Tag Archives: dualed

TRANSPARENT and REBOOT cover reveals!

26 Friday Oct 2012

Posted by in Covers, Random, YA

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so these two covers i’m about to go on about? i absolutely fell in love with them as soon as i saw them. i think they are both so unique and fresh and eye-catching. especially for YA covers, which sometimes seem to play it on the safe side due to keeping with trends.

natalie whipple is a fellow friday the thirteener and my good friend, and i was already super excited to read TRANSPARENT, anyway. and now that i’ve seen her amazing cover (no easy feat for her publisher’s design team, considering her teenaged MC is invisible!), the wait for her debut is going to be even harder! i love the vibrant neon colourway the artist chose to use, as well as the cool unfilled title font which ties in so perfectly with TRANSPARENT’s invisibility factor! all of it just meshes so well together, and it’s both vivid and balanced. natalie, huge congratulations on the face they gave your book baby because it. is. awesome!

amy tintera is a fellow lucky 13 as well as a great writer friend. her YA debut REBOOT sounds damn incredible and i’m counting down the days until i can get my hands on it! in the meantime, i’m just going to have to squeal over REBOOT’s incredible cover. so many reasons why i love it–the cold starkness, the classic red and black colour combo, the clever way they pulled down the 178 from the barcode. but the main reason is, i think, how it verges on being a cover you might expect for adult fiction. i’m a big fan of adult fiction covers that have the potential to be timeless, which–for me–usually means something font-driven, without much else in terms of visuals. classy, classy, classy. amy, your cover is fantastic!

TRANSPARENT will be published may 21st, 2013 (harperteen), and REBOOT may 7th, 2013 (harperteen). and whoa, may is my birthday month! i know what i’ll be buying for myself to read!

also, eARCs of DUALED went back up on netgalley and edelweiss yesterday. for all the reviewers and bloggers who have been requesting my book, thank you so much. it’s made the first page of most requested ARCs. i couldn’t believe it. i have no clue how long it’s going to stay that way, but really, really cool. THANK YOU.

DUALED: a new tagline and audio book update

10 Monday Sep 2012

Posted by in Publishing, Random

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so, about that tagline for DUALED. if you’ve seen pics of the cover or actually have a physical ARC, you’ll note the tagline on the front cover is this:

you or your alt?
only one will survive.

there’s been a lot of love for this tagline; i love it, my publisher loves it, bloggers and readers thus far seem to love it, too.

but sometimes that’s not enough. especially when it comes to book buyers–the guys who decide what to buy to sell in their stores. and while the word “alt” makes perfect sense within the context of DUALED’s plot, for someone who doesn’t know the plot, it’s been decided the word falls on the vague side.

to be honest, i was a bit disappointed at the idea of losing the tagline. but the thing is, just like the guys in charge of cover art know what works and doesn’t work for a jacket, buyers know a helluva a lot more than me when it comes to stuff like this. and taglines? it’s incredibly hard to come up with one that’s succinct, memorable, fitting–and having to fit within tight space constraints at the same time, too. so to the team at random house children’s books who came up with not only one great tagline but two? you guys are brilliant. the new tagline that will be on the covers of the finished copies:

two of you exist.
only one will survive.

i think it’s absolutely perfect. thanks so very much to those who worked on coming up with it!

also, i found out that voice actress alicyn packard will be narrating DUALED for the audio edition! we’ve talked on twitter and she’s just lovely and talented and i cannot wait to hear the finished product. i know there was an audition process to find the perfect voice for west, and i think she is going to be fantastic!

randomness: oh, this band. so where have i been that i’ve missed ONE OK ROCK this whole time? discovering a band whose music i instantly fall in love with is, for me, the same as picking up a book by an author i’ve never read before and being unable to stop myself from getting sucked into the world within its pages. my heart actually beats a little faster, i get all giddy, and i just want to leave real life for a bit and explore whatever crazy goodness they’ve created. and these single-take videos will always amaze me!

link round up! and KENSHIN!

