Tuesday Top Ten Launch Day Edition – Ten Things You Should Know About The Awakened!

Happy Release Day to me!

Official Awakened Cover

That is probably one of the weirdest and most surreal things I’ve ever typed up on this blog. I’m seriously blown away by that!

But its today! Today, The Awakened is a real book out in the real world! All over the world, decease people can go online and buy a copy of MY book, either in Kindle and paperback format! This is crazy to me. But also it feels amazing. This is what I’ve spent most of my life hoping for. Working my ass off for. I’m glad its finally here.

Have you gotten your copy of The Awakened yet? Its okay! I’ve provided a beautiful link here for you ;)

Even better! In just half an hour, I’ll be starting my SIX HOUR Twitter party extravaganza. If you don’t follow me on my author twitter yet, you definitely should! I’ll be on Twitter from noon PST to 6 pm PST, celebrating the release of The Awakened. I’ll be answering any and all questions you have, and reading alongside anyone else who is reading it! I’m going to be sharing snippets from The Awakened and even smaller ones (but still cool) from the rough draft of The Awakened 2. I’ll have giveaways, including signed bookmarks, signed posters and Kindle copies of the book.

12295380_875285382592325_7153715133112012905_n

Definitely come and check it out! You don’t have to stick around for the whole six hours so come by anytime, shoot a question my way, anything! I’ll be happy to chat with all of you!

Now moving on to this week’s Tuesday Top Ten. Today is a special one, since today is my release day! So excited! Today I’m sharing ten things you should know about The Awakened before you read it! There are NO spoilers below, so don’t be scared to go beyond this part!

Also below is the schedule for the blog tour! SO many amazing and fantastic blogs are participating, sharing in The Awakened celebration and hosting me as a guest writer or in interview form. There is also information for the giveaway as well! It runs until December 12th so get those entries in!

Now, let’s get to it!

The book is about zombies…sort of

For so long, I hesitated to compare the Awakened to zombies but there are similarities for sure. They’re both undead, and they both crave one thing: human flesh. However, the Awakened don’t really have the same origin as zombies and that’s a huge plot point in the novel. And they’re smarter. They’re reflections of their old selves, but their overwhelming hunger outweighs that and makes them the monsters they are.

Zoey and Ash aren’t perfect. 

I’ve had beta readers and reviewers and several people tell me, I loved the book but Ash drove me insane or god I got annoyed with Zoey. And I’m okay with that! I want you to feel that! Both of these characters are incredibly flawed! They’re 18 years old and kind of sheltered, very taken care of, until the world goes to sh*t and so they mess up a lot. They make a lot of mistakes. And that’s okay. That’s a huge part of the book, having these two figure out what the hell they are doing.

The bombing was an accidental scene. 

I didn’t intend to bomb every major city as part of a plot point. I remember watching The Walking Dead with my boyfriend at the time and saying, jokingly, “Why don’t they just nuke everything? Why do they just let it get out of control?” Well, because my brain can’t shut off, it got me thinking and I wondered, what if they DID bomb everything? Where would you go? What would be the consequences of that? And that’s why I wrote it in.

“Nightmare” by Set It Off is the unofficial theme song. 

I was having SUCH a hard time at the beginning of this novel. I had this idea and for me, it was very risky. I don’t write science fiction! I’ve always stuck to romance! So this was out of the box for me and I was feeling doubts about actually accomplishing it! I went to a concert where Set It Off was opening, the first time I actually saw them. They played Nightmare and it just immediately stuck to me, and that song, plus the entire Cinematics album was on repeat while I wrote.

All the settings are done by research not experience. 

I have not been to ANY of the settings that are in the novel. I know, crazy right? I was originally going to have Zoey from Los Angeles, since I’ve lived here in Southern California my entire life but my book before The Awakened took place here so I needed a break for sure. So New York, and all the other settings, were researched. It was hard at times. I forgot that Zoey and her companions would be FREEZING at times because it was winter. Winter isn’t much of a thing here so that was actually genuinely tough! There is a setting that appears at the very very end of the book, and I have been there. That setting is way more important in the second book and I’m glad I’ve actually BEEN there LOL.

The Awakened was supposed to be a standalone. 

When I originally started writing the book, I had no plans to write more than the one book. As I continued to write, however, I realized I had created a world and a scenario much, much bigger than just one book and I realized I’d have to split it in two. People keep asking if it’ll be a trilogy but I think I’d lose my mind if I attempted that LOL. It’ll be two books and that’s it!

