Sunday Post #58 and Stacking the Shelves May 22nd, 2016

The Sunday Post is a weekly meme hosted  @ Caffeinated Book Reviewer. It’s a chance to share news ~ A post to recap the past week on your blog, showcase books and things we have received and share news about what is coming up on our blog for the week ahead. See rules here: Sunday Post Meme.  Let me tell you what.  The last week of school was so busy!  And then, this weekend was Planet Comic Con in Kansas City, and so my Friday night, and all of Saturday, was spent at that.  So I've got books to share from then, as well as some awesome pictures that I got with some movie stars! It was also a very busy week on my blog as well.

Last week on the blog:

• Reviews:  7 NA Free/Cheap ebooks, Circle of Jinn by Lori Goldstein (Blog tour and Giveaway), The Star-Touched Queen by Roshani Chokshi, True Born by L.E. Sterling (Blog tour, Author interview, and Giveaway)
• Top 10 Tuesday:  Ten books I picked up on a whim
• Waiting on Wednesday:  Like a River Glorious (The Gold Seer Trilogy #2) by Rae Carson
• Cover Characteristic:  Silhouettes
• Summer 2016 Comment Challenge Sign Up Post

If you remember I mentioned about all the free/cheap ebooks I'd been downloading and reading, basically speeding through.  Well, instead of stretching their reviews out over a long time, I just did very short reviews of all of them together in one big post.  I joined into Top 10 Tuesday for the first time in a long time!  I also signed up for another challenge, a comment one, and it will help me with my own goals for the year.  I got my two days of walking done, not to mention at Planet Comic Con on Saturday I walked all 10,000 steps as well!  As I said, school is out for the summer.  Yay!  I'm ready for being able to stay up late reading and not having to worry about getting up in the morning.  I'm ready to bump up my amount of walking for the week and try to keep losing more weight.  I'm still losing weight, slowly, but I'm happy with the way it's going, because I feel it is easier to keep it off when I'm losing it this slowly.  

Now, let's talk about Comic Con this weekend.  Because this year was amazing!  First thing I did was wander through the hall while I waited for the Kevin Smith show to start at 8 pm.  So I got to see the Mary from Supernatural (Dean's car) replica and get my picture taken with it. 

I have been a huge fan of Kevin Smith.  If you don't know who he is, he is responsible for the movies Clerks, Mallrats, Dogma, Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, and Chasing Amy, just to name a few (and my favorites).  He also plays Silent Bob in those movies.  I have wanted to see him in person for so long.  But both times he's been here in Kansas City, I've not been able to see him, because of money or scheduling issues.  But when I found out he was coming to do his show the first night of Comic Con this year, I made sure to buy a ticket as soon as I could. And I bought a VIP ticket.  Which meant that I got a seat in the front rows, and a free autographed picture.  Unfortunately I didn't get to actually meet him.  So that kinda sucked.  But I keep my hopes up that some day I will get to!  He was hilarious!  First there was an issue that he had been in Nashville the day before, and his flight got cancelled.  So his only choice was to take a Southwest flight. And if you know much about Kevin Smith, you know that he has an issue with Southwest.  But, because he didn't want to let us down, he got on the flight and made it here, just about a half hour late.  Then he said the show would go till about 11, and he would understand if anyone needed to leave.  But actually, it wasn't over until almost midnight!  But it was totally worth it.  I never got tired or bored, and never even checked my phone to see what time it was.  If you are a fan, and ever get the chance to see Kevin Smith, it is totally worth every penny.  Here is a shot I took. The only problem that night was that he never came over to our side of the stage!  

So that was my Friday night.  I also got to go see an author that I have reviewed her book, The Curse of Jacob Tracy, on Friday night.  Here I am with Holly Messinger.  I had to pick up the new short story book that goes with the series, The Romance of Certain Old Bones.  It is set 5 years before the first book. 