27 Monday Aug 2012

Posted by in Link Round Up, Publishing, Writing, YA

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it’s link round up time as i play catch up on general life stuff while waiting on edits, which should hit my inbox by the end of the week.

so some reading (how come it’s taken me this long to discover the monstrumologist series by rick yancey? it’s bloody fantastic!), setting up posts, responding to interviews for future dates. um, not much cleaning. at all. we are neat people, but even i’m surprised how quickly we’ve gotten used to living in a constant state of disarray.

and school’s back on in a week. i’m excited because it means a return to a normal work day. when your kids are going to bed at about the same time your husband wakes up to go to work, the hours just feel off…

ya writer john hansen featured me on his blog, incessant droning of a bored author. read it here. thanks so much for hosting me, john!

i previewed DUALED for fellow lucky and YA author lenore appelhans (LEVEL TWO, simon & schuster, jan 2013) over at her blog, presenting lenore. thank you so much for featuring me, lenore!

fellow lucky and YA author miriam forster (CITY OF A THOUSAND DOLLS, harperteen, feb 2013) read an ARC of DUALED when her bookstore received a copy. she wrote up a blog post about the importance of world building for her blog, dancing with dragons is hard on your shoes. i was really blown away when she referred to DUALED in her write up. thanks so much, miriam!

so. i made the decision a while ago to not link to reviews here on the blog. (editing to add that fellow canadian, author, and AWer peggy blair (THE BEGGAR’S OPERA, penguin, february 2012) recommends a tab linking to good reviews, which is a great idea. thanks peggy!) there’s going to be lots, good and bad. why i’m not going to link to bad ones is kind of self-explanatory; going on and on about good ones will get very tiresome, very fast. but i might make some exceptions here and there. like this one from kenny brechner, book buyer and store manager for indie DDG books in maine. it’s my first review outside of the blogosphere, and it very much made my day. thank you so much, kenny! come february, i’ll also be doing an interview with kenny for his column, which i’m very excited about.


also, you’ve probably caught me bemoaning the fact that we missed the premiere of the kenshin live-action movie by a matter of days when we were in japan. ads were everywhere. trailers were playing on a loop in every record and bookstore. it was torture. there’s talk of an international release. someone, please make this happen! in the meantime, here are the trailers, subbed in english.

bookstores in japan, japanese editions of popular YA titles, and manga!

09 Thursday Aug 2012

Posted by in Publishing, Random, YA

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so i’m here on vacation in japan, and i’d forgotten how absolutely amazing the bookstores are in tokyo. the mass amounts of what they have in stock, the sheer number of volumes and editions, the lovely covers and artwork…give me some take out sushi and bottles of royal milk tea from the vending machine and i could happily stay in one all day.

apart from food, i’m finding myself taking tons of pictures of books here. manga, in particular; never mind that i’ve long forgotten my hiragana and katakana–the artwork alone is awesome. for a while, i read nothing but manga, to the point where i found myself running out of translated manga to read. i miss that time, and seeing so much of it all over the place here makes me want to try harder to find time for it again. also, i took lots of pics of what japanese editions i could find of popular YA books back home!

needless to say, this post is SUPER pic heavy! most of them were taken at maruzen, yurindo, and book-off stores in tokyo and sendai.



japanese editions of THE HUNGER GAMES trilogy by suzanne collins.



j.k. rowling’s HARRY POTTER series. i don’t know why all the different covers. the chess inspired ones are very TWILIGHT-esque.


really excited to see one of my favourite series, CHAOS WALKING by patrick ness, on the shelf!


the INHERITANCE series by christopher paolini.


i’m guessing this is a children’s novel based on the pixar movie BRAVE.


lots of studio ghibli art books!


hayao miyazaki adapted MAJO NO TAKKYUBIN by eiko kadono into his film KIKI’S DELIVERY SERVICE. being big fans of miyazaki, we picked up the novel for a great souvenir.


