enter your email address to join the mailing list, and you can receive promotional offers as well as announcements for upcoming work from myself and other amazing indie authors!

Giveaway: 

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Blog Tour: Unplugged by Donna Freitas

Unplugged (The Wired #1)

by Donna Freitas
Publisher: Harper Children's
Release Date: June 21st 2016

Genre: Young Adult, Science Fiction, Dystopia

Synopsis:

The first book in a provocative new series from acclaimed author Donna Freitas—Feed for a new generation.

Humanity is split into the App World and the Real World—an extravagant virtual world for the wealthy and a dying physical world for the poor. Years ago, Skylar Cruz’s family sent her to the App World for a chance at a better life.

Now Skye is a nobody, a virtual sixteen-year-old girl without any glamorous effects or expensive downloads to make her stand out in the App World. Yet none of that matters to Skye. All she wants is a chance to unplug and see her mother and sister again.

But when the borders between worlds suddenly close, Skye loses that chance. Desperate to reach her family, Skye risks everything to get back to the physical world. Once she arrives, however, she discovers a much larger, darker reality than the one she remembers.

In the tradition of M. T. Anderson’s Feed and Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies, Unplugged kicks off a thrilling and timely sci-fi series for teens from an award-winning writer

1) What made you want to be a writer?

I’ve always been a big reader—it’s one of my favorite things to do in the entire world. But I never thought I would become a writer. The reason why I did is because one day, this character—a girl named Antonia Lucia Labella—popped into my head and I could hear her voice, clear as day. She rattled around in my brain for quite a while before I sat down to write her story. And even when I finally did, I felt crazy for trying to write a novel! Antonia became the girl at the center of my debut novel The Possibilities of Sainthood.

2) How do you motivate yourself to write?

Coffee! A lot of coffee. And cookies and other sweets to go with it.

What really motivates me, though, is that I love having this space to play around and figure out someone’s story and life. For me, writing is often like one big do over—I get to go back to these moments in my life and relive them, re-imagine them, fix them, take a situation that turned out in a way I didn’t want it to, and make it turn out the way I wished it had. Also: my protagonists get to date all the boys I never got to date in real life, or the boy of my/their dreams. ☺ And that is very fun!

Plus, writing novels is a safe place to imagine dark things in the future, like with Unplugged, fears and struggles and life’s hardest moments. Getting to work through all of this stuff is really motivating to me. Writing is like my therapist. ☺

3) Do you have any advice for aspiring writers?

Don’t be afraid of the blank page: think of it as a playground where you get to do and live whatever you want. Where all your dreams can come true or you can live out all of your fears but safely. And you can always, always revise later.

4) Do you have an email subscription list, Facebook page, street team, etc for my followers and I to receive more information about your books now and in the future?

I do! You can sign up via my website: www.donnafreitas.com. And you can always email me directly: donnamariefreitas@gmail.com.

Thanks for having me!

Follow the Unplugged by Donna Freitas Blog Tour and don't miss anything! Click on the banner to see the tour schedule.

Donna Freitas is an author of fiction, nonfiction, and articles that appear in newspapers, magazines, and on blogs. Born in Rhode Island, Donna now splits her time between New York City and Barcelona.

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Blog Tour: Hair In All The Wrong Places by Andrew Buckley

 

 

Hair In All The Wrong Places by Andrew Buckley
Publication Date:  June 7, 2016
Publisher:  Month9Books
Synopsis:
What has he done?

What’s happening to him?

And what on Earth is that smell?

For Colin Strauss, puberty stinks. Blackouts, hallucinations, and lapses in memory are the perils of growing up werewolf.

Worse than that, Colin worries he might have had something to do with the recent attacks on the townspeople. He may have eaten a person. It doesn’t matter that it’s someone he doesn’t particularly like. What kind of boy goes around eating people?

Foolishly, all Colin can think about is how Becca Emerson finally kissed him for the first time. Yep, hormones are afoot. Yikes!

But girls will have to wait. Collin better get himself under control before someone else ends up hurt or worse . . . dead.


Meet Andrew,

Andrew Buckley attended the Vancouver Film School’s Writing for Film and Television program. After pitching and developing several screenplay projects for film and television, he worked in marketing and public relations, before becoming a professional copy and content writer. During this time Andrew began writing his first adult novel, DEATH, THE DEVIL AND THE GOLDFISH, followed closely by his second novel, STILTSKIN. He works as an editor for Curiosity Quills Press.

Andrew also co-hosts a geek movie podcast, is working on his next novel, and has a stunning amount of other ideas. He now lives happily in the Okanagan Valley, BC with three kids, one cat, one needy dog, one beautiful wife, and a multitude of characters that live comfortably inside of his mind.

Andrew is represented by Mark Gottlieb at the Trident Media Group.


Website | Twitter | Facebook | Goodreads

Interview:
1) What inspires you to write?
I’d like to say that it’s a primal desire to nurture creativity and spread joy and happiness throughout the world through the insertion of the written word. But really I do it for the money, fame, fortune, and being an author gives me a great excuse to look generally scruffy. I don’t even own a tie. Not one.

