Ontario Teen Book Fest 2015 Authors Revealed!

December 19, 2014Leave a comment

My favorite event is JUST around the corner and I am bursting with excitement to finally release the list of authors that will attending.

The Ontario Teen Book Fest will be taking place Saturday, viagra March 21st from 9:30 am to 5 pm at Colony High School. More details of events, information pills and all of that will come in February as I host the Ontario TBF blog tour! Yay!

Check out their official website here.

For now, viagra its time to announce all the AMAZING authors that will be in attendance this year. Brace yourselves!

Make sure to click their names to head to their website, to find out more about the authors and their books!

Jessica Brody

Anna Carey

Cecil Castellucci

Debra Driza

Katie Finn (Morgan Matson)

Maurene Goo

Claudia Gray

Aaron Hartzler

Jessica Khoury

Melissa Landers

Shannon Messenger

Lauren Miller

Elizabeth Ross

Sherri Smith

Mary Elizabeth Summer

Kasie West

Also included in this WONDERFUL list of attending authors are the three moderator/authors that will be in attendance as well:

Gretchen McNeil

Catherine Linka

Brad Gottfred

* * * * *

I’m SO excited about this year’s list of authors and I canNOT wait for this event. I hope you all can join me in March! Stay tuned for more as the blog tour, and giveaways and all sorts of fun stuff comes in the future!

Tuesday Top Ten: Updated on 2014 Nerd and Bookish Resolutions!

December 16, 2014Leave a comment

Hello everyone! Welcome to the Tuesday Top Ten!

Last year I made TEN resolutions that were nerdy/bookish related. Today I’m going to recount those for you, more about and whether or not I actually achieved them. In a couple weeks, buy information pills I’ll have NEW resolutions for you, cialis 40mg for the year of 2015!

Its all so exciting guys!

Let’s do this!

10. Get to BEA! – FAIL

I did not get anywhere near BEA! And it basically boils down to this: its expensive. I want to go. I really do. Its so much fun, from what I’ve heard and there are tons of authors there and free books and all of that. But I just could not afford it at all. Hopefully in the future sometime.

9. Read More Adult Novels – FAIL

As of this moment, I have read 122 books for the year (I know, I suck big time). 3 of those were adult novels and an addition 7 were new adult, which kind of counts. I basically wanted to explore more than just YA and let’s face, I failed miserably with that haha. 3 of 122 is 2% of the books that I’ve read so far this year.

8. Expand My Blog: More Nerd! – FAIL/SUCCESS

I’ve sort of failed and succeeded with this. I didn’t expand the nerd as much. I wanted to write more about movies and video games and all sorts of other things that weren’t books and I didn’t do such a great job at that. I think this one will end up on my list again for 2015 because I truly do want to make my blog all around nerdy, not just books, even though books is most successful part. But while I didn’t write about other things nerdy, I did expand a lot into writing. I wrote a TON about writing this year, and so I’m slowly expanding outward.

7. Hit 150K Views by The End of 2014 – SUCCESS

As of this moment (and there ARE still roughly 15 days left in the year), I am currently at 254,000 views. I completely blew away this number goal by over 100K. I am SO incredibly proud of this blog, all of its views and all of the awesomeness it has become. I know the past few months have been hard but I’m determined to get right back into it for 2015!

6. Only Ask for ARCs that I Know I Will Read – FAIL

Okay, I so failed this one. I have a stack of ARCs and a bunch on my Nook that I haven’t read. Now, part of this is that I didn’t stick to this resolution and asked for ones that I just knew I wasn’t going to read. The other part of it is…I”m stuck in the worst book slump that I’ve been in…ever. So yeah. For 2015, I’m gonna work on that some more. I also started receiving a ton of ARCs without request this year, so there’s that also. That was a VERY exciting part of my year :)

5. Cosplay More! – FAIL

HA! Nope. I didn’t even try. I really wanted to. I really wanted to dress up more and wear costumes and all of that and I didn’t even succeed slightly with this. I’m terrible. My first major event of 2015 is Gallifrey One in February and I’m determined I will cosplay in SOME way at that con.

4. Condense My Book Reviews/Posts – SUCCESS

DEFINITELY. I definitely succeeded with this one. All book reviews have a format, and they’re done much more concise and to the point than my old ones. I’m actually proud of myself for making my book reviews SO much better than they were before.