FROM UP ON POPPY HILL is studio ghibli’s latest film, and it’s based on the comic of the same name, written by tetsuro sayama and drawn by chizuru takahashi. already a hit here in japan, it comes to theatres in north america in march, 2013!


39 CLUES! this is more middle grade than YA.


THE PRINCESS DIARIES by meg cabot, GOSSIP GIRL by cecily von zeigesar, PRETTY LITTLE LIARS by sara shepard.



found these really interesting editions of stephenie meyer’s TWILIGHT series. it’s been broken down into 13 novels; pictured here are books 1 and 13. cool how bella’s eyes change colour from one to the other.

AND OH THE MANGA.


the newest volumes are kept at the end of the aisles, or along the front.


before manga is collected into volumes, they’re released weekly or monthly in magazines.


KODANSHA BOXED is a new (or relatively new) line of boxed manga!


boys love manga, or yaoi.



BAKUMAN, NARUTO, and KENSHIN are some of the series we’ve collected, or are still collecting, back home.


vol. 12 of HIKARU NO GO. i haven’t read the manga, but the anime is awesome!


NANA’s up to vol. 21 over here! and over at a book-off in tokyo, i found a fan book of the series which has been labelled vol. 7.8. here are some pics of the artwork inside!




i’ve always loved the artwork of VAMPIRE KNIGHT (up to vol. 16 here), and here’s some pics of the artwork inside the fan book! this was 105 yen from book-off–so about $1.25 with the exchange rate.


and this is the infamous BOKU WA IMOUTO NI KOI WO SURU, which lightly translates into “i love my little sister”. it’s a manga about incest between twins and was a bestseller here in japan. when cuddlebuggery’s kat kennedy referenced twincest in a blurb about DUALED, this manga was the first thing that came to mind!


i’ve been trying to find vols. 9 and 10 of IMMORTAL RAIN (published in japan as METEOR METHUSELAH) by kaori ozaki. now that tokyopop’s US operations have shut down and it’s not likely i’ll be able to finish collecting the series in english, i thought the original japanese editions would be cool to have. no luck so far, but i did buy this related MM work. also, the hubs finally found kaoru mori’s EMMA vol. 5 to fill in for the now-out-print english edition!

in all honesty, i don’t think i’ll have the time or dedication to learn enough japanese to read any manga in its original format. but i do think i’ll be looking into picking up some new translated series back when i get home! hope you guys all enjoyed the pics!

so can i have a DUALED floor display for myself, please?

19 Thursday Jul 2012

Posted by in Link Round Up, Publishing, Reading, YA

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because it’s me and i’m lazy with fine print, i had no clue DUALED was going to be sold in australia as part of the deal for north america. so that was incredibly exciting to find out! but i think the best way was how i found out.

i came across this listing for a 9 copy floor display at angus & robertson, an australian bookstore! come february i don’t know if it can actually be ordered as it says, or even actually made, but if so i’ll most definitely try. because how fun would this be to have in the house? i’d rotate the book selection on a regular basis!

a brief link round up this week! DUALED was mentioned in Publisher’s Weekly Spring 2013 Sneak Previews, which was amazing! i was floored to be included with such talented authors. also, an interview i did was translated into romanian at i’m wide awake and fantasy books. english is here! thanks so much sabrina, laura, and ramona!

