Little White Lies Blog Tour: Guest Post!

Hiya!  Today, I'm so pleased to welcome Katie Dale for her Little White Lies blog tour.  I myself have read her new book and it's absolutely fantastic - get your hands on a copy if you don't already have one!  Today, I'd like to share a brilliant guest post she has written especially...

The first time Lou meets tall, dark, and handsome Christian, she knows he's hiding something. Why does he clam up every time she asks about his past? Why doesn't he have any family photos and why does he dye his blond hair black?
Then suddenly his terrible secret is unveiled to the world - and it seems everything he's ever told Lou is a lie. Can what the media are saying about him really be true? Should Lou trust him? Or is she in terrible danger? But Christian isn't the only one keeping secrets. For what if their chance meeting was no accident at all ...?
As lie follows lie, nothing is as it seems, and soon Lou finds herself ensnared in a web of deceit, her loyalties torn, her emotions in tatters as she faces a heart-wrenching dilemma: should she shatter the lives of those she holds dearest, or betray the guy who, against all odds, she's fallen in love with? Full of family secrets, surprising twists and unexpected revelations, Katie Dale's second novel will have readers on the edge of their seats.

Write what you know, so they say, so when it came to choosing the settings for various events in my new YA thriller LITTLE WHITE LIES, I decided to mine my own past for locations…

Boarding School

Like Lou, I too was a day girl at a boarding school for sixth form college, namely Lancing College in West Sussex. It’s an incredibly grand building (pictured is the chapel – the largest school chapel in the world) with fantastic architecture (it was nearly chosen to be Hogwarts in the films) draughty cloisters, pristine quads, (and in my day a ratio of 5:1 boys:girls! ) but, like Lou, I found that you can’t keep any secrets in a boarding school for long – gossip spreads like wildfire!

Sheffield University

So after sixth form, I went to Sheffield University to study English Literature – just like Lou in LITTLE WHITE LIES! I wanted Lou to go to the same halls of residence as I did too – Earnshaw Hall – but sadly it’s been knocked down now, and replaced with a rather swanky student village.

Park

Like Lou, I enjoyed visiting, picnicking and writing in  the many beautiful parks whilst in Sheffield (but unlike Lou I never jogged round any of them!) and the park in which Lou and Christian meet for the first time is a mixture of the exquisite Sheffield Botanical Gardens and Endcliffe Park, which is where the café they bump into is based.

The Flying Pig Pub

In LITTLE WHITE LIES Christian and Lou both work in a pub called The Flying Pig – but although no such pub exists in Sheffield, I based it on one of my local haunts, The Porter Brook (left). It was only after I finished writing the book that I realized I pass a pub called The Flying Pig every time I get the bus in Cambridge – so it’s a strange mix of the two!

Castleton

Lou and Christian travel to Castleton for a party – one of my favourite places to visit whilst I was a student. Nestled up in the hills, with its steep gorge and crumbling castle, it’s a beautiful quaint little village, far from the hustle of the city.

Travelodge

Not very glamorous, but at least I didn’t have to do any research about Travelodges because in my other life as an actress, I once spent a summer on an outdoor Shakespeare tour and every night we’d stay in a different Travelodge. They’re all pretty much identical inside, so every morning I’d wake up and have absolutely no idea whereabouts in the country I was! I got pretty fed up of Travelodges! But in a way the familiarity was kind of nice, too.

KATIE DALE

An actress as well as an author, Katie loves nothing more than creating characters - both 

on page and onstage. She kept her parents happy by getting a “proper degree” in English Literature at Sheffield University, before finally going to drama school, then whilst she was on a belated gap year travelling through South-East Asia she found out she’d been chosen as a winner of the SCBWI Undiscovered Voices competition with the her first novel, the emotional rollercoaster SOMEONE ELSE'S LIFE, which launched her writing career, and is now published all over the world. LITTLE WHITE LIES, her second novel, has just as many twists and turns, but is more of a thriller...
Website: katiedaleuk.blogspot.com
Twitter: @katiedaleuk

So what did you guys think of that?  Let me know in the comments below and be sure to show your support for Katie!

