Amazon Daily Deal: AMAROK!!! (and Operation Awesome charity auction item)

Housekeeping: yesterday was a huge day for YA fiction fans (who to a person adore Veronica Mars), so we have to forgive each other for completely missing out on most everything else going on yesterday. I forgive you. Do you forgive me? Okay, good. So here are the links to yesterday's blog posts:

First I shared cover love for Angie Smibert's upcoming release, THE MEME PLAGUE (August 2013), book 3 in the MEMENTO NORA series. It is fabulous, by the way. If you haven't read it, go get Memento Nora and join the revolution.

Then my husband (yes, he is awesome) posted news of the Veronica Mars Movie kickstarter page and so I went all fangirl and blogged about it.

K, flashback over.

Today, special treat from Amazon: Amarok is in the Kindle Daily Deals zone! Woot, woot! Go Angela! (That's the incredible, sweet, and talented author of Amarok.)

Here's the cover, buy link, and blurb:

On Goodreads

AMAZON DAILY DEAL: AMAROK by Angela J. Townsend $1.99 today only

Emma's life has been hell since she moved from sunny California to a remote Alaskan town. Abandoned by her father and living with the guilt of causing her mother's death, she makes a desperate dash for freedom from her abusive stepfather. But when her car skids off the icy road, her planned escape leads to further captivity in a world beyond her imagining. Dragged across the tundra by an evil mountain man and his enormous black wolf, she learns that love can be found in the most unexpected places. Amarok, as she's nicknamed the wolf, is a young man from the gold-rush era enslaved by an ancient shaman. Emma's gentle touch and kind heart win his love and devotion. When a vicious madman--trapped in bear form by the same Shaman--attacks the travelers and injures Amarok, Emma must find the strength to face her fears and free the wolf she's come to love. But that means she must face down the evil shaman, a Siberian mammoth hunter from the ice age, and he has no intention of giving up his power to her.

If you'd like to get a feel for how this wolf shapeshifting story is unique, this trailer will take you there:


As someone who's read a lot of Angela's work, I can tell you her prose is delicious, her settings vivid like sweeping masterpieces. You will feel rooted in her world for the duration of the story. You will not be able to put it down between chapters because of her expert use of suspense. And your heart will break for the ordeals of her beloved characters. If you've never read Angela Townsend's work before, I urge you to take advantage of this deal and try her out. You may discover a new favorite author. :)

Currently reading:
Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell (for book club)
The Lives of Tao by Wesley Chu (with my husband)

What are you reading?

UPDATE: Doh! Totally slipped my mind, but OPERATION AWESOME's Multi-Pack of Awesome is up for auction at charity auction Pens for Paws today (until tomorrow)! So if you'd like to win a 20-page critique from Yours Truly, along with a handful of critiques from other OA members and signed books/swag, too, get over and bid now! (Other items for bidding include agent critiques!)

Here's a screen shot of the Operation Awesome prize:

So much goodness, it didn't all fit in one screen cap! Go check out the rest: http://pensforpaws.blogspot.com/2013/03/awesome-multi-prize-package-from.html

VERONICA MARS MOVIE!!!! #VeronicaMarsMovie

Update: We did it! $2 million dollars raised in ten hours, $2.4 mil by midnight. Veronica Mars is funded! So now we just get to have fun watching the numbers slowly tick up day by day for 29 more days. Any bets on how big the final number will be? $60 mil? Anyone? Anyone?

Why is there a hash tag in my title? Well, because something incredible is happening and it's twitter-related, as most incredible happenings are.

This:

Veronica Mars Movie being crowdfunded by fans through Kickstarter

Does it get any better than THIS?

A favorite tv show. Check.

With an unsatisfying season finale. Check.

Canceled before they could rectify it. Check.

Teased as a new FBI crime show. Check.

Dropped as a new FBI crime show before funding. Check.

Teased as a movie. Check.

Determined unfundable to the lament of millions of fans. Check.

But today? Today!! Today, this is happening. 

A Message from Kristen:dearest marshmallows...
I am currently the happiest blonde in a hamster ball the world has ever seen. We have been waiting so long to make this movie dream a movie reality, and it’s because of YOUR commitment, YOUR persistence, that we finally have a chance. We just have one more step to go.
You have banded together like the sassy little honey badgers you are and made this possibility happen. i promise if we hit our goal, we will make the sleuthiest, snarkiest, it’s-all-fun-and-games-‘til-one-of-you-gets-my-foot-up-your-ass movie we possibly can.
I promise to give it my all. i promise to work my hardest to give everyone a little bit more Veronica, and i will be oh so honored to do so.  

So what do we have to do to make this a certainty?

Donate a few bucks to the cause at Kickstarter.

It garnered a MILLION DOLLARS in donations in the first FOUR HOURS, earning it a spot as record-breaker in the First to a Mil Hall of Fame! But there's still about $700,000 to go before they reach the goal amount so the owners, Warner Brothers, will kick in for promotion, etc. 

Let's show them there IS a big enough fan base to justify a movie!

As excited as I am about Kristen Bell taking up her role as the intrepid, vengeful Veronica Mars once more (WHICH IS VERY EXCITED), I am also completely intrigued by the precedent this is setting for the relationship between viewers/fans and TV/movies. 

If fandom rather than ratings decides what airs, then the most beloved shows will stop getting canceled in the middle of storylines! 

Kyle XY, anyone? 

What show would you fork out money to keep on the air (or raise from the dead?)

A note to the creators if they happen to read this: PLEASE BRING BACK DUNCAN KANE!!