i only have a few days left until my first set of edits come in for DIVIDED, but since turning in the first draft to my editor, i’ve been madly working through my to-be-read pile (it’s still huge). i’m pretty careful with the books i choose just because of how little time i seem to have left for reading nowadays. this is what i’ve read recently and enjoyed:

ellen oh PROPHECY
april tucholke BETWEEN THE DEVIL AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA
shannon messenger LET THE SKY FALL
daniel marks VELVETEEN
kendare blake ANNA DRESSED IN BLOOD
ransom riggs MISS PEREGRINE’S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN
patrick ness THE KNIFE OF NEVER LETTING GO
patrick ness THE ASK AND THE ANSWER
patrick ness MONSTERS OF MEN
joshua c. cohen LEVERAGE
moira young BLOOD RED ROAD
laini taylor DAUGHTER OF SMOKE AND BONE
lauren destefano WITHER
emma donoghue ROOM
patrick ness A MONSTER CALLS
rj palacio WONDER
huntley fitzpatrick MY LIFE NEXT DOOR
jandy nelson THE SKY IS EVERYWHERE

DUALED ARCs have finally arrived!

13 Friday Jul 2012

Posted by in Publishing, YA

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i can’t even begin to describe what it’s like to finally hold DUALED in real book form. at first i simply held the unopened package in my hands, just enjoying the moment. it’s a mix of many emotions–joy, gratitude, pride.

a lot of authors capture that one instant with a pic, or on film. i happened to be home by myself when it came to my door, so that didn’t work out. but thinking about it now, it seems fitting that it happened that way. writing is such a solitary journey in so many ways, and seeing this step also unfold on my own somehow felt right, too.

i did take a pic after opening the package! they look absolutely fantastic, and random house accented the title with glossy raised font on the front and the spine in shiny red foil. LOVE.

seeing my name on the cover totally blows me away. seeing my husband and kids hold it and read the words inside is completely surreal. people have been asking me if it finally feels real now, and to tell you the truth, i don’t really know what that means. i don’t know if i’m going to feel any differently when i can walk into a bookstore in february and see it on the shelf. all i know is i already feel so much, of everything. incredibly excited, immense happiness, anxiety and nervousness and anticipation for the upcoming months…

it’s awesome, you guys!!!

now, today is also friday the thirteenth. 2013 has been deemed a very lucky year for us friday the thirteeners! to celebrate our day, we’ve come up with a super fun post and an epic giveaway! we had some fun and came up with pen names and titles for our books. la dude by peach seminal? that would be me!

anyway, come by the blog and enter for your chance to win a prize pack consisting of thirteen YA books. each thirteener is offering up a book in our genre that we love so much we wish we’d written it! my selection is battle royale by koushun takami.

a lot of readers compare it to the hunger games, but battle royale was actually originally published in japan in 1999 and only translated for north american audiences in 2003. takami takes the idea of children being forced to battle to the death much further, in ways much darker and much more violent and visceral. it’s an unforgettable book, a true standout in the dystopian genre, and i hope whoever wins it will enjoy it!

random: reading patrick ness’s chaos walking trilogy book 2, the ask and the answer; listening to gym class heroes feat. ryan tedder the fighter, calvin harris feat. ne-yo let’s go.

taken and the nightmare affair cover reveals/ARCs at ala!

21 Thursday Jun 2012

Posted by in Covers, Publishing, YA

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even more gorgeous covers being revealed this week! this time it’s fellow YA author, friday the thirteener, and lucky 13 erin bowman‘s cover for taken, as well as fellow YA author and  lucky 13 mindee arnett‘s cover for the nightmare affair! what blows me away about both of these fantastic covers is the use of deep, saturated colours throughout the jacket. those art designers did an amazing job! taken will be published in april 2013 and the nightmare affair in march 2013!

also, it’s the american library association (ala) annual conference this weekend in anaheim, ca! it’s where librarians, educators, authors, and publishers all get together and talk books. crowds and booths and tables abound. what’s cool is there will be DUALED ARCs available! i’ve already begged some author and blogger friends to take a pic if they’re spotted!

speaking of ARCs, i should be getting my copies soon, but in the meantime, marketing at random house sent me a pic. you know, just to torture me! they look absolutely incredible and i’m going to cry when i finally hold one!

prophecy and the madman’s daughter cover reveals!

