Tuesday, May 23, 2017

YA Paranormal Romance Kingdom of Darkness Cover Reveal










About the book:

Title: Kingdom of Darkness
Series: Kingdom Journals #2
Author: Tricia Copeland
Genre: YA Paranormal Romance
Release: June 21, 2017
Goodreads








Blurb:
 
“… the previous night’s vision, or whatever it was, ended with a name I heard clear as day, as if the people were in my room. Ivy, the girl and boy recited together.” – Camille

Could her dreams be real? Is she the key to freeing witches from their curse? Of course not, right? Thinking that her only chance at a normal life lay in a new treatment, Camille joins Dr. Antos and a group of teens for a month long camping trip in Iceland. There she meets Jude, a fellow schizophrenic. Dr. Antos invites Camille and Jude to extend their work with him on the island of Sardinia. Camille is suspicious of Dr. Antos’s intentions but her dad goes missing, leaving her no choice but to travel to Italy. Is she walking into a lion’s den or has her illness invaded her reality?

PreOrder (99 cents)
 
Amazon US
Amazon UK
Amazon CA
Amazon AU


In the Series:

Kingdom of Embers (Kingdom Journals #1)
 
Amazon US
Amazon CA
Amazon UK
Amazon AU
Goodreads

Praise for Kingdom of Embers
 
“HEARTSTOPPING!”
“A much-needed twist to an old genre.”
“Fantastic twist on the paranormal!”

Author Bio:
 
Tricia Copeland grew up in Georgia and now lives in Colorado with her family. Her books include the clean new adult Being Me Series, Is This Me?, If I Could Fly, Thinking You Know Me, and the final installment, Being Me, as well as a young adult novellas, Drops of Sunshine and the Lovelock Chronicles, Lovelock Ones: Native One, published in The Butterfly Box. If she’s not out running, you can find Tricia at www.triciacopeland.com or your favorite social media.

Social Media Links:
 
Website
Facebook
Instagram
Twitter
Pinterest
YouTube
Google
Blog
Goodreads
Amazon





Giveaway:
Embedded:
a Rafflecopter giveaway


Direct Link: https://www.rafflecopter.com/rafl/display/9912b71a70/








Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Writing Tips & the 84th Kid Lit Blog Hop

Carpinello's Writing Pages is back once again with writing tips from the authors interviewed. These interviews are from March and April 2016. As always, read and please leave a writing tip of your own in the comments.

Keep writing. Don't let setbacks discourage you. Go to conferences, take courses, join a critique group, and read, read, read—Darlene Foster, author of Amanda in Alberta-The Writing on the Stone

Don’t write to make a living. Write because you love it—Jessica Therrien, author of Children of the Gods series
 
Write what you’re passionate about. Dig down inside to find the emotion to put on the page. Don’t publish the story before it’s ready. Just because you can easily self-publish doesn’t mean the story should be quickly put out there before its polished. Get away from your writing regularly to refill the well with activities and experiences that inform and energize your stories. But most of all, don’t write/publish in a vacuum – join a supportive professional organization related to your genre/category of books to learn and grow as an authorBetty Bolte, author of Hometown Heroes

Keep writing! I find that if I take a break, it’s much harder to get back in the swing of things. Also, do your research about the publishing process to determine if you want to go the independent or traditional route. Whichever route you choose, be informedElizabeth Woodrum, author of The Maisy Files series.

And now,

Welcome back to another month of terrific children's literature on the May 2017 Kid Lit Blog Hop. 

On this Hop, Carpinello's Writing Pages interviews
MG Author
Gary Val Tenuta


This hop takes place every 3rd Wednesday of the month. It is designed to engage a  group of people who love everything that has to do with children's literature. Everyone is welcome to join us: bloggers, authors, publicist, and publishers!


Have you seen the  Kid Lit Blog Hopper Facebook fan page? This page has all the news and information related to the hop plus ongoing posts, giveaways, news articles, etc. related to Kid's Lit. Check it out and of course, please like the page.


So for our hop, please make sure that your posts are related to Children’s literature only and add it to the linky. (Please make sure to add your direct post only) If you are an author, feel free just to link to your blog. Once you are done, then hop around to visit others. Please follow the co-host and visit at least the one or two people above your link. Please leave a comment when you do visit, we all like those.

Also, it would be appreciated if you grab the Kid Lit Blog Hop Badge and display it on your blog and/or your post. Note: Make sure you have the newest badge as the old one goes to the wrong page.
We would also be grateful if you tweet and/or posted on Facebook about the blog hop. Let’s grow this wonderful community.


Thanks for sharing your great children's books with all of us! The hostess will be around to see you.
Happy Hopping!
BeachBoundBooks, co-hostess
                                                    Pragmatic Mom, co-hostess
Jump Into A Book, co-hostess
Spark and Pook, co-hostess
                                              Carpinello's Writing Page, co-hostess



Meet Middle Grade Author Gary Val Tenuta

Carpinello's Writing Pages welcomes Gary Val Tenuta, an author of many talents as you will see.

First, a bit about Gary:

Gary Val Tenuta is a book cover designer (BookCoversAndVideos.webs.com), songwriter, and author with a degree in Social Psychology. His professional writing career began as a contributing writer for Fate Magazine in the 1990s. Since then he has authored two full-length novels and a series of novellas all for adult readers. The Lost Dreamstone is his first novel for Middle-Grade readers. Gary lives with his black cat Bear in a cozy condo in the Pacific Northwest of the U.S.