Zoey and Ash used to be Kate and Nate. 

Kate. And. Nate. Did I ever mention how absolutely AWFUL I am at naming characters? I am truly truly awful at it. I would just name all my characters the same thing if I could because names are baffling to me. It took me a second to realize their names rhymed and I was so horrified at myself. So I changed Nate to Ash. Then eventually I changed Kate to Zoey. I tend to do that a lot, change character names. I like change and I get tired of names quickly. I almost changed it from Zoey too until my friends were like, NO. I’m so glad they keep me in line…

The 5th Wave, Alienated and Unremembered were the biggest influences on the book. 

I love all three of these books so much and they all had huge influences on The Awakened. The 5th Wave by Rick Yancey did a lot for the survival part, especially since my characters are teenagers like Cassie. It was beyond helpful. I LOVED using Alienated by Melissa Landers to incorporate the romance between Zoey and Ash, but also still make it about the science fiction. Though Alienated is definitely more romance, it was so helpful. I think one of the most helpful though was Unremembered Jessica Brody. Its SO science fiction but it has a heavy foot in reality, in the reality we know and it showed me that I could totally write this book. It had a HUGE influence on this book.

The Awakened gave me the confidence to write more science fiction. 

I honestly didn’t think I could write science fiction before this book. I still sometimes don’t think I can do it. The book I wrote about this one is called Benched and is a new adult sports romance novel. Much shorter, and felt much easier to me. But I do feel the confidence to take these ideas I have and go with it. I’m currently working on the sequels to both The Awakened and Benched but I have an idea for a sort of space/robot/cyborg story about a girl named Nadia, who is the last human, the last princess, left in existence, surrounded by robots and cyborgs, until she finds out maybe she’s not. Its daunting but I really believe I can tackle it.

The sequel to The Awakened will open the world even more. 

The Awakened focuses a LOT on the main characters and their own problems, their own survival. Its very very centered on them, and for good reason. Its all about Zoey and her companions. However, in the sequel, its going to be very much about the rest of the survivors as well. Its going to be much more about the bigger picture. This is SO daunting to me but I’m excited for it. I’m excited to open up this world and exploring the bigger consequences of everything that has happened.

********

I hope you guys enjoyed that and that you enjoy reading The Awakened! I am so excited that its out today. Don’t forget that there is a great giveaway going on, hosted by me, which has no effect on me saying its great ;)

Up for grabs is a signed book, poster and bookmark, more signed posters and bookmarks and kindle editions of The Awakened!

Giveaway Graphic

a Rafflecopter giveaway

******

Don’t forget to check out the rest of the blog tour for interviews, guest posts and more!

November 26th: Reading and Reviews / What A Nerd Girl Says

November 27th:  Living Within Fiction

November 28th: Lisa of Literature / Seeking Bazinga

November 29th: Chloe’s Book Nook / Book and Movies Addict

November 30th: Tine’s Reviews / Escape from Realities

December 1st: What A Nerd Girl Says / The Book Academy / Bookish Wonderland

December 2nd: Recently Acquired Obsessions / Morgan Reads

December 3rd: Case Maynard, Author / Movies, Shows and Books

December 4thBout of Bibliophilia

December 5th: Tesairie’s Book Reads / iFandoms Collide

December 6th: Just One of Those Bibliophiles / A Traveling Book / Endlessly Readings

December 7th: My Life in Blog / Erin Rhew Books

December 8th: Metamorphic Books / Knightingale Reviews

December 9th: Reading Over Sleeping / Always and Forever Fangirl

********

What A Nerd Girl Says Three Year Blog Birthday and Giveaway!

OMG GUYS!

Can you believe my blog is celebrating THREE YEARS of existing today? I have had this little ‘ol thing for three years now. I’m still trying to wrap my head around this because I seriously can hardly believe that my blog is three years old. THREE years old. If it was a child, sale it would be walking and talking, and maybe learning to count and eating cheerios and watching Disney Jr and probably throwing tantrums…its insane.

I literally just had a mental image of my blog throwing a tantrum right now and it made me laugh out loud because how ridiculous does my imagination truly have to be to imagine my blog throwing a tantrum…

I gotta say, when I started this blog three years ago, it really started as a way for me to be like, look, come to this website and watch me ramble on how much I love books and nerdy things and also listen to me defend YA literature over and over and over and over and over again.