3. Concentrate More On Reading for Fun and Less on Reading for Goal – SUCCESS

I think I definitely did this one. Mostly because I was in such a slump, I started to care less and less about the actual end goal, and more about just enjoying reading. I was not enjoying reading several times this year and that made me incredibly sad, as reading is my number one thing to do. I’m SO behind on my goal, but I’ve kind of given up on it. I’m happy that I’ve read a little more books this month than I did last month and I’m concentrating on getting back to loving reading.

2. Read 150 Books – FAIL

Okay, I mean, technically I haven’t failed yet. I still have about 15 more days to finish…28 books? I could technically do it. I’m a fast reader. But this year has been full of so many ups and downs so I’m just glad that I finished any books, period. I think I’ll reach about 125-130 and I think that’s a fair goal. Reading more for fun. Plus I spent a TON of my time this year, not focused on reading, but focused on writing. Which leads me to my number one resolution for 2014.

1. Finish my Novel – SUCCESS

I finished my novel. I wrote all of The Awakened. I changed character names a couple times, I changed the title, I wrote and rewrote and edited and had other people edit and had beta readers and am currently receiving tons of rejection emails from agents but you know what? I finished it. I finished The Awakened. Its done. It was my main goal of the year, and I finished it back in the summer, and I’ve spent so much of my time since then making it the best it can be in order to find an agent and get this thing published. I’m so proud that of all the goals I set for this year, this one, this number one goal, was definitely accomplished!

* * * * * *

Stay tuned! In a couple weeks, it’ll be time to make new goals!

Music Monday: “Vegas Skies” by The Cab

December 15, 2014December 16, 2014Leave a comment

“Vegas Skies” by The Cab

Its twelve o clock and I need your attention
Its like the alcohol making my head spin
Send me the one the room is a bottle
Keeping me hopeless til I wake tomorrow

And if tonight ever makes a difference
The way that I feel the way that Ill remember it
Ill take this down until the glass remains
Swallow the words that I was meant to say

Its a long drive back to Vegas skies
So I dont, viagra 100mg I make one more wrong turn tonight so

Say goodnight our first goodbye
Ive only got forever and forever is fine
Just take your time
Well stop the clock together
And know that the timing was right

All of these guards they stand tall and defensive
Putting up walls around what was once innocent
It wont let me in but Im stronger than that
Cuz you stole my eyes and Ill never look back

Girl last night I forgot to mention
The way that I feel the way that Ill remember this
When were this young we have nothing to lose
We just the clock to beat and a hand to choose

Its a long drive back to Vegas skies
So I dont, medical I make one more wrong turn tonight so

Say goodnight our first goodbye
Ive only got forever and forever is fine
Just take your time
Well stop the clock together
And know that the timing was right

Its a long way down
Just fall into place and youll fall into me
Well make it out youll see

So say goodnight our first goodbye
Ive only got forever and forever is fine
Just take your time
Well stop the clock together

And say goodnight our first goodbye
Ive only got forever and forever is fine
Just take your time
Well stop the clock together
And know that the timing was right

Find The Cab

Website / Facebook / Twitter / Instagram / YouTube / Tumblr / iTunes

The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies Black Carpet Premiere in Los Angeles!

December 13, 2014December 13, 20141 Comment

Hello everyone! It is finally time to talk about The Hobbit Part 3: The Battle of Five Armies. I’m pretty sure that’s not the EXACT title but meh, order that’s what I’ll call it. I’ve been so MASSIVELY busy this week and I’m finally ready to share my awesome day at the premiere!

I was so excited to finally go to a Hobbit premiere and I’m sad because it was the very last one. It was a very bittersweet feeling, even though I’d never been before.

Setting up for the black carpet. They had all these posters and white trees and it looked really awesome.

I spent the day with my girls Cassandra and Ally. The premiere took place at the Dolby Theater on Hollywood boulevard. Its right next door to the Chinese Theater and home of many movie premieres and the Oscars. Premieres there are always kind of wacky so we lined up across the street. We spent lots of hours there, as per usual.

They had a MASSIVE jumbotron. They showed the trailer for the movie, and then showed the action on the black carpet once the actual carpet event started.

We waited awhile to see what the deal was going to be. We talked to our friends from SPEC, who run the security and they told us our best bet was to go across the street so that’s exactly what we did. By this time, we were tired, dirty from the LA streets haha and just ready for the carpet to start already.

