Blog Tour: A Matter of Heart by Amy Fellner Dominy

Hi guys! I know I don't normally do blog tours, but this book was really personal to me and so I had to do the tour. I hope you enjoy my post as well as Amy's!

BOOK DETAILS

A Matter of Heart

by Amy Fellner Dominy

Publisher: Delacorte

Release Date: May 2015

BOOK LINKS: Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, The Book Depository, iTunes, Kobo

Synopsis:

Readers will happily sink into this emotionally grounded, contemporary young adult novel about the sudden end of one girl's Olympic swimming dreams and the struggles she endures before realizing there are many things that define who we are.

Sixteen-year-old Abby Lipman is on track to win the state swim championships and qualify for the Olympic trials when a fainting incident at a swim meet leads to the diagnosis of a deadly heart condition. Now Abby is forced to discover who she is without the one thing that's defined her entire life.

Excerpt

Swimming is who I am.

Winning is what I live for.

No one is going to stop me from becoming the fastest swimmer in the world.

Not my dad.

Not my boyfriend.

Not even my own heart.

My least favorite sport to play in PE

I am horribly uncoordinated, so I really wasn't a big fan of playing sports in PE class. Anything that required me to run, was something that I didn't enjoy. Plus I have balance issues along with some other health issues. So I struggled a lot. So I would definitely say anything that required me to run was my least favorite PE sport. Cross country running was hell on me and on my body. Yet I am so insanely competitive that I didn't "go easy" on myself. I pushed myself. 

When it came time to play baseball or soccer or basketball, I hated it too, although it wasn't as bad as running for me. At least I got to stand, shoot baskets and kick soccer balls. That was actual relief for me and my body. 

Believe me, I wish I was more coordinated and had better balance. Thankfully my teen brother has all the athleticism in the world.

Guest Post

I’m not the most athletic person in the world. My marching band director once yelled at me for being so uncoordinated that he told me to stop playing my Clarinet and just focus on moving my feet.  Ouch!  But, like most things I’m told I can’t do, I get stubborn. And I work harder. I ended up being able to march and play my instrument through four years of high school and three years of college. So there, Mr. Band Director! 

            Anyway, I’ve always loved sports and I’ve always wished I were more talented. I think that’s one of the reasons I really liked writing about Abby. It was one of my dreams to be the best of the best at something. Abby is that. She’s a top swimmer and blue ribbons are the only kind she collects. So while I wrote this book, at least in my imagination, I got to experience what it would be like to swim like a fish. 

So, with no further ado, here’s the scoop on me and sports:

  

TOP FIVE SPORTS LIST

FAVORITE SPORT TO PLAY: Doubles tennis. It’s a lot fun and you get to play with a friend.

FAVORITE SPORT TO WATCH: Men’s tennis. It’s not all about gawking at a bunch of very handsome men, but, um, that might be part of it.

FAVORITE SPORTS TEAM: Oberlin College baseball team. What can I say…my son is one of the starting pitchers. J Go Yeomen!!

FAVORITE SPORT FOR CURSING: Golf. I play every week with my hubby and there’s just something about that retched sport that brings out the potty mouth in me. But, I do love the challenge of golf—one day I’m going to figure the darn thing out.

MY GREATEST SPORTS VICTORY: Abby might beat my pants off in swimming, but there’s one sport where I was once crowned CHAMPION:

Hula hooping.

Yep—I was pretty darn good with a Hula hoop and thank heavens there’s no video of it now!  Though it’s not an Olympic sport yet, I really think it should be, don’t you?

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Amy Fellner Dominy worked as a copywriter in the advertising business before leaving to earn her MFA in playwriting. Her plays for adults and children have been staged in various cities around the country. Amy's novels for teens include OyMG (Walker, 2011) and AUDITION & SUBTRACTION (Walker, 2012.) Amy's next book is a contemporary YA coming Spring, 2015 from Random House. It's called A MATTER OF HEART.

AUTHOR LINKS:

Website

Goodreads

Twitter

Facebook

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SST: Making Pretty by Corey Ann Haydu

Welcome to the Sunday Street Team! This awesome idea was one that Nori of Readwritelove28 came up with and I jumped at the chance to be a part of it.