THE MEME PLAGUE Cover LOVE! (by Angie Smibert)

I just ate up MEMENTO NORA and THE FORGETTING CURVE (read my Afterglow reviews here and here), and then found out I have to wait for THE MEME PLAGUE to be released before I can have any closure.

Gah!

But to my happiness, author Angie Smibert updated her blog with this gem last Tuesday:

On goodreads

And some good news! THE MEME PLAGUE has a new release date: AUGUST 13, 2013!!

So I still have to wait, but not as long as for some other books I'm anticipating. And at last we'll get to hear more from Meme Boy, or whatever he's calling himself now, and have some more news from the underground. Yes, yes, I know I am a nerd.

The Memento series is cult-worthy. If you haven't read the series yet, check out the books below:

In other news, I'll have a fabulous daily deal to share with you bookish bargain hunters tomorrow. So come back and take advantage of that!

World Book Day: Donate a Book

Yesterday was World Book Day, according to my favorite curriculum provider, Sonlight. They posted an article citing research which suggests a home library during the teen years may influence children to finish college later on.

Beneath the article, many commenters praised the idea by telling their own stories of having a home library, or a library card and a fabulous local librarian. Books, they said, were their portals into another realm, their windows to the world beyond their front doors.

A few suggested charities who provide all children with books, to begin a home library of their own. That's where I found these guys:

Firstbook.org

A small donation can give four new books to readers who may not otherwise have books of their own. When I remember some of the first books I owned, The Girl With the Silver Eyes by Willo Davis Roberts and See You Later by Christopher Pike, I get all warm and gushy inside. 

What were the first books you owned?

Blog Chain: Keep Calm and Fall in Love with Your Best Friend's Brother

Source: Buy Poster

Kate's topic:

As a reader and/or a writer what are some of your favorite fiction
tropes? Are you sucker for secretly in love with best friend type
stories, stories set in mysterious boarding school stories, stories
that contain time travel, or something else entirely? As a writer how
do you try to give the tropes you tackle in your own books a fresh
spin?


My favorite tropes are:

• kids discovering special powers
• kids trying to keep powers a secret
• best friend loyal to the end
• grade school crush turns out to be a jerk/intellectual lightweight
• true love is the friend right under your nose the whole time
• someone new comes to town
• central authority is no match for the small but determined rebellion

tropes I don't love:

• quest journeys (these are so hard to pull off in a unique way because of the iconic ones)
• best friend betrayal (it just makes me too sad)
• villain more relatable than the hero (obviously)
• anti-hero

I think tropes are always customized differently by each author. The only time we think they're cliches is when it's a trope we personally don't like. So we go, Oh no, not another best friend love story! Or Yikes, the discovery of special powers... again! That doesn't make them cliche. 

All people are the same. 

And all people are different. 

I think the key for writers is hitting on tropes that aren't overdone for the moment. Like maybe avoid writing about vampires and dystopian societies with a strong central authority... for now. Not because these are cliche, but because readers may be getting tired of seeing them... for now. The answer is to read a lot and thereby keep your finger on the pulse of our collective consciousness. 

When someone recycles an old trope that hasn't been used in a while, it suddenly feels unique and genius! It's not because the author's a genius. It's because people have been looking for something outside the tropes currently being used. 

So long as I, as a writer, make each character as unique as real people, the reuse of these tropes will be under good regulation. 

What are your favorite tropes?  

Check out Christine Fonseca's thoughts from yesterday and Demitria Lunetta's tomorrow.

Trying Something New: Scrivener (plus coupon!)

This has been shared around lately: http://www.retailmenot.com/view/literatureandlatte.com

It's a coupon code for Scrivener, which Cassie Clare used for her Mortal Instruments series, and which countless other authors have also used to help them organize complex novels.

I've wanted to learn this writing software for some time, but I've been intimidated by two things:

1) The financial investment in my writing which it represents, and
2) The complexity of the software itself.

But two tweeters (a couple of my favorite writer peeps) encouraged me to try it out. Because of the coupon linked above and my admiration for these tweeters (@wes_chu and @authoressanon), I bit the bullet and bought Scrivener.

Yesterday was crazy with kid-watching, menu-planning, and food-purchasing, so today will be my first chance to experiment with Scrivener. I'm told that watching the tutorial is as much fun as raking leaves (Wes Chu's words), and that it can be frustrating at first, but I shouldn't give up (Authoress). Both of them swear by this program today.

So I'm looking forward to the time AFTER the tutorial when I can implement the tools Scrivener provides with ease and grace... you know, after all the leaves are raked.

Have you used writing software? Which software? 

I also recommend WriteOrDie, especially if you have writer's block. It's $10 for a full license, and is especially useful for cutting out distractions like this blog. :)

Awesome Bookish Uses for Pinterest: New Leaf Literary and Month9Books

Querying? Your literary agent research just got easier (and more visual-learner-friendly)!

Check out this awesome use of Pinterest by literary agency New Leaf Literary:

See more of New Leaf Literary on Pinterest

Each literary agent has her own board, each book has its own board. Brilliant, no? I think so!

Tech-savvy literary agencies aren't the only bookish entities using Pinterest awesomely, either! Check out Month9Books, an MG/YA publisher of all things speculative fiction:

See more of Month9Books on Pinterest

Upcoming titles are all represented here, as well as contest entries/winners as part of a book promotion, and other bookish stuff which speaks to the personality and character of Month9Books as a whole.

Do you use Pinterest to express yourself professionally? Until now I've been using it mostly for time-wasting, cute birthday party ideas, and setting research. But now I'm starting to see the potential for more.

Add it to the social media toolbox!

And follow me on Pinterest. I follow back writers and bookish peeps. :)