Happy reading,

Beverley x 

You Don't Know Me Blog Tour: Guest Post!

Hi guys, Beverley here!  Are you surprised to hear from me?  Unfortunately, I'm not returning early from my hiatus as much as I would like to - revision is making me crazy!!!  Anyway, I don't want to bog you down with my school news... in fact, I want to welcome Sophia Bennett to the blog for her blog tour of You Don't Know Me!  I'm a big fan of Sophia and I jumped at the chance to take part so today, I have a guest post about the cover to share with all of you lovely people.  Enjoy!

***

It was all so good. Sasha and Rose. Best friends in a band, singing together. Right up to the finals of Killer Act when the judges tell them one of them must go Suddenly their friendship is put to the ultimate test. On TV in front of millions. Two girls. One huge mistake. Can they ever forgive each other?

[summary taken from Goodreads]

The Cover Story

I always enjoy writing about covers. When I visit schools I increasingly talk about them, because we’ve all got our opinion – usually a strong one – and the cover are is important to a book’s success, even though the writing takes months or years, and the cover takes … well, a depressingly short time by comparison, if you happen to be the writer.

Although you’d like to think they do, cover illustrators don’t actually go through your manuscript with a fine-tooth comb, looking for the perfect scene to represent exactly. They get a few sentences giving them a rough idea about what the story is about, and off they go. However, my publisher Rachel knows that I like to put a mood board together for each book, to give me a visual sense of what I’m working towards while I’m writing, and now she likes to see it before she thinks about the cover. This is very flattering. Here was the picture I sent her for You Don’t Know Me:

Rachel also asked if I had any ideas in mind for the cover, because when she asked me about The Look I told her I was thinking of something with a magazine cover feel: the cropped face of a girl staring out strongly from the page. And that’s pretty much what we ended up going for.

This time, I was thinking more in terms of a girl in a spotlight, ready to sing. Possibly a girl with a not-so-size-zero body shape, which would make a refreshing change. I found a few things online, including some fan art for an idealised Selena Gomez album cover, and suggested these:

I think the golden eye was inspired by the Adele covers. (Note the Adele theme creeping through my inspirations here.) We both liked how graphic and strong it was. It reminded us a bit of the cover of ‘The Look’. Also, by looking down, the eye seemed somehow mysterious and possibly sad, which suited the darker elements of the book.

I like to think that maybe the eye inspired what came next, because the ‘girl in the spotlight’ idea didn’t make it through. This time, Rachel wanted to commission a photo for the cover, though, which was exciting. She suggested a photographer called Rosie Hardy, whose website is here, and Rosie’s mysterious, artistic, romantic images looked wonderful to me.

Coincidentally, Rosie has a picture of Janet Devlin on the site – an X Factor finalist from 2011 – who was one of the many people I was thinking of when I wrote the character of Rose. Rosie also did the cover for Rachel Ward’s new book, The Drowning, which is a self-portrait. Of Rosie, not Rachel. So now you know.

Rosie took a picture of a girl looking down and we ended up with a cover like this:

I liked it, but I didn’t love it, apart from those turquoise page edges, which are fabulous. Some other people in the process felt the same, so the picture went through some colour tweaks, ending up like this:

Which I think is much stronger. Big sigh of relief.

I’ve since shown it to a couple of secondary school classes, to get their opinion. One girl said ‘It looks as though she’s sad and she’s thinking about something’, which seemed pretty accurate. Another one said ‘She looks like she’s doing something on her phone,’ which made me laugh because in the story the main character, Sasha Bayley, is almost surgically attached to her phone. It’s what drives the plot. So I think we got there in the end.

I say ‘we’ – I was just an interested observer on this one. I think Chicken House got there in the end. I hope so, anyway. What do you think?

***

Thank you, Sophia for writing such a lovely post!  I love hearing about the cover story for different books and I was intrigued to hear about the process behind the glowing cover of You Don't Know Me.  I adore the idea of a mood board - I think I'm going to make my own one for a 'book' I'm planning to write after exams!

