Fab Five Questions for Devon Ashley, Author of Ordained

1. In Ordained, Abby knows how to fight her way through demons, controlling the elements and setting things on fire with the flick of her wrist. Can you share with us a favorite line, scene or passage from the book? 

[Noel] returned with a glass of blue tonic water and tried to hand it to her. Her stomach growled and her face cringed. She didn’t need to smell the stuff to know she wouldn’t like it.

“No way am I touching that nasty potion,” she said boldly.

“I’ve changed the formula. I added vanilla to make it taste better.”

Abby accepted it but still eyed it reluctantly. Alcohol never sat well with her system. “How much vanilla?”
“Like I’d really load you up with enough alcohol to throw your balance off. Just drink the tonic, Abby. You’ll feel better quicker.”

She sipped the tonic. Her face puckered again. She gagged, covered her mouth and mumbled in disgust, “Oh my God!”

“I said it tasted better, not great.”

Abby continued to force the sour tonic down in sips. She could taste a hint of vanilla but the potion left a bitter aftertaste that was similar to vinegar. Her stomach gurgled and burned.

“Water,” she coughed after her last sip of tonic.

“No. You’ll dilute it,” Noel said firmly, relieving her of the glass.

Smartly, she rebutted, “Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do after drinking poison? Or is it throw up?”

2. What three words best describe Abby’s personality?

Stubborn, Sarcastic, Protective

3. Abby’s fellow friend and hunter Emily is important to the story. What is a day in the life of a hunter like Emily like?

Well, right now, Emily’s been forced to return to school and not allowed outside the manor’s protective borders (like that stops her), so she’s not really hunting. But that doesn’t mean life is any easier inside the manor, especially when a group of demons break through the magical enchantments that protect the school…

“And just out of curiosity, how many of these twelve did you two end up killing?” [Emily] glared at the Chancellor. Surprisingly, he didn’t back away from her eyes.

Abby hesitantly looked toward Noel. She could tell he didn’t like where this was going. He slowly and quietly raised three fingers. “Seven.”

“Seven?” she huffed. “Wow. Two of them, seven demons. Well, I’m glad the twenty of us could help you out with the other five,” she ranted sarcastically.

“All right, that’s enough!” the Chancellor bellowed. Reddened, he added, “We’re all upset by this attack. None of you would be alive right now if you hadn’t been given the training you received during your school years.”

“You’re delusional!” she stressed. “These demons kicked our [bums]! Abby and Noel are the reason the rest of us are still alive. Your training only kept us alive long enough for them to sort out the mess!”

“Emily!” yelled Ethan, stamping forward. “You will stop this right now!”


“I’m not taking orders from you anymore!” she yelled back. “Any of you!”

Ethan approached Emily with fury in his eyes. With only four steps, Abby put herself directly in his path and caused him to stop abruptly.

4. Abby has been isolated for thirteen years, lacking affection and nursing a broken and bruised body. What do you think would be the hardest thing about being Abby?

Abby has an evil entity living within her that fights for control of her body – the same evil that took control and murdered five advisors when she was sixteen. The hardest thing about being Abby is keeping the entity contained, but sometimes it manages to break through and stuff her deep within herself, into what she refers to as the hollow.

5. Ordained is the first book in a new series, The Immortal Archives. Can you give us a hint of what we can look forward to in the next book? 

Lots of physical changes, especially with Emily as her body undergoes transformation.
A high pitched screech once again reverberated through Emily’s head. She threw her hands to her ears to block the noise, but it had the opposite effect. The inside of her head vibrated violently. She fell to a crouch, writhing and crying out in pain.

“Emily?”

But Emily couldn’t stop screaming. She felt a pair of arms lift her from the doorstep, then drop her on the sofa. She continued to jolt back and forth viciously. The intense vibrations and screeching within her head refused to relent. She knew it was pointless to scream, but she couldn’t stop the only release her body was giving her.

Thanks to Kim for having me! Don’t forget to stop by my Crazy Dream Blog for a chance to win a copy of Ordained signed with a personalized doodle-graph. Giveaway ends August 20th.

ORDAINED
BY DEVON ASHLEY
(The Immortal Archives #1)
Release Date ~ November 15, 2011


Normally, the school creates the hunters - not the monsters.

