Bringing YA to You: Promotion and Giveaway!

Have you ever wished that a big YA book tour would make a stop in your hometown? Well, here's your chance for that wish to come true! YA2U is a program that features five award-winning and best-selling authors who are holding a contest to see what city they should visit in an exclusive tour stop!

The authors are collecting votes from January 1 to February 15, and any city in the continental US or any Canadian city that has an international airport can win an exclusive visit from all five authors, including an author panel and book signing! Entering is super easy--and if you help spread the word about the contest, you can also enter win a signed copy of all of their books (TEN signed books in total!)--and the book contest is open internationally!


The authors in the program are:

• Marie Lu, the New York Times best-selling author of Legend and the upcoming Prodigy
• Marissa Meyer, the New York Times best-selling author of Cinder and the upcoming Scarlet
• Beth Revis, the New York Times best-selling author of Across the Universe, A Million Suns, and the upcoming Shades of Earth
• Victoria Schwab, author of The Near Witch and the highly-anticipated upcoming The Archived
• Megan Shepherd, author of the debut novel The Madman's Daughter

And they want to have an event in your home town! To participate, just got to the YA2U website and let them know what city you want them to come to. And while you're there, help spread the word about the contest and you can be entered to win all of their books--TEN signed books in total! 

Why should the YA2U Team come to your hometown? Why not join in the fun today and share with others about this program and your hometown. The more votes your town gets, the closer you are to having your very own personal tour stop! Vote for YOUR town here!

And if you help spread the word, you can also participate in the book giveaway. Tell them that you learned about YA2U from me and we both get extra entries in the contest! 

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Year in Review: 2012

Happy New Year!

2012 was a great year. I wrote many fewer blog posts this years (less than half from 2011) but my viewership increased significantly and I became much more a part of the book-blogging community. I also read many fantastic books - and reached my goal of 200 books in a single year!

This year, I wrote 30 reviews, and 95 posts in total. I also got 29034 page views, averaging 2419.5 views per month. Thank you to all my readers for helping me achieve such a great viewership boost this year.

I also participated in three challenges this year, not counting my personal challenge to read 200 books (not counting rereads within the same year). I completed two of the three: the Fairy Tales Retold Challenge and the 2012 Debut Challenge. I only finished about half of the 2012 Standalone Challenge, but I am not to disappointed, as I didn't particularly try to read books for this challenge (rather, I read what I wanted and some happened to fit), and many of the standalones I did read were not published in 2012, I requirement I had forgotten about. You can see the books I read for each challenge on my 2012 Challenges page.

Best wishes to everyone,

Welcome in, 2012!

Happy New Year! 

2011 has been a wonderful year for me. I read a ton of fantastic books, really began blogging, and had a lot of fun.

I read 218 books this year (more than my Goodreads count because GR doesn't count rereads), posted 233 posts, and wrote 56 reviews. For next year, I hope to read 200 books again, and keep on blogging through the year.

Here's to hoping that the new year will bring just as many wonderful experiences, both inside and outside the pages.

Cheers,

The Oh-My-Word... Readathon: Final Tally

The readathon is over! It was so much fun, and I'm glad I participated.

Total Books Read: 3

• Inheritance, by Christopher Paolini
• The Coming of the Dragon, by Rebecca Barnhouse
• Daughter of Smoke and Bone, by Laini Taylor

Although the number of books finished wasn't too high this time around, I think it was the perfect amount of reading for right now. I read the second half of Inheritance, the last two-thirds of The Coming of the Dragon, and all of Daughter of Smoke and Bone. I also made significant progress in but did not finish Tales of Grimm and Andersen. I spent a lot of time reading, but I never felt like I was overwhelmed by too much reading (yes, there is such a thing). After I finished Smoke and Bone I had a couple of hours left before the readathon ended, but I didn't pick anything else up because it was a wonderful book to end the year with.

See you in 2012,

The Oh-My-Word... Readathon!