And those things are still a HUGE reason why I blog but my blog has morphed into something much more. Now I’m reviewing the actual books that I read…and I’m part of teams that support them and get the word out about them. WHAT? That’s insane. Totally normal to me now, especially with ARCs of book showing up in my snail mail and email inboxes on a weekly basis, but if you would have told me that was a thing three years ago, I would have been…wait, what?

If you would have told me three years ago that I would have over 300K views on my blog, and over 2000 followers, I would laughed. I have 1538 followers on Facebook, 1345 followers on Twitter, 1997 on Tumblr and 2346 followers on Instagram. And yeah, in the grand scheme of things, I have such a small following. But I adore each and every single one of you because you guys are so enthusiastic, SO encouraging and just plain awesome. And the fact that I’ve had several of you write me letters and emails and come up to me at events and tell me good things and ask to take pictures with me? Just absolutely blows my mind. I’m not famous in the slightest (oh and I know this) but hearing things like that from you guys means the TOTAL world. You guys are the ultimate rock stars.

I gotta throw some shout outs to my fangirl besties: Sylvia, Alex, Cassie and Steph. You guys are so awesome, you are there throughout every fangirl adventure, whether its a book event, a movie premiere, an insane road trip for ONE day at a book convention (I still can’t believe we did that) or just eating a TON of food and talking about books. This blog wouldn’t be what it is without these girls because they’re the ones that get me into all these adventures and ridiculousness and they help keep the reading passion alive. When you can talk for HOURS about fictional characters as if they’re totally real? They’re the winners!

Also a huge shout out to every single blogger that I’ve come across, because you are all awesome and you work just as hard, if not more, than I do and all of your blogs and beautiful and inspirational and this blogger community is so kickass.

Thanks to Courtney and Allison for being the most badass librarians around and for believing in me and supporting me and talking about me in their presentations because that’s pretty cool.

My dad because seriously I don’t know how many other dads put up with the fact that their 27 year old daughter lives at home and takes up most of her space with her ever growing book collection. One day, there won’t be enough room for me to even sleep in this room. I’m still deciding if that’s a bad thing or not ;)

Every single YA (and NA) author out there who has written an amazing book. You guys are the reason this blog even exists. You guys have become my friends (which still blows my mind, every, single, time) and my encouragement and as long as you guys keep writing these awesome books, I’m gonna keep promoting the hell out of them.

Lastly (I feel like the music would be turning on at this point if I was saying this at the Oscars or something…), a shoutout to ALL the nerd girls out there. Let your nerd girl flag fly high and proud. You can be girly and badass and you can do your hair and make-up and curl up with a book. You can be anything you want to be and don’t let the haters (cough cough boys cough cough) get you down because you all ROCK!

Okay

Now to the fun part ;)

The Giveaway!!!!!!!

SO many prizes :)

Prize #1

unnamed-4

-A Copy of Cora Carmack’s All Lined Up, A signed All Lined Up postcard, a signed All Broke Down postcard and an ecopy of Elle Kennedy’s The Deal

Prize #2:

unnamed-5 unnamed-6

-A Signed Copy of Jessica Brody’s Unremembered, a Signed Unremembered poster, a Unremembered bookmark, an Alienated bookmark, a Trust Me, I’m Lying postcard and an Ex-Gen button

Prize #3:

unnamed-7 unnamed-8

-A Signed ARC of Robyn Schneider’s Extraordinary Means, an ARC of Sugar by Deirdre Riordan Hall, a Signed How We Fall by Kate Brauning postcard, and a bookmark and magnet for Michelle Levy’s Not After Everything.

Prize #4

unnamed-9

-A signed copy of The 100 by Kass Morgan, a signed copy of Vanishing Girls by Lauren Oliver and an ecopy of Tonya Kuper’s Anomaly!

Prize #5:

unnamed-10

-The ultimate swag pack with bookmarks, buttons, postcards, sneak peeks and more from authors such as: Michelle Levy, Jennifer L Armentrout, Danielle Paige, BT Gottfred, Shannon Messenger (signed), Tonya Kuper, Sabba Tahir, Victoria Aveyard, Cora Carmack (signed), Sara B Larson (signed), Lindsay Leavitt (signed) and Mary Elizabeth Summer! Includes a tote bag!  

The Rules

Because, yes, there have to be rules!

The contest will run from today, May 23rd until June 6th!

The winner will be contacted within 24 hours of contest end. If winner(s) do not respond within a 24 hour period of contact, their prize will be forfeited and a new winner will be chosen.

Come back every day to share on Twitter and Instagram to earn more entries!