Abby Sorrensten likes to play rough. Ripping the horns off the foreheads of demons, manipulating lightning and setting things on fire with the flick of your wrist can give you a serious rush. So she probably wasn’t the best choice for the Order’s experimental training program. Thirteen years of isolation, lack of affection and a bruised and broken body from horrendous training sessions creates more than just an exceptional fighter. It creates an evil within - an evil responsible for several deaths the night she left.

Two hundred years later Abby resurfaces as the very thing the Order trained her to kill: a vampire. A mythical demon has set his sights on the school and only the ordained hunter has the powers to face it. Unbeknownst to the Order, Abby’s their precious ordained one and their only chance for survival. As much as she would love to leave them hanging, she’s not willing to risk the life of Emily, a fellow friend and hunter also fed up with the organization.

But for Abby, locking herself away in a fortress with angry descendants of those she killed causes suspicions and tensions to run high. Abby must learn the demon’s weaknesses for battle before the Order learns hers.

Be sure and check out The Teen Book Scene for more tour stops. Devon will be stopping by Ivy Reads on Friday, August 12th.

Five Fab Questions for Veronica Roth, Author of DIVERGENT!

Today I'd like to welcome Veronica Roth who stopped by today to answer a few questions about her dystopian novel, Divergent. Let's get started!

 DIVERGENT BY VERONICA ROTH
May 3rd 2011

In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is—she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself.

During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles to determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes infuriating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers a growing conflict that threatens to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves . . . or it might destroy her.

Debut author Veronica Roth bursts onto the literary scene with the first book in the Divergent series—dystopian thrillers filled with electrifying decisions, heartbreaking betrayals, stunning consequences, and unexpected romance.

INTERVIEW

1. What was the biggest hurdle you had to overcome in developing the five factions of dystopian Chicago?

I had a clear sense of two of the factions (Abnegation and Dauntless). I knew what kind of houses they lived in, what kind of environment they lived in, what they wore, what they did in their free time, how they talked—everything. But developing the other three factions was—and continues to be—a real challenge. I don’t know why the other virtues are harder for me to extrapolate from than bravery and selflessness, but they are! All the same, it’s fun to learn more about the other three factions as I continue to write.

2. Does music play a role to get the creative juices flowing?

Definitely. I wrote the rough draft of book one to the CD Memento Mori by Flyleaf. I must have listened to each song a hundred times, if not more. For me it’s mostly about the mood of the music—it has to match the mood of the book, and if it does, it doesn’t really matter what kind of music it is or how dead-on the lyrics are. I just put it on in the background to get myself in the right mindset to write.

3. What are some of your all-time favorite books? Do you think they influenced the writing of Divergent?

Some of my favorite books influenced Divergent, and some didn’t. Gilead by Marilynne Robinson and Wise Blood by Flannery O’Connor, for example, probably didn’t. But 1984 by George Orwell, Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card, The Giver by Lois Lowry? Definitely. They helped me figure out what I liked and what I didn’t like in sci-fi, and made me realize how far I could push the story—Ender’s Game, for example, never shies away from the dark side of human nature, and I tried to emulate that.

4. Can you tell us something about yourself that most people don’t know?

I drive a black Honda Civic, and sometimes can’t find it in parking lots because it looks like 50% of the cars that exist.

5. What is the best advice you’ve been given as an author?

Turn off the internal editor! I think that tidbit came originally from Anne Lamott, but it was reiterated by my favorite writing professor in college, and by half a dozen people since then. You can’t try to make every little thing perfect before you move on or you will never finish the story—and it’s only when you finish that you can really revise well, anyway, so what’s the point of obsessing about all the mistakes until then? I have a lot of trouble following this advice, but it’s nonetheless essential to my writing process.

Check out the Teen Book Scene for more of Veronica's tour stops on the Divergent Tour! 

Veronica Roth is only 22, so her bio will be short. She’s from a Chicago suburb. She studied creative writing at Northwestern University, and wrote DIVERGENT, her YA dystopian thriller (Katherine Tegen Books, May 2011!), while she was supposed to be doing homework. This was a decidedly good choice that will unfortunately make it difficult for her to someday lecture her future children on how important it is to get your homework done.