The readathon has officially begun! Somehow, life tends to get in the way of reading on the specific dates that readathons are scheduled for, but I'll at least keep a book on hand throughout the next two days.

I will probably not be updating my progress much, but I will have a final tally up on January 1st.

What I want to finish:
I have several books that I have gotten about halfway through and that I'd like to finish in the next day or so, or at least make significant progress on:

• Inheritance, by Christopher Paolini
• The Coming of the Dragon, by Rebecca Barnhouse
• Tales of Grimm and Andersen, by The Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen

I don't have many goals beyond that, as I can tell those three will be quite a bit of reading on their own, but I have a ton of books stacked up by my bed (my regular TBR shelf  and  the temporarily commandeered "helper shelf" are both full and have additional books stacked on top of them) that I would love to begin, including but not limited to:

• Shatter Me, by Tareh Mafi
• The Princess Curse, by Merrie Haskell
• Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes, by Jonathan Auxier
• Daughter of Smoke and Bone, by Laini Taylor
• Liesl and Po, by Lauren Oliver
• Well Witched, by Frances Hardinge
• Spindle's End, by Robin McKinley
• Wither, by Lauren DeStephano
• Birthmarked, by Caragh O'Brien

And as if those and several large handfuls more were not enough (because you can never have too much with books), I have a few by my bed that I've been itching to reread for a while now:

• Enna Burning, by Shannon Hale
• River Secrets, by Shannon Hale
• Forest Born, by Shannon Hale
• Dragon Flight, by Jessica Day George
• Dragon Spear, by Jessica Day George
• East, by Edith Pattou

I have no intention of getting through these lists, but they're much of my selection. And the books that I don't get to now will be the one's I'll be reading in the next few weeks, or more likely, months.

Are you participating in the Oh-My-Word... Readathon? Have you read any of the books above? What should I read first? Let me know in the comments!

Fortnight of Old Favorites

As I mentioned in last week's In My Mailbox, I am on a temporary book-buying ban in order to let my dwindling book funds recover ("dwindling" is an understatement - "gone" is more accurate) and to take the time to reread some of my old favorites. I buy a ton of books, and I figure as long as I am buying them, I should read them more than once. So starting today, I have two weeks more-or-less free until school starts, and I am going to take those two weeks to get through a huge pile of books I want to reread.

These range from books I read just a few months ago to books I love but haven't picked up in years, and from MG to YA. And this pile is what I came up with after I went through it and put a bunch back. I'd love to read more than this, but I tried to limit the number of books I chose. I don't have any specific order I'm going to read these in. I figure I'll just pick up anything that strikes my fancy at the time. I don't think I will be able to finish all of these in just two weeks, but I'm certainly going to try. 18 books in 14 days? It's possible.

But this challenge doesn't mean I'm going to stop reading the new books I've gotten in the past few weeks. I was planning on finishing those books before I started FOOF, but then I ended up getting a ton of new books, so.... yep. I'm going to be reading those at the same time, and reviewing them as well. They just won't count for the FOOF challenge.

If you'd like, join me! Rereading old favorites is always great, and I'd love to hear about some of your favorites. Or, you can read any of the books on my list. I recommend them all.

I'm Back, and Look What I Found...

Look, look! Pretty German covers!

I always think it's so interesting and fun to see how publishers in different countries choose to change the covers of books. I snapped a few photos (I would have more, but the rest of my family was begging me to get on with it) to post. These are from a bookstore in Basel (or is it Basle? I saw it spelled both ways) in Switzerland.

First, we have The Hunger Games in German. I really really like these covers. They are definitely in competition with the American covers. And the blood dripping off the leaves on the first is so creepy but so great. Plus I love the translation.

The Hunger Games
Direct Translation: The Tributes of Panem

I'd seen these two covers on Kristin Cashore's website, but I loved seeing them in person.

