Win an ARC of ENTANGLED!

Look what turned up in my office yesterday - much to my surprise! A lovely, shiny pink ARC of my book. It's a book - with pages and words and EVERYTHING! And I wrote it. Yes, I'm perfectly aware I sound like an idiot, thank you very much. But this is a Big Deal for me.

I'd like to share the joy by giving you the opportunity to win one of these bad boys.

The rules:

1. You must be a follower of this blog.
2. You must be a person who lives somewhere in the world. Yes, that's right, this contest is open INTERNATIONALLY. I'm willing to brave the hideousness that is the post office for you guys.
3. You must... Nah, that's it. Bored of rules now.

To be in with a chance of winning, please complete the following sentence:

I need to read Entangled right this second because...

The winner will be whoever makes me laugh the most/tugs on my heartstrings/says something just plain crazy. I'll announce the winner on Sunday, so you only have three short days to enter. 


Good luck!

A change is as good as a rest... right?

Big week here. Got promoted on Monday. Handed in my notice on Tuesday (purely coincidental timing, I assure you). So, the day job is no more. Well, I've got a month left, but come the end of August, the day job will bite the dust. Exciting stuff, huh?

So here are my plans:

1. Move to Scotland. Bye bye, London.
2. Write. A lot. I'm way behind on book 2, but I can't let myself think about that right now.
3. Set up new Top Sekrit Business. (I'll reveal all soon, I promise)
4. Hopefully pick up a part-time job in a bookshop or a deli. I've always fancied working in a deli... all that parma ham... olives as far as the eye can see... CHEESE!

It's all rather scary and leap-of-faithy, but let's hope it's the right thing to do. And if it isn't, then so be it. At least I'll have given it a go.

Aargh. Now that I've just seen that written down in list form, I've got the FEAR. Last time I was this scared was when I moved down to London six and a half years ago, hoping to make my fortune (!) in the world of children's publishing. And that worked out OK. Fingers crossed this will too.

Have you done anything that really scares you? How did it work out? (Please please please tell me it worked out PERFECTLY.)

Amazon awesomeness

Entangled is now available to pre-order on Amazon. You can check it out here. There's no cover up there yet, but that only serves to heighten the excitement, right? RIGHT?

I was going to order a copy myself, but I can't work out whether that would be weird or not.

So, 6th January is the day. Slap-bang in the most depressing week of the year. Something tells me that week might be ever so slightly less depressing for me in 2011. And hopefully for you too.

And the bestest YA book trailer is...

The Wolves of Mercy Falls: A Stop Motion Trailer for Linger, by Maggie Stiefvater. This trailer was chosen by lovely Lara, who wins copies of Rich and Mad (William Nicholson) and Numbers (Rachel Ward). Congrats to you, Lara! And thanks to everyone for taking part - there were some REALLY good suggestions. But why did the Linger trailer come out on top?

1. The music - written and performed by Maggie herself, I believe. Beautiful and atmospheric and simply gorgeous.
2. It's a simple idea, brilliantly executed.
3. THE SHEER AMOUNT OF TIME AND EFFORT IT MUST HAVE TAKEN! And not by some specialist trailer-making company, but by the author herself. Maggie, I salute you!

So, here's the trailer in all its glory.

Trailer contest... last chance

Hey folks, I thought you might like one last chance to enter the recommend-a-book-trailer-contest. The link is here. I'll announce the winner on Sunday, so you have four whole days to scour the interwebs for the best YA trailer in existence.

Thanks for your books-to-make-you-smile recommendations. My, you are a well-read lot.

Books to make you smile

First of all, thank you so much for the warm welcome back into the world of blogging. I really, really appreciate it.

Another short post from me today - sorry. I need your help again.

Which book makes you smile? Which book brings you joy? And why? Do you prefer shiny happy books, or gritty, depressing ones? Or a bit of both, depending on your mood?

Thank you.

Hello

Hello, lovely people. First of all, thank you so much for your kind words and patience. Things have been tough, are still tough, and will continue to be tough for a long time. There's nothing else I can really say.

This is me tentatively dipping my toe back into the sea of blogging. I'm just going to see how it goes, but please forgive me if my posts are somewhat sporadic in the coming weeks.

Not really sure what to talk about, so maybe you can help me out? What are you reading/writing at the moment?

I've just finished reading a John Grisham novel (don't even ask). And I am writing... nothing.