Why did you pick to write books for MG readers?

The idea for The Lost Dreamstone came to me over 30 years ago. Due to a crazy series of odd coincidences, the book sat unfinished until recently when I decided if I didn’t finish it now, it might never get done. The details of that strange series of coincidences — all of which were related to the story — are included as an addendum at the back of the book.


What types of books do you like to read?

I’ve read everything Dan Brown (author of The DaVinci Code, et. al.) has ever published. So that’s a big clue as to the kind of stories that draw me in.  I’m also a big fan of anything that’s similar to Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone.

When you are not writing, what do you like to do?

When I’m not writing I’m usually busy designing book covers or creating book trailer videos. Otherwise there’s good chance I’ll be practicing some bluegrass licks on my guitar. Or, if I’m feeling really lazy, I might be caught binge-watching a good series on Netflix.

Tell us about The Lost Dreamstone and how the story came to be.
 
As I mentioned earlier, the story of The Lost Dreamstone came to me over 30 years ago. What inspired it, I honestly don’t remember. I suspect it was probably an infatuation with two of my all-time favorites, Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz. I was a new father of a son at that time, and I think I just wanted to write something that he would like to read when he got older. But, also as I mentioned earlier, a strange series of coincidental events (all related to the story I wanted to write) caused the book to remain unfinished for years. That series of events is a story in itself, and it’s included at the back of the book under it’s own title: A Tale of Two Tales: The Story Behind the Story of The Lost Dreamstone. My son now has a 4-year-old son of his own, and The Lost Dreamstone will be waiting for him to read when he’s a few years older. I created all of the illustrations in the book, some of which can be seen in the book trailer.

Here's a peek at The Lost Dreamstone:
 
Don't believe in the Sandman? Neither did 11-year-old twins, Josh and Jenna. That is, until one night when something moved in the corner of Jenna's bedroom. That event started a chain reaction that catapulted the twins across a threshold into a mystical realm, "the place of dreams where nothing is quite the way it seems, where that which is, perhaps is not and what is not might be."

Josh and Jenna are shocked to discover they are the key to fulfilling an ancient prophecy:

Now the Dreamstone has been lost
Waiting who knows where?
Like a ball between two players tossed
’Tis neither here nor there.
Two children from the Outer World
Together shall come alone.
They must be twins, a boy and girl
To find the lost Dreamstone.

The prophecy must be fulfilled or all of us––you, me, everyone––will suffer horrendous nightmares every sleeping moment of our lives for as long as we live.

Tasked with finding the Dreamstone in a realm populated by Dreamons and Drangels and Skrids––Oh my!––not to mention those annoying Weedles––the twins face dangers and strangers beyond their wildest dreams.

Will Josh, the adventurous one, find this adventure to be more than he can handle? Jenna, the cautious one, will certainly find her cautious nature challenged by the need to press onward in spite of the obstacles at nearly every turn.

Failure to succeed in their quest is not an option––at least not if they ever want to return to their home and to the comfortable lives they once knew. D'rath Kahn, the Dark Lord of Nightmares has declared it so.

There is much to be discovered in the place where dreams come from. Like Shamara the Sorceress told the twins, "Future fortune is often lost because a threshold is left uncrossed."

The door is open. Won’t you come on in?

Have you written other books? If so, tell us a bit about them.

My first novel, The Ezekiel Code, was self-published back in 2007. It is a metaphysical mystery adventure inspired by UFOs and the Bible!

My second novel, ASH: Return of the Beast, is a cross-genre tale incorporating elements of the occult lore, supernatural phenomena and police procedural. The story was inspired by a little known legend concerning Aleister Crowley, a notorious practitioner of what is often called the “Dark Arts”, or “Magick”. According to the legend (apparently true) Crowley was cremated when he died in England in 1947, but the urn containing his ashes mysteriously disappeared. In my novel, the how and why of that disappearance is revealed, and it’s reappearance in modern day Seattle brings about a series of baffling deaths that becomes a the most bizarre case that ever landed on the desk of Seattle Police Detective, Brian Kane, who doesn’t believe in the supernatural.

I also have a series of Twilight Zone-ish novellas on Kindle called Twisted Tales From the Files of the Second Chance Limousine Service. They are stand-alone stories that can be purchased individually or all five of them together in a set called “Wanna Take a Ride?”

What’s next for your writing? Are you working on a new story?

I’m currently working the 6th Second Chance Limousine story and I’m hoping to have a children’s picture book out by the end of the year.

What advice do you have for other authors?

There are several things I could say but one thing that comes to mind immediately is about reviews. If you get some bad reviews, don’t let them stop you from continuing to write. Yes, it’s disappointing, but it’s just possible that some of those bad reviews might turn out to be very helpful. Try to be objective and see what you can learn from them. The reviews for my first novel, The Ezekiel Code, were nearly equally divided by 4 and 5 star reviews on the upside and 1 and 2 star reviews on the downside. It took me a long time to get over the disappointment of the negative reviews but eventually I began to see that what many of those reviewers had to say was true. I made a concerted effort to learn from them so that my future work would show a marked improvement. I’ve made a lot of headway in that respect, and I’m still working at it.

Anything else you want readers to know?

The Lost Dreamstone is currently promo priced at just $1.99 in the U