Today, I have Corey Ann Haydu and her new book, Making Pretty on the blog. You may recall that I posted a review of this book a couple of days ago, but in case you missed it, go ahead and read it now. Don't forget to enter the giveaway below!

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Goodreads Link: GR

Synopsis (GR): 
Montana and her sister, Arizona, are named after the mountainous states their mother left them for. But Montana is a New York City girl through and through, and as the city heats up, she’s stepping into the most intense summer of her life. With Arizona wrapped up in her college world and their father distracted by yet another divorce, Montana’s been immersing herself in an intoxicating new friendship with a girl from her acting class. Karissa is bold, imperfectly beautiful, and unafraid of being vulnerable. She’s everything Montana would like to become. But the friendship with Karissa is driving a wedge between Montana and her sister, and the more of her own secrets Karissa reveals, the more Montana has to wonder if Karissa’s someone she can really trust. In the midst of her uncertainty, Montana finds a heady distraction in Bernardo. He’s serious and spontaneous, and he looks at Montana in the way she wants to be seen. For the first time, Montana understands how you can become both lost and found in somebody else. But when that love becomes everything, where does it leave the rest of her imperfect life? 

Review:
How does Corey Ann Haydu do this? 

She creates wonderfully real, flawed characters that you don' t always love, but you root for them. She creates real life situations that would make most of us ragey, frustrated and sometimes downright angry.

I've never been the type of person who needs to love or even like the characters in order to like or even love the book. That was a much needed realization as I dove into this book. Montana did not make the best decisions in her life. She makes questionable decisions throughout the book. Some of her decisions made me want to put my head through a wall. I literally had to remind myself that she was a teenager. Teenagers are pretty much known for making questionable decisions.

She struggles with wanting to belong, and while that is definitely a teenage thing, I think that's also something that comes with having extremely limited contact with her mom and her dad basically treating marriage as unimportant as he marries them, talks them into a lot of plastic surgery and then eventually divorces them. I understand Montana's unhealthy approach to relationships and love.

That's why I didn't mind her relationship with Bernardo too much. Yes, the guy had red flags all over him, and yes, I didn't like him very much. However Montana just wanted to be loved for who she was. She wanted someone to want to stick around for her. Bernardo was that guy. He made her feel loved, adored and cherished. 

Yes she had her friend, Roxanne and her older sister Arizona, but there was distance between them. Both Roxanne and Arizona were in college and Montana definitely felt left out.

This was where Karissa came in.

Karissa was one of those "bad decisions" She seemed to use  Montana, drugs & alcohol as a way to deal with her rough life. In toxic friendships, the toxic one usually pulls the other friend into things so quickly and so fully that it takes awhile for the non-toxic person to realize that the toxic person is not all that great.

This book was intoxicating. I was absolutely addicted to this book and I was so curious to see how things would turn out by the end. I wish we had gotten a bit more in the end because I really wanted to see how certain things played out. I did love this book though and will happily give it 5 stars.

About the Author: 
Corey Ann Haydu is the author of OCD LOVE STORY, LIFE BY COMMITTEE, MAKING PRETTY and her upcoming middle grade debut, RULES FOR STEALING STARS. A graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and The New School’s Writing for Children MFA program, Corey has been working in children’s publishing since 2009. In 2013, Corey was chosen as one of Publisher Weekly’s Flying Starts. Her books have been Junior Library Guild Selections, Indie Next Selections, and BCCB Blue Ribbon Selections. Corey also teaches YA Novel Writing with Mediabistro and is adapting her debut novel, OCD LOVE STORY into a high school play, which will have its first run in Fall 2015. Corey lives in Brooklyn with her dog, her boyfriend, and a wide selection of cheese. 

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Release Day Blitz: Play On by Michelle Smith

 Title: Play On

Author: Michelle Smith

Release Date: April 21, 2015

Publisher: Spencer Hill Contemporary

Synopsis

In the small town of Lewis Creek, baseball is everything. Especially for all-star pitcher Austin Braxton, who has a one-way ticket out of town with his scholarship to a top university. All that stands between him and a new start is one final season. But when Austin starts flunking Chemistry, his picture-perfect future is in jeopardy. A failing grade means zero playing time, and zero playing time means no scholarship.

