Lydia Kang Takes The Dare

Okay, so way back when, April asked me to do a truth or dare, and I picked a dare. This one, to be exact:

Go to a cemetery at dusk and write a poem.

I put it off for months! But the time came, and lo and behold, it was Friday the 13^th last week, so it was meant to be. I drove to the Bohemian Cemetery in town, prayed I wouldn’t get arrested or maimed by the dead, and did the deed. Actually, I did the deed several times, as you can see. I also have pictures to prove that I went.  See? (in one of them, I found a 4-leaf clover looking thing. I think the spirit of the Lucky13s was with me. J)

Here are my poems. Yes, I wrote a bunch. The dead, the robins, and the mosquitoes kept me company.

Cemetery at Dusk

In the quiet of the cemetery,

I heard the mourners.

The ones who wept a lake,

and the unmoving, those who screamed inside themselves

for Anna

for Charles

for Vaclav and Mary.

I heard others who laughed with shameful spite

happy to be parted with the freshly dead.

And those who cried because,

dearest,

they’d wished they’d had more time.

Antonia’s grave

Antonia said she disliked lace.

It makes me sad, she said.

Bury me in clematis vine

in lapis and gold leaf

with a water veil

and the perfume of an angry woman.

And so he did.

A Question of Death

Will you say goodbye

to the firefly and the cicadas,

the angry words and the scent of violence?

To salt and caramel and regret,

To love so keen it bores like a parasite?

I ask you this, knowing there is no answer,

knowing there is no choice.

Lydia Kang is an author. A part-time doc. A salt-lover. A geek-girl. A hyphen addict. She is represented by Eric Myers of the Spieler Agency, and her YA sci-fi novel, CONTROL, will be out with Dial/Penguin in the summer of 2013. Find her awesome blog here.

Next up: Natalie, this Friday. Send her truth and dares.

Happy Friday The 13th!

It's Friday the 13th again and we're celebrating with anagrams and a giveaway! (Bear with us. This will all make sense shortly.)

Not too long ago, one of the Thirteeners stumbled upon this wordsmith site where you could plug in your name, a phrase, anything, and get anagramed results with the click of a button. We started playing with it, plugging in our names (awesome pen name options!) and finally our book titles. 

What resulted, was this fantastic list of truly compelling novels:

Heathen Debutantes & Bedevilled Peewees by Altho Pluckier
La Dude by Peach Seminal
@Ken by N. Amber Wino
A Located Noise Pit by Dabbler Cry Not
Veal Gas by Duenna Lax-Canar
Ninjas Sneer for John by A. Minions
Fat Elk Tell Shy by Gram Nonsense Hens 
Creeper Hypotheses By Hell Eon 
A Damned Hamster Thug by Sane Hangmen
Android Knot Port by Syncing Mind Mi
Vino Tit Pop by Askew Ties 
Tanners Tarp by Lineal Thaw Pipe 

And then, in typical Thirteener fashion, we had to take it a step further by creating things like fake covers and riveting synopses.  I mean, aren't you dying to read La Dude after this writeup and jacket?  

LA DUDE by Peach Seminal


Surf slacker extraordinaire Sam "the dude" Foster is seeking the next big wave in Australia when he takes a wrong turn at the airport and ends up in Paris.  Having no money for a ticket home, Sam must get a job in a Parisian cafe. Soon he's embracing the French way of life, dropping "bonjours" and "au chantes" like a pro. La Dude is the story of a man who loses his way, and finds it again, all with the help of a little ooh-la-la.





And check out these other mock covers. Admit it: you'd totally pick one of these up at your local bookstore.

photo for @KEN by Madeline Yoki and used under Creative Commons

And then you'd be headed straight to the registers, money in hand, if the author had credentials like so:

Yeah. Ahem. Thank you for indulging us.

Now that we've had our fun, we wanted to offer up some fun for you. Below is a list of books each of us Thirteeners adores and wishes we had written first! (These are novels written either in our respective genres, or novels with similar themes/voice/style to our upcoming books.) 

One lucky winner is going to receive these 13 books:

WHITE CAT by Holly Black and HEIST SOCIETY by Ally Carter (from Natalie)
BATTLE ROYALE by Koushun Takami (from Elsie) 

PARANORMALCY by Kiersten White (from Shannon) 

WINTERGIRLS by Laurie Halse Anderson (from Brandy) 

THE HUNGER GAMES by Suzanne Collins (from Mindy) 

ANNA DRESSED IN BLOOD by Kendare Blake (from Jenn)

UNDER THE NEVER SKY by Veronica Rossi (from Erin)

HOW I LIVE NOW by Meg Rosoff (from April) 

THE ADORATION OF JENNA FOX by Mary E. Pearson (from Alexa) 

SHADOW AND BONE by Leigh Bardugo (from Ellen) 

THE SCORPIO RACES by Maggie Stiefvater (from Kasie) 

TIGER LILY by Jodi Lynn Anderson (from Megan)

Use the widget below to enter the giveaway:

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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So that's it! Happy Friday the 13th to you all! We hope you've enjoyed celebrating with us, even if the anagrams were a little crazy.  ;)

Next week Natalie Whipple is on the chopping block. Send her truth and dares here. And if you're a published (or soon to be published) author, don't forget you can sign up to guest post with us. 
 

Dorothy Dreyer Takes the Dare

Today's guest post is from Dorothy Dreyer, and as you'll see, she wrote a book, and you'll like it!

Dorothy's bio:

Dorothy Dreyer writes young adult books. She's an American living in Germany with her husband and two teenagers. Her debut YA urban fantasy, My Sister's Reaper, comes out May 29, 2013, from Month9Books. The sequel releases in May, 2014. She'd love to hear from you on Facebook, Twitter, or Goodreads.

Dorothy says:

I had originally planned on taking the truth. I was all set on writing a serious post about the writing journey, perseverance, etc. But then I read the dares. And I couldn't resist.

I saw the dares "Sing your favorite theme song" and "Sing a silly children's song" and "Write a theme song for your book," and I thought ... wait a minute! A couple years ago, I wrote a parody song about querying to Katy Perry's "I Kissed a Girl." I dared myself to sing it and make the video for the Friday the Thirteeners gang.

So here it is, "I Wrote a Book." Please forgive me for the over-the-top facial expression and, you know, the singing.

We Friday the Thirteeners think Dorothy is a triple threat: great writer, great singer, and so hilarious! Thanks for that awesome video, Dorothy!

Next up on the blog is a very special post...for Friday the Thirteenth! We try to do something a little extra fun each Friday the Thirteenth, and I think you'll like what we have planned for July 13. And there might just be PRIZES involved!

Mindy McGinnis Takes The Truth

It's time for me to take a truth, and while I'm more of a stretching-the-truth kind of girl, I did find one suggestion in the truths that definitely resonated with me. Follower Orchid F. wants to know if there's anything that scares one of us more than having our book out in the wild for the masses to read. My answer is - definitely.

So what scares me? Watch my fun vlog to find out.

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Mindy McGinnis is a YA author and librarian. Her debut dystopian, NOT A DROP TO DRINK, will be available from Katherine Tegen / Harper Collins Fall, 2013. She blogs at Writer, Writer Pants on Fire. You can also find her on Twitter and Facebook.

Brandy Colbert Takes the Truth

Thanks for the warm welcome last week, everyone! I am super excited to be a part of the Thirteeners and for my very first post, I picked a truth. Specifically:

What are the novels that made you think? The ones that wouldn’t leave your head for weeks after you turned the last page?

Those that know me well shouldn’t be surprised I chose this one. There are few things I love more than talking up people, places, and things that I love. A friend once told me they were always intimidated to meet my other friends because I talked them up too much. So, yeah. I’m kind of an all-or-nothing type of person, and naturally, this extends to my love of books. I’m sticking with YA/MG novels since we are a group of children’s book writers, but this still proved a difficult list to narrow down. When I fall for books, I fall hard. And these are a few that I can’t stop thinking about/recommending/forcing anyone within shouting distance to read:

Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King

I picked up this book in February 2011, just a few months after its release. I hadn’t read A.S. King’s debut novel, so I was simply going by the jacket copy and the original, hardback cover (which I continue to love). The thing about this book is that it’s inherently dark, as it deals with the death of Vera’s best friend, Charlie, with whom she was frequently on the outs. But it’s also funny. And quirky. And sad. And damn smart. I loved Vera. Her voice just spoke to me. Felt like I’d known her for years. And I so admire the way King draws on this unique voice to slowly unravel Vera’s story and complicated relationship with her dead best friend. This book is a master class on pacing, tension, and character development, and when I finished I immediately turned back to page one because I couldn’t bear to leave this story. I still think about it all the time, more than a year later, and if you’ve ever asked for a book recommendation, chances are this one was at the very top. 

Living Dead Girl by Elizabeth Scott 

When I was revising my novel for my agent prior to submission, she suggested I read this book for research. I cringed. I stared at the book for a few days, tucked neatly into my bookshelf. I removed it from the shelf and looked at it a few more days until I finally worked up the nerve to open the cover. The surprising part? I’d already read it. I owned it and I thought it was brilliant—but I never wanted to read it again. If you’ve so much as peeked into this book, you know what I mean. To say it is an uncomfortable read is, perhaps, the understatement of the century. Imagine some of the most horrifying stories you’ve heard about abduction victims, then imagine the victims relaying that time in captivity. In fairly graphic detail. Multiply that by 10 and you have LIVING DEAD GIRL. I’ve read a lot of reviews that cry, “This book isn’t suitable for young adults!” and “It didn’t need to be so graphic!” I completely disagree. Completely. Stories like this need to be told. Yes, they make us put down the book, they give us nightmares, and they make us squirm. But if this book reached even one person who needed to read it, could relate to it, changed because of it? It is necessary. I think about this book a lot and I can’t imagine the places Elizabeth Scott had to go, mentally, to tell Alice’s story. It’s so damn brave and sad, sad, sad. I should also say that my own novel has an abduction storyline, and I don't think I would have had the courage to even attempt to write it if I hadn't discovered this one. It’s necessary.

Sixth Grade Can Really Kill You by Barthe DeClements

Yup. I just took it way back. To 1985, y’all. So, it was technically published a few years before I was old enough to read it, but I discovered this book sometime in elementary school – ordered from the Scholastic Book Club, thank you very much – and I can’t count the number of times I’ve read it since then. (But I do revisit my stacks and stacks of childhood books every time I’m back home in Missouri and I read this one almost every time, if that gives you an idea.) A companion novel of sorts to DeClements’ other MG and YA books, this one focuses on Helen (or Bad Helen, as her classmates call her). She’s great at sports and socializing and prank-pulling—not so great at reading and following the rules. I didn’t exactly relate to Helen, but I think that’s the point. Her ongoing shenanigans and inability to want to help herself were infuriating; thus, she was the first narrator I can remember working very hard to like and understand. I enjoy a relatable main character as much as the next person, but I’ll take a complex and realistic character over “likeable” any day. I also adore DeClements’ spare, almost casual writing style. As a child, I wondered how she was able to tell such a complete story in so few words and now I realize that in addition to being one of my very favorite authors, she was one of my very first influences as well.

           

Wonder by R.J. Palacio

Yet another book that I just can’t shut up about because if you haven’t read it, let me assure you it is much better than anyone can articulate. Much. Dare I say it’s perfect? I'll admit I was skeptical to dive in; I'm fiercely protective of the underdog (I mean, I proudly own and often watch the Rocky saga - come on) and I just knew Auggie and his story would break my heart. And yes, there were tears, but they were a surprising mixture of sad and joyful. Books like this are so wonderful (pun kinda intended) because they maintain a strong, valuable message, yet it's so skillfully woven into a compelling story that you never feel like you’ve been beaten over the head with it. Not to mention WONDER is beautifully written, surprising, and timeless. And makes you want to be a better person. So. I loved it. My friends loved it. My mom loved it. You will, too. Promise.

  

Have you read any of these books? Agree? Disagree? What are the novels that stuck with you? I’d love to hear about them in the comments.

Thanks for submitting your fun truths and dares, and don’t forget to come back Friday for a post by the fabulous Mindy McGinnis.

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Brandy Colbert lives in Los Angeles where she works as a freelance magazine copyeditor, combining her Journalism degree and love of words and grammar. Her debut novel, A Point So Delicate, is forthcoming from G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers/Penguin in Fall 2013. She'd love to connect with you on Twitter, her blog, or Goodreads.

Megan Shepherd Takes the Dare

Can I just say, you guys sure do know how to suggest some good Truths & Dares.

As I was going through the list of submitted truths & dares, I was sorely tempted to pick this one from Alyssa Sooklal that goes, "I dare you not to bathe for a week." Except then my friends reminded me that's more or less a normal week for me. Welcome to the glamourous life of a writer!

So in the interest of personal hygiene and keeping my friends, I instead chose this dare submitted by Heather Zundel:

That was a great dare, Heather. I now know how to accurately write about sheer terror. Thanks, I guess?

Next up is Brandy Colbert, our newest member, on Tuesday, July 3! This will be Brandy's first Truth or Dare, so let's make it a great one. You can submit truths & dares for her here.

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Megan Shepherd is a young adult writer living in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. Her debut novel, The Madman's Daughter, comes out January 29, 2013 from Balzer+Bray/HarperCollins, and is the first in a Gothic thriller trilogy. She’d love to hear from you at her blog, Twitter, Facebook, or on Goodreads.

Introducing Our Newest Mystery Author!

I'm so excited to introduce you to the newest Thirteener! Please join me in welcoming the lovely Brandy Colbert to the group!

Brandy was born and raised in the Ozarks – more specifically, Springfield, Missouri – and earned a Bachelors Degree in Journalism from Missouri State University. Brandy works as a freelance magazine copy editor and while she's a picky eater and a vegetarian in real life, she's an adventurous foodie at heart. She tap dances and is an avid fan of Degrassi, the Flintstones, Louis C.K., and Hello Kitty. Brandy is represented by Tina Wexler at International Creative Management. Her debut novel, A Point So Delicate, comes out Fall of 2013 from Putnam/Penguin.

We know 2013 is still pretty far off, and fall of 2013 even further still, but we can't help but squee over Brandy's book. Check out this premise:

A ballet prodigy's life begins to unravel when she’s forced to admit to the role she played in her childhood friend’s abduction.

Talk about an amazing one-line pitch, huh? Maybe you want to go add A Point So Delicate on goodreads. (*nudge, nudge*)

And now comes the best part of introducing new members: truth or dare! Leave your especially torturous dares for Brandy here. She'll be answering one a week from today. In the meantime, let's give Brandy a warm welcome in the comments.

PIVOT POINT Cover Reveal (plus more fun news)!

We love to share good news, and Kasie's had quite a bit of it these last few weeks.

To start, her absolutely stunning cover for PIVOT POINT was revealed exclusively on YABC this past Friday. Here it is in case you missed it before the weekend:

Gorgeous, don't you think? The mirrored instance of the girl? The title splitting them in two? The fractured light?! Plus, check out that blurb! And here's the official jacket copy:

Addison Coleman's life is one big "What if?" As a Searcher, whenever Addie is faced with a choice, she can look into the future and see both outcomes. It's the ultimate insurance plan against disaster. Or so she thought. When Addie's parents ambush her with the news of their divorce, she has to pick who she wants to live with–her father, who is leaving the paranormal compound to live among the "Norms," or her mother, who is staying in the life Addie has always known. Addie loves her life just as it is, so her answer should be easy. One Search six weeks into the future proves it's not.

In one potential future, Addie is adjusting to life outside the Compound as the new girl in a Norm high school where she meets Trevor, a cute, sensitive artist who understands her. In the other path, Addie is being pursued by the hottest guy in school–but she never wanted to be a quarterback's girlfriend. When Addie's father is asked to consult on a murder in the compound, she's unwittingly drawn into a dangerous game that threatens everything she holds dear. With love and loss in both lives, it all comes down to which reality she's willing to live through...and who she can't live without.

And to add to all the excitement, Kasie recently sold another two-book series to HarperTeen! That's right, she'll have two YA books hitting shelves next year: PIVOT POINT and THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US!

Here's the official sales announcement on Publishers Marketplace:

Kasie West's THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US, a humorous love story about a girl who has her lifelong disdain of the wealthy challenged by the son of a hotel mogul, whose attention and loyalty almost convince her that being rich isn't a character flaw, until she finds out that money is a bigger part of their relationship than she realized, to Sarah Landis at Harper Teen, in a very nice deal, in a two-book deal, for publication in Fall 2013, by Michelle Wolfson at Wolfson Literary Agency (World English).

And for those of you craving to know more about THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US, here's the full summary:

Seventeen-year-old Caymen Meyers studies the rich like her own personal science experiment, and after years of observation she’s pretty sure they’re only good for one thing—spending money on useless stuff, like the porcelain dolls in her mother’s shop.

So when Xander Spence walks into the store to pick up a doll for his grandmother, it only takes one glance for Caymen to figure out he’s oozing rich. Despite his charming ways and that he’s one of the first people who actually gets her, she’s smart enough to know his interest won’t last. Because if there’s one thing she’s learned from her mother’s warnings, it’s that the rich have a short attention span. But Xander keeps coming around, despite her best efforts to scare him off. And much to her dismay, she's beginning to enjoy his company.

She knows her mom can’t find out—she wouldn’t approve. She’d much rather Caymen hang out with the local rocker who hasn’t been raised by money. But just when Xander’s attention and loyalty are about to convince Caymen that being rich isn’t a character flaw, she finds out that money is a much bigger part of their relationship than she’d ever realized. And that Xander’s not the only one she should’ve been worried about.

Doesn't that sound fantastic? And both of these coming out in one year! I'm in awe.

Please join us in congratulating Kasie, squeeing over PIVOT POINT's cover, and maybe adding THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US and PIVOT POINT to your goodreads shelves! :)