And if you haven't already, be sure to pick up a copy of You Don't Know Me - I'm currently reading it and LOVING it!

As usual, please feel free to leave your thoughts and comments!  And I look forward to my return in June, when I can fully resume blogging 'duties' :D

Happy reading,

Beverley xxx

P.S. If any of you have exams coming up, GOOD LUCK!

Blog Tour: Stung Review, Guest Post, and Giveaway!

Hey everyone! Today is my stop in the Stung blog tour, hosted by The Book Paparazzi Blog Tours. Thank you ladies so much for allowing me to be a part of this awesome tour! Today I have my review of Stung, a guest post from Bethany Wiggins herself, and a giveaway to share with you all! Check out the rest of the tour here.

Jen's Review

Stung
by Bethany Wiggins

Publisher: Walker Childrens

Release Date: April 2, 2013 (US)

Pages: 304, Hardcover

Source: For review via Netgalley/blog tour

Rating: 3.5 Teacups

Of all things, Stung was definitely an interesting read to say the least. It wasn't jaw-dropping amazing, but it wasn't bored-to-tears awful, either. Pretty much somewhere in between. In my opinion, Stung was moderately creative, but also your typical post-apocalyptic story. The concept behind the reasoning for the chase and action is awesome: bees being extinct and a flu that turns humans into beasts. But the rest of the plot was a bit boring and vague itself. Up until the halfway point, I had no idea where this book was going. Everything was kind of hidden in that cryptic way and there was no explanation as to what was happening. It's a little annoying at first, to put it nicely. Thankfully, the plot picked up later on.

The plot for the second half was gripping and intense. The characters are constantly on the run from society. You all know those chase scenes are lovable and extremely awesome. I'm one of those people who highly enjoy these parts in the story, therefore my liking for this book increased. It kept me intrigued and wanting to know what happened next.

Now the characters are a curious thing in Stung, as was the romance. Since finishing the book, I am still not quite sure what to think about them. I didn't particularly connect with them on any emotional level; these characters were just kind of there. Fiona, the main protagonist, wakes up from a coma, so it was bit difficult to sympathize with her when she didn't really know what was going on half the time. And Bowen, the love interest, was your typical guy-- nothing special. Their romance can definitely be considered insta-lovey. I was not a fan of this, but I can see how their romance developed after trying to survive together for a week.

To sum up my thoughts, readers will enjoy Stung if they are a fan of post-apocalyptic stories with lots of action, chase scenes, and an addicting plot. While lacking in the character and romance department, Stung was enjoyable and can pass as a quick action-packed story.

3.5 Teacups for Stung!

*Thanks to the publisher and TBPBT for the review copy!*

Guest Post

My question for Bethany Wiggins:  How did the idea for Stung come about? (What was your inspiration?)

Inspiration is a funny thing! You never know when/where/how it will hit. The story of how STUNG came into existence is this:

The first was an early morning nightmare that woke me from a dead sleep (I usually don't wake up from nightmares, let alone remember them!). This nightmare was so vivid and riveting, I wrote it down and it became chapter one of STUNG. 

Also, I started writing STUNG at the time the swine flu scare was running rampant through the USA. I watched these crazy people on the news who were swarming the health departments, frantic to the point of violent to get the swine flu vaccine for their kids, and it made me wonder, "What if the government told us there is this huge flu to scare us into taking a vaccine that is really going to harm us?" 

Lastly, I remember getting a Discovery Magazine that talked about the decline of bees. And all of sudden, it was like a puzzle clicking into place. I had everything I needed to write a book. And that is the recipe for STUNG!

Giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

HAPPY reading,
Jen xx

Blog Tour: Shadow Eyes Guest Post + Giveaway!

Hi everyone! Today I'll be sharing with you guys the inspiration behind Shadow Eyes, a young adult fantasy novel by Dusty Crabtree. The blog tour is for this book's one-year anniversary! Make sure you enter the giveaway below. Thanks for having me as a part of this fantastic tour, Dusty!!

