Thursday, May 14, 2015
Saturday, May 9, 2015
Your Perception of Success | 30 second {or more} writing tips
aka... what I learned from my 9 year old and soccer <3
Saturday, May 2, 2015
'Had a Great Fall' by Shawn McGuire cover reveal!!! EEEP!!!
Kelly's Note: I'M SO EXCITED TO BE A PART OF THIS!!
Back
Cover Blurb
A
new home in a new state. The chance to get away from the relentless bullies and
reinvent himself. Then on the first day at his new high school, Robin Westmore
finds himself in the exact wrong place at the exact wrong time and right back
into the role of victim. All Robin can do now is wish for the harassment to
stop.
Being
the leader of the genie world is not what Desiree expected. The Guides aren’t
happy with her or any of the decisions she makes. The only thing they all agree
on is that they want their old boss back, but Kaf has vanished, leaving the
Guides in shock and Desiree with a broken heart.
While
Desiree hides from her responsibilities, Robin disappears into the video game
he’s created. There he finds excitement, adventure, and control. When the game
presents him with an escape from his tortured life, will he take it?
Excerpt
Chapter
One
Robin
Maybe I could call in sick.
With something fatal. Something so contagious the entire high school would
contract it just by looking at me. Was there such a thing? I took out my phone.
“Okay, Google. What is visual contagion?”
“Good morning, Robin.”
For half a second I thought
my phone had learned my name. And had started speaking in my mom’s voice? I
entered the kitchen and found Mom in her pink bathrobe with the tea stain down
the front, waiting for me. She must’ve heard me talking to my phone.
“Morning.” I set my messenger
bag by the back door and took a seat at the kitchen bar.
Google had only come up with
only one direct hit and was now blinking at me, waiting for something that
would challenge its storage banks. The ‘contagion’ it presented wasn’t even a
disease. It was some company in Vancouver that spread positive messages on
organic hemp or bamboo T-shirts. Great. I ask for science, I get hippies.
“Do you think Visual
Contagion would be a good name for a band?” I asked Mom as I scrolled through a
few of the t-shirt pictures.
“Hmm,” Mom said, tapping her
fingernail against her teacup. “A band that plays music?”
My turn to sit and blink.
“What other kind is there?”
“Plenty. A wrist band.
Hairband. Wedding band. Waistband.”
“Okay, okay.” She’d go on and
on and then open the thesaurus app on her tablet if I didn’t stop her. “I’m a
guy. I don’t think about hairbands or jewelry. Yes, I meant a band that plays
music.”
“Then I’d say no. Visual
Contagion, great a name as it is, would not work for a musical group.” She took
a sip of her tea, Irish breakfast according to the tag hanging from the string,
as she contemplated. “Auditory Contagion could work. Audio? Audial?”
Auditory Contagion would
indeed be a damn cool name for a band. Almost made me want to form one. Except
I couldn’t play a single instrument. Not even that plastic flute-thing they
made us play in elementary school. Maybe I could compose something on my
computer. I needed music for my video game anyway.
“Okay, Google. Popular music
software.”
“Would you like some
breakfast?” Mom asked. “Or are you just going to play with your phone until
it’s time to leave?”
My mom wasn’t the most
domestic person. She did like to feed people though, and when she took the time
to make an actual meal, she was a great cook.
I set my phone in my lap and
analyzed my hunger level. “Juice and toast with butter and jam. Two slices.”
“Two? You’re hungry today.
What kind of tea?” She held up her Irish breakfast to me with a questioning
look and wiggled the box as if that would lure me to the Celtic side.
“English breakfast, please. With cream and two sugar cubes.”
“Off to the range,” my dad said as he entered
the kitchen and set a black case—smaller than a briefcase, larger than a
lunchbox—on the gray marble counter.
“Before work?” Mom asked.
“I don’t have any meetings
until ten today. I want to try out my birthday present.”
Who knew a guy could get so
excited over a handgun? Then again, this one did have a built-in laser. Guns
weren’t my thing, but if presented with a laser-operated piece of technology
I’d be all over it. So, I could understand his enthusiasm to a point.
“Want to come with me,
Robin?” Dad asked as he plugged the first of two coffee pods into the machine
to fill his travel mug.
“Thanks, but I do have a
meeting before ten,” I said. “I have that test first thing.”
“Finally,” Dad said. “I don’t
understand the holdup on allowing you to take a placement test. You studied?”
“Of course he studied,” Mom
said as though nothing could be more unthinkable than me not studying.
“I did,” I told them. “Don’t
worry, I’ll pass.”
“They should put him directly
into Calculus and Differential Equations,” Dad said.
“He could handle it,” Mom
agreed, “but AP Calculus will be an easy A for him.”
“Good point,” Dad said and
clapped me on the back, nearly knocking me off my stool. “Build that killer
GPA. Get into the college of your choice and academic scholarships as well.”
“Don’t pressure him,” Mom
said, setting a plate with my buttered and jammed toast on the placemat in
front of me.
