Book Recommendation--Immortal Beloved

Immortal Beloved by Cate Tiernan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was one of those books I had a hard time putting down. I love history, so I LOVED Nastasya's flashbacks to her previous life. It almost felt like two books in one. And Reyn, the Viking god--yeah, who wouldn't love him? Great read!

If you've read it, what did you think?


View all my reviews

Full Shorts Week

This week at Tangled Fiction, the girls and I have decided to each write 1 full short story to share with you all! I kick us off today with a short starring Jack and Charlie, the two main characters in my wip, GREYSKIN.

Here is a small teaser, but to read the full, you'll have to hop over to TF and check it out!

Jack stands beside me, mouth open, eyes wide, as we stare down into an empty trunk. The heat of the exhaust burns my leg through my jeans, but I can’t move away from it. The trunk is empty.

“Where the hell’d it go?” Jack asks.

I shake my head. “How’d it get out?”

Jacky slams the trunk closed and turns around to lean against it. I do the same. The cicadas buzz so loud out here at night it’s impossible to hear anything else, so there’s no point being on guard. Besides, not even Jack can outrun a pissed off vampire. After being knocked over the head with a tire iron, wrapped in silver chains, and thrown in a trunk, I’m sure I’d be pretty pissed too. Vampires aren’t known for their happy-go-lucky attitudes. 

Thanks for reading! And I hope you check out the full story.
Happy Monday!

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Sunday Squirrel

Stretchy Squirrel

*More about Sunday Squirrel*

Happy Thanksgiving!

First, HAPPY THANKSGIVING!! I hope everyone is enjoying family/friends/loved ones and good food right now, instead of reading this. But in case everyone you love is in a food coma and you're all by your lonesome, here are the top 5 writing related things I am thankful for.

1. My friends and family. My parents and siblings, my husband and my children. Even my in-laws, who are super awesome. I've been blessed with the people in my life. I could gush on about how amazing my husband is and how smart, cute, funny, well-behaved my kids are, but you don't want to hear all that. The people in my life support my writing and I think it's very important to any writer to have that support. And my mom gave me the awesome desk that I write on. :)

2. The ability to write! Like Kristi said, I am very thankful that I can write! It's what I love (read: need) to do, and I am thankful that I am able.

3. Critique partners! Without my Sisters, and writing friends, my writing would be nowhere near the level it is right now. I'm very grateful for all their time, patience, and hard work.

4. The Internet. Not only is it a fantastic marketing tool (you know, for whenever I'll actually have a book to market), but it's basically my only social outlet. Writing is a very solitary endeavor, and although my family and friends are supportive, they don't always get my obsession with pretty book covers, or the relationship I have with the people in my head. You guys do. Right?

5. The YA writing community. Writers both published and non, agented and still treading through the query trenches. You are all so helpful and supportive. Everyone believes in paying it forward. In helping each other. This kind of community is just invaluable. Many of you organize charities and events, like the season of love and hope auction that Valerie mentioned yesterday. There is the YA lit chat community. the Verla Kay blue boards. The countless blogs chock full of information for aspiring writers on everything from what books to read, to how publishing works, to who, how and when to query. You are all fantastic! Thank you all!

What are YOU thankful for?

Happy Thanksgiving!

comic from http://www.inkygirl.com/

Bikers With Dolls

I may or may not have mentioned that my husband and I ride. We also belong to a local riding club, formerly a HOG chapter that was forced to disband when our local dealership closed. The club has always done a toy run every year where each rider brings a donation of one new, unwrapped toy, and we ride together (with biker Santa and Mrs. Biker Clause--also club members) to a daycare center in an under privileged neighborhood where Santa meets the kids and gives everyone a toy. Afterward, we go party and listen to live music, but that's not the important part. OR the fun part.

Lots of bikers made lots of children happy, and not just on this day with our club and those who came out to support the event. I didn't take any of these pictures, so I am totally stealing them from the guys who did, but I just have to share. It was such an awesome day. I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving!

:)

Biker Santa (also known as Bob)

I am somewhere to Santa's right (left side of the pic) in this one. See how many bikers showed up? :D And the NYPD escorted us all safely to the daycare. Thanks, NYPD!

That's only about half of the donated toys.

The girls and I taking names and toys. I am in the back, middle, and that cute lil reindeer up front is mine.

Our amazing escorts! If I get ticketed for going through all those red lights, I'm coming to them...

Some of the kids and families that came to see Santa!

And there is a few hundred more, but I'll stop here. HUGE thanks to all the riders who came out, to Santa Bob and his wife for being so awesome, and for the NYPD for keeping the NYC traffic at bay for hundreds of motorcycles. And thanks to you for looking!