  
Then, Saturday.  Can I just say that Saturday was such a cool day?  Of course I bought too many books.  You'll see a picture of my haul from Comic Con below in my Stacking the Shelves portion of the post.  I wandered around for a bit.  But first I had to go back to the author booth next to Holly Messinger's booth, because there was a book there I'd seen on someone's blog, and so I had to buy it.  And I was lucky enough that the author was there as well!  The book is The Silver Sickle by Ellie Ann.  I guess she is really tall as you can see in this picture, but honestly I'm pretty short myself.   

My next excitement for the day was to get in line to get to meet Jason Mewes. If you don't know who he is, he's been in every Kevin Smith movie, and he usually plays the character of Jay, who is always with Silent Bob.  I only paid for a physical print copy, so I had to take a picture of the picture for this.  He was doing all kinds of fun poses with everyone.  I saw him stand back to back with one guy, then he had the next girl jump up and put her legs around his waist.  The next guy he had stand behind him and act like, well, something inappropriate.  For my picture, I was wearing the Mooby's uniform shirt that I wore for my Halloween costume.  So he kind of pointed to the Mooby's picture on my shirt.  Totally ignore my stupid, giddy fangirl smile!

 The pictures for that ran a little late, so I didn't get to the panel with Holly Messinger that I had hoped to.  Instead, I had seen the girls from The Hillywood Show on Youtube, Hilly and Hannah Hindi, were in a booth doing autographs and pictures!  Here they are dressed as Dean and Castiel. 

 They had cool tshirts for sell that went along with the Supernatural Parody, so I had to buy one.  Here is a picture of it.

Not long after that was time for the Hillywood Show panel.  It was fun to get to see the girls talk, and they showed us three of their videos.  I'd seen two of them, the Supernatural one and The Walking Dead one. The third one was for Doctor Who, which I don't watch. But it was still fun to see!  Hannah and Hilly are just tiny!  They are about my height, a little shorter I think even!  But here they are up on stage answering fan questions.

After the panel I went to get some lunch.  I wandered around the show again for awhile.  Then I went to a panel with with some horror authors, one that I specifically wanted to see, Dan Wells.  They talked about what horror is, as well as about writing and publishing.  I got some great writing tips that work for any genre.  So that was great.  Then I went back to the booth and bought some books and got my picture taken with Dan Wells.

And then.  Then came the highlight of the show.  The reason that I stayed all day, even though I'd arrived at 10 am that morning.  I had a photo scheduled at 5:30 with, drumroll, Tom Felton, otherwise known as the actor who played Draco Malfoy in the Harry Potter films.  And he was sooooo  nice!  When I went over to him, he said "Hi, darling!" and put his arm around me for the picture.  Now, he did call the girl in front of me, sweetheart, but still.  So darn sweet!  I was totally swooning and fangirling with the girls in front and behind me when we went to pick up our pictures afterwards.  Here we are.  I could stare at this picture all night. Again, I didn't pay for the digital version, so I had to take a picture of the actual picture to post it, as you can tell from my finger holding it on the side.  I think I'm going to bring the picture up to my bedroom to stare at as I fall asleep.  :-)  Once again, ignore my total geeky smile!  I get so excited my smile just won't stop!

So that was my awesome weekend. Saturday was exhausting, from walking and standing in line for sure.  But also from all the excitement of meeting the awesome people I got to meet! 

This week on the blog:

• Cover Characteristic:  Only the backs of people
• Promo:  Resolution:  Huck Finn by Andrew Joyce
• Waiting on Wednesday
• Reviews:  Exile for Dreamers (Stranje House #2) by Kathleen Baldwin (Rock Star Tours), and Opposition (Lux series #5) by Jennifer L. Armentrout
• Audiobook reviews:  Down London Road and Until Fountain Bridge by Samantha Young, and Lady Renegades (Rebel Belle #3) by Rachel Hawkins.     