About Shadow Eyes 

 Shadow Eyes
by Dusty Crabtree
Publisher: Musa Publishing
Release Date: February 3, 2012
Synopsis:

Iris Kohl lives in a world populated by murky shadows that surround, harass, and entice unsuspecting individuals toward evil.  But she is the only one who can see them.  She’s had this ability to see the shadows, as well as brilliantly glowing light figures, ever since an obscure, tragic incident on her fourteenth birthday three years earlier.
 Although she’s learned to cope, the view of her world begins to shift upon the arrival of three mysterious characters.  First, a handsome new teacher whose presence scares away shadows; second, a new friend with an awe-inspiring aura; and third, a mysterious and alluring new student whom Iris has a hard time resisting despite already having a boyfriend. As the shadows invade and terrorize her own life and family, she must ultimately revisit the most horrific event of her life in order to learn her true identity and become the hero she was meant to be.

 Dusty's Blog - Facebook - 

Twitter - Buy Shadow Eyes 

The Inspiration behind Shadow Eyes

Thank you for hosting me, ladies!  I’m honored to be here and to share with you my unique inspiration for my YA urban fantasy, Shadow Eyes!

(Everyone, don’t forget to enter the rafflecopter below for a chance to win a print copy of Shadow Eyes, your full name in the sequel, and a KINDLE FIRE!)

Obviously, stories don’t just magically materialize out of thin air, and, poof, you have a story.  It would be nice if it happened that way, but generally writers have sources of inspiration that then morph – several times – into an actual idea for a story. Some things that inspire us may be so small we don’t even realize it, but others are fairly elaborate – like the basis of inspiration for my novel.

The idea for Shadow Eyes actually first came to me as a screenplay for a Christian horror movie.  I know.  That’s not really a genre.  But it should be.  Anyway, the movie would have been about a cast of intertwined characters going about their lives and making mistakes with dark, creepy shadows (demons) hovering around them, whispering to them, and influencing them to do evil things.  Only the audience would see the shadows.  The characters would be completely oblivious.  The ultimate dramatic irony!  (Sorry, I’m an English teacher.)  I could see it all in my head, and it was awesome!  But I had no idea how to write a screenplay.

A few years after I’d had that idea, my friend suggested I should write a novel like the paranormal angel books we’d been reading and loving.  I’d always loved the concept of angels and demons in stories and immediately thought back to that screenplay idea.  After a lot of thought on how to make the story work for a novel, I decided on a 17-year-old narrator, Iris, who had a special ability to see the shadows, as well as light figures (angels), but nobody else could. 

The more the story developed in my mind, the crazier I was about it.  All the mysterious characters, the twists and turns, the big mystery about what happened to Iris when she was 14 that first gave her the ability, her making mistakes and discovering who these characters were and, more importantly, who she was – all of it just fell into place on an outline out of my crazy, overly-creative, overly-stimulated mind.  Shadow Eyes, my pride and joy, my baby, is the result.

Giveaway Time!! 

EPIC GIVEAWAY TIME. Make sure you all go enter to win a print copy of Shadow Eyes, your full name in the sequel, and a KINDLE FIRE.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Happy reading,
Jen xx

Promo Blitz: Fang Girl- Guest Post + Giveaway!

Hi everyone! Today I'm going to be telling you guys all about FANG GIRL, along with a lovely excerpt and giveaway! Thanks to Giselle from Xpresso Book Tours for hosting this promo post.

ABOUT FANG GIRL

Fang Girl 
by Helen Keeble
Published by HarperTeen
September 11th, 2012

Things That Are Destroying Jane Greene’s Undead Social Life Before It Can Even Begin:
1) A twelve-year-old brother who’s convinced she’s a zombie.2) Parents who are begging her to turn them into vampires.3) The pet goldfish she accidentally turns instead.4) Weird superpowers that let her rip the heads off of every other vampire she meets.(Sounds cool, but it doesn’t win you many friends.)5) A pyschotic vampire creator who’s using her to carry out a plan for world domination.
And finally:6) A seriously ripped vampire hunter who either wants to stake her or make out with her. Not sure which.
Being an undead, eternally pasty fifteen-year-old isn’t quite the sexy, brooding, angst-fest Jane always imagined....
Helen Keeble’s riotous debut novel combines the humor of Vladimir Tod with Ally Carter’s spot-on teen voice. With a one-of-a-kind vampire mythology and an irresistibly relatable undead heroine, this uproarious page-turner will leave readers bloodthirsty for more.