Graceling

Fire

I actually saw tons of Cornelia Funke in multiple bookstores. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure she writes all her books in German first, and then translates them into the English versions.

Inkheart & Inkspell

There are so many versions of Harry Potter covers out there, and I'd never actually seen these. It's kind of strange to think that these are the covers people are used to in Switzerland. All the characters look so weird to me because I've been visualizing the GrandPre illustrations for so long.

Harry Potter 1-6

Harry Potter 1-6 Box Set

The Tales of Beedle the Bard

Harry Potter 7

The newest Artemis Fowl. Not quite how I envisioned it, but oh well.

Artemis Fowl: The Atlantis Complex
German Edition

I read this just before I left, so it was lots of fun to see it while I was there. The cover is pretty much the same as the American one, though.

The Warlock (The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel)

Again, more Cornelia Funke. I really like this one in English.

Dragon Rider

The Bartimaeus books. It's cool that they have matching covers, but again, I guess I have a bias toward what I'm used to.

The Bartimeus Books

The German/ Swiss publishers of Matched did a beautiful job with this cover. Of all the ones I saw, this is the one I really wanted to buy a copy of and take home with me.

Matched

A whole shelf of Matched!

And I also found English Books, but with German covers.

(Couldn't find a copy of Catching Fire, sorry!)

So, thoughts on all the different covers?

It's great to be back. Until later,

My First Read-a-thon

Hello,
Stopping by to let you know about the Read-a-thon that's going to happen in just a few short weeks. It's hosted by the wonderful Squeaky Books and will take place from June 17-18. There are going to be lots of fun contests and giveaways, and it seems like it will be a great event. Read THIS POST on Squeaky Books for more information.

Click the image to learn more!
This readathon is happening in pretty much the worst weekend of my summer for it, but I'm going to try anyway. No clue when I'll have time to read, but it can't hurt to try it out. :D

PicaReads is 1 Year Old!

Happy belated blogoversary to me!

I just found out not five minutes ago that PicaReads had its blogoversary last Friday (the 22nd). I was planning to do something fun and special for it, but I didn't know the exact date until a few minutes ago. As it turns out, I was doing something fun and special for my blogoversary but didn't know it at the time. Friday night I was listening to five of my favorite authors speak. I think that's the best blogoversary party ever, especially for a book blog. Over this weekend I might bake a cake to celebrate anyway. (And because any excuse for cake is good.)

I thought I would post a few stats from my first year as a blogger:

• I've posted 125 posts, and written 130.
• I've written 37 book reviews.
• I've completed 2 challenges - PBM and March Merriment.
• I've read 158 books, including most of my favorites. 
• PicaReads has been viewed 4,758 times.
• 4,372 of those views have been from the U.S.
• The next largest viewership comes from Canada, with 119 views.

I'm off to celebrate!

Thanks, Logan

Sorry for not posting much recently. I keep looking at my blog, thinking "What? Haven't I posted something by now?", start writing a post, and get distracted/ have to go do something else.

But I have to post about this weekend, because it was great. My dad and I flew to Logan, Utah to see five of my favorite authors speak. (More info in this post) I got there about an hour early and spent the time helping set up, which was incredibly fun. Then people started filling into the auditorium, and I joined them, having saved a seat for myself when I first arrived. (This turned out to be a great idea, because the auditorium was packed. Apparently the people who organized this event were expecting a couple hundred people to show up. They were wrong - there were over 1,000 people.) We sat down to hear the authors speak. This was the highlight of the night. They were hilarious. I could not stop laughing. They talked for about an hour, and then there was book signing. Of course, with 1,000 people, signing took a very long time. But it was so much fun. The entire time I was practically jumping up and down. My parents wouldn't let me take all of my books on the plane, but I brought 1 or 2 from each author, and I got them all signed. The event wasn't over until 11:45. During that time, I met and got signatures from all five of the authors (who were all so nice), made friends with the person behind me in line, bought 2 books (The Journal of Curious Letters, by James Dashner, and Yearbook, by Ally Condie), read Rapunzel's Revenge twice, and read about 100 pages of Yearbook. I, for one, was incredibly happy that the signing went on for so long. I loved every moment of it. Thank you, dad (for taking me and waiting in 2-hour-long lines), thank you, wonderful authors, and thank you, Logan.