Enter Marisa Marlowe, the new girl in town who gets a job at his momma's flower shop. Not only is Marisa some home-schooled super-genius, she's also a baseball fanatic and more than willing to help Austin study. As the two grow closer, there's something about Marisa that makes Austin want more than just baseball and out of Lewis Creek--he wants a future with her. But Marisa has a past that still haunts her, one that she ran all the way to South Carolina to escape.

As Austin starts to peel back the layers of Marisa s pain, it forces him to look beyond the facade of himself and everyone he thought he knew in his town. What he sees instead is that in a small town like Lewis Creek, maybe baseball isn t everything--maybe it is just the thing that ties them all together."

  

Buy Links and Goodreads Link:

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

The Book Depository

IndieBound

Goodreads

Excerpt

In this excerpt, Marisa surprises Austin on the baseball field…in more ways than one.

I pass the bat to her, watching her face light up like a full moon on a summer night. “Now, it’s a little heavy,” I joke. “Think you can handle it?”

Her eyes widen. “I don’t know,” she says breathlessly. “I may need the help of a big, strong, baseball player. Because we both know that baseball is so superior to softball.”

I shake my head. “That’s not entirely true. Your balls are bigger.”

We stare at each other. Stare. Stare some more. She’s the first one who breaks, bursting out laughing. It’s one of the best sounds I’ve heard in a long time.

“Here,” I say, still laughing. I carefully place my hands on her hips, helping her square up over the plate. “In case, you know, you’re too out of practice.”

She bites back a smile. “Yeah. Because I’ve totally forgotten how to square up for a pitch.”

“Two years is a long time.” Resting my hands on her shoulders, I remind her, “And relax these. You’re too stiff.”

She hangs her head. “You’re killin’ me, Smalls.”

I walked right into that one. She relaxes her shoulders. Slowly, my hands move down her arms until they rest on top of hers. They’re so warm, fit so perfectly in mine that it almost hurts to let them go. But I do, because, you know, friends.

“There,” I say on an exhale. “Ready?”

Her lips curve up. “Let me have it, Floral Prince.”

My mouth drops open. “All right. No mercy, Marlowe.”

I grab the ball and jog out to the mound. I gotta say, she’s the prettiest batter I’ve ever been up against. Taking a deep breath, I wind up and let my fastball fly.

That girl smacks the hell out of the ball.

Holy… I turn, watching it sail all the way back to the fence. When I whirl back around, she grins, pointing the bat at me.

“And that’s how it’s done,” she calls to me, setting the bat in the dirt. She wipes her hands on her jeans.

All I can do is gape. Some of the guys on our team could take a lesson from her. It’s not like I thought she would be bad, but damn. I pull off my cap as I walk toward her. As soon as I tug it onto her head, she laughs.

“Are you going to have any of these left?”

“I have an endless supply.” I nudge the brim of the cap, so I can see her eyes. “And you’ve earned that one.”

She quirks her lips into this little half-smirk that makes me pure weak in the knees. Takes a step closer. Another. And another. I swallow hard. My hands ache to touch her, to pull her to me and kiss the daylights out of her.

But friends, though.

Q&A with Michelle Smith

1. Play On touches on several sensitive topics. What do you hope your readers will take away from reading it?

I hope they come away knowing that illnesses do not define us. That setbacks, mistakes, scars, whatever we’ve done in the past—none of that defines who we are. That yes, you can fall to rock bottom, and you can still thrive after that fall. There’s laughter, and happiness, and hope, and love waiting for you—there’s so much love. And I hope they know that they’re worthy of that love.

It’s okay to not be okay. It’s okay to reach out. It’s okay to admit that you need help with this crazy life-thing. Because none of us have all the answers—we’re just doing the best we can. And we’re all in it together.

2. What scene do you most regret having to cut?

Not really a scene itself, but one of the lines. In the original draft, Austin had an ex-girlfriend that was, in a word, vengeful. One night, Austin told her to leave, and she came back to slash his truck’s tires. After discovering what happened the next morning, his mom said, “Your breakup really brought out the redneck in that girl.” That line always made me giggle.