Stacking the Shelves is hosted by Tynga's Reviews.  Once again I had a bad week with the ebooks.  Not to mention buying too many books at Comic Con.  And egalleys, although to be fair, they were all from Edelweiss which means I don't download them until closer to the time I'm going to actually read them.
Physical Books:

I checked these two out from the school library where I work.  I decided they sounded good and I'd try to read them over the summer.  

The two books at the top of the picture I got from a Books for Trade group on Facebook.  The swag in the front came with one of them!

The top one is the short story book by Holly Messinger that I told you about above.  Then there are two by Dan Wells:  Partials and I Am Not A Serial Killer.  The first one was planned, the second one I decided on after hearing him talk about it in the panel.  Next is The Silver Sickle by Ellie Ann, who I have a picture with above.  The last book, Wings of Arian is by Devri Walls.  I met her at Comic Con at the booth where Ellie Ann was.  I  met her Friday night, and decided on Saturday to go back and buy her book as well, I forgot to get my picture with her though.  It sounds good, although I'm not usually that type of a fantasy reader, so we'll see!

I got a stripped cover copy of this from the bookstore where I work.  I still probably want an actual good condition copy, but for now at least I have it available to read. 

E-galleys:
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 All of these are on Edelweiss. The last one isn't my normal type of read, but the author is one of my favorites, so it is a must read for me.

Free/cheap e-books:

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The first seven are from Amazon, and actually, so far, only one of them is turning out to be good.  I've tried a couple of the others and they aren't catching my attention.  So they may be DNFs.  Then I got the next one, Running Wild, from Barnes and Noble as a Nook Book.  The last four are all ones that I got from authors for signing up for their newsletters or because they asked me to review them.  The last one is probably not one I'll end up reading. But we'll see.

Wow, so many books, and such an exciting week!  I'm so tired!  Looking forward to school being out so I can get to reading!  Plus, I'm going to Branson next weekend, so that will be time for lots of reading!  I'm debating about whether to take my laptop with me so that I can blog if need be, or if I will get all my blogging done before.  But I go down Thursday, so I may need to go ahead and bring it. We'll see what all I can get done by Wednesday night.

Summer 2016 Comment Challenge Sign-Up Post

So I recently saw this challenge and thought it sounded like the perfect one to help me with my goals about commenting this summer.  It's hosted by Lonna @FLYLēF and Alicia @ A Kernel of Nonsense.   It's a way to increase comment activity on your own blog, as well as meet some new bloggers and help them out!  Here are the details:

• This challenge will run June through August.
• You are welcome to sign up for one, two, or all three months (a sign-up post will go up a month in advance for each month and will be open for three weeks).
• Bloggers will be paired up for one month and will be required to comment on each other’s blog posts.
• If you sign up for more than one month, you will have a different comment partner each month.
• To allow a bit of freedom, you will be able to choose how often you would like to comment on your partner’s blog (options include 5-10 or 11-20 posts).
• Social Media Option: If you’d like to give your partner further encouragement through social media, we will do our best to connect you with bloggers who are active on the same platforms.
• Giveaway: at the end of August, we will be giving away two bookish prizes. Please note: this giveaway will only be open to participants.

Today is the last day to sign up for June, but you could still sign up for July and August I think.  I'm signing up to do all three months, and to do 11-20 posts, as that is about one comment a day.  And I want to start being better about always commenting on people's blogs!   If this sounds interesting to you, click the button at the top of this post to go to the sign up page!

Blog Tour: Review, Author Interview, and Giveaway - True Born by L.E. Sterling

About the Book:

Book Title: True Born
Author: L.E. Sterling
Release Date: May 3, 2016
Genre: YA Sci-Fi Fantasy

Your fate is in your blood…

Welcome to Dominion City.

After the great Plague descended, the world population was decimated…and their genetics damaged beyond repair.

