Blog Tour with Giveaway: Sasquatch, Love, and Other Imaginary Things by Betsy Aldredge and Carrie DuBois-Shaw

Book info:

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Title: SASQUATCH, LOVE, AND OTHER IMAGINARY THINGS

Author: Betsy Aldredge and Carrie DuBois-Shaw

Pub. Date: August 8, 2017

Publisher: Simon Pulse

Pages: 272

Formats: Hardcover, eBook

Find it: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, iBooks, TBD, Goodreads  

Synopsis:

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Pride and Prejudice meets Animal Planet’s Finding Bigfoot in this humorous and heartfelt debut about a loving, quirky family on the hunt for the mythical Sasquatch.

                  
Hunting for monsters was never so awkward. 

It’s bad enough that Samantha’s parents, charter members of the Northern Ohio Bigfoot Society, have dragged their daughter around forever, hunting for yetis. But now they’re doing it on national TV, and worse, in front of an aristocratic prep-school crew including a boy who disdains Samantha’s family.

But when he scorns her humble Ohio roots, she becomes determined to take him down. As they go to war, their friction and attraction almost distract them from the hint that Sasquatch may actually be out there somewhere…  

Excerpt:

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Chapter One

“Sasquatch: a hairy human-like creature, most often spotted in the northwestern United States and Canada. The animal, which can be up to 10 feet tall, is also called Bigfoot.”

—The Big Guide to Bigfoot, published by the International Association of Sasquatch Enthusiasts

On a good day, my parents were just mildly embarrassing. The day the camera crew came to our house was not a good day.

I squinted at the bright lights illuminating our dingy living room, and turned to my older sister, Sophie. “Hunting Bigfoot in private isn’t bad enough?” I whispered. “Now Mom and Dad have to humiliate us on national television?”

Sophie shrugged. “You’ve been complaining for weeks. It’s time to suck it up.”

Colin, the producer of a new TV show called Myth Gnomers, stood behind our scratched-up coffee table shooting pre-interviews with my parents, me, and my two sisters. The awful title of this lousy reality show should’ve served as an obvious warning we were about to do something ridiculous, but nope, it sure didn’t.

Instead of running like hell, all five of us were squished together on our stained, saggy brown couch, smiles frozen in place. At least our butts hid the holes in the upholstery.

“Checking. Checking one, two. Your mics should all be on now.” Colin peered over the camera at my parents’ matching neon green shirts that read “Ohio is Bigfoot Country.”

My mom’s smile tightened. She glared and gestured at me until I put on a Northern Ohio Bigfoot Society hat like my sisters. Each Sasquatch club designed their own logo. My tacky-ass trucker cap had a cartoon footprint and a motto on it in Latin—which probably translated to “We have nothing better to do.”

I pulled the brim over my eyes and slumped down, wishing I could join the pennies and crumbs hiding in the dark crevices of the sofa.  

About the Authors:

--> Betsy is a former magazine editor turned communications professional who avoids math at all costs. Therefore, she’s held a series of artsy jobs at Opera News, Museums Magazine, and the Museum of Jewish Heritage, where she tried to remember everything she learned in Hebrew school. She now works at Purchase College, SUNY, where she is inspired daily by the cool and creative students and professors. She lives and works in New York.  

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Carrie is an arts administrator and has worked for world-renowned organizations such as San Francisco Ballet, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, and the New Victory Theater. She is a passionate advocate for high quality performing arts for children and has written two plays for young audiences, which were produced and performed throughout

New York City. She currently lives in San Francisco.

 








Website | Betsy’s Twitter | Carrie’s Twitter  

Giveaway:

--> 1 winner will receive a finished copy of SASQUATCH, LOVE, AND OTHER IMAGINARY THINGS and swag. US only.      a Rafflecopter giveaway

Tour Schedule:

Week One:

7/31/2017- Swoony Boys Podcast- Interview

8/1/2017- Book Princess Reviews- Review

8/2/2017- Wandering Bark Books- Guest Post

8/3/2017- Savings in Seconds- Review

8/4/2017- Such a Novel Idea- Interview

Week Two:

8/7/2017- YA and Wine- Review

8/8/2017- Novel Novice- Guest Post

8/9/2017- Nerdophiles- Review

8/10/2017- Lisa Loves Literature- Excerpt

8/11/2017- Bibliobakes- Review   

Wake (Watersong #1) by Amanda Hocking

As always I'd like to thank the people who made it possible for me to read an advanced copy of this.  I was fortunate enough to walk into work at Barnes and Noble and see this sitting on the break room table.  As I had fallen in love with the Trylle series by Amanda Hocking, I immediately grabbed it and stuffed it into my locker to take home.  Thank you to St. Martin's Press for sending a copy to my store for me to get!
Okay, first I have to say that this is my first foray into the "mermaid" genre.  Although, technically, they aren't mermaids per se, but sirens.  I do have to say that I was not disappointed in the story though.  Again I can see that Hocking has really built her own mythological story with all the details to make the story work.  And even though we don't know quite everything, I mean, if we did, why would we read on, you can see that there is thought behind what all is happening, and a reason for it.
The main character is Gemma, she's 16 years old, and loves swimming, in fact she's so good, that she's working towards the next Olympics.  And she's starting to notice the boy next door.  And he's noticing her right back.  She lives with her father and her older sister Harper.  Their mother was in a car accident a while back, and hasn't quite been right since then.  So she had to go live in a  home where there would be people to keep an eye on her.  It doesn't sound like a nursing home type of place, though, so not bad.  So since that, Harper has felt that she must fill in for Gemma as her mother.  Something that Gemma sometimes feels is a bit annoying, as any teenager would for an older sister acting that way.  Recently there have been 4 new girls in town, although one has not been around as much.  These girls are Penn, Thea, and Lexi.  Harper gets an uneasy feeling around them.  They're beautiful and popular, but there is something dangerous or menacing about them.  Gemma likes to go each night to the sea and swim when no one is around, even though she notices the 3 girls in one of the coves each night, but she stays away, because she wants to swim in solitude.  One night, the girls call to her, and it's like she can't resist, even though she wants to, and so she goes up and hangs out with them in the cove.  They give her a drink, after which she gets really out of it, and wakes up on the beach the next morning, unable to remember what happened the night before.  But now she's grounded for staying out all night when her father and sister wake up to find her missing.  The truth is that Gemma can now really swim, and she feels even more beautiful.  In fact she seems to have a bit more of a mesmerizing effect on the boy next door, Alex.  But as you would assume, there is a price to her new powers.  And the mysterious girls are the reason, and hold all the answers.
As I said before, the story did not disappoint.  My only issues, first, I don't like that the parents are called by their first names.  It confuses me.  I don't remember what other book I read that in recently, but it just is weird to me.  Second, when I first talked about how much I liked the Trylle books, someone commented that they'd heard Hocking's e-books had lots of grammar mistakes.  I didn't notice any in the Trylle books, but I do have to say that I did in this one.  Yes, it is an ARC, so I'm sure they'll all be fixed before it is published.  I hope.  And when I say grammar mistakes, just really things that probably came from writing quickly to get the story out, thinking ahead of the line she was one, etc.  I do that too sometimes.  Thank goodness for editors and friends who check things!
To wrap up, I am eager to read on in the story.  One funny thing, as I was reading this, I watched the Animal Planet's show about "real" mermaids.  It was funny to me that I just happened to watch that as I was reading a book about the topic.  And this gives me a bit of a nudge to go ahead and maybe dive into some other mermaid types of stories.