Intense Debate

One thing I love about lj is the threaded comments. Blogger, I adore your user friendliness, but you lack this feature, and that sucks. So I've added intense debate to my comments! If you don't have an intense debate account (but you should because it's pretty cool) and you don't want to make one, have no fear! You can sign in using open ID.

:D

Website Launch!

Do you remember my website with the cool flash animation, and the creepy desk, and flickering candle of awesome? Well, that's gone now.

*sniffle*

But! I have put up another website, a much more informative one, in it's place. I loved my old one, but flash doesn't work well for everyone, and I wanted it to be user friendly. Anywho, once I figure out how to recreate the website background in photoshop and then edit blogger, this will match a little better. I hope. But I am really terrible with photoshop so by the time I figure that out, I'll probably end up changing it all again.

:)

Redesign!

In case you were wondering, I am attempting to make my blog match my website @ ljboldyrev.com.

It won't look so crazy around here once I figure this out!

Tangled Fiction: This post brought to you by the letter 'T'

Tangled Fiction: This post brought to you by the letter 'T': "We have an announcement to make. *ahem* We have heard from a few readers that they prefer waiting until Friday to read the full story all ..."

Sunday Squirrel

This is one of my favorites. They store food inside this tree.

Tangled Fiction Fulls

We now have an archive page on the TF blog where we will post links to the full stories as well as each individual part. lhttp://http://tangledfiction.blogspot.com/p/story-archive.html Sneak peek of IN THE CARDS, started by me, continued by Natalie C Parker, and concluded by Valerie Kemp!

The caravan sat up against an old wooden fence, covered in rust and moss like it had been puked out by the earth. Vintage, her older brother Lem had called it, but Nim knew better. Vintage meant trash.

She pulled her shawl around her shoulders, but the wind still bit her skin. She couldn’t go inside yet. Lem hadn’t given the signal. Tonight’s girl was blonde, her skin bronzed by the sun. Nim looked down at her own milky white hands. She’d never have tan skin. She’d never have anything the girl in the caravan had—money, friends. It wasn’t in the cards for her.

Follow the above link to read more of this one, and our second 3 part short, WHAT WISHES ARE MADE OF! Thanks for looking!

Author Interview with Carrie Harris!

No, not here. But over at my critique group blog, Sisters in Scribe, Kristi has set up a fabulous interview with one of my favorite people, YA author, Carrie Harris! Carrie's debut novel BAD TASTE IN BOYS will be released July 12th 2011 and is available for pre-order now. With a cover like this, it's a must have.

About the book, from Carrie's (awesome) website:

Someone’s been a very bad zombie.

Super-smartie Kate Grable gets to play doctor, helping out her high school football team. Not only will the experience look good on her college apps, she gets to bethis close to her quarterback crush, Aaron. Then something disturbing happens. Kate finds out that the coach has given the team steroids. Except . . . the vials she finds don’t exactly contain steroids. Whatever’s in them is turning hot gridiron hunks into mindless, flesh-eating . . . zombies.

Unless she finds an antidote, no one is safe. Not Aaron, not Kate’s brother, not her best friend . . . not even Kate . . .

It’s scary. It’s twisted. It’s sick. It’s high school.

Please hop on over and check out Carrie's interview. If you aren't familiar with her, you want to be, and if you are, you know you love her.

Teen Fiction Contest!

Teen fiction contest deadline is Nov. 11

Teens in grades seven through 12 can write a short story or a few chapters of a book, up to 10 typed pages, for a Teen Fiction Writing contest. The entry deadline is Nov. 11. Any genre, from contemporary, historical, fantasy, realistic, steampunk, horror or paranormal, is acceptable. The contest will coincide with a teen author event being held at Barnes & Noble on Route 59 in Nanuet at 3 p.m. Dec. 11.

The authors are Shannon Delany, author of “13 to Life”; Margie Gelbwasser, author of “Inconvenient”; Shari Maurer, author of “Change of Heart”; Jen Nadol, author of “The Mark”; and Jame Richards, author of “Three Rivers Rising.” They will read from their novels, talk about writing and publishing a book, and sign copies of their books.

The winner will get a 15-minute one-on-one critique with one of the authors before the Dec. 11 program and a signed copy of the author’s book. Entries may be e-mailed to shari.maurer@alumni.duke.edu or brought to the Nanuet Barnes & Noble store. Visit www.sharimaurer.com.

Sunday Squirrel

As you may know, I'm a bit of a squirrel watcher. Only because I live in NYC and my wildlife interaction is limited to pigeons and squirrels, and the occasional rat. I've seen a raccoon, a few hawks, and a opossum before, but not often. Anyway, squirrels. They're cute and I like them, so I take pictures whenever they come to my yard. I post the pictures on my facebook every now and then, but I decided I want to start sharing them here. So I give to you Sunday Squirrel! :D Yay! Every Sunday (I will try to remember every single Sunday) I will post one picture of a squirrel that I've taken. Starting now.