Before the carpet started, there were all kinds of people handing out things. They had these really cool flags that had the hashtag #OneLastTime. I wanted one SO bad but they completely skipped us and so I didn’t get my hands on one, unfortunately. Then I spotted people giving away wristbands. I had NO idea what they were for, but I knew I wanted one. The people handing them out seemed to be looking for something in particular, while handing them out. I noticed that they seemed to be going for Hobbit stuff. Luckily, I was wearing my Thorin shirt for the premiere and I pointed it out to them. I totally guessed right and they came right up to me, asked how many people were in my party. The wristbands were for the screening immediately after the carpet! Yay!

Fangirling SO hard. Meeting the great Andy Serkis. In the LoTR and Hobbit sagas, he plays Gollum/Smeagol. He’s just all around BADASS. He was the first person that I met on the carpet and I was STOKED.

The absolutely GORGEOUS Lee Pace, who plays Thranduil in the film. He was pretty much my #1 goal to meet once we had figured out that Benedict, Martin and Ian weren’t coming to the premiere. Look at that face. Seriously. YUM.

This is Mark Hadlow, who plays the dwarf, Dori.

The lovely Stephen Hunter, who plays Bombur!

MY LIFE. I adore Evangline Lilly. I think she’s one of the first actresses that I had a crush on before I realized I also liked girls. I used to watch the first few seasons of Lost and she plays a seriously badass female elf, Tauriel. I was SO excited to meet her and get her autograph. I liked her in the second movie, but I had some issues, but after seeing the movie, I’m so sold on her character. She was even better in the third one.

I fangirled SO hard on this. I’ve had a crush on Orlando Bloom since he played Will Turner in Pirates of the Caribbean, when I was like 13 years old. I was a little bummed that he didn’t sign my book. I’ve heard that he doesn’t really do that. Not sure why. But I got a picture with him and that was pretty awesome. He plays Legolas, of course.

My awkward, blurry selfie with Richard Armitage in the background. He, of course, plays Thorin Oakenshield. He signed for us, but wasn’t taking pictures so I had to do this. I get creative sometimes ;)

William Kircher, who was a totally sweetheart. I seriously adore him. He plays the elf, Bifur, and I’m just massively in love with him. He was really just SO nice.

Also, mad props to that photo bomber in the background haha.

Jed Brophy, who plays Nori! He was such a delightful guy!

Me and Cassie and Graham McTavish, who plays the badass dwarf, Dwalin in the film. Apparently he is also in Outlander as well but I haven’t had a chance to watch that show yet. He was seriously awesome in his kilt!

Be still, my fangirl heart! Meeting Peter Jackson was INCREDIBLE. He wasn’t doing pictures so hence the super awkward, blurry, funky selfie but I’m stoked beyond belief that I got to meet him and get his autograph. I mean, he’s the brains behind the Lord of the Rings trilogy and the Hobbit trilogy and he’s just genius. My mind is still BLOWN that I met him.

My beautiful beautiful beautiful book signed by:

Andy Serkis (Gollum)
Lee Pace (Thranduil)
Richard Armitage (Thorin)
Mark Hadlow (Dori)
Stephen Hunter (Bombur)
William Kircher (Bifur)
Jed Brophy (Nori)
Graham McTavish (Dwalin)
Evangeline Lilly (Tauriel)
Peter Jackson (Director)

I was really bummed because Elijah Wood (Frodo) and Billy Boyd (Pippin) were there. I was fangirling SO hard but they completely skipped our section. It made me incredibly sad. James Cameron was also there and he directed one of my favorite movies ever, Titanic, and he just waved as he passed by. Sad face. It was a bit disappointed that actors like Cate Blanchett, Benedict Cumberbatch, Martin Freeman, Ian McKellan and Luke Evans weren’t there, but it was just the LA premiere, not the world premiere, so it made sense.

After the premiere was over, there was parking drama with my car and I had to run to my car, drive it to a different parking lot and then practically run to the movie theater. Cassie and I grabbed our seats, and our super cool Hobbit 3D glasses and settled in to watch the movie.