The Lasters wait hopelessly for their genes to self-destruct. The Splicers pay for expensive treatments that might prolong their life. The plague-resistant True Borns are as mysterious as they are feared…

And then there’s Lucy Fox and her identical twin sister, Margot. After endless tests, no one wants to reveal what they are.

When Margot disappears, a desperate Lucy has no choice but to put her faith in the True Borns, led by the charismatic leader, Nolan Storm, and the beautiful but deadly Jared, who tempts her as much as he infuriates her. As Lucy and the True Borns set out to rescue her sister, they stumble upon a vast conspiracy stretching from Dominion’s street preachers to shady Russian tycoons. But why target the Fox sisters?

As they say in Dominion, it’s in the blood.

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26114621-true-born

Amazon:  http://www.amazon.com/True-Born-L-E-Sterling-ebook/dp/B0166SEV0O

Barnes and Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/true-born-le-sterling/1122537957

iBooks: https://geo.itunes.apple.com/us/book/true-born/id1046533172

Kobo: https://store.kobobooks.com/en-US/ebook/true-born

Amazon.co.uk:  http://www.amazon.co.uk/True-Born-L-E-Sterling-ebook/dp/B0166SEV0O

Amazon.ca: http://www.amazon.ca/True-Born-L-E-Sterling-ebook/dp/B0166SEV0O

Entangled Publishing: http://www.entangledpublishing.com/true-born/

Review:
First I have to say thanks to YA Reads Book Tours and Entangled Publishing for allowing me to read an egalley of this title.  The synopsis above is what sold me right away.  When I finally picked it up, I was hooked, and when I finished, all I know is that I need a sequel now!

The main character is Lucy Fox.  She is a twin, at birth she was joined to her sister Margot's foot with one of her own feet.  Margot is kind of the "perfect" daughter, although she is the one who has lately found something, a boy probably, who is keeping her sneaking out of the house, and also making her not be as open with Lucy as normal. The two of them have a connection, they can communicate when they're not even in the same room, they feel emotions and can send pictures or thoughts.  Margot and Lucy are very close to their own "Reveal" Party.  That is where they will find out if they are Splicers, or True Borns.  But something strange is going on.  They have to keep going back to do the tests over and over.  It is about this time that their father has hired some new security people.  They are True Born, people who are born with genetic "throw-backs" or traits that seem to go back to our ancestors in the evolutionary path.  For instance the guy in charge of security, Storm, has antlers.  

Then there is Jared, the snarky, cocky guy that Lucy first runs into, literally, at the top of a staircase at her school.  There is something about him, but she uses her "status" to look down on this guy that she doesn't know, even though he's very cute, just because of the way he comes across in their first meeting.  Turns out that he also works for Storm, as part of the new security detail, and he is also a True Born.  But there is something between them.  Even though it is wrong for them.  Lucy must be with whoever her parents decide.  And Jared, he doesn't want to be interested in a girl like her, a privileged girl, that stands for all the things that have kept people like him, True Borns, down.  

About this same time, Lucy senses something is wrong with Margot one night when she's snuck out.  Lucy gets Jared to go with her to find Margot.  And they end up at the clinic where the testing goes on, only someone is not testing Margot, but drawing something out of her body, blood or something.  They have to rescue her, and it doesn't happen without a fight.  Jared shifts into his panther-like body to do this, and then there feels as if something has changed between them. But not only that, with their parents having gone out of town, Margot is now not herself.  You can tell she feels traumatized.  In order to keep the girls safe, they go to Storm's headquarters.  While they are there they find out that maybe something else is going on.  Maybe there is something in the girls' blood that could be very highly sought after by people wanting to save themselves against the plague.  At the same time the Lasters, the people who cannot fight the plague, are beginning to rebel.  

The story has so many twists and turns it keeps you on the edge of your seat.  All the different types of True Borns are neat to hear about, and to try to picture in my head.  The heat between Jared and Lucy is really good, I enjoy the back and forth between them.  I enjoy all of the stuff that builds into the world.  My only problem was that I feel there are still so many questions left unanswered.  And I wish there would have been one or two more of these answered. But I guess the author knew what they were doing, because I'll need to read the next book soon!  