This giveaway is in NO way endorsed by any authors, their publishers or any other affiliates.

What A Nerd Girl Says is not responsible for lost, stolen or damaged prizes. It HAS happened before, but only once!

How to Enter!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

*******

Thanks again guys for showing all your support, as always. You guys are rock stars and I can’t wait to be celebrating FOUR years next year!

PS. This is the image you need in order to enter the Instagram portion of the giveaway!

unnamed-11

GoFundMe: Help What A Nerd Girl Says Get to RT Book Lover’s Convention!

I’ve been thinking for awhile now on whether or not to actually make a GoFundMe for this. I felt kind of weird actually asking people for money. But I sat, salve talked to a ton of people who have used it, and decided I would use it. Its used for such a great variety of things and I thought, you know what, why not?

In May, my friends and I will be embarking a road trip to Texas to attend the RT BookLovers Convention. Its an absolutely incredible convention, that changes location every year, and focuses completely on books, the love of reading and the love of writing. I wish I had the funds to do the entire convention but that’s just not in the cards. However, they have a Teen Day, which is focused ALL on YA authors. It is literally heaven on earth for me. Literally. Authors like Meg Cabot, Richelle Mead, Jennifer Armentrout, Susan Ee, Lindsey Cummings, Sara Raasch, Victoria Scott, Cora Carmack, Tammara Webber, Kiera Cass, Bethan Hagen, Tonya Kuper, Marie Lu, Stephanie Perkins, I could literally go on for ages…its an incredible line-up.

And I want to see each and every single one of those authors. But what sold me, what broke my heart about not being able to go last year, was the my favorite author in the entire world (besides good ol JK Rowling), Tamora Pierce, is going to be there. Tamora is a goddess. She has been writing teen fantasy since the early 80s and she’s just absolutely incredible. The mere thought of meeting literally sends tears to my eyes. Literally.

So I knew I had to get there. I had to be there. And I’ve been planning with my friends for awhile now. But we finally made a solid move in our planning: we booked our hotel. We’re doing this. We’re going to drive to Dallas and go to Teen Day at RT and meet a ton of authors and MEET TAMORA PIERCE.

I’m dying.

And here’s the thing: I will make this happen. No matter what I have to do, I will make this happen. One, I’m not bailing out on my friends. Two, I’m not bailing out on such an awesome event.

But life happens, guys. I’m 27 years old and only just about a year and a half ago, I made the decision on exactly what I wanted to do with my life. I dropped out of school to put 100% of my focus on my blog and on writing a novel and getting published. In the process, I’ve also gotten a job at Disneyland, one that I’ve wanted for SO long, and one where I am totally happy. But the thing is, while I’m seriously happy with WHAT I’m doing in my life, it doesn’t pay the bills. It just doesn’t. And it sucks. Its stressful and it makes my anxiety shoot through the roof. But I don’t want to give up the happiness I’ve had so I push forward each and every day to try and make this work because I believe in chasing after my dreams.

So I’m asking for your help. I’m asking for donations from all of you, to help get me to RT. This money will go towards my hotel, my food, books, gas money to get there, etc. It will ALSO go to extra books and stuff for an EPIC giveaway for this blog’s THIRD birthday, which will be celebrated when I return from the trip. You guys like that idea, right?

I hope that you can help out :) Even the smallest bit helps, and I would appreciate it more than you even know. Click the picture below to head to my GoFundMe.

And if you’re heading to RT, make sure to say hi to me :) I’ll be the one in a puddle of tears in front of Tamora Pierce’s table. Legit.

Screen Shot 2015-03-13 at 3.07.13 AM

Thanks guys :)

Giveaway: Win a Signed Copy of The Maze Runner!

Happy Release Day to The Maze Runner!

I’ve been anxiously awaiting the arrival of this movie for quite some time, rx and was able to see it last night at the 10 pm showing and I’m SO blown away by it. As much as I enjoyed the book, I think the world that James Dashner created exploded even more on screen and it was just brilliant. Great casting, great effects…I could go on for ages but I’ll save that for later in my review of the movie!

Now, unfortunately there was no Hollywood premiere for the movie so I was unable to meet any of the cast for the movie.

BUT!

Fear not, my dear followers! I promised to have a Maze Runner giveaway and I have not failed you.

Think about this: this movie would not exist without the awesome writing and creativity and world building of one James Dashner. He’s the brains behind this operation and he’s honestly just brilliant to meet in person too.

