Cover Reveal: Protecting Truth

I was lucky enough to participate in a cover reveal for the second book in The Seraphina Parrish Trilogy, Protecting Truth.  There isn't any other information available yet about the book, so stay tuned to the Wander Dust Trilogy website for that post.  Warren is officially releasing the cover on May 18th.

And here it is:

Isn't it a beautiful cover?  As soon as I find out more information, I will let you know. 

Also, because of the release of the cover of book two, Wander Dust is going to be on sale.  Everyone loves a sale, right?  If you have ever wanted to read this book, now is your opportunity!  I highly recommend this book.  Here is my review.  In case you don't remember what Wander Dust is about, here is the synopsis from Goodreads.

Ever since her sixteenth birthday, strange things keep happening to Seraphina Parrish.

The Lady in Black… burns Sera’s memories.

Unexplainable Premonitions… catapult her to other cities.

The Grungy Gang… wants to kill her.

And a beautiful, mysterious boy… stalks her.

But when Sera moves to Chicago, and her aunt reveals their family connection to a centuries old, secret society, she is immediately thrust into an unbelievable fantasy world, leading her on a quest to unravel the mysteries that plague her. In the end, their meanings crash into an epic struggle of loyalty and betrayal, and she’ll be forced to choose between the boy who has stolen her heart and the thing she desires most.

Wander Dust is the breathtaking fantasy that will catapult you through a story of time, adventure, and love.

Tempest

Julie Cross

Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin

Tentative Publish Date: January 17, 2012

Version: Advanced Readers’ Edition from Librarything FirstReads

Series: Tempest

This story starts out with Jackson Meyer writing entries in his journal.  He is doing this because his friend, Adam Silverman, has told him that she should record his experiences.  One thing about Jackson is he can time travel.  It is the year 2009 when he first starts experimenting with Adam and time traveling.  Adam is the only person that Jackson has told about his abilities.  

He is dating Holly Flynn and works at a day camp.  Holly suspects that there is something Jackson is hiding.  Due to Jackson’s and Adam’s time traveling experiments, Jackson is late for a date with Holly on October 29^th.  This creates tension between them and Jackson goes over to Holly’s dorm to smooth things over.  They are awoken on October 30^th by the sounds of someone knocking on the door.  Jackson soon realizes, that the people who are at the door want to do he and Holly harm.  He tries to get them to leave, but in the chaos, Holly ends up getting shot.

Jackson “jumps” or time travels to get out of that situation.  At first, he cannot believe he left Holly there to die.  As he goes back over what happens, he wonders if they knew that he was able to jump.  He jumped to 2007.  He cannot figure out what is happening and tries to get back to 2009.  While trying, he jumps to 2003, 2004 and 2007.   While he is stuck in the past, he gets to spend time with his twin sister Courtney, who has previously died.  He also learns more about his dad and the people that were after him.  His main thought at first is to weave himself into Holly’s earlier life and prevent the event on October 30^th, 2009 from happening.  Through Holly, he meets Adam again and he helps Jackson make sense of things and the new people who show up in Jackson’s life.  There are many things about time travel and his history that Jackson doesn’t know about.  The questions are, is he willing to pay the price to find out and how far will he go to protect Adam and Holly?

When I first received this book in the mail from Librarything’s First Reads, I was ecstatic!  This was a book that I was anticipating reading for a while and it didn’t disappoint.  There have been a few books recently which deal in time travel.  The thing I like about this is that it is always different.  You can basically have a book about the same thing (time travel) and have a different experience each time because the opportunities are so vast.  What makes Tempest so great is that the learning experience that Jackson embarks on while he is trying to get back to 2009.

The year is 2009.  Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun.

That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future.

Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities.

But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler.  Recruit… or kill him.

Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

 

▪Jackson Meyer.  In the beginning of the book, he is more self-centered and thinks more of himself than other people.  When he gets toward the end of the book, he is more appreciative of Adam, Holly and his Father and what they’ve been through. Jackson learns more about himself and who he is during his stint in the past.  In the end of the book, he has tough decisions to make that don’t just affect him. 

▪Holly Flynn.  Even when things get weird around Jackson, she sticks with him. 