Purchase it:

Amazon -- Barnes & Noble -- The Book Depository

 ABOUT HELEN KEEBLE

 Helen Keeble is not, and never has been, a vampire. She has however been a teenager. She grew up partly in America and partly in England, which has left her with an unidentifiable accent and a fondness for peanut butter crackers washed   down with a nice cup of tea. She now lives in West Sussex, England, with her husband, daughter, two cats, and a variable number of fish. To the best of her knowledge, none of the fish are undead.

Her first novel, a YA vampire comedy called FANG GIRL, is out 11th Sept 2012, from HarperTeen. 

She also has another YA paranormal comedy novel (provisionally titled NO ANGEL) scheduled for Sept 2013.

Helen's Website -- Goodreads -- Twitter

GUEST POST

Fandom, Family, and FANG GIRL

Guest Post by Helen Keeble

FANG GIRL is about two things: fandom and family.

…Okay, so it's also about a lot of other things, like undead goldfish, vampiric retail empires, and hot boys in tight leather trousers, but mostly it's about fandom and family. Let me explain.

I started writing FANG GIRL because I was immensely irritated (I suspect irritation is the major cause of novels, actually). It was at the height of Twilight fever, and it seemed like every day there was a new article in the newspapers or blogosphere about it. You couldn't click a link or turn on the radio without finding someone either dismissing all YA paranormal romance fans as utterly stupid for liking "that trash", or alternatively getting into a moral panic that these girls were being fundamentally damaged by reading it.

As I rather enjoy a good paranormal romance myself, this was irritating. Really irritating. So irritating I had to spend a year writing a novel to fully express my irritation.

See, personally I think that teenagers are a lot smarter and more discriminating than adults assume. I certainly read an awful lot of fantasy schlock as a teen, and enjoyed it immensely without ever thinking I was actually going to fall through a portal and meet the perfect knight-protector, so I don't believe that all teenage girls are having their relationship expectations warped for life by Robert Patterson's hair. And in my experience, teen paranormal fans can be hugely clever and creative -- they dissect their favorite books like ruthless surgeons, they write their own fanfic versions, they make amazing music videos with footage from movies or tv shows… it's a far cry from the stereotype of a wide-eyed, ditzy girl uncritically consuming anything packaged with a black-and-red cover.

So I decided to write a paranormal romance about a girl who's a vampire fangirl, and who is also practical, snarky, and intelligent -- so when she wakes up one night and discovers she's now a vampire herself, she's got the knowledge and wits to deal with it.

But of course, vampires are rather ridiculous creatures -- seriously, you're angsty because you're eternally young and beautiful? Seriously? I mean, the first thing I'd do is camp out in New York Public Library and read every book ever -- so I also wanted to poke fun at some paranormal romance cliches. The much older vampire hero who inexplicably falls in love with the heroine, eternal angst-filled passion, the inevitable brooding rival, the terribly glamorous vampire lifestyle… in my book, the vampires are quite aware of all these tropes, and are willing to use them to try to influence my heroine Jane. But the vampires are -- like all those columnists and bloggers -- assuming that teenage vampire fangirls actually believe all this stuff… which turns out to be a big mistake.

The other trend I'd noticed in paranormal romances is that usually the heroine's family are barely present (especially not both parents). She might have endless conversations with vampires and werewolves and bears, oh my, but parents seem to stay mostly off-page. Now, I'm not saying that I never fought with my parents when I was a teen, but mostly we got along, and my family were definitely a big influence in my life. And I think that's true for a lot of teens. So I wanted my protagonist's family to be a major part of the story. And really, if you're a girl who wakes up unexpectedly dead one night, what are you going to do? Run off alone and try to survive on the contents of your pockets (most people don't get buried with credit cards, you know), or go back home where there's bed, broadband, and people who love you even if you do now seem to have fangs? No contest!