So here’s the prize!

2014-09-19 01.57.04

2014-09-19 01.57.12

One Copy of The Maze Runner signed by author, James Dashner!

The Rules (yes, there has to be rules!)

The contest will run from today, September 19th to October 1st!

The winner will be contacted within 24 hours of contest end. If winner(s) do not respond within a 24 hour period of contact, their prize will be forfeited and a new winner will be chosen.

Come back every day to share on Twitter and Instagram to earn more entries!

If you check off an option on the rafflecopter, please make sure that you have fulfilled that option. Please be honest! I double check every winning entry and if you are dishonest, you will not win the prize!

This giveaway is in NO way endorsed by any authors, their publishers, the movie studios or any other affiliates.

What A Nerd Girl Says is not responsible for lost, stolen or damaged prizes. It HAS happened before, but only once!

How to Enter: 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

*****

Good luck!

Don’t forget! Get to those theaters and see the movie! YA movies depend on every ticket sold to do successful in order for sequels to have so go see the movie and see it again and tell your friends all about it!

Fierce Reads Giveaway! Prizes from Authors Leigh Bardugo, Marissa Meyer, Anna Banks, Ann Aguirre and Josephine Angelini!

It’s San Diego Comic Con weekend and while I know there a ton of you who are making your way there and having a blast, viagra there’s also a HUGE amount of you that are unable to be there. (Personally, sildenafil I choose NOT to go haha). But I have just the thing to make it a bit better…

ITS GIVEAWAY TIME!

Oh yes, cheapest time to get excited.

Now that I’ve mostly caught up on sending out actual giveaway prizes, I’m ready to jump back in the saddle and start holding giveaways again. I got behind a bit on them, but I scored some seriously awesome stuff at the Fierce Reads Blockbuster event at Barnes and Noble just a couple days ago and I’m ready for an epic giveaway!

Want to see the prize?

Oh, I know you do!

Check it out!

The Prize

2014-07-23 23.49.04

This Fierce Reads Prize Pack Includes:

-One Advanced Reader’s Copy of Josephine Angelini’s Trial by Fire (not signed). This book does not release until September and it is AMAZING.

-One Signed Copy of Cinder by Marissa Meyer

-One Signed Copy of Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo

-One Sneak Peek Of Poseidon Booklet signed by author Anna Banks

-One Bookmark signed by Ann Aguirre

-3 Bookmarks (Anna Banks, Leigh Bardugo, Marissa Meyer), Unsigned

-6 buttons from The Grisha Trilogy, The Syrena Legacy and The Lunar Chronicles

Pretty epic right?

The Rules (yes, there has to be rules!)

The contest will run from today, July 25th to August 5th!

The winner will be contacted within 24 hours of contest end. If winner(s) do not respond within a 24 hour period of contact, their prize will be forfeited and a new winner will be chosen.

Come back every day to share on Twitter and Instagram to earn more entries!

If you check off an option on the rafflecopter, please make sure that you have fulfilled that option. Please be honest! I double check every winning entry and if you are dishonest, you will not win the prize!

This giveaway is in NO way endorsed by any authors, their publishers or any other affiliates.

What A Nerd Girl Says is not responsible for lost, stolen or damaged prizes. It HAS happened before, but only once!

How to Enter:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

*******

It’s as simple as that! Don’t forget to share and post this for all your friend’s to see, and good luck!

Fierce Reads Blockbuster Event!

Can you guys believe that its been about three weeks since I’ve done a book event? Yeah! Three weeks! Insanity! Ever since I got back home from ALA in Las Vegas, link I’ve been overwhelmed with work, abortion and my novel, that I just haven’t had much time for blogging or going to book events.

Luckily, that is about to change VERY soon. I had an awesome time tonight at the Fierce Reads event at The Grove in Los Angeles, and will be attending a James Dashner and a Maggie Stiefvater event in the next few days and I’m very excited for those. Things are picking up guys.

Tonight I headed down to one of my favorite bookstores for what was sure to be an awesome event. I love Barnes and Noble in general, but I love going to the one at The Grove because they always have such great events and the event coordinator, Lita, is just a doll. I got there early, grabbed my wristband, and had lunch at Veggie Grill (yum yum!) before heading back to the store for the event.

The authors attending this event were four total YA all stars:

2014-07-23 17.49.49

Marissa Meyer, author of the Lunar Chronicles series, including Cinder, Scarlet, Cress and soon to be, Winter. Winter hits bookstores next year, but before that, a prequel story about Queen Levana will hit bookstores. Yay!

