Hi kittens! I hope everyone had a fantabulous New Year period.
Now for the part I know you’ve been waiting with bated breathon the edge of your seat for. The winners of the giveaway where you got to choose which of my books you could receive.
Because there were eight entries, there are four winners.
Eveyone should check their emails because I’ve sent off the coupons now.
If you didn’t win, that’s too bad, but better luck for next time!
That’s right: because I’m an indie author I can host giveaways as often as I want. Which is really cool, actually. Because I guarantee there will be more in the future.
Thanks for playing, kittens! I had fun. Almost as much fun as this kitty:
Look what magically happens now when you search my name on Amazon!
This is the Amazon.com page from a United Kingdom server - it's really $0.99 when you purchase in the United States and £0.86 in the United Kingdom.
Storm Front, the Tina Storm urban fantasy short story collection bundled with The Archive of Lost Dreams paranormal short story collection is now available for purchase for the Kindle!
Another absolutely gorgeous cover courtesy of the extraordinarily talented Archer!
I am absolutely in love with this cover as well. I think it’s gritty and urban, which suits Tina Storm exactly right! Every time I have an idea for a cover, it turns out to be so totally beyond what I imagined and so much better – I really, really love it.
I’m toying with the idea of enrolling Storm Front into the Kindle Library, which means that it will be free for short amounts of time during a 90 day lending period. I’ll probably do that after Christmas, possibly after the New Year, so if I do decide to do it I’ll keep you posted.
I’m not sure when the paperback version will be available, but I am working on it.
While I’m not sure if Storm Front (bundled with The Archive of Lost Dreams) will be available for the Kindle before Christmas (I’m going away for a few days at a crucial moment, bad timing I know, but that’s what Christmas is all about!), I’m still waiting on The Archive of Lost Dreams to be approved for the Premium Catalogue on Smashwords. My last few stories have taken up to two/three weeks to be approved and shipped so I don’t expect the Archive will be available on Kobo, Diesel, iTunes etc before Christmas.
On top of my perpetually bad timing, I’m offering a
CHRISTMASGIVEAWAY
Complete with a Disney-themed Christmas picture! (The Enchanted Christmas)
Because I feel like it, and it’s Christmas, and because I’m an indie writer I can do as I please. And it pleases me greatly to host this giveaway.
I’m giving away copies of both of my books on Smashwords: The deep space cyberpunk The Edge of Darkness, and my collection of paranormal short stories, The Archive of Lost Dreams. (Remember, the five Storm Front urban fantasy short stories are still currently FREE on Smashwords.)
To qualify for the giveaway, you must do the following:
Make sure you leave a VALID email address in the comment, because this will be the email address I contact you with. You’ll be receiving a code for a limited time free Smashwords download.
It is not required that you subscribe to this blog, but it would be a nice thought!
I’m going to be selecting winners at random, and the number of winners will be equal to half the number of entries. If there are two entries there will be one winner, if there are four entries there will be two winners. If there are one hundred entries there will be fifty winners! (Eh, a girl can dream).
So basically you have a 50/50 chance of winning! And the more entries there are, the more I will give away!
It would help A LOT if you tweeted, Facebooked and blogged about this giveaway, but it won’t give you an extra entry.
This giveaway will end on New Year’s Eve! That gives you a little over a week to help spread the word and get as many friends to enter as you can, because the more entries there are, the more winners there will be!
Good luck, and please have a very happy and safe holiday!
This list is basically a Christmas gift list of recommendations for young female book lovers. These five books had a huge emotional impact on me in 2011. I’m planning on re-reading them in 2012. The good thing is, these oldest of these books were printed in 2009 so they should still be available in book stores. And who doesn’t want to support their book store?
Fire by Kristen Cashore
Young adult high fantasy, published in 2009.
At first I didn’t expect Fire to be a favourite read of mine. I’d read Graceling and only given it three stars, so I didn’t even buy my copy of Fire – it was given to me by a friend who didn’t like it. I however loved it. I aspire to write books like this. My favourite part is the building romance, which is simply lovely. I love broken, vulnerable heroines like Fire – in fact, I’ve written one myself – and her growth to become the strong heroine at the end astounded me. I found it perfect, and although I know a lot of people will have problems with the pre-marital sex and bed-hopping, I didn’t mind that part so much.
Bloodlines by Richelle Mead
Young adult paranormal/urban fantasy, published in 2011.
Bloodlines is the first book in a spin-off series of Mead’s popular young adult paranormal romance/urban fantasy Vampire Academy. A lot of people had problems with Sydney the protagonist because they claim she’s boring, lacking courage, and a teacher’s pet or whatever, but I found her personality resounded so strongly with mine that I really identified with her. I found parallels between her uncertainty, her realistic desire to avoid conflict, and especially her tendency to think about things a lot before acting – these things contrasted to Vampire Academy’s narrator, Rose, which is what a lot of people didn’t like, but to me it simply proved Mead can write in different voices. I haven’t tackled Mead’s other two series, Dark Swan and Georgina Kincaid yet, but I will get them when I moved back to Australia.
Glow by Amy Kathleen Ryan – Author Debut
Young adult sci-fi, published in 2011.
My blogging friend Penelope from The Reading Fever actually sent me the ARC (Advance Reader’s Copy) of this book, and I couldn’t believe my luck. I thought the blurb sounded awesome, but I predicted I’d gotten my hopes up yet again and was half-expecting this book to fall short. Luckily I was completely wrong – this book was amazing. Waverly the female protagonist was super-tough and smart, and I liked her a lot. There was also a scene in this book that tackled one of my absolute worst nightmares, so I was pretty horrified by it all. Ultimately, Ryan proved her worth as an author because this book’s characters were all different shades of grey and I didn’t know who to trust.
Unearthly by Cynthia Hand – Author Debut
Young adult paranormal romance, published in 2011.
This trope-defying novel was extraordinarily well written. Hand played with my emotions and I shed a tear during the climax. Despite it being a novel about angels, it managed to tackle religion while avoid being preachy, which is probably the most important thing. The amazing thing about this book is that I started out hating the love interest and ended up totally loving him – along with Sam from Shiver, he’s made my extremely short list of YA male love interests I actually like. I trust Hand so much I’d pay in advance to read Hallowed (if I had the money), the second book in the trilogy, which is being released mid-January. The Australian covers of these books are simply gorgeous, so I’ll probably get the sequel after I’ve moved.
Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver – Author Debut
Young adult contemporary with a twist, published in 2010.
This was a rare book that totally blew me away but I neither admired the lead character nor could identify with her. Sam Kingston is a bitch through and through, but when she starts re-living the same day over and over again after a fateful car crash, she learns the true value of everything she’d experienced and unravels the mystery of her death. This was probably my favourite read of 2011 because it made me cry four times. Oliver has beautiful lyrical writing and the novel was just so perfect and poignant. Unfortunately it was a library book, so I had to return it. I do want to buy my own copy, but I will probably wait until I’ve moved to Australia and started to build my collection again.
Honourable mentions:
Divergent by Veronica Roth (debut, 2011).Bumped by Megan McCafferty (2011).
Paranormalcy by Kiersten White (debut, 2010).
Nevermore by Kelly Creagh (debut, 2010).
Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater (2009).
What books did you love reading for the first time in 2011?
Lissa Bilyk 