I LOVED it. There will be an actual full reviews to come BUT I truly loved it. I think everyone did a fabulous job. After the film was over, no one wanted to leave. No one. They stayed all the way until the very end, once the credits had ended and the screen went blank. Its always very sad when a series ends that way. Saying goodbye and all that. I was a little emotional but not nearly as emotional as I was when I saw Deathly Hallows Part 2.

All in all, it was one of the easier premieres that I went to, and I had a fun time. I’m glad I decided to go and I’m urging you ALL to go see the movie when it releases next week! A review is coming this weekend so watch out for it!

Tuesday Top Ten: Authors New to Me in 2014

December 9, 2014December 9, 20142 Comments

Hello my lovelies! How are you all doing on this fine Tuesday? I hope fantastic. I hope you’re all watching fantastic shows and movies and reading fantastic books and just being all around nerdy and fantastic. Did I ever tell you how much I absolutely love the word “fantastic”? Well, seek I do.

But anyway…I had been trying to think of topics for a Tuesday Top Ten because I’ve been SO incredibly bad at doing them, and I was checking my emails and saw that this week’s post for The Broke and Bookish was the one I’m doing and I thought, hey that’s kind of fun!

So here we are, my top ten authors that are new to me, and a couple of honorable mentions as well because it was SO hard to narrow it down!

Honorable Mentions:

All debut novelists who rocked my world this year. The Jewel and Love Letters to the Dead all absolutely blew my mind and are books that I definitely won’t be forgetting any time soon.

Amy Ewing

Ava Dellaira

10. Tonya Kuper

I met Tonya at ALA in Las Vegas this past summer, and she made an impression on me. I didn’t know what her book was about, I didn’t even really know anything about HER. All I knew was that she was really nice, she was published by Entangled and that she was massively enthusiastic about her book. I went home, followed her on Instagram, became her friend on Facebook, and helped promote the hell out of her debut novel, Anomaly. I love her book and absolutely ADORE her so I’m glad she is a new author to me this year.

9. Cora Carmack

Cora Carmack came on my radar because she was friends with Jennifer Armentrout, who I adore to bits and pieces. The first novel I read of hers didn’t massively impress me, which I think was Losing It, back in the beginning of this year. However, when she started talking about her new series, which boiled down to football, hot guys, romance and sexiness, I knew I couldn’t resist and I immediately bought All Lined Up when it came out. Not long after, All Broke Down, released and I’m officially in love.

8. Lauren Miller

I first met Lauren when she made an appearance at my fave event, Ontario Teen Book Fest. I was already about halfway through the ARC of her new book, Free to Fall. She was so FUNNY and I had a ton of fun talking to her and so I immediately went home and finished this book, and then read her first novel, Parallel. I love both of these books, so fresh, so new, I love the romance, and I adore Lauren. I’m also glad they’re both standalone so that I didn’t get sucked into the never ending abyss of series!

7. Jenny Han

I had never read Jenny Han before. Ever. For some reason, her series just never ever appealed to me. I’m not sure why, but I know I went to the bookstore numerous times, and held her books in my hands and then ultimately decided not to get them. She did a signing in May with Morgan Matson and you had to buy one of their books in order to do the signing. I already had all of Morgan’s books (obviously) so I bought this one. Jenny read from it and it was funny and SHE was funny and I went home THAT night and read it in a few hours. This book is fresh and hilarious and beautiful and I’m already DYING for the sequel.

6. Amie Kaufman and Megan Spooner

I had seen this book circling around the interwebs for a while, I think instagram or some such like that and finally I decided, hey, what the hell, I’m going to buy. Even though I had heard good things, I was still wary. I think the cover is totally beautiful BUT I also think its a little cheesy too haha. Its possible for it to be both right? Right. Anyway, what I found was a fantastically written science fiction novel that also held an incredible romance as well. I BLEW through this book and was amazing at every moment. This book is incredible and brilliant and I’m counting down the days until the sequel comes out.

5. Sara Raasch

I literally read this book about a week and a half ago but that’s how much of an impression it made on me. I’m not really sure how it got on my radar but it did and it sounded really awesome and I liked the title and the cover and her name is Sara without the H which is brilliant and yeah. I was on a book buying ban, technically, but I decided, meh, what the hell, and ended up buying it anyway because I wanted to read it so bad and I am so glad that I did. Its a fantastic fantasy novel that I legitimately canNOT get out of my head and I hope there are more (please be more) because Sara’s writing was just so fluid and descriptive and real and beautiful that I need more of it in my life.