19 Tuesday Jun 2012

Posted by in Blog Hopping, Covers, YA

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there is nothing better than being able to celebrate with your friends when something fantastic happens. today, fellow YA authors, friday the thirteeners, AND lucky 13s ellen oh and megan shepherd both had cover reveals! ellen’s prophecy and megan’s the madman’s daughter will both be released in january 2013. buy them, read them, enjoy them!

and just look at these covers! they are gorgeous and mind-blowing and i couldn’t be happier for them! plus their books are pretty damn fantastic, too!

blog hopping: i’m over at fellow YA author, friday the thirteener, AND lucky 13 mindy mcginnis’s blog today. we’re hanging out and she gets to ask me questions about DUALED’s cover. come say hi!

DIVIDED: 70K and counting. and my first pass pages for DUALED are due next week. but there is light at the end of the tunnel, you guys, and waiting for me on the other side is summer vacation, a dirty house that needs to be cleaned, and a super massive to be read pile.

random: listening to snow patrol’s run. eating: take out every night for the last week and a half. feeling kind of gross about it.

netgalley/edelweiss/blog hopping #9

15 Friday Jun 2012

Posted by in Blog Hopping

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hi all, it’s another here-but-not-here post, and there’s an incredible amount of stuff happening this week! most of which i’ll post about later, when i’m done (or close to done) drafting DiVIDED and signing off on DUALED. because there’s only two weeks left before summer hits and the house is once again bombarded with loud, sweaty youth and i’m feeding the neighbourhood kids freezies all day long. two weeks. so much writing to still be done. eeeeps.

but right now i have to share this, because it just about blew my mind when it happened.

DUALED is now on netgalley as well as edelweiss. which means librarians, booksellers, reviewers, and select bloggers can now request it from random house and actually read it.

i’m both excited and terrified. so much enthusiasm already on twitter, where some amazing bloggers have already reached out to me to tell me how they can’t wait to read it as soon as they get approved and can start downloading. some already have it, right this very minute. it’s completely surreal and bizarre and wonderful all at the same time!

so while i’m trying to not think about that too much, today you can find me over at gypsy book reviews, where the lovely ashelynn interviews me about the cover for DUALED! ashelynn, thank you again so much for having me on your blog!

let the sky fall cover reveal and link round up!

01 Friday Jun 2012

Posted by in Covers, Link Round Up, Publishing, YA

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my friend and fellow friday the thirteener shannon messenger had her cover reveal for let the sky fall this week! here is the pretty! how incredibly gorgeous is this cover, right? congrats, shannon! as we get closer to 2013, i’ll be posting cover reveals of the rest of the thirteeners here, and some of my closest luckies, too. cover reveals are big milestones for an author, and there’s nothing better than being able to share them.

also, my brain is so. very. fried this week. halfway through book 2 and living on drafting adrenaline and very little sleep. but it’s all good!!! it’s been an incredible last few days, and with so much love for DUALED (and not out of sheer exhaustion, nope, not at all!), i’ll finish up this post with a link round up.

DUALED made it onto amazon (ca and com and even japan, heh!) and chapters this week. EEPS. something very surreal about seeing it out there. I can’t even… truly unbelievable!

the lovely giselle (a canadian book blogger!) over at xpressoreads picked DUALED as her WoW this week. as did cleo over at booklopedia, kim at kimreads, brodie at eleusinian mysteries of reading, and renae at rolling with the moments. hopefully i didn’t miss anyone!

and lots more cover love! thanks kat and steph for featuring DUALED at cuddlebuggery, and thanks to all things urban fantasy for DUALED winning the, um, duel of covers!

thanks to the book smugglers, wild heart, natasa, a never ending fantasy, a reader of fictions, erika on the move, katie’s book blog, imperial beach, nicole’s ya book haven, bibliopunkk, ya book queen, and young readers!

and some foreign sites picked up on it, too. here, here, here and here. WOW.

MUCH thanks and love, everyone!

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