(There’s no ex-girlfriend in the final version, by the way. She got the cut in my first round of edits.)

3. On the flip side, what was your favorite scene that got added during edits?

My favorite scene in the entire book was added during edits!  It takes place toward the end and involves stars, hand-holding, and Austin and Marisa talking about what’s to come, rather than the past. It’s a sweet moment that makes me grin like an idiot.

4. Biggest writing quirk?

I have to have something on my feet, whether it’s socks or shoes. Like, I absolutely cannot write with cold feet.

5. Are you working on any new projects?

I am! I can’t say too much at the moment, but I will say that we haven’t seen the last of Lewis Creek. ;) 

Author Bio:

Michelle Smith was born and raised in North Carolina, where she developed a healthy appreciation for college football, sweet tea, front porches, and a well-placed “y’all.” She’s a lover of all things happy, laughs way too much, and fully believes that a little bit of kindness goes a long way.

Michelle lives near the Carolina coast with her family.

Author Social Media Links: 

Website

Twitter

Facebook

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Blog Tour: Play On by Michelle Smith

Title: Play On

Author: Michelle Smith

Release Date: April 21, 2015

Publisher: Spencer Hill Contemporary

Synopsis: 

In the small town of Lewis Creek, baseball is everything. Especially for all-star pitcher Austin Braxton, who has a one-way ticket out of town with his scholarship to a top university. All that stands between him and a new start is one final season. But when Austin starts flunking Chemistry, his picture-perfect future is in jeopardy. A failing grade means zero playing time, and zero playing time means no scholarship.

Enter Marisa Marlowe, the new girl in town who gets a job at his momma's flower shop. Not only is Marisa some home-schooled super-genius, she's also a baseball fanatic and more than willing to help Austin study. As the two grow closer, there's something about Marisa that makes Austin want more than just baseball and out of Lewis Creek--he wants a future with her. But Marisa has a past that still haunts her, one that she ran all the way to South Carolina to escape.

As Austin starts to peel back the layers of Marisa s pain, it forces him to look beyond the facade of himself and everyone he thought he knew in his town. What he sees instead is that in a small town like Lewis Creek, maybe baseball isn t everything--maybe it is just the thing that ties them all together."

Excerpt

In this scene, Austin and Marisa have been sentenced to Valentine’s Day duty at the flower shop. Once Austin discovers that Marisa is a dance-hater, he proves that not all dates are entirely terrible.

She lets go of my hand. I fight a frown. Come back. “That sounds good. Are you…” Looking down at my now-lonely hand, she clears her throat. “Will you be going to the dance?”

I shrug a shoulder. “Dances are a lot more fun when you’ve got a date to spoil all night, which I don’t. Never thought to ask anyone.” And if I did ask someone, it’d be the girl in front of me.

She sighs and leans onto the counter, putting her chin in her hands. “Well, congratulations. You’ll hang on to your soul.”

Or not. I bite back a smile. “Not a dancer, I’m guessing?”

She shakes her head. “Never been a fan. Formal dances are the invention of Satan.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. You have dances confused with Chem. That’s where Satan focused all his energy.”

She pushes me, smirking. “I’m serious. A girl has to suffer through frilly decorations, spiked punch, and the guy trying to get in her pants afterward, and for what? A corsage, maybe some dinner, and two hours of dancing, which results in foot blisters.” She hops off the stool and grabs the push-broom. “I’m so glad I’ll never have to go to another one again. Homeschooling for the win.”

’Kay. So now I’m really glad I never asked her.

“See, I’m insulted,” I say, moving around the counter. “Guys don’t always try to get in your pants. And dances aren’t that bad.” Maybe a little bad, but not complete torture.

She starts sweeping, huffing a little. “So says Lewis Creek’s god of baseball. Of course dances are awesome for you.” She holds the broom to her chest, throwing her hand up to her forehead like she’s in Gone with the Wind or some crap. “Oh, Austin! I never knew there was a difference between fastballs and sliders, but whisper it in my ear while we dance all night in the bed of your truck.”