Bio
Her
books deal with harder topics (death of a sibling, divorce, dating violence, bullying,
and teen suicide) because she believes it is important to talk about these
things. Those kinds of topics can be hard to handle and a bit overwhelming, so she
infuses a bit of humor in her work as well because she also believes that a
sense of humor can help you get through just about anything.
Shawn
lives in Colorado with her family where she spends her time reading, cooking
and baking, practicing yoga and meditation, and hiking and camping in the
spectacular Rocky Mountains.
Author Links
Website - www.Shawn-McGuire.com
Facebook www.Facebook.com/ShawnMcGuireAuthor
Newsletter signup - http://eepurl.com/V21k1
Pinterest - http://www.pinterest.com/shawnmcguire1/
Twitter - https://twitter.com/Shawn_McGuire
Amazon Author - http://www.amazon.com/Shawn-McGuire/e/B00L0FJDFW/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1420552843&sr=1-2-ent
Author’s Other
Works
The Wish Makers
Series
Friday, May 1, 2015
Awesome New Covers for The Harvest Saga Series! I'm so excited to show them to you!!! W/Casey L. Bond
Thanks so much for checking out the blog today! Casey L. Bond is revealing brand new covers for her Harvest Saga trilogy! Check these bad boys out.
I.LOVE.THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Full disclosure: I read REAP a few months agot and LOVE IT!!! <3
If you're interested in reading Reap, here are the links:
If you're interested in reading Resist, here are the links:
Reclaim is currently being edited. A release date will be announced very soon.
When Reclaim is released, the boxed set will also be released! Isn't it pretty?
Thank you so much for checking out the blog today! If you want to go stalker on Casey, just follow her at the links below!
I.LOVE.THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Full disclosure: I read REAP a few months agot and LOVE IT!!! <3
The covers were designed by Cassy Roop of Pink Ink Designs.
Cover photography by Mandy Hollis of MHPhotography.
Cover models are Mandy Hollis and Amee Thompson.
If you're interested in reading Reap, here are the links:
REAP
If you're interested in reading Resist, here are the links:
RESIST
Reclaim is currently being edited. A release date will be announced very soon.
Thank you so much for checking out the blog today! If you want to go stalker on Casey, just follow her at the links below!
Casey L. Bond resides in West Virginia
with her husband and their two beautiful daughters. When she’s not busy being a
domestic goddess and chasing her baby girls, she loves to write young adult and
new adult fiction.
You can find more information about
Bond’s books via the following links:
Twitter:
@authorcaseybond
Connect on tsu,
Instagram, Google+ and LinkedIn!
Available
or Soon-To-Be Released Books:
Winter Shadows
Pariah, Book 1 in The New Covenant
Series
Paradox, Book 2, The New Covenant Series
Devil Creek
Shady Bay
Reap, Book 1 in The Harvest Saga
Resist, Book 2 in The Harvest Saga
Reclaim, Book 3 in The Harvest Saga
Sin (Serial Series)
Light in the Darkness (YA Anthology)
Fractured Glass (Novel Anthology)
Crazy Love
Dark Bishop
(Serial Series)
Prep For Doom (Dystopian Anthology)
Catalyst
Temptation (Serial Series)
Water Witch
Thursday, April 30, 2015
Sunday, April 26, 2015
My First Time || Strawberry Cheesecake Yogurt {don't be jealous}
You guys requested this... I blame you entirely. ;) TRY NEW THINGS!!!
Saturday, April 25, 2015
THE SEARCH IS OVER!! #thestrugglewasreal
Ever have a song stuck in your head... and you don't know the song or the words really... but you can't get rid of it!!! Well...
Remember way back in the day when they had those 80s rock compilation CD commercials? And they played some of the songs while they were talking about them? (please tell me you remember). I've had this ONE LINE of a song in my head for years... not even one line... just, "blah, blah, blah, blah, blah poisonnnnnn..." I have tried and tried to find something... anything that would match it on youtube. I tried Cinderella, Poison (the band), Guns N' Roses... NOTHING.
Then today, I got into a Billy Idol kick and low and behold-- a suggestion whilst listening to White Wedding was... Alice Cooper-- Poison.
HIT ME WITH A SHOE! THAT'S IT!!! I feel better about life now and my brain can finally rest. #abouttime #enjoy
Remember way back in the day when they had those 80s rock compilation CD commercials? And they played some of the songs while they were talking about them? (please tell me you remember). I've had this ONE LINE of a song in my head for years... not even one line... just, "blah, blah, blah, blah, blah poisonnnnnn..." I have tried and tried to find something... anything that would match it on youtube. I tried Cinderella, Poison (the band), Guns N' Roses... NOTHING.
Then today, I got into a Billy Idol kick and low and behold-- a suggestion whilst listening to White Wedding was... Alice Cooper-- Poison.
HIT ME WITH A SHOE! THAT'S IT!!! I feel better about life now and my brain can finally rest. #abouttime #enjoy
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)