4. Melissa Landers

This was another book that seemed to be floating around my radar on IG and that sort of thing. She was signing ARCs of the sequel, Invaded, at ALA and somehow, miraculously, I got my hands on it. We joked that I got mine early, before Sasha (because I think that’s who I had heard it from) and I kind of felt bad! I had a signed copy of the ARC and I hadn’t even read the first book! So I went to the book store, bought this one and read in a few hours. This book is INCREDIBLE. I swear by it. I keep telling people about it. Its beautiful. I love that its an incredible romance but it also has a great science fiction background with it. I love aliens and there just aren’t enough alien books out there, not ones like this.

3. Victoria Scott

I only found Victoria because of Jessica Brody and I seriously thank her SO much for that. She did a live vlog thing with Victoria because their books were releasing the same day and I won a trivia part of it and got some signed swag from Victoria. So when Fire and Flood released, I immediately bought it and I LOVE it. A lot of people compare it to The Hunger Games, which I *kinda* see but I honestly think its unique and fresh and I love the main character, Tella, so much and I LOVE Pandoras (read the book). I recently won a copy of the sequel and LOVED that as well, and I also read the first of her Dante Walker series and I’m just madly in love with Victoria. I’m glad to be part of her V Mafia now!

2. Kiera Cass

It took me AGES to read this and I can’t believe that it did. I think it was the cover. Scratch that, I know it was the cover and I just didn’t know what it was going to be about really but there wasn’t much desire to read it. That is, until someone gifted it to me. I had heard it described as The Bachelor meets The Hunger Games, and its totally that, in an amazing way. The entire trilogy was totally brilliant and I’m anxiously awaiting The Heir. I’m SO glad I finally buckled down and read it and I’m so glad that I totally have the entire series signed now too! Kiera is always a totally LOVELY human being that I adore to pieces so I’m glad I finally read this book.

1. Catherine Linka

This is the debut novel of a local author friend of mine. I had heard about it through Alethea, who runs Read Now Sleep Later and managed to get my hands on an early copy, because I was going to be meeting her at Ontario Teen Book Fest. This book completely BLEW my mind and I am seriously anxiously awaiting the sequel. I’m going to convince her to get one to me ;) The reason she’s number one is because I’m so inspired by her. She had a struggle to get it published, she had to change things, and work out kinks but the book has done SO well and won awards and she’s SUCH a great friend and inspiration. She’s constantly giving me tips and words of encouragement and I just adore her. Her book is fabulous and I can’t wait for the sequel.

* * * * * *

What are some new authors YOU’VE read this year? Share in the comments!

Shout out to Sarah!

December 8, 20141 Comment

I don’t normally do posts like these but I decided to do it because today I met an AWESOME girl at work.

For those of you that don’t now, viagra dosage I work at Disneyland :) I love my job. I’ve only been there a few months but I’m massively in love with it. I get to meet the best people, discount every single day, and I get to work around the magic every day. I seriously love it.

Now today, I met a special girl named Sarah. Sarah came into the store that I worked today and she was carrying a book. You guys know me, I couldn’t resist! I asked her what she was reading and she said very quietly, “Good Omens”. I immediately smiled and told her that I loved that book, and she lit up SO fast. I don’t think she was used to people recognizing the books she enjoyed reading. I told her Neil Gaiman is my spirit animal, she laughed and we got into a GREAT conversation about books.

I just wanted to throw a shout out to Sarah here on What a Nerd Girl Says. I shared my blog with her, and I hope she’s able to come and join in on the fun :) She was SO fun to talk to and I was so delighted to meet such an amazing reader, who was so young. It made my entire day and it was definitely the bright light of my day. She mentioned very briefly that most of the kids she knew didn’t really know the same things as her, and I knew exactly what she meant.

So this is a special shoutout and post to YOU, Sarah :) Keep reading! Keep reading everything you can get your hands on. Read Neil Gaiman. Read fantasy. Read trashy romance novels and read science fiction. Read comic books. You keep reading all those awesome fics on fanfiction.net. You watch all those old school movies, and you be YOU. You were a shining light in my day today and I was SO grateful and happy that I was able to meet you and talk to you today. I’m not sure if you’re going to see this but I definitely hope that you do! Thanks for being a reader, and for loving books and for talking books with me today!