▪Adam Silverman.   Adam is described as a “science nerd.”  When Jackson jumps back to 2007 and “meets” Adam for the first time, it doesn’t seem to faze him that much when Jackson tells him about his time travel capabilities.  Adam is a smart person who is always thinking ahead.

▪Courtney Meyer.  Jackson’s twin sister who died of cancer.  When Jackson jumps back to when he can actually interact with Courtney, she trusts him when he tells her that he is from the future.

▪Emily.  I don’t know much about her character as it is not discussed a lot until the last part of the book, but what I do know, I like.  She is the young girl that Jackson keeps seeing that reminds him of Courtney.  You might be asking how can you like a character that you know very little about?  To find that answer, you'll have to read the book and then you'll understand more.

▪Kevin Meyer.  I wasn’t sure which side I was going to put him on.  He is Jackson’s and Courtney’s father.  The reason for my hesitance is that there is a lot of information that he kept from Jackson and whenever he shows up, trouble seems to follow him.  I believe that his intentions are good.

▪Dr. Melvin.  This is a doctor that has taken care of Jackson and Courtney all of their lives.  He seems to want what is best for Jackson.  This is another one who was hard to determine if I liked him or not because there are things brought up near the end of the book that make me not like him.

 

▪The EOT or enemies of time.  The way that they are pictured in the majority of this book puts them in bad light.  I will have to read the subsequent books before making a final judgment on that.  They want to capture Jackson and are who Kevin Meyer and his team fight against.

▪Chief Marshall.  He is the one who is in charge and isn’t afraid to let everyone know it.  He doesn’t seem to have a compassionate bone in his body.

 

On this cover, you are shown clouds and a thunderstorm.  In the front are a boy (Jackson) and a girl (Holly) trying to reach each other.  This fits the story well, because that is basically what the book is about.  Jackson trying to get back to Holly.  I really like the colors in this cover.  That is what drew me to the book primarily.

This is what it said about this book on Julie's website:

Here's the 411 on this title you may have seen around online.

WHAT IS IT? This is basically like a prequel and it's about 10,000 words which might not mean much to the non-writers. I think it was around 50 pages double spaced in a word document.

DO YOU HAVE TO READ THE BOOK FIRST? Nope. But I would highly recommend reading the free excerpt first which is the first four chapters. You get a sense of how time travel works in TEMPEST from the opening and I don't rehash those rules in the bonus story. If you have read the book from one of the "early review" opportunities or because you're related to me, and you liked the characters, specifically Jackson, Adam, and Holly, then you will most likely enjoy TOMORROW IS TODAY.

WHAT SHOULD I EXPECT? Expect a lighter tone and a lot of fun because this story is before everything went bad for Jackson. When time-travel was just fun and games. It's even before Jackson got the girl. You'll get a little more insight into both Holly and Adam's characters.

WHEN CAN I GET IT? It's available for e-readers on December 6, 2011. You can pre-order now and have it automatically download on December 6th.


HOW MUCH DOES IT COST? It's FREE! totally and completely 100% free.




Order it here
Read the first four chapters of Tempest here

Find Julie Cross

Wander Dust

Michelle Warren

Publisher: Michelle Preast

Publish Date: already out

Version: e-book

Series: The Seraphina Parrish Trilogy

 Not all those who wander are lost.
-J. R. R. Tolkien

Seraphina Parrish is a normal (and I use that term loosely) sixteen year old girl who lives in Miami with her father.  The story starts out with her sixteenth birthday celebration.  It is at a restaurant with her dad, Ray and his girlfriend, Maddi.  During this celebration is when Seraphina, who goes by Sera, first encounters the Lady in Black and feels the effects of the lady in black’s fire.  This terrifies Sera and she is sure that the Lady in Black will come back to finish the job that she started.   The night is almost completely a bust when Ray gives her a birthday present.  It is a bracelet that belonged to her mother before she died.  This makes the whole night bearable.  While trying on this bracelet at school, something strange happens.  Sera is transported to another city in another time.  Then there is the mysterious letter with a picture of a boy in it.  Sera doesn’t know who the boy is, but he makes her feel safe whenever she looks at his picture.