Visit http://veronicarothbooks.blogspot.com/ to learn more!

Fab Five Questions & Giveaway with Maria Padian, Author of Jersey Tomatoes are the Best!

1. Tomatoes centers on two teens from New Jersey: tennis player Henry (don’t call her Henriette!) and dancer, Eva. They’re super talented, best friends facing more than just a little pressure in their lives. Could you tell us more about the story and explain the title?

The title is from a T-shirt I owned when I was a teen growing up in Jersey. It’s a play on words, since tomato is slang for girl. So that T- shirt and yes, my title, essentially say Jersey Girls Are the Best! It’s the mantra for the main characters, Henry and Eva, who feel a tad defensive about being from The Garden State, where, as Henry explains, “Jersey jokes probably outnumber Polish jokes and lawyer jokes combined.”

Tomatoes is the story about one summer when Henry and Eva head off to competitive, pre-professional camps where gifted kids either make it … or don’t. It’s a novel about friendship and the lengths we’re willing to go for people we love. It’s about battling your demons, making healthy, life affirming choices, and taking ownership of your future.

2. You paint a vivid picture of the competitive worlds of tennis and ballet. How did you research those parts of the book?

I’ve played tennis since I was a third grader and still play competitively, although not at Henry’s level! But while the tennis action scenes were easy for me to write, I relied on pros who work with kids for specifics about competitive youth tennis. I was lucky to tour the Evert Tennis Academy in Florida and speak with a representative there about the work they do with young players. Evert makes a real commitment to educating their players, helping them maintain a good balance in their lives and keeping them healthy … unlike the fictional academy in Tomatoes.

The ballet sections took some real work, because I don’t dance and have never taken a single ballet class. I relied heavily on interviewing young dancers, reading books about ballet, combing through autobiographies of my favorite dancers, and even watching ballet how-to videos. I once tried standing en pointe in some borrowed slippers. That lasted about one excruciating second! I am in awe of what ballet dancers can do with their bodies.

3. Do you have any favorite scenes or characters from the book?

I’ll confess: I have a bit of a crush on David, Henry’s love interest at the tennis camp. When I was 16, that’s exactly the sort of guy I would have liked. My favorite scenes in the book are when the two of them are sparring emotionally: they’re both smart, competitive, and really attracted to each other. I loved writing their dialogue!

4. Do you have any favorite female athletes?

Martina Navratilova, for sure. Martina redefined what it meant to be a woman athlete. Muscular and aggressive at net, she made all the other players on the tour look like children in comparison. Martina was a ground breaker in a variety of ways, and thanks to her, female athletes today know that being strong and competitive are not inconsistent with being feminine.

You know, I live in a college town, and often attend the women’s basketball games. I remember this one game in particular, when a player executed a perfect hook shot: you could see her bright, red manicured fingernails all the way from the stands. That pretty much says it all, and I think it’s great.

5. What do you hope readers take away from Jersey Tomatoes?

Well, I mostly just hope they fall in love with Henry and Eva the way I did! My first goal as an author is to tell a true story that strikes an emotional chord. I hope I’ve done that.

I also hope Tomatoes helps people better understand anorexia, especially as it relates to the negative inner voice which plagues its victims. Both Henry and Eva face a lot of pressure and pretty difficult parents, but only one of them falls prey to an eating disorder. I hope Tomatoes succeeds in exploring why.

MARIA PADIAN has worked as a commercial radio news reporter, an essayist for public radio, a press secreterary for a U.S. Congressman, and a freelance writer. An avid tennis player, gardner, skiier, and hiker, she is also the mother of two teenagers, who, along with their friends, have provided countless ideas, inspirations, and insights for her writing. A graduate of Middlebury College, she has also attended the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, Oxford University, and the University of Virginia. She lives with her children and husband, and an Australian Shepherd, in Maine where she is at work on a new novel.

 Want more? Check out these upcoming tour stops for Maria Padian

March 30th—Random Acts of Reading

March 31st—The Reading Zone

April 1st—Cleverly Inked

****GIVEAWAY****

THREE COPIES

of JERSEY TOMATOES ARE THE BEST by 

* Courtesy of Random House!