I wiggle my eyebrows. “And by ‘dance,’ you mean what, exactly?” She swats the broom at me. I hold up my hands in surrender. “All right, all right! But I will say that, after a few beers, truck dancin’ is a blast. You should try it.”

She rolls her eyes and resumes sweeping, turning her back to me. Okay, then. Challenge accepted. I dig my phone out of my pants pocket and scroll through the music app until I find a halfway decent slow song. You can never go wrong with some Luke Bryan. Girls eat that shit up.

As the opening notes of “Crash My Party” fill the room, Marisa stops. Her head pops up, and she whirls around, cocking an eyebrow. “Um, what do you think you’re doing?”

Grinning, I place the phone on the counter and hold out my hand. “I’m on a mission to prove that not all dance dates are evil. I’ll have you know, I’m a darn good date.”

Her gaze flickers from my outstretched hand to my face. “Are you serious?”

“As a heart attack.” With the way my heart’s pounding, that’s entirely possible. Even though it sounds cheesy as hell, I think I finally know what girls mean when they talk about having butterflies in their gut, or stomach, or whatever. But even that’s not a good way to describe it. The butterflies feel like they’re all over the place.

And now I’m thinking about butterflies. Lord, help me.

She narrows her eyes. “You’ve been drinking moonshine again, haven’t you?”

Maybe the Luke Bryan song wasn’t as foolproof as I’d thought. “Please?”

She opens her mouth like she’s going to argue again, but instead she sighs and sets the broom against one of the coolers. “That’s not fair,” she says, crossing the distance between us. “No one in her right mind can resist that accent.”

When she slips her hand into mine, I pull her against me in one swift movement. She sucks in a breath, looking up at me with wide eyes.

“What?” I ask, resting my hands just above her hips. “Too close?” 

She smiles. Looping her arms around my neck, she says, “I think it’s just right.”

Author Bio:
Michelle Smith was born and raised in North Carolina, where she developed a healthy appreciation for college football, sweet tea, front porches, and a well-placed “y’all.” She’s a lover of all things happy, laughs way too much, and fully believes that a little bit of kindness goes a long way. Michelle lives near the Carolina coast with her family.

Author Social Media Links: 

Website: http://msmithbooks.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/MichelleA_Smith

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Michelle-Smith/102249256558130

Tumblr: http://michellesmithya.tumblr.com/

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Blog Tour & Giveaway: Positively Beautiful by Wendy Mills

Welcome to Adventures in Reading. Today, I am participating in a blog tour for Positively Beautiful. Generally I don't do blog tours anymore unless I either read the book and adored it or I haven't read it, but am very excited for it. Positively Beautiful fell into the former category.

Book Information:

Book Title: Positively Beautiful
Author: Wendy Mills
Published Date: March 3rd, 2015
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA Childrens

Book Link: Goodreads
Purchase Links: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, The Book Depository

Synopsis:

Jodi Picoult for teens meets Lurlene McDaniel. Beautiful written, beautifully moving, a vivid contemporary story of a girl’s unusual but terrible dilemma - and the love story that springs from it. 

Erin’s life is taken up with her best friend, Trina, her crush on smoky-eyed, unattainable Michael, and fending off Faith, the vision of perfection who’s somehow always had a knife in for Erin. Her dad, a pilot, died when she was very young, but Erin and her mom are just fine on their own.

Then everything changes forever when Erin’s mom announces she has breast cancer and even worse, the cancer is linked to a rare gene mutation. The chances that Erin has inherited it are frighteningly high. Would it be better to get tested and have major preemptive surgery or spend as much life as she has left in blissful ignorance?

As Erin grapples with the terrible dilemma, her life spirals downward, alleviated only by the flying lessons she starts taking. Up in the sky, following in her dad’s footsteps, Erin finds freedom chasing the horizon. She also finds solace in Ashley, a girl she meets in an online support group. But when, in a moment of madness, Erin flies away to find her new friend, she finds herself on a journey that will take her through not only shock and despair—but ultimately, to a new understanding of the true meaning of beauty and love.

