Prepare for Lift-off

Want to see a book launch? There’s no rocketship fire and smoke and rumble, but it’s exciting anyway. So if you live in or near Nashville (or want to visit), you’re invited to see Breath of Angel launch and start its life on bookstore shelves. (If you’ve followed this blog since its inception last year, congratulations! You’re now witnessing the final stages of the manuscript-to-bookstore journey.) Here are the launch details:

Barnes & Noble, Cool Springs/Brentwood, 7:00 PM, Friday night, June 24. I’ll do a brief reading from the book, sign and personalize copies for you, and give away a basket of “angel” goodies. Bring a teen group or your reading group or just yourself and a friend. I’d love to meet you there.

Meanwhile, Breath of Angel is still on virtual tour. Today’s stop is an author interview I did at Missy Reads and Reviews. You can join me on tour every day this month with Teen Book Scene.

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Fifth Stop: Songs

  Fifth stop on the Breath of Angel blog tour lists my top ten songs. (That was a hard one – I like all kinds of music. But I chose ten.) Curious? Visit the Reading Room.

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Teaming Up with a Bibliophile

Today’s stop on the Breath of Angel blog tour is with Hopelessly Devoted Bibliophile. She reveals what I do when I’m not writing!

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A Winner! + Juggling a Series

Congratulations to Natalie Zaman, winner of an ARC of Breath of Angel, which will soon (in 7 weeks!) be available in bookstores and online.

Meanwhile I’m learning to juggle books in a series. From now until release date, a huge amount of PR and marketing will kick in for book 1. Lots has already happened behind the scenes, but more will become visible as the next few weeks go by: A book trailer is almost ready; I’ll autograph Breath of Angel at the Random House booth at BEA in NYC (Wednesday at 10:00 between Lauren Kate at 9:00 and Christopher Paolini at 11:00 – okay, I’m shamelessly name dropping and hoping to meet these awesome authors); in the following weeks, I’ll be doing tv, radio, and book blog interviews, and during release week, I’ll have a launch party. Stay tuned for announcements and invites.

Meanwhile, line edits on book 2, Eye of the Sword, are almost complete. Once line edits are accepted, book 2 goes to production. At that point, my agent can begin negotiations for book 3, which has undergone a change of titles. (Now Throat of the Night.) And with book 3, the entire process will begin again.

Such is the life of a series. While Book 1 is in PR and release mode, Book 2 is finalizing edits and getting a bookcover, and book 3 is getting a contract and entering the editorial process. I’m learning to juggle.

Look exciting? It is. What most people don’t see is the amount of plain old hard work that goes into it. The trick with juggling is not dropping any balls – and making it look easy.

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A Giveaway . . . At Last!

Entering the final eleven-week countdown toward the June release of Breath of Angel! I hope you’ll join the anticipation by entering the drawing for an autographed ARC and a couple of gorgeous bookmarks my publisher has created for Breath of Angel. You have the whole month of April to enter and to encourage reader-friends to enter as well. I plan to make entering fun, interesting, and easy. Here’s the way it works:

In the Angelaeon Circle books, angels are in essence forms of pure light who often take on human forms in order to fulfill their earthly tasks. In Breath of Angel, angels have been trapped in the world within various human forms. But they still sense each other by the light they emanate. Each angel’s light is a different color depending on the temperament and personality of the angel.

Colors have different emotional effects on us or symbolize different characteristics. (I’ll blog more about that – and other Angelaeon details – in coming weeks.) For now: if you were an angel, what color of light would you be? To enter the drawing, comment on this blog with your chosen color plus a descriptive word that links the color to your personality. For example: “I’m mysterious purple.” Or “I’m energetic red.” Or “I’m a laid-back blue.” Turquoise? Taupe? Magenta? All the colors are fair game.

You may enter only once as a color, but if you tweet about the giveaway or announce it on Facebook or blog about it, let me know in a comment, and I’ll give you another entry (one each for Twitter, Facebook, and blog). That means you get up to four chances to enter. I’ll gather names through April and will do a random drawing of all entries on May 1.

So . . . what color angel are you?

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New Faces

A new face for my blog today, a new direction for my blog next week, all in preparation for the presentation of my new book eleven weeks from now. (Since I’m with the Elevensies, the number is significant to me!) Next week, I’ll be blogging about the world of the Angelaeon Circle novels, including angels and characters and inspirations for building the world of the Angelaeon. For you who have followed the journey of Breath of Angel from manuscript to release day, the morphing of this blog shows you first hand another step in the process, and I’ll still keep you informed about happenings behind the scenes. And … drum roll, please …

Next week I’ll give you details about the giveaway of an autographed ARC and some stunning bookmarks my publisher made for me. I’ll let you know on Monday how you can sign up for the drawing. It will be easy – and fun. So stay tuned.