Super Author Visit!

This is the most exciting thing I've heard about in a long time. On Friday April 22, in Logan, Utah, not one but five amazing authors are coming to speak. Shannon Hale, Ally Condie, James Dashner, Brandon Mull, and Jessica Day George - all favorite authors of mine - are doing a visit together. And according to James Dashner, Nathan Hale will be there as well. And I'm going to go hear them! I'm so incredibly happy.  If you live anywhere remotely close to Logan, or if you can convince your parents to let you fly to Utah (like me), this is going to be an awesome event.

[UPDATE: I just got some more information about this event: The library  has the largest meeting room in Logan, Utah - seats 80 people. They expect 300 people for this event. They will broadcast the event to the other rooms in the library. Book signings will take place at 5 stations in the library and yes, you may bring your own books for signing. Yay!]
[UPDATE AGAIN: They expect so many people that they are going to move locations to the auditorium at the Mount Logan Middle School.]

The Seven Facts Award

I've just won my first ever blogging award! It's called the seven facts award, and I received it from Allegra of Here's to Us. Thank you so much, Allegra! It's so great to know that someone who I've never met face-to-face actually reads and appreciates this blog.

Here's how the award works:
1. Thank the person who gave you the award and link back to his/her blog.
2. Write a post about the award, in which you share seven facts about yourself.
3. Share the award with fifteen worthy bloggers.

So, seven things. Hmm....
I'm not sure if this is obvious at all from my previous posts, but I'm a little... *ahem* paranoid... about posting stuff about myself on the internet. But here goes anyway:

1. I have five overstuffed bookcases in my room.
2. I avoid books that I think will make me sad or upset.
3. I don't think I'm very good at creative writing, although my friends tell me otherwise.
4. I love languages - I take Latin and ancient Greek, and hope someday to learn German, Italian, French, and ASL.
5. I love challenging myself (taking difficult classes, participating in challenges like PBM, etc.)
6. I've never been able to decide on a favorite color.
7. I love to sing.

And I don't even have fifteen people to pass this on to, because most of the blogs that I follow are writers' and illustrators' blogs, and I'm way too intimidated to make them share seven things about themselves. So I'm sticking to two. Two is a good number. (Yes, I know I'm pathetic at fullflling the requirements of this particular award, but I'll improve with time.)

1. Curious Sparkplug
2. The Secret Adventures of WriterGirl

Until tomorrow, or tonight if I need to procrastinate my studying a bit more,

Save Los Angeles Libraries!

A few days ago, I wrote a post talking about how important bookstores are. After volunteering at the library today, I recieved a fact sheet about the cuts made to Los Angeles libraries, and I'm convinced that libraries are even more important.

Some of the facts I recieved:
- 160 library employees fired (July 1, 2010)
- serivce days cut to 5 (July 16, 2010)
- libraries closed on Mondays
- service hours cut from 41.5 to 34.0
- fewer story times, youth activities, adult programs and books
- additional cuts and firings proposed for library services, hours, programs, and staff  by Mayor and City Council of LA (October 2010)

Luckily, in the coming elections, Los Angeles has put an option called Measure L, which will increase the Los Angeles Public Library's share of city funds. Measure L will provide additional funds to:
- help restore 6-day services at all libraries and eventually 7-day services at 9 neighborhood libraries
- purchase books
- support library programs including after-school/summer youth, student homework help, adult literacy, and job search programs.