 Knopf Books for Young Readers (March 8, 2011)

This is a hilarious and heartbreaking story of two teen girls and the summer when everything changes for them. Both Henry and Eva are New Jersey natives and excellent athletes: Henry's a master on the tennis court and Eva is a graceful ballerina. When opportunity knocks for both of them the summer before their junior year in high school they throw open the door: Henry sees freedom from her overbearing father and a chance to build her talents on the court. Eva sees the chance to be the best as well as even more pressure to be graceful, lighter, more perfect on the dancefloor.

Soon, Eva's obsession with physical perfection leads her down the path to anorexia, and her health issues overwhelm everything else. But through it all these two best friends know that Jersey Tomatoes are the Best, and nothing will come between them no matter the distance.

Official Rules:

1.You must be 13 years or older to enter

2. U.S Entrants Only Please!

3. Entries must be received by Midnight EST on April 12th 2011

4.To enter to win, simply fill out the form below. Good luck!  

FORM

Fab Five Questions for Carrie Vaughn, Author of Steel!

Today I'd like to welcome Carrie Vaughn, author of Steel, a book about a high school fencer whose vacation takes a turn she never imagined when she is transported to an 18th-century pirate ship. You can learn more about the book and read an excerpt  here.

1.       Steel centers around Jill, a high school fencer who gets transported to an 18^th century pirate ship while on vacation with her family in the Bahamas.  Can you tell us a little more about the book, and share with us a favorite line, scene or passage?

In some ways STEEL is about Jill figuring out what she wants to do with her life -- whether to work toward competing in the Olympics, or maybe give up fencing entirely.  Then she gets taken completely out of her own world where the question becomes irrelevant and all she's worried about is getting home.  This was also my chance to write about pirates and life on the high seas, and I tried hard to make it as unromantic as possible -- it was a really difficult way to make a living.

My favorite scene may be when Jill first finds herself on the Diana, the pirate ship, and realizes she isn't in Kansas anymore.

 2.       What was the most challenging aspect of Steel to bring to life? Did you have to do extensive historical research or learn about fencing?

I did do a bunch of research, mostly about piracy and 18^th century sailing, and the hardest part was getting across so much information while not sounding boring.  It helps that Jill is learning about the world at the same time the reader is, so we can see it through her eyes.  At the same time, I loved getting into details about sailing and the economics of piracy.  I already knew how to fence -- I've been fencing since I was in college.  I hope my love of the sport comes through in the story.

3.       If you could inhabit the life of one literary character and dive into their world for just one day, who would you choose and why?

Oh, that's a tough one.  A lot of literary characters have really hard lives that I wouldn't want to live even for a day.  But I have to say Harry from The Blue Sword by Robin McKinley, because it's my favorite book and I absolutely love the world she creates in it -- full of magic and swashbuckling and gorgeous horses.

 4.      What were you like as a teen? Were there certain books that were your favorites and what do you think your teenage self would think about your book?

Well, I'm kind of hoping to write the kinds of books I would have loved as a teen.  The kinds of books where girls go off and have amazing adventures with swords and horses and sailing ships and dragons and so on.  (That's why I love McKinley's Damar books so much.)  What kind of teen was I?  I think I was very serious.  I worked hard in school, got into political arguments with my teachers, that sort of thing.  I read a ton of science fiction.  I read a ton of everything, really.  I also did a lot of theater, acting in plays and musicals and so on.  Good training for doing readings of my books in public!

 

5.       What can we look forward to next from you? Any upcoming projects in the works?

I always seem to have a ton of projects in the works!  My Kitty series is still going strong -- Kitty Goes to War just came out, and I'm working on the ninth and tenth books in the series.  (The ninth is called Kitty's Big Trouble.)  My first stand-alone fantasy novel just came out -- it's called Discord's Apple and is about a woman who discovers a treasure trove of mythological artifacts in her family's basement.  Another stand alone, my superhero novel After the Golden Age, should be out sometime next year as well.

Books by Carrie Vaughn

Young Adult

Adult

  

Carrie Vaughn had the nomadic childhood of the typical Air Force brat, with stops in California, Florida, North Dakota, Maryland, and Colorado. She holds a Masters in English Literature and collects hobbies-fencing and sewing are currently high on the list. She lives in Boulder, Colorado. Official Website