My Thoughts:

I actually posted a review last month and I'll link to it here, but what I really wanted to talk about was Erin's relationship with her mom. It's such an important part of the book and it was my favorite part of the book. I don't see a lot of positive mother-daughter relationships in YA, so I was happy that Mills chose to write a positive mother-daughter relationship. I related a lot to Erin's relationship with her mom because I have always been very close with my own mom. Watching Erin deal with her mom's illness was absolutely heartbreaking and I kept thinking about how I would have reacted if I was in her position with my mom. It was a beautiful book that made me so thankful that my mom is in decent health. I just couldn't imagine going through what they went through.

Author Biography:

WENDY MILLS was born in Virginia and spent several years in North Carolina, but now lives with her family on the tropical island of Bokeelia, off the south-west coast of Florida where she spends her time writing and dodging hurricanes. She has published adult mysteries with Poisoned Pen Press, and Positively Beautiful is her first young adult novel.  Visit her online at www.wendymillsbooks.com or on Twitter @WendyMillsBooks.

This is a US only giveaway for 1 hardcover of POSITIVELY BEAUTIFUL by Wendy Mills. Entrants must be 13 years or older.

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POSITIVELY BEAUTIFUL Blog Tour Schedule

March 2^nd à Jenuine Cupcakes

March 3^rd à YA Bibliophile

March 4^th à Book Revels

March 5^th à  The Hardcover Lover

March 6^th à Bookiemoji

March 9^th à Dana Square

March 10^th à Lovin Los Libros

March 11^th à The Book Belles

March 12^th à Adventures in Reading

March 13^th à Who Ru Blog

Blog Tour & Giveaway: The Orphan Queen (The Orphan Queen #1) by Jodi Meadows

Hello everyone, and welcome to Adventures in Reading. Normally I don't do blog tours unless I've read the book and loved it or I haven't read the book, but am extremely excited for it. This time, it's the latter.

BOOK INFORMATION

 TITLE: The Orphan Queen

AUTHOR: Jodi Meadows

SERIES: The Orphan Queen #1

PUBLISHER: Katherine Tegen Books

PUBLICATION DATE: March 10, 2015

FIND IT: Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, The Book Depository, IndieBound

SYNOPSIS: 

Wilhelmina has a hundred identities.

She is a princess. When the Indigo Kingdom conquered her homeland, Wilhelmina and other orphaned children of nobility were taken to Skyvale, the Indigo Kingdom’s capital. Ten years later, they are the Ospreys, experts at stealth and theft. With them, Wilhelmina means to take back her throne.

She is a spy. Wil and her best friend, Melanie, infiltrate Skyvale Palace to study their foes. They assume the identities of nobles from a wraith-fallen kingdom, but enemies fill the palace, and Melanie’s behavior grows suspicious. With Osprey missions becoming increasingly dangerous and their leader more unstable, Wil can’t trust anyone.

She is a threat. Wraith is the toxic by-product of magic, and for a century using magic has been forbidden. Still the wraith pours across the continent, reshaping the land and animals into fresh horrors. Soon it will reach the Indigo Kingdom. Wilhelmina’s magic might be the key to stopping the wraith, but if the vigilante Black Knife discovers Wil’s magic, she will vanish like all the others,

Jodi Meadows introduces a vivid new fantasy full of intrigue, romance, dangerous magic, and one girl’s battle to reclaim her place in the world.

Necessity forced Wilhelmina to become good at many things -- including forgery. She regularly uses this skill to steal food and clothing shipments, create "official" identification documents, and obtain supplies to help her reach her goal of retaking her kingdom.

My Thoughts
I haven't read The Orphan Queen yet, but by the time this post goes up I will have an ARC loaned to me by a fellow blogger, and will have probably dove into it. I do think Wilhelmina will be a badass character. I am sure there will be times when I want to yell at her for making stupid decisions, but I think I'll end up falling in love with her.

AUTHOR INFO

Jodi Meadows lives and writes in the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, with her husband, a Kippy*, and an alarming number of ferrets. She is a confessed book addict, and has wanted to be a writer ever since she decided against becoming an astronaut. She is the author of the INCARNATE Trilogy and the forthcoming ORPHAN QUEEN Duology (HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen).

*A Kippy is a cat.

