Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Teen Author Boot Camp and BEYONDERS book launch


This year at the Teen Author Boot Camp, we (Writers Cubed) felt very fortunate to have eight wonderful authors come and teach some great classes and workshops for our teen writers. We had over 250 kids this year. Our keynote speaker, Brandon Mull was a huge hit.  All of the authors had fantastic, fun and educational classes for the kids, with some great advice and tools for writing a book. (Wish we'd known some of this when we started out!)
And at the end of the day, Agent Amy Jameson presented the prizes and trophies for our First Chapter Contest winners. There are some seriously talented kids involved! After that, the authors hung out with the kids, signing books and chatting. It was a great day. Here is a slide show of just some of the pics taken that day.


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Most of all we had fun! (top row: Jennifer Jenkins, Tahsha Ford, Lois Brown, Margie Jordan, Jo Schaffer, Kirsten Chandler. below: Tyler Whitesides, Frank Cole, Jeff Scott Savage, Brandon Mull, Elana Johnson, Bethany Wiggins and Elizabeth Mueller.


A few days after the TABC we attended Brandon Mull's book launch party for the second BEYONDERS book. It was so much fun! He had skits and glow sticks! Haha! He raised the roof!

Shannon Hale and Brandon on stage being funny.

 D.C .Comedy-- rocked the house. It was like SNL.

 The glow sticks looked awesome when the lights went out between skits.
This particular skit made me laugh so hard. It was group therapy for writers. Authors Anonymous: (Dean Hale, Shannon Hale, Brandon Mull, Tyler Whitesides, Eric Patten and Matthew Kirby)

Shannon is not only talented and funny-- she's also a super sweetheart.

Anyway, there are YouTube videos from the launch party if you want to see some of the fun.

Hope you're all getting some writing done! It has been busy but I'm working hard to get stuff sent off to my agent--including the dreaded synopsis. UGH!!! Wish me luck.





Thursday, March 8, 2012

Lucky Sevens



Lisa Shafer tagged me for this very "seveny" meme:

The rules are as follows:
1. Go to page 77 of your current MS
2. Go to line 7
3. Copy down the next 7 lines - sentences or paragraphs - and post them as they're written. No cheating
4. Tag 7 authors
5. Let them know


Ok... here are my random 7 lines:

and locking it. Out in the haunted hallway her brother “oooohhhhed” and moaned.
Shaking and weeping, Atty cowered under the blankets on her bed as the storm battered the house. She hugged Flower’s white stuffed bunny, named Popcorn, to her chest so hard her shoulders ached. Terrible images of gore and murder flashed in her mind. She dreaded the coming of the morning in a house still as death—alone with Brian.
An arm wrapped around Atty’s shoulders.

So there you go. It's kinda mysterious when seen this way. Haha!
I'll tag 7 bloggers to play
1. Roland (he's the most prolific writer I know!)
2. Talli (have you read her books yet! Love them!)
3. Candace (my adopted daughter *wink*)
4. Elizabeth (one of the guest authors at Teen Author Boot Camp.)
5.Bethany (her book Shifting is super cool! Also a guest author at TABC!)
6.Johanna (we share a name... and her book Losing Beauty is awesome.)
7.Susan ( a talented woman and one of my first bloggy friends.)
Now I'm off to get some stuff done! Teen Author Boot Camp is this Saturday and our registration has doubled from last year! Wooot!



Monday, March 5, 2012

Build A Man--by Talli Roland


The perfect man is out there . . . he just needs a little work.

Slave to the rich, rude and deluded, cosmetic surgery receptionist Serenity Holland longs for the day she's a high-flying tabloid reporter. Unfortunately, every pitch she sends out disappears like her clients' liposuctioned fat, never to be seen again. Then she meets Jeremy Ritchie -- the hang-dog man determined to be Britain's Most Eligible Bachelor by making himself over from head to toe and everything in between -- giving Serenity a story no editor could resist.

With London's biggest tabloid on board and her very own column tracking Jeremy's progress from dud to dude, Serenity is determined to be a success, even going undercover to gain intimate access to Jeremy's life. But when Jeremy's surgery goes drastically wrong and Serenity is ordered to cover all the car-crash goriness, she must decide how far she really will go for her dream job.


This book totally met my expectations. I'm already a Talli Roland fan, so I knew this read would be witty, fun, unbearably stressful at parts and very satisfying in the end. Roland has perfected the comedic undercurrent that comes from the achingly frustrating as well as a nice balance between funny and tragic.

Main character, Serenity, is a likable girl that most of us can relate to. After making some horrid mistakes, she learns that what she thought she wanted--turns out to be wrong for her. Her "perfect" guy turns out to be an OCD living hell, but the "fixer upper" man just might be the perfect match for her.

Hilarious narrative, snarky dialog and totally, deliciously awkward moments  that build tension in this fun Chick Lit romp.

A very fun read, but surprisingly touching and insightful. Get it. Read it.


Get it on AMAZON now!