Author Interview:

1.  What does your writing process look like?  Do you know the whole story when you start?  Or do you just start writing and go with it (seat of the pants writing)?  If you plan it out, how do you do that?  Outline, note cards, post-it notes, etc.?

I typically start with a burning image in my mind - either a scenario or a final scene -  and I just work through the tangles until I have all the threads sorted. Sometimes I’ll start with a scene, stop, then start developing the rest of the narrative. Planning, especially for long projects, is essential! Having said that, I always maintain flexibility as my imagination adds to the world, layer by layer.

I keep track of everything in what I some authors call a Story Bible (and sometime, as with True Born, I have more than one floating around). Right now, for instance, as I work on the True Born series, I have 3 or 4 different story bibles filled with notes, as well as a chapter by chapter breakdown of what I think is going to happen… and I fill that with obsessive notes, as well!

2.  How do you come up with your ideas for your stories?

Ha! Great question – and very difficult to answer! Every story is different. But, in general I would say that the imagination is like a vast library. Like most people, I think I file everything that I have ever experienced, read, thought into that library, so that when an idea pops into my mind, it’s drawing from a hundred different sources: history, the state of the world, an extrapolation of where I think we’re headed, science articles I’ve written, researchers I’ve interviewed, and so on. 

3.  How long have you been writing?

I published my first article in Owl, a kid’s magazine, when I was in grade three, so I must have started around then! I went on to write my first novel at age eleven… it was terrible! I started taking Creative Writing classes in High School, then continued studying Creative Writing in University…I can’t remember a time when I didn’t not know that I wanted to be a writer.

4.  What tips do you have for aspiring writers?

Read. A lot. I have met people who aspire to being published authors who claim (proudly) that they never read anything. But honestly, I can learn more from reading a single page of one of my favourite authors than I ever did listening to anybody, or attending any class. You need to trust your gut, but you can learn so much from how other people tackle writing problems: an action scene, for instance, or paranormal characters.

I would also say that the more I write, the better I get. I’ve been keeping a daily journal for nearly 20 years now. I write in my journal before I get started on my books. Every day. It’s now so much a part of me that I couldn’t imagine my days without it. It’s cheap therapy, for one thing – and it frees my mind up so much for more imaginative work!

5. How important are names in your books?  Do you choose the names based on liking the way it sounds, or the meaning?  Do you have any name choosing resources you recommend?

Names are so important! Some names I draw from myth or classic literature that adds layers to the story. For instance, with my last novel, Pluto’s Gate, the heroine’s name is Percy (short for Persephone) Clare (meaning light). The narrative is a contemporary retelling of the Pluto (or Hades)/Demeter/Persephone myth, so this works really well.

In True Born, this process is a little more intuitive. My lead character, Lucy Fox, is named for a character in Dracula, believe it or not! True Born, while not a vampire story, is a novel obsessed with blood!

6.  Since this has a science fiction feel to it, did you do any research into the science parts?

I actually worked for some of the world’s top scientists for a couple of years. I would get to interview these amazing biomedical engineers about the crazy stuff they are working on (like: engineering living, beating heart tissue, or nanoparticle delivery vehicles for chemo drugs) and all of that really made its way into the world of True Born.

7.  As a former teacher, one of the best parts of that is hearing back from students who learned something or felt they got something from being in my class.  Can you name a teacher that you felt was important in your life in some way?

One of my mentors was a man named Matt Cohen. He was a Governor General award winning author (this is the holy grail of writing prizes in Canada). I kept winning ‘best story’ prizes in his writing workshop – I think I won three of the four prizes that year – and he pushed me to consider going on to a Masters in Creative Writing (I did). To be honest, I feel like he was really the only person who ever made me feel like I was talented or could really do this. I have never forgotten him for it. Sadly, he died shortly before the publication of my first book. It’s dedicated to him anyway.