So that's FANG GIRL: one part fandom, one part family, blended together with creamy comedy goodness and baked in the oven of righteous irritation. Can I tempt you to a bite?

GIVEAWAY

Below is the Rafflecopter code for the prize pack giveaway that you may share on your post. The Rafflecopter has an entry for blog following. It's open internationally, and the last day to enter is December 25th.

The prize pack includes:

- one signed copy of Fang Girl (can be personalised)
- a voucher for an ARC of Helen's next book NO ANGEL as soon as they are available (likely to be Spring/Summer 2013)
- a cheerful vampire goldfish paperclip

- Fang Girl stickers featuring the cover and quotes from the book 



a Rafflecopter giveaway

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making Blog Tour: Interviews + GIVEAWAY

Today, it's a pleasure to welcome Catherynne Valente to the blog as part of the blog tour for her wonderful book, The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making.  You're in for a treat because I'm sharing an interview with the main character, September, AND Cat herself!  Plus there's also a giveaway at the end...  I really enjoyed reading the book and found it to be a lovely, whimsical read. Click HERE to see my review :)  I hope you enjoy this stop of the blog tour <3

~Interview with September~

Fairy News at Midnight: We’re reporting LIVE from Fairyland and have been granted an exclusive interview with none other than Fairyland’s most famous visitor, September.

You've had many adventures in Fairyland, where’s your favourite place on the island?

Oh, goodness! Everything always happens so fast in Fairyland I hardly have time to see everything, but Pandemonium was just the most extraordinary place. I had to leave so quickly and I’m terribly sorry, I wish I could have wandered the woven streets and seen a fairy parade! I do find cities so marvelous--I’ve only been to Omaha twice, and Pandemonium is ever so much grander and more colorful! Perhaps one day I shall get to go back.

What was it like meeting The Marquess for the first time?

Dreadful! I’ve met unkind girls before, but she was so awfully frightening and strong. I wanted to be brave and good but you just can’t say no to her. She’s like one of those snake charmer’s I’ve seen in picture books. She plays her flute and you sway along. I suppose she is pretty, and I did like her panther, but she made me want to cry and hide and kick her and laugh at her all at once. I suppose that’s what Queens are like. I’ve never met one before! Oh, I know she calls herself a Marquess but that’s what she really is. I wonder if we might have been friends, if things were different and she weren’t Queen of anyplace. She did have such a fancy way of talking.

A-through-L was your most faithful and close companion, any secrets that you can divulge about him for our audience?

Good gracious! Poor Ell wouldn’t like me spilling his secrets all about! Even if secrets DO begin with S and he’s really wretched at keeping them. It’s not much of a secret to say he’s a big, lovely soul who means well even when he breaks things. But I will say that he feels terribly guilty that he’s held up his mother’s side of his heart, being big and lovely and a great thumping Wyvern with fiery breath, but hasn’t carried on his father’s line much. His father was a library, you know, and he hasn’t studied Library Magic even a bit. I think he hopes that once he finds a library that loves him and wants to take him in it’ll all come naturally! I’ve heard from the Green Wind that he’s taken a journey to the outer isles in order to take up an internship with a card catalogue imp, and I do hope it doesn’t take so long that he’s away when I return to Fairyland!

We hear that a new book, The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making was released this month chronicling your adventures. Do you think the narrator tells the story accurately and what do you think of Ana Juan’s likeness of you?

Didn’t Miss Juan draw such nice pictures of me? It was awfully kind of her to make me and Ell and Saturday look so fetching. I do especially like how she drew the Key! The Key is off having its own adventures now, but I hope it peeks into a bookstore’s lock and sees how sharp it’s looking on the cover.