After some mishaps in school that end in Sera getting “grounded for life,” Ray decides that it is time to send Sera to her Aunt Mona’s in Chicago.  Mona is her mother’s sister and Sera has always loved visiting her and is looking forward to moving so she can finally find out things about her mother.  When she first arrives in Chicago, she learns that the airline has lost her luggage and all she has is what is on her back.  This isn’t nearly enough for the cold Chicago winter.  While traveling to Mona’s brownstone, she not only is freezing, but encounters “the grungy gang” who seem to want to kill her.  She doesn’t know what to think about this, but knows she needs to run to get away from them.  It is on the platform while running that Sera first meets the boy from the photo.  She isn’t sure at first whether he is good or bad and thinks he might be with the grungy gang.

Mona finally finds her, gets her home and gets her some clothing appropriate for the winter.  Even though Sera trusts Mona, she isn’t sure whether she wants to tell her about the things that have been happening.  She thinks that she is going crazy and doesn’t want anyone else to think that also.  She then starts her “list of weird,” or the things that she cannot explain. 

Sera is to start at Washington Square Academy, where Mona works.  It is the same high school that her mother attended, so she is happy about that.  At school, she makes friends and sees the boy standing outside her classroom.  Sera tries to be late for class in order to see this boy and ask him what he is doing there.  Finally, she gets in contact with him and learns how to wander.  Once she does this, she is transferred to the boarding school side of Washington Square Academy.  She learns things there that she never could have imagined.  Her list of weird still plagues her and as the book goes on, she adds and subtracts things to the list.

I thought that this book was a good way to start out a series.  It gives you the background information of what “wandering” is, but also leaves enough questions so that you’ll want to read the next book.  This book was a good read.  I thoroughly enjoyed it. 

 

Ever since her sixteenth birthday, strange things keep happening to Seraphina Parrish.

The Lady in Black… burns Sera’s memories.

Unexplainable Premonitions… catapult her to other cities.

The Grungy Gang… wants to kill her.

And a beautiful, mysterious boy… stalks her.

But when Sera moves to Chicago, and her aunt reveals their family connection to a centuries old, secret society, she is immediately thrust into an unbelievable fantasy world, leading her on a quest to unravel the mysteries that plague her. In the end, their meanings crash into an epic struggle of loyalty and betrayal, and she’ll be forced to choose between the boy who has stolen her heart and the thing she desires most.

Wander Dust is the breathtaking fantasy that will catapult you through a story of time, adventure, and love.

• Seraphina.  She is thinking about her list of weird all the time.  Even though she doesn’t understand things, she goes on to find out more about her mother, making tough decisions along the way.  Sera truly shows her character in the decisions that she is forced to make.

• Aunt Mona.   She tries her best to do things right by Seraphina and is hindered by what she can tell her.   Even still, she always puts Sera ahead of other things and she is one that Sera knows she can trust.

• Macey DuBois.  She is Sera’s first friend in Washington Square Academy.  Sera doesn’t tell her everything that is going on and Macey is still a good friend to her and helps her out a little when she first arrives at the Academy.

• Gabe, the activities director at Washington Square Academy.   His enthusiasm for the things he has to do is contagious.  I just love reading about the things that Gabe has had a part in.   He is unpredictable, but that is part of his personality that is so great.

• Samantha James, Max Bishop.  They are in Sera’s team.  At first, they don’t seem too pleased to be paired up with Sera, but later on they warm up to her.  While in the Washington Square Academy, you live in an “apartment” with your team, attend classes with them, and are basically with them 24 hours a day.  With all this time spent together, Sera still doesn’t get to really know them until near the end of the book.  Sam and “Bishop” help Sera out in a lot of things that she couldn’t do on her own in her pursuit to find out what happened to her mother.

• Sera’s list of weird.  I like how she adds things that she doesn’t understand or seem weird to her and subtracts things that she figures out.  I also like her determination in finding out the answers to her list of weird.  I think we all should have this attribute.

• Ray Parrish.  Sera’s father.  Even though he acts like a dork at the opening scene, which I understand Sera’s attitude of being grossed out, he does try to do right by Sera.  Sending her to live with her Aunt Mona was a tough decision for him.  He is a single father who has no idea how to raise a teenage daughter.  Throughout the book, Sera mentions how her father wouldn’t have shown her compassion, how he puts his job and girlfriend before her, but in the end, I think he is a good guy.

• The Washington Square Academy.  Holy Crow!  If all schools were like how this one is described, I don’t think we would have nearly the dropouts as we do now.  Both sides are described and seem wonderful to me.  Although, living in an apartment where your every whim is catered to does seem like quite the wonderful thing when you are in high school.

• Some of the other classmates in Sera’s school.  I won’t name names or say why I don’t like them because alas, that would spoil the book for you and this is one book that you should definitely read!

• Terease Ivanov. I didn’t like her before she was introduced in the Academy and I didn’t like her after. She is the one who seems to appear out of nowhere to discipline the students. The description of her seems fitting to her personality.

• The Grungy gang. The way that they are described as being putrid and smelling like garbage. Yuck! Also the fact that they are after Seraphina, doesn’t help their popularity any.

I think the girl on the cover is Seraphina although she looks older than sixteen.  The Chicago skyline in the background is fitting to the events that happened and the fact that the Academy was in Chicago.  I’m not sure what the field has to do with the story, but that is irrelevant.  The fact that she is running is integral to the story.  I liked the colors in the cover.  Overall, I think that this is a very nice cover and it outlines the story well.

See the author interview and giveaway.

Blog Tour: Wander Dust by Michelle Warren

Being that this is the first blog tour post that has been done on Young Adult Book Reviews, I have been very excited to do this.  First, there is an author interview with the author of Wander Dust, Michelle Warren, then there is a giveaway and finally there is a scavenger hunt which will take place on Michelle's Facebook page on December 18th.

Ever since her sixteenth birthday, strange things keep happening to Seraphina Parrish.

The Lady in Black… burns Sera’s memories.

Unexplainable Premonitions… catapult her to other cities.

The Grungy Gang… wants to kill her.

And a beautiful, mysterious boy… stalks her.

But when Sera moves to Chicago, and her aunt reveals their family connection to a centuries old, secret society, she is immediately thrust into an unbelievable fantasy world, leading her on a quest to unravel the mysteries that plague her. In the end, their meanings crash into an epic struggle of loyalty and betrayal, and she’ll be forced to choose between the boy who has stolen her heart and the thing she desires most.

Wander Dust is the breathtaking fantasy that will catapult you through a story of time, adventure, and love.

Michelle Warren

Michelle Warren has graciously answered a few questions for me.

What inspires you when you write?

I love, love science fiction. When I think of story lines in my head, this is usually the direction they lean, mixed with a little magic, of course. I’m fascinated by concepts that seem unreal now but may be completely possible one day. For me, these make the best stories.

Do you base your characters off of real people?  Do you have a process for coming up with characters?

I would say that my characters are Frankenstiened. They are a mish-mash of qualities in people that I know, have met, or wish that I could meet. Many qualities appeared organically as I wrote. That’s the fun of character development. They literally take on a life of their own. It seems I choose character traits based on how they will react with other characters. I love to create tension.

Do you ever experience writer’s block and how do you get over it?

Yes, I have. I like to meditate on scenes in the book before I write. There was once instance where that didn’t work and after a few months, I woke up in the middle of the night with the answers. So I guess sleep made me kick my writer’s block to the curb!

What type/genre of books do you like to read?

I read mostly YA fantasy and paranormal, but Dan Brown is one of my favorite authors. He’s amazing.

Favorite color

Pink or orange. It changes. I’m an artist. I can’t help it :)

Favorite holiday/season

Thanksgiving. I love that it’s all about family and friends.

Word that best describes you and why

Perpetual. My brain never stops.

Optimist or pessimist

I try very hard at optimism

Favorite author/book/series

My favorites right now are Daughter of Smoke and Bone and the Tiger’s Curse series.

Favorite food/drink

Chocolate, Milk

Favorite place to read/write

Read: my couch | write: my mac

Find Michelle:

There will be a scavenger hunt on Michelle's Facebook page starting on December 18th.  Here is a puzzle piece from that scavenger hunt.  The details have not been released yet, so check back here when they are.

I love giveaways!  I got a generous prize pack from Michelle to give to my lucky readers.   This giveaway is so great, I wish I could enter it myself, but that wouldn't be very fair, would it?  The giveaway is international and will end on December 31st.

The prizes are as follows:

▪One lucky reader will win the signed paperback copy of Wander Dust, the Tolkein quote necklace, and a signed Wander Dust bookmark.

▪Nine other winners will receive an autographed Wander Dust bookmark.