Some fun questions

Favorites:  

Books/authors/genres

Sci-fi, fantasy, urban fantasy: Charlaine Harris, Patricia Briggs, Cassandra Clare, Tanya Huff, Ilona Andrews, Karen Chance, Maria V. Snyder.

Movies/TV Shows

Game of Thrones, Battlestar Galactica

Music

Arcade Fire, Billy Holiday, David Bowie, Leonard Cohen

Food/writing snack

Coffee!

Social Media Site

? I’ll let you know when I find one.  

About the Author: 

L.E. Sterling had an early obsession with sci-fi, fantasy and romance to which she remained faithful even through an M.A. in Creative Writing and a PhD in English Literature – where she completed a thesis on magical representation. She is the author of two previous novels, the cult hit Y/A novel The Originals (under pen name L.E. Vollick), dubbed “the Catcher in the Rye of a new generation” by one reviewer, and the urban fantasy Pluto’s Gate.

Originally hailing from Parry Sound, Ontario, L.E. spent most of her summers roaming across Canada in a van with her father, a hippie musician, her brothers and an occasional stray mutt – inspiring her writing career. She currently lives in Toronto, Ontario.

Author Website: le-sterling.com

Author Twitter: @le_sterling

Author Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LESterling22/

Author Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/LESterling

The Excerpt:
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“Isn’t it a little weird that we have to do our tests again? Was there some kind of mistake with the first one?” Margot says it innocently enough, a slight twang to her voice to match the nurse’s rabble-like twang.

           “Well, hon, sometimes they get mixed signals, you know? Like when you think a boy likes you but then he goes all hot and cold?” She winks. Margot’s fingers tighten on mine.

           “Uh huh.” Margot nods. “So there’s a problem with your machines? Or with the staff?”

           The nurse frowns. “Not this staff. They’re five-star amazing. Must have just been a bad sample or something. Try not to worry about it, sweetie.” She pats Margot’s arm just before she shoves the needle in my sister’s vein.

           I squirm on my seat. The skin on my arm crawls from the sharp pain originating in my sister’s arm. Relaxed beside me, Margot doesn’t move a muscle. She knows what I’m feeling even if she can’t do anything about it. This is just how it is with us.

           “How much are you going to take this time?” My voice shakes as our coltish nurse comes around to me and drives a needle into my arm. It doesn’t hurt nearly as bad as Margot’s did. Our hands stay folded together. There’s a note in our file about letting us. One of the perks of being born us.

           “Oh.” For the first time she looks a little dismayed. “I’m sorry, hon. Didn’t they tell you? We gotta go through the whole protocol again. The whole shebang.”

           My twin and I did know. We’d been told. Still, it bothers us. A full day’s worth of giving blood, going through tests, having your organs measured and documented. Urine samples, more blood samples, hair samples. We’d already been through this two times in the last two months. We no longer believe they’d gotten “bad” samples—not that we’re going to let on to the nurse.

           And funny thing is, each time we come, the Protocols Nurse is new. This is the third we’ve had, each as clueless as the last.

           We know better than to ask our parents. The deepening silence and constant rounds of testing and lies must mean the news is the worst. Late at night we lie together, holding hands and whispering under the deep canopy of one or other of our beds. We’ve thought about what it will mean if one of us turns out to be a Laster. We’ve talked until dawn about what we’d want, what we’d do. I tell Margot I’d want to go with her, but she’s against the idea.

           “One of us needs to survive,” she said to me, her gray-green eyes as serious as I’ve ever seen them.

           “What if it’s not that?” I asked her.

           “What do you mean?”

           “What if we’re, you know,” the words mere whispers, “True Born?”

The Giveaway:

• $10 Amazon Gift Card  

  a Rafflecopter giveaway

  Tour Schedule