[Elevensies Love #3] Beth Revis, author of Across the Universe

I, like many of you, love debut authors and so to hit off the new year a bit early, I'm doing a weekly feature here. These features will introduce you to new YA authors for 2011: blurbs, links and giveaways--no giveaways from me, but I'll scour the 'net and see if there are any going on at the moment. If I were organised I'd have come up with some interview questions for the authors, but I'm not that smart. :P

Beth Revis...

lives in rural North Carolina with her husband and dog, and believes space is nowhere near the final frontier. Across the Universe is her first novel. Her debut novel, Across the Universe, is coming from Razorbill/Penguin in Spring 2011. A former high-school English teacher, Beth can’t help but blog about writing, grammar, and publishing at Writing it Out.

* ACROSS THE UNIVERSE *

Author: Beth Revis

Release Date: January 4th (UK) /11th (US) 2011

Publisher: Razorbill, Penguin

Genre: Sci-fi, mystery

A love out of time. A spaceship built of secrets and murder.

Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awake on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into a brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.

Amy quickly realizes that her awakening was no mere computer malfunction. Someone—one of the few thousand inhabitants of the spaceship—tried to kill her. And if Amy doesn’t do something soon, her parents will be next.

Now, Amy must race to unlock Godspeed’s hidden secrets. But out of her list of murder suspects, there’s only one who matters: Elder, the future leader of the ship and the love she could never have seen coming.

Don't you love the cover? Unfortunately it seems Australia & UK are sticking with the old cover, but the content will stay the same. ;) Anyone who has read it already has RAVED about this book. It should prove to be a great read, even to non-sci-fi fans.

Early Reviews:

• "I spent one whole day with my eyes glued to the page, my heart beating out a samba in my chest and my hands were shaking as I read the last page."- Alpha Reader

MORE EARLY REVIEWS

Interviews

THE INTERVIEWS

Follow Beth:
Check out Beth's site
Follow Beth's blog
Twitter | Facebook | Email
Goodreads

Giveaways

Beth is hosting another SUPER giveaway in December. Follow her blog to keep updated!!