The narrator is funny, isn’t she? She says all sorts of things that I think about, but can never quite manage to find the words for. Sometimes she stops the story to have her say, but that’s all right, sometimes you need to stop and contemplate everything that’s happened! I think if the narrator and I ever met, we’d have the most interesting time together!

What’s the one useful thing a young ravished child could pack before entering Fairyland?

Food or a compass! A good hunk of bread and dried meat would do her quite well, and a compass would help her to get her bearings--not that the directions in Fairyland are an obedient lot! But when you first arrive, everything is so confusing, and it’s nice to know one thing surely, which is to say North, because if you know one thing, other things will come to join it, by and by!

And tell us, what is the best tasting Fairy food?

Oh, just everything in the Autumn Provinces was delicious! I had no idea you could make so many things out of pumpkins!

Isn't September just the cutest?  I don't know about you, but I've had great fun 'getting to know' her!  And now over to Cat herself, who will be answering some of my questions...

~Interview with the Author~

Welcome to A Reading Daydreamer! Can you tell us a bit about yourself?

Hi! Well, I’m originally from Seattle on the west coast of America, but I live in Maine now, which is the very topmost tip of the east coast. I actually live on an island off the coast of Portland, Maine, and I have one husband, two dogs, two cats, and six chickens. I like to knit and play the accordion as well as write. I’ve been writing professionally for about eight years now. Fairyland was my tenth novel, but my first for kids.

When did you decide you wanted to become an author?

I always wanted to write, but that’s not the same as always wanting to be a writer. Originally, I meant to be a teacher, but it turned out I was pretty good at writing books. I decided to try to write fiction (I’d mainly been writing poetry before that) when I was 22 and working in a seaside village as a fortune teller. I just wanted to see if I could--I don’t think I intended to be an author until my fourth book came out.

What inspired you to write TGWCFIASOHOM and how did the idea come about?

Fairyland started out its life as a book within a book in my adult novel Palimpsest. It was the protagonist’s favorite childhood novel. When I toured for Palimpsest, people kept asking if it was real, where they could get a copy, could they find it online--and when I said no, they begged me to write it.

The spark of idea came from my old inability to understand Dorothy when I first say the Wizard of Oz film. I didn’t understand why, when faced with magic and witches and adventure, she wanted to go home to a miserable place where her parents were dead and the Depression was on. I would have wanted to stay--so I wrote a book about a girl who wanted to stay.

What was your reaction when you discovered it was going to be published?

I was over the moon. I could never have imagined that a book which began as a crowdfunded online serial would be picked up by a major press and made into such a beautiful physical book. I’m not going to lie, I cried.

If TGWCFIASOHOM was turned into a movie, who could you see playing the lead roles?

I imagine it might be animated, but I think Amandla Stenberg (Rue from The Hunger Games) or Kiernan Shipka (Sally Draper on Mad Men) would be wonderful as September, though I might prefer an unknown. For the voice of Ell, perhaps Stephen Fry or John Rhys-Davies? For Saturday, I think it’s important to find a middle eastern actor, and that probably means an unknown, as child actors of Arabic descent don’t often get much work in the western media. Abigail Breslin would be an amazing Marquess and I would love to see David Tennant as The Green Wind.

Can you give us a sneak peek of the next book in the series?

The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There is about September’s shadow, who has become Queen of the mysterious underworld known as Fairyland-Below, and is causing a good deal of trouble for topsiders. September has to go underground to fight herself and face the consequences of her choices in the first novel

What is your favourite childhood fairytale?

Snow White. My parents divorced early and I had a stepmother who didn’t much care for me, especially as I have dark hair like my mother and my siblings are all blonde. The story always seemed to be about me somehow. Without the dwarves.

If you could meet any fairytale character, who would it be and why?

The witch from Hansel and Gretel. A candy house is a strange idea--I always thought there was more going on with her than she let on. I’d like to sit down for tea. Witches are always the most interesting women

And finally, do you like to daydream?

Daydreaming is, quite literally, my job. I love it.

Thank you to Cat!  I hope you all enjoyed finding more about the author and September and if you haven't read the book, I hope it's encouraged you to check it out soon.