In all seriousness, I find inspiration in the creativity of others. I’m heavily influenced by authors like Douglas Adams, Neil Gaiman, Tolkien, George RR Martin, Anne Rice, and so on. I find mythology and folklore to be utterly fascinating so I draw a ton of inspiration from there. Even random and weird bits of history prove to be quite interesting. For example I have a work in progress that chronicles the hilarious life and times of Jack the Ripper. Inspiration is truly everywhere.

2) What do you do when you find yourself having writers block?
I’m very fortunate not to have suffered from any such things. I have down days when it’s harder to write than others but I brew another pot of tea and I push through, even if what I’m putting down on paper is garbage, I still think it’s good to keep writing regardless of whether the words are flowing freely or not. Eventually you’ll hit an up-turn.


3) What advice can you give to aspiring writers?
It’s going to sound clichéd and ridiculous but my main piece of advice is ‘write’. And when you’re done writing, write something else. And after that, write. Beyond that, keep writing. Many writers produce a book and then push to have it published. If they’re fortunate to get it published they then find themselves with nothing else to do and in today’s literary marketplace it’s as equally important to have a large volume or work as it is to have high quality work. So, I say again, WRITE!

Aside from that I’d recommend building yourself a marketing platform whether you’re already published or not. Create a website, start blogging, create a podcast, make sure you have a Facebook page for your writing, and start tweeting (I got my first publishing contract via a contact I made on Twitter). Yes, it’s all work, yes, it’ll be difficult. But it’s worth it. Publishers like to see writers who are marketable and aren’t afraid to put themselves out there.


4) Do you have an email subscription, Facebook page, street team, etc for my followers and I to follow to learn about news and upcoming releases from you?
Indeed I do! Here are all my pertinent links. My newsletter is new and the first issue will be coming out this month so make sure you sign up for that!

Newsletter sign up: http://www.andrewbuckleyauthor.com/#section_6
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AndrewBuckleyAuthor/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/abuckley23 

Giveaway:

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Book Tour: Saved By a Soldier by Alison Mello

Saved by a Soldier
Alison Mello
(Love Conquers Life, #1)
Published by: Limitless Publishing
Publication date: June 2016
Genres: Adult, Romance

Patricia Ann Fitzgerald is no man’s arm candy…
Refusing to entertain her mother’s ridiculous notion that she should become the perfect little housewife for her ex-boyfriend Ben, Patty escapes to her father’s lake house to focus on what matters most to her. She has to break through her writer’s block and start her next book.
Medically discharged from the service and suffering from PTSD, Carter Montgomery is still trying to get his life back in order…
When Carter’s father Jackson suggests a week at the lake, it’s not only so he can gain a little clarity about his future. Jackson has other plans for his recovering son, intending for him to watch over his best friend’s daughter while she’s on a solo writing retreat—an idea that doesn’t please Carter at all.
Patty finds it hard to get any work done when her attention keeps diverting to the handsome stranger next door…
Patty is persuaded to attend a charity event, despite knowing her ex will be in attendance. When Ben rudely interrupts Patty’s dance with her father and drags her off the floor, Carter is quick to intervene. He’s tired of admiring Patty from afar, and refuses to see her treated that way. Ready to ditch the stuffy event, Patty escapes with her savior someplace where they can finally talk.
Ben always gets what he wants, and he isn’t willing to let Patty slip away…
Patty fights to preserve her blooming relationship with Carter from the critical eyes of her mother and the scheming ways of her ex. Will Carter manage to get his life back in order in time to save Patty from the life she never wanted?

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*Cover designed by Deranged Doctor Design*

Author Bio:
Alison Mello is a wife and stay at home mom to a wonderful little boy. She lives with her amazing family in Massachusetts. She loves playing soccer, basketball and football with her son.
After having her son, Alison started reading again and fell in love with Contemporary Romance. Reading made her happy and gave her something to do when she had downtime. As she started to read more, she started to noticed things she really enjoyed in a book and things she didn’t. She began to have ideas for writing one of her own. One day she literally woke up and started writing. She realized that if there was ever a time for her to write, it was now. She had a part time job to give her something to do. The hours at work were slow and she was bored with what she was doing, so while her son was off enjoying his friends over summer vacation she got started.
Alison finished the first book in two weeks and decided that she really enjoyed writing, so she kept going. She already had ideas in mind for books two and three, so she kept writing. That is how the Learning to Love Series was born. Somewhere along the line, one of my Beta readers convinced me that Michael, a character from Finding Love, needed his own story. That is when Alison added the fourth and final book. Alison hopes you enjoy her books as much as she enjoyed writing them.
She’s so glad she started this writing journey and hopes you will stay with her for the ride. Chasing Dreams is scheduled to release in April and the first two books of the Love Conquers Life series will be out this summer!

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Book Blitz: Ellas Twisted Senior Year by Amy Spalding