Speaking of new faces, another Elevensie debuts today: Happy birthday to Angie Smibert‘s novel Memento Nora. Here’s a bit about the intriguing story:

“Nora witnesses a horrific bombing in her near-future world where terrorism is so commonplace that all  she has to do is pop one little white pill to forget like her mother does. But when she discovers what her  mother has been forgetting, she decides to split her pills and hold on to her memories along with two  friends who also have reasons to remember. However, they soon learn that remembering has  consequences.”

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Kid Lit for Japan

Want to help Japan through the kid lit community? Authors have donated books, ARCs (pre-publication Advance Reading Copies of upcoming books), and other services to raise money. Bidding starts today at kidlit4japan. Each item will be available for bidding for a couple of weeks, new items to be added during that time. Money raised will be sent from the bidder directly to a reputable charity (like UNICEF). I’ve donated an ARC of Breath of Angel. If you’re interested, watch for it to come up in the list for bidding.

Some of you know that my daughter-in-law is Japanese. She lives in L.A. with my son, but her family lives in Yokohama. They felt the quake, of course, and have been facing the usual inconveniences of no train service, etc. But they’re all fine, and we are very grateful. Since we have a direct connection to Japan as many of you do, kidlit4japan was another way for us to help out.

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Loud Cheers for Librarians!

Whoopie-pies, a teen book club and sponsor, and librarians – what more could an author ask for at the end of a week of mind-bending revisions?

Last Thursday afternoon, I made my way to the Hillsboro High School library to introduce myself and Breath of Angel to Hillsboro teen book club members and librarians from various local schools. Great people, all of them. They love reading and are keenly interested in transmitting that book-love to students. As a result of the meeting, I think a couple of other schools will start a book club. Getting enough copies of the same book was a concern. The sponsor at Hillsboro says she buys as many copies as she can at a used book store and puts out requests for parents to donate copies.

So I left plenty of copies of my ARC with the book club. I also reminded them that there are errors in an ARC that will be corrected by the time the final book comes out. One librarian warned me that her students will pick up on every error they find in the ARC – and will often email the publisher to tell them what they discovered that was wrong. Future editors?

I also gave everyone a teacher/reader discussion guide, which I’ll be adding to my web page this week. So if you’re interested in that sort of thing, it should be available by the weekend. One warning: The questions on the guide may include a few spoilers. I tried not to give away anything crucial, but it’s amazingly hard to write questions and not reveal twists in the story!

Oh – and for those of you wondering what in creation Whoopie-Pies are, they’re the most delectable cream-filled chocolate cake-like big cookies I’ve ever tasted! Available at Trader Joe’s!

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The Story-Go-Round

Remember singing “Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall” or “This is the song that never ends” or “Michael Finnigan … begin again”? (Sorry if I gave you ear worms.) It’s “begin again” for me on the story-go-round.

If you’ve followed my blog since I started in August of 2010, you’ll remember that one of the first happenings, besides edits, was a CD interview my publisher did in order to present Breath of Angel to sales reps and to prepare for stirring buzz about the book. I just got an email asking me to do a CD interview for book 2, Eye of the Sword (due out March 2012). So here we go again, even before book 1 is released. I’m sure that if I get to continue the series, this kind of schedule will be so normal, it won’t be even a bump on the story-go-round, but since this is my first experience with novels, the schedule is new to me and provides a reality check about the work ahead of me.

From what I’ve been told, publishers like to release one novel per year of an author’s series. So here’s how it goes. Sell series. Edit book #1, write #2, promote #1, edit #2, write #3, promote #2 and #1, edit #3, write #4, promote series . . . These are not sequential, but overlap. Like waves.

Somehow I get visions of Lucy and Ethel trying to wrap chocolates coming down a conveyor belt that keeps going faster and faster! (For you young-bodies, check out I Love Lucy, “Job Switching.”)If you don’t get the reference, either you’re way too young, or I’m way too old!)

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Sneak Peek at Book 2

Brilliant idea: Put the first chapter of book 2, Eye of the Sword, as a teaser at the end of book 1, Breath of Angel. A sneak peek. Lots of books do this, so I’m surprised we didn’t think of it sooner.

So last week, I stopped down revisions halfway through book 2 and made sure the first chapter was ready for prime time. After I sent it to my editor, of course, the fine-toothed comb ran through it, and I got it back with revision suggestions. Minor and quickly done I’m glad to say. Now it’s off and running – to press, I hope. Release date still scheduled for June 21.

Meanwhile, here’s your sneak peek at the first few lines of Eye of the Sword.

“As Trevin stepped into the seedy tavern at Drywell, his hand instinctively slid toward his dagger. Not that he was daft enough to challenge the three well-muscled strangers who had cornered his younger brother. Nor did Dwin look as if he wanted to be rescued.”

The rest of the chapter will appear at the end of book 1. The full version of book 2 is due out March 2012. But I’m getting ahead of myself. First step: finish editorial revisions of book 2 (deadline March 15, 2011!).

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