2014-07-23 19.18.42

Leigh Bardugo, author of the Grisha Trilogy, including Shadow and Bone, Siege and Storm and Ruin and Rising. She’s currently working on another series, which takes place in the same Grisha world, not long after the end of Ruin and Rising.

2014-07-23 19.21.23

Anna Banks, author of the Syrena Legacy, including Of Poseidon, Of Triton and Of Neptune. She also has a new book called Joyride heading to bookstores next June!

2014-07-23 19.26.46-1

and

Ann Aguirre, author of the Razorland trilogy, including Enclave, Outpost, and Horde. And soon to be a TON of other books! This includes a new adult trilogy whose titles are Backstreet Boy’s songs. I call that a win.

unnamed-1

I was SO excited because I love all of these authors so much, and I always have a good time going to these events.

2014-07-23 17.45.52

We took our seats, and Lita talked up the event and the authors, and even talked about the moderator, Anthony Breznican and his debut novel, Brutal Youth. She talked it up so much that I immediately went downstairs to pick myself a copy of it. He was so awesome, a great moderator and was fun to talk to after the panel. He seemed happy that some of us grabbed copies of his book; it must be SO nerve wracking to have your debut novel out there!

Then Lita and the fantastic people of Macmillan Teens had a surprise for us early arrivals: ARCs! You know me, I can NEVER get enough of books :) I immediately went forward to check out what they had. I had most of them, from ALA, but they had a copy of Caragh O’Brien’s Vault of Dreamers, which I hadn’t managed to score at ALA. That was exciting. I also had my sister with me, and she was kind of my assistant for the event, so she grabbed a copy of Josephine Angelini’s Trial by Fire. Now, if you guys pay attention at all, you’ll know that I already have a copy of Trial by Fire so this one is going to be up for grabs very soon!

Then the event! Yay!

2014-07-23 19.47.02

2014-07-23 19.19.57

2014-07-23 19.17.41

All four ladies were so much fun in the panel. I honestly haven’t laughed so hard in so long. Leigh was her usual hilarious self and Marissa had a quirky little sense of humor. Ann Aguirre had a sort of awkward sense of humor, which remind me so much of myself that I just couldn’t stop laughing. And ohmygod, Anna Banks’ dry sense of humor was KILLING me. I could NOT stop laughing. It was too much.

They talked about their books, their inspirations for them, how they tackled them. They talked about books they loved, and what books inspired them. What I really loved is how they dove into the appeal of YA to adults and the growing diversity in YA books. Those are two very important topics and I was eager to hear what they had to say about it!

Then was the signing, of course. I got books signed by all of them, because I’m spoiled that way ;) I got Mortal Danger signed by Ann Aguirre, Of Poseidon by Anna Banks, and my extra copies of Siege and Storm and Ruin and Rising by Leigh Bardugo.

Because I already have my entire Lunar Chronicles signed (so far), I bought an extra copy of Cinder (and also Shadow and Bone) and those will be up for grabs soon as well!

I think I cleaned up pretty nicely after this event!

2014-07-23 23.44.59-2

Not a bad haul from the event!

I also managed to get my hands on some extra stuff! Check it out!

2014-07-23 23.49.04

I bought extra copies of Cinder and Shadow and Bone and those are both signed by the author. I got my hands on that extra copy of Trial by Fire, which doesn’t hit bookstores until September! I also got an Of Poseidon sneak peek booklet signed by Anna Banks and a bookmark signed by Ann Aguirre, and ton of other cool bookmarks and pins. Keep an eye out because a giveaway is coming VERY VERY soon!

Leigh’s mom was there, and I’ve met her twice before, at the Siege and Storm release party and the Ruin and Rising release part, and she’s such a doll. She remembered me and gave me a big ol hug and sat next to me during the event. She’s such a sweetheart :)

I also met a “fan” of What A Nerd Girl Says today, named Laura! She was SO cool, and I always love meeting you guys so NEVER be nervous to say hi. I’m kind of a weirdo so please do! Also, she read my excerpt that I posted the other day of The Awakened, and loved it, and that gave me SUCH a boost! Thanks for that, Laura :)

All in all, a super great night and I’m always so glad to go to the Barnes and Noble at the Grove and to go to Fierce Reads events. I ADORE Macteen and they put out so many amazing books and I will go to every Fierce Reads event that I can!

Until next time, folks! And keep an eye out for that giveaway!