CONNECT WITH THE AUTHOR

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Harper Collins has graciously offered to give away a copy of The Orphan Queen to one of my readers. This is for US mailing addresses only and will run from midnight on March 2, 2015 until March 8, 2015 at 11:59PM EST. Please fill out the rafflecopter entry below and good luck!

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Blog Tour: When Joss Met Matt by Ellie Cahill

ABOUT WHEN JOSS MET MATT:

In the tradition of New Adult superstar Jessica Sorensen, Ellie Cahill’s debut novel is a charming friends-with-benefits story . . . with a twist!

What if after every bad breakup, there was someone to help “cleanse your palate”—someone who wouldn’t judge you, who was great in bed, someone you were sure not to fall in love with? “Sorbet sex” could solve everything—as long as it never got too sweet.

Joss and Matt have been friends since freshman year of college, meeting one night after Joss is dumped by her boyfriend. After a few drinks, Matt humors her with a proposition: that he’ll become her go-to guy whenever she needs to heal a broken heart. In return, she’ll do the same for him. The #1 Rule: They’ll never fall in love with each other. People scoff at the arrangement. But six years later, Joss and Matt are still the best of friends . . . with benefits.

Through a string of boyfriends and girlfriends—some almost perfect, some downright wrong—Joss and Matt are always there for each other when the going gets tough. No strings. No attachments. Piece of cake. No problem. After all, since they wrote the rules, surely they can play by them. Or can they?

Advance praise for When Joss Met Matt:

“Hands down, one of my favorite New Adult reads . . . Ellie Cahill is definitely one to watch!”—New York Times bestselling author Cora Carmack 

“This is one of those books that make you forget everything around you. Prepare to be consumed by this story.”—Sophie Jordan, New York Times bestselling author of Wild

“Fun, sexy, and full of amazing chemistry, When Joss Met Matt is an entertaining escape that will leave you smiling with every turn of the page.”—Cassie Mae, author of The Real Thing

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Ellie Cahill is a freelance writer and also writes books for young adults under the name Liz Czukas. She lives outside Milwaukee, Wisconsin, with her husband, son, and the world’s loudest cat.

CONNECT WITH THE AUTHOR

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Book Blitz & Giveaway: Breaking the Rules (Pushing the Limits #1.5) by Katie McGarry

Breaking the Rules (Pushing the Limits #1.5)

by Katie McGarry 

Release Date: 12/08/14

Harlequin Teen

Summary from Goodreads:

A summer road trip changes everything in this unforgettable new tale from acclaimed author Katie McGarry.

For new high school graduate Echo Emerson, a summer road trip out west with her boyfriend means getting away and forgetting what makes her so... different. It means seeing cool sights while selling her art at galleries along the way. And most of all, it means almost three months alone with Noah Hutchins, the hot, smart, soul-battered guy who’s never judged her. Echo and Noah share everything — except the one thing Echo’s just not ready for.

But when the source of Echo’s constant nightmares comes back into her life, she has to make some tough decisions about what she really wants — even as foster kid Noah’s search for his last remaining relatives forces them both to confront some serious truths about life, love, and themselves.

Now, with one week left before college orientation, jobs and real life, Echo must decide if Noah's more than the bad-boy fling everyone warned her he'd be. And the last leg of an amazing road trip will turn... seriously epic.

Available for Pre-Order:
     

Books in the series:
(covers linked to Goodreads)
    

Excerpt

From Noah’s Point of View

“Me and you,” I whisper, hoping my words will sink into her subconscious, beyond where she overthinks. “It’s how it’s supposed to be.”

Echo’s hand glides over mine, and she links our fingers together. “You like disturbing my sleep, don’t you?”

I kiss her shoulder, permitting my lips to linger on her soft skin. Guess I did wake her. “Just keeping things straight between us.”

“In my sleep?” Damn, I love that groggy voice.

“You argue less that way.”

About the Author

KATIE MCGARRY was a teenager during the age of grunge and boy bands and remembers those years as the best and worst of her life. She is a lover of music, happy endings, and reality television, and is a secret University of Kentucky basketball fan.

Katie would love to hear from her readers. Contact her via her website, katielmcgarry.com, follow her on Twitter @KatieMcGarry, or become a fan on Facebook and Goodreads.

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