Here's the chance to get your hands on a copy...

The publisher is kindly giving away a paperback copy of the book to FIVE lucky readers!  Read on to see how you have a chance of winning...

Terms and Conditions:

- Fill in the Rafflecopter below - please don't leave your personal details in the comments

-You must live in the UK as the publisher will be sending the books out

- You must be 13 years or older, if you're under 13 please ask a parent/guardian for permission

- Neither I or the publisher are responsible for prizes lost or damaged in the post

- Giveaway ends at 12:01AM EST on 1st July 2012

Good Luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Have a great weekend,
Beverley <3

Straight to Heaven Blog Tour: Guest Post and GIVEAWAY!

I would like to introduce Michelle Scott, author of Straight to Hell and Straight to Heaven, to A Reading  Daydreamer!  Today is the last day of the Straight to Heaven blog tour and Michelle has written a guest post about her favourite childhood books for me to share here with you!  I hope you enjoy reading it and don't forget to enter the international giveaway at the end to be in with a chance of winning a 2GB iPod shuffle (wow, right?!) and there's also four e-copies of Straight to Heaven up for grabs!

So without further ado, over to Michelle...

Enter the Book Mobile

I owe my childhood love of reading to an old woman driving a really large caravan across the back roads of Michigan.

When I was growing up, I lived in a small community whose public library was shuffled from one odd location to another.  Every few years, they’d have to pack up their collection and haul it to another site: an old house, a deserted elementary school, or an unused office building...  The librarians were dedicated, but without proper funding, they had enough trouble finding a place to house their library let alone fill their shelves.

Enter the book mobile.

The book mobile was an enormous caravan (what we in Michigan called an RV) that housed a portion of the county’s public library.  Once a month, the book mobile would visit our area, and my mother and I would visit it.

Inside the vehicle, on either side of the narrow aisle, were shelves and shelves of books.  It was very claustrophobic, but I didn’t mind.  In fact, I wanted one of my own.

At the time, I liked fantasy novels – especially fantasy novels about enchanted animals – but for some reason, my mother thought I would do better with gritty, real-life dramas about teenagers who drank and did drugs.  Books like The Outsiders and Dinky Hocker Shoots Smack.  Both of those are very good novels, but since I was only eleven, they scared the you-know-what out of me.  I think my mother thought I’d learn something about ‘real life’ by reading them, but honestly, all I wanted was to be left alone with my enchanted animals.

The librarian who drove the book mobile from tiny town to tiny town was a very chatty lady, and over the years, we got to know her pretty well.  She was the one who recommended what has to be my favorite book of all time: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  To Kill a Mockingbird is a wonderful story that transitioned me from enchanted animals to novels about real life.  The book is funny enough to be gentle, but at the same time it doesn’t mince words when it comes to discussing racial issues in the south.

Now that my own kids are teenagers, I try not to press my tastes on them too much.  My daughters prefer books like Harry Potter and The Ranger’s Apprentice over gritty, realistic novels.  But then again, so do I.  As much as I like realistic fiction, I’ve never outgrown my love of fantasy.

***

About the author

Michelle Scott received her MFA from Wayne State University.  Her stories have appeared in such places as Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show, All Possible Worlds and Realms.  Her fantasy novel, The Dragons of Hazlett was nominated for a 2009 EPPIE Award.  Michelle’s YA novels include the vampire romance, Blood Sisters, and the fantasy Uncommon Magic.  Her latest fantasy novel, An Anthem for the Battle Lands, was recently released from Mundania Press, LLC.  Michelle lives in southeast Michigan with her husband and three children.

Website - Blog - Where to buy

And don't forget to enter the giveaway!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


Thank you to Michelle for taking time to stop by my blog and to Dani at Pen to Paper for hosting this wonderful tour!  I hope you all enjoyed it too and hopefully you'll be able to walk away with one of the prizes!

Happy reading,
Beverley x

P.S. I will be returning to regular blogging very soon!  I have two more exams and then they're all finished, leaving me a whole summer to catch up on reading and blogging!