True Review

I recently received an email from ABC Family asking me if I wanted to participate in a game that takes place in the three weeks prior to the premier of their new show, The Nine Lives of Chloe King. I was lucky enough to participate in last years Pretty Little Liars challenge and that was a lot of fun, so of course I said yes. While I was away at BEA, the "game box" showed up at my house. I wasn't able to see it until I came home on Friday, but what was inside was definitely exciting. Here's what came in the box: An custom Ipad2, or for the game, a "MaiPad" A Russian Birth Certificate A Letter A Circle Charm A Bib (The box itself is wooden with symbols carved into it) I've already completed the first two tasks (there is a total of 9). The first one consisted of folding up my birth certificate and finding a location. I then had to go to my "MaiMap," which was located on the MaiPad. I then had to look up the meaning of the location. The secon...

Tempest Rising by Tracy Deebs Publication Date: May 10th, 2011 Published By: Walker Books for Young Readers Hardcover, 352 Pages Souce: ARC received from the author/ Teen Book Scene Blog Tour Summary: "Tempest Maguire wants nothing more than to surf the killer waves near her California home; continue her steady relationship with her boyfriend, Mark; and take care of her brothers and surfer dad. But Tempest is half mermaid, and as her seventeenth birthday approaches, she will have to decide whether to remain on land or give herself to the ocean like her mother. The pull of the water becomes as insistent as her attraction to Kai, a gorgeous surfer whose uncanny abilities hint at an otherworldly identity as well. And when Tempest does finally give in to the water's temptation and enters a fantastical underwater world, she finds that a larger destiny awaits her—and that the entire ocean's future hangs in the balance." My Review: **** = 4 Stars I was very eager to re...

 I'm so pleased to host Tracy Deebs today, author of the recently released Tempest Rising (Walker Books for Young Readers, May 10th, 2011). For Into the Past, the question is:  What books do you think your past self would recommend at ages 5, 12, 17 and 20? Please welcome Tracy! :) *** Thanks for having me, Sherry! I’ve been a huge reader my whole life, so your prompt made me very, very excited! At 5 , I would have recommended the Hans Christian Anderson fairy tale, The Little Mermaid, and any book that had Wonder Woman in it (I’m still a huge fan of both to this day)  Oh, and If I Ran the Circus by Dr. Seuss. At 12 , I probably would have recommended the Sweet Valley High series and Forever by Judy Blume. I also loved the Sunfire Historical YA series, where each book was a girl’s name and she lived in a different time in history (the gold rush, New Orleans during pirating times, the American Revolution). A new one came out each month and I devoured them. This was also th...

As part of the blog tour for Heidi Ayarbe's Compulsion(which was just released from Balzer & bray/HarperCollins on May 3rd!), she's allowed us to see what the twitter feed of some of the characters from her books might look like. Featured in this feed is Luc from Compulsion, Cappy from Compromised, and Jason from Freeze Frame! ~~~~~~~ Character Tweets: If some of your characters had Twitter accounts, what would their tweet convos be like? (Character tweets between Jason (from Freeze Frame), Cappy (from Compromised) and Luc (from Compulsion) …) Jason: Hey, Cappy. Thought you couldn’t read and write. Cappy: Listen, Dead Boy, if you can do some other-world tweeting, I’ll take care on my end. At least I can touch the fuckin’ keyboard. Jason: Mind over matter. Cappy: You’ve got neither, dead boy. Or do you have a mind? Do dead people keep their minds? Luc: Hijueputa. And I thought M&M was nuts. I’m tweeting with dead guy and illiterate. I’ll take OCD...

Future Imperfect by K. Ryer Breese Publication Date: April 26th, 2011 Published By: St. Martin's Griffin Paperback, 320 Pages Source: ARC received from published, Teen Book Scene Blog Tour Summary: "Ade Patience can see the future and it's destroying his life. When the seventeen-year-old Mantlo High School student knocks himself unconscious, he can see days and decades into his own future. Ade's the best of Denver's "divination" underground and eager to join the heralded Mantlo Diviners, a group of similarly enabled teens. Yet, unlike the Diviners, Ade Patience doesn't see the future out of curiosity or good will; Ade gives himself concussions because he's addicted to the high, the Buzz, he gets when he breaks the laws of physics. And while there have been visions he's wanted to change, Ade knows the Rule: You can't change the future, no matter how hard you try. His memory is failing, his grades are in a death spiral, and both Ade...

Joining us today is Janet Gurtler, author of the upcoming release I'm Not Her(Sourcebooks Fire, May 1st, 2011). As part of the blog tour for her books' release, she's here to tell us what she does when she isn't writing! Please welcome Janet! ******  What do you do when you're not writing? Gosh am I ever not writing? If not at the actual laptop usually I’m plotting or making notes in my head even when I don’t even realize it. But of course I do have a life outside of writing too. I am Mom to a super cool ten year old boy who swims with a swim team in a town close to the city where I live. He swims every day except Sunday so I spend a lot of time at the pool. I use that time to either work out at the gym in the recreation centre where he swims, or I um. Write. Right now I am not working at a job outside of writing, but that may change. I have worked in sales years. (more than I care to remember lol). Up until January I was working for a cool toy company as ...

I'm so happy to have Amy Plum on the blog today, sharing with us her OCD List of Favorite Films! Amy is the author of the upcoming Die for Me(Revenants #1), which is being released on May 10th from HarperTeen. I was lucky enough to read this early and I can't wait to share my review with you! It's wonderful! :) Please welcome Amy! ~~~~~~ Amy's OCD List of Favorite Films I love films SO MUCH that it is impossible to choose only ten. So I'm going to cheat. The uppermost echelon of my film pantheon can be grouped under the following categories: ALMOST EVERYTHING WITH OR BY, listing only my top 2 of each Audrey Hepburn (Breakfast at Tiffany's, Roman Holiday); Charlie Kaufman (Eternal Sunshine, Being John Malkovich); Wes Anderson (Rushmore, The Royal Tenenbaums) The Coen Brothers (Raising Arizona, Fargo) Pedro Almodovar (Women on the Verge, Tie Me Up Tie Me Down) Monty Python (Holy Grail, Life of Brian) Terry Gilliam (Time Bandits, The Adventures of B...