Additionally, here is a speech I found given by Philip Pullman about saving Oxfordshire libraries, which I found well-reasoned and expertly written. http://falseeconomy.org.uk/blog/save-oxfordshire-libraries-speech-philip-pullman

I don't have anything for PBM right now - today was totally devoid of inspiration - but I'm going to try to get something up before I go to bed.

This Weekend

...has been crazy.

First, I volunteered at the library again, which was very fun. I re-shelved the books in the large print section, crossed out the bar codes in discarded books and magazines, and I made a poster display for the YA section. It was incredibly fun, even more than last week.

And then  I went to my friends birthday party which was SO FUN and we stayed up until all hours of the night. Yay! By the way, starting a movie at 11:30 - so great. Custom Apples to Apples (where you make your own cards before the game starts) - best game ever. Happy Birthday Emi!

And then I got home today, realized I didn't write a picture book yesterday, went to turn on my computer, and... nothing happened. My computer would not turn on. At all. So I took my computer into the mac store (I have a mac) and they said they could fix it, but it would take them a week. A WEEK. So started freaking out because all of my schoolwork (including notes) is on my computer. And then I realized all of my notes for PBM are on my computer. But I didn't really have a choice because my computer wouldn't work even if I brought it home, so I might as well have them fix it.

So I went home and called my friend (thank you!) for the notes from last week (I backed up my computer last weekend, thank goodness so I'm only missing stuff from last week, which includes everything for PBM) and borrowed my brother's computer, a PC which I can barely use (with lots of "gahh"s and "darn it"s and "oh my gosh this freaking computer"s but which I'm using now, and I'm going to make do for this week.

Except that by the time I finished my homework after all of this, it was 11. And I just didn't have the energy to write 2 picture books without any of my notes. And my brother's computer doesn't have photoshop, so I can't draw covers and be done with it.

That is my excuse for why I missed two days in a row. And it's a much better excuse than "I had a lot of homework" which I'm sure I'm going to use a bunch of times in the coming weeks, especially in the week before finals (gack!).

I'm going to try to write THREE tomorrow (yeah, right). I'll probably end up with 1 completed book and 2 ideas. And since spring sports start tomorrow I'll be too exhausted to make those 2 ideas into 2 full books. Which is what double frees on Tuesdays are for. I also want to finish the drawing I started for the inside page of Fox & Sparrow (which may have to wait since it's on my computer) and make a cover for Green Yarn. Goodness, I have a lot to do.

Until tomorrow,

Community Service

My school has a 20-hour project as a community service requirement, due at the end of the year. I recently started thinking about things I love that could be turned into a community service project. So, this weekend, I volunteered my first 2.75 hours at my local public library. It was incredibly fun. I took down a display about online homework help, helped to catalog duplicates in the mysteries section, and organized magazines in chronological order and took out all editions from 2009 to be archived. It was a great experience and I'm going to come back for my next 17.25 hours. If your local library takes volunteers, I'd recommend trying this out. In addition, next weekend I'm going to go a bit early so I can check out some of their picture books, because by then I'll be in the thick of PBM. So excited for Tuesday and finally being able to start writing!

On another note, I got a bunch of new books this weekend from my Omi Mary and my great-aunt Mady. Thank you both so much! Also this week I'm receiving a bunch of pre-ordered books. It seems like as much as I try to keep just a few books on my nightstand at a time, they come in waves, like they want to be sitting there for weeks. I suppose it's better than sitting on the bookshelf for months or years. The new books for this week are:

- The Heavenward Path, by Kara Dakley
It hasn't arrived yet but will be coming any day now.
- Leviathan, by Scott Westerfeld
Last time I got it from the library, but this time I'm keeping it, and I will read it over and over for years to come.
- Fire, by Kristin Cashore
I own Graceling, but I liked Fire just as much. If you scroll down, you will see that I read Fire on January 6th, but I want to reread it. And besides, it just came out in paperback yesterday
- Incarceron, by Catherine Fisher
I made myself curious with my post about Incarceron and The Maze Runner. I heard that The Maze Runner is much creepier than Incarceron, so I'm starting with the latter.
- Midnighters, by Scott Westerfeld
I've come to the conclusion that anything Westerfeld has got to be good. I haven't been proven wrong yet.
- Animal Farm, by George Orwell
I read 1984 over the summer, and wanted to read Animal Farm immediately afterward, but NN lost my copy (well, not mine, technically, but the one NN was going to give me after NN was done using it for school), so I didn't get a new copy until now.
- Cloaked in Red, by Vivian Vande Velde
It's finally coming! It's supposed to arrive today! Yay!
- Amulet (Books 1-3), by Kazu Kibuishi
I love graphic novels. Who doesn't like graphic novels? I'm pretty sure this is going to be a middle-school level book, but with graphic novels, it doesn't really matter. For example: Rapunzel's Revenge (Shannon Hale) is one of my favorite books. Ever. And my little cousins love it too, so there you go.
- A True Princess, by Diane Zhaler
Same general idea as The Thirteenth Princess, but rather than a retelling of The Twelve Dancing Princesses, this is a retelling of The Princess and the Pea. Comes out on Thursday!

Until tomorrow,

The Book Swap, Part II

I thought I should post a picture of the great books I got at the Book Swap.

Bright Shadow, by Avi

I have no idea what it's about, but Avi is reliably good.

Science Fair, by Dave Barry and Ridely Pearson

I was so excited when I saw this book because Barry and Pearson also co-wrote the Peter and the Starcatchers series, which I loved. Science Fair seems like it will have a bit of a weaker plot, but these guys are great writers, and it's sure to be very funny.

Morning Girl, by Michael Dorris

Definitely below my reading level, but I remember really loving it, so I thought, why not?

A Girl Named Disaster, by Nancy Farmer

I love Nancy Farmer. She writes so well on such a variety of subjects. Also, A Girl Named Disaster is a Newbery Honor Book, so it must be good.

Tracker, by Gary Paulsen

I've never read any Gary Paulsen, but Hatchet has been on my shelf for as long as I can remember. I intend to start reading his books ASAP.

Fablehaven (Books 1-3), by Brandon Mull

Agatha Christie: Five Complete Novels, by Agatha Christie

Never read any Agatha Christie before, but a friend who gives me great book recommendations told me to try it out.

So anyway, those are the books I got at the wonderful MS Book Swap. Thank you again, great librarians. It was fantastic.

Hurray for Book Swaps!

My school library just recently organized a Middle School book swap. Even though I’m not in MS, I got permission from the librarians to come after school and pick out books that people hadn’t chosen. Let me say this – it was awesome. There were tables full of books not chosen, and SO MANY great books that I wanted to pick. They were mostly MS-level (obviously) but there were some great books (e.g. The Giver, by Lois Lowry, A bunch of Avi books, some Nancy Farmer, a giant volume of Agatha Christie…. I could go on and on). I ended up picking out about ten that I’m very excited to read, but they’ll have to wait until after the giant stack has been reduced quite a bit. Since I took a break to read the Sea of Trolls trilogy (which I’ll hopefully be finishing tonight or tomorrow), I still have 10 of my 14 from a few posts ago patiently waiting to be read. And one more that I borrowed from my friend. And two more that I checked out of the library. It’s so nice to have books waiting to be read.

Thank you, very nice librarians!

Halloween Costume Research -- The Sea of Trolls

By Nancy Farmer
Start Date: hopefully tomorrow (6 October 2010)

For Halloween, my friend and I are going to dress up as Thorgil and Jack from Nancy Farmer’s The Sea of Trolls trilogy. So we’re both re-reading the series before we figure out our costumes. We call it research. The trilogy is set in Viking times, combining historical fiction with the fantastical Norse myths. It’s a great series that I hope to post a review of later on. For now, everything else (i.e. I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett and a few other half-finished books) either gets finished tonight or put on pause until our research is completed.