US only giveaway at GOODREADS. {link} Ends Dec-01

Pre-order

The Book Depository | Amazon

Australians can support Aussie shops!

~~~

Learn even more about Beth Revis here!

That's it for this week's Elevensies Love featurette!

In the future I'll be able to host more contests--I've emailed a small number of 2011 authors, and I will be giving away swag in the future. ;)

Previously on Elevensies Love:

Sara Bennett Wealer, Rival (Feb 2011)

Kirsten Hubbard, Like Mandarin (March 2011)
Beth Revis, Across the Universe (Jan 2011)

[Elevensies Love #2] Kirsten Hubbard, author of Like Mandarin

I, like many of you, love debut authors and so to hit off the new year a bit early, I'm doing a weekly feature here. These features will introduce you to new YA authors for 2011: blurbs, links and giveaways--no giveaways from me, but I'll scour the 'net and see if there are any going on at the moment. If I were organised I'd have come up with some interview questions for the authors, but I'm not that smart. :P

Kirsten Hubbard is...

A 27-year-old travel writer and young adult author, Kirsten Hubbard has hiked ancient ruins in Cambodia, dived with wild dolphins in Belize (one totally looked her in the eye), slept in a Slovenian jail cell, and navigated the Wyoming badlands (without a compass) in search of transcendent backdrops for her novels. She lives in San Diego, California.

Come on, this girl's got some life! Hiking in ancient ruins? Sleeping in wild and unknown lands? She's definitely got stories to tell!

Like Mandarin

Author: Kirsten Hubbard

Release Date: March 8th 2011

Publisher: Delacorte Press

Genre: Contemporary

Part of the Contemps Challenge!!

"I want to be beautiful like you, I thought, as if Mandarin were listening.

I want apricot skin and Pocahontas hair and eyes the color of tea. I want to be confident and detached and effortlessly sensual, and if promiscuity is part of the package, I will gladly follow your lead. All I know is I'm so tired of being inside my body.

I would give anything to be like Mandarin."

~

It's hard finding beauty in the badlands of Washokey, Wyoming, but 14-year-old Grace Carpenter knows it's not her mother's pageant obsessions, or the cowboy dances adored by her small-town classmates. True beauty is wild-girl Mandarin Ramey: 17, shameless and utterly carefree. Grace would give anything to be like Mandarin.

When they're united for a project, they form an unlikely, explosive friendship, packed with nights spent skinny-dipping in the canal, liberating the town's animal-head trophies, and searching for someplace magic. Grace plays along when Mandarin suggests they run away together. Blame it on the crazy-making wildwinds plaguing their badlands town.

Because all too soon, Grace discovers Mandarin's unique beauty hides a girl who's troubled, broken, and even dangerous. And no matter how hard Grace fights to keep the magic, no friendship can withstand betrayal.

I've always been mysteriously drawn to this title. I like the concept of the novel, and love contemporary so, so much, because these kinds of things could actually happen! I like the cover. It's nothing too extravagant, and I think that's the main thing about the cover: it suits the book.

Early Reviews:

• "Hubbard's writing is magical. I was so caught up in the story." (full review)
  --Ashelynn of A Gypsy Writer:
• "A beautifully crafted, bittersweet story about an unlikely friendship that sets two very different people free."
  --Melina Marchetta

Interviews:

• Kody Keplinger, author of The DUFF
• The Book Scout
• Laura and Lisa Write

Follow Kirsten:
Check out Kirsten's site
Twitter | Facebook | Youtube
Goodreads

Giveaways

There are two giveaways on at the moment. They both end on the 22nd.

http://www.yahighway.com/2010/11/like-mandarin-arc-giveaway.html

http://www.kirstenhubbard.com/2010/11/another-like-mandarin-arc-giveaway.html

Pre-order

The Book Depository | IndieBound | Amazon

Angus & Robertson | Big W

Learn even more about Kirsten Hubbard here!

That's it for this week's Elevensies Love featurette!

My Elevensies Love contest has ended, and winners have been announced. Maybe in the future I'll be able to host more contests--I've emailed a small number of 2011 authors, and I will be giving away swag in the future. ;)

Previously on Elevensies Love:

Sara Bennett Wealer, Rival (Feb 2011)

Kirsten Hubbard, Like Mandarin (March 2011)

[Elevensies Love #1] Sara Bennett Wealer, author of RIVAL

Today is Sara's birthday!

I'm not going to count up how old young she is now, since that's not the point of the matter, is it? In any case, she's amazing and skilled in the performing arts (pretty much all corners!), and come February 15th 2011, her debut novel RIVAL will be available for you to order! Heck, go ahead and pre-order right now. 

First, I'll post the blurb:

What if your worst enemy turned out to be the best friend you ever had?

Meet Brooke: Popular, powerful and hating every minute of it, she’s the “It” girl at Douglas High in Lake Champion, Minnesota. Her real ambition? Using her operatic mezzo as a ticket back to NYC, where her family lived before her dad ran off with an up and coming male movie star.

Now meet Kathryn: An overachieving soprano with an underachieving savings account, she’s been a leper ever since Brooke punched her at a party junior year. For Kath, music is the key to a much-needed college scholarship.

The stage is set for a high-stakes duet between the two seniors as they prepare for the prestigious Blackmore competition. Brooke and Kathryn work toward the Blackmore with eyes not just on first prize but on one another, each still stinging from a past that started with friendship and ended in betrayal. With competition day nearing, Brooke dreams of escaping the in-crowd for life as a professional singer, but her scheming BFF Chloe has other plans. And when Kathryn gets an unlikely invitation to Homecoming, she suspects Brooke of trying to sabotage her with one last public humiliation.

As pressures mount, Brooke starts to sense that the person she hates most might just be the best friend she ever had. But Kathryn has a decision to make. Can she forgive? Or are some rivalries for life?

Yes, it is a tad long, but even if you're too lazy to read the whole thing, LOOK AT THE COVER! Doesn't it just pop? Also, I love the concept and the colour scheme used. All the symbolism and metaphorical mumbo-gumbo I could use aside, I think the piano is simple and effective.

What's better? Cindy over at Princess Bookie just posted her review of it on Goodreads! 5 stars, no less! She had a lot of great things to say, and I hope that more people get to read Rival as the days roll by. Some other feedback include:

“This book gets it all exactly right—friendships, envy, and the fact that you can never truly know another person.” (Sara Zarr, National Book Award finalist )

“Awesome, awesome, and more awesome. Not one wrong note.” (Lauren Myracle, New York Times bestselling author )

Rival is about so many things. Secrets, a friendship gone awry, competition--thus the name Rival, music, love . . . I've been super jealous of people who have received the ARC of Rival from Harper Teen. It's a real shame that they don't send ARCs overseas, but their reasonings behind it are legit enough that I'm not ready to send a torch their way.

Unfortunately I don't have any extra special for Sara, other than this.

Stalking Sara (hey, that should be a song!):
Check out Sara's site
Visit Sara's blog
Twitter | Facebook | Youtube

Giveaways

Are you a GLEE fan? The Sara (hehe) has been generous enough to offer 3 advance readers copies (ARCs) for 3 Gleeks! :D Unfortunately it's US only. The drawing is in December, so get your entries in! Get your Gleek on!

Also a teen? Lucky you! This contest is also US only. This one is for one of 5 ARCs! So, if you're a US teen, you get 8 chances to score. As for the rest of us who have none. ;) What smells like teen spirit?

Pre-order

The Book Depository | IndieBound | Harper Teen's list | Amazon

Angus & Robertson | Big W

Hope some people take the time out to read that review, and maybe even pre-order themself a copy. Comment if you plan on doing so. ;) By the way Sara, if you're reading this, I wouldn't mind a signed bookmark or two (I'll even pay postage!) . . .

That's it for this week's (?) Elevensies Love featurette! Spread the Elevensies Love! Also, it just suits so well to feature Sara first, since she's a moderator of The Elevensies. ;) Learn even more about her here!

Remember, there's still time to enter my Elevensies Love GIVEAWAY! We're well over 100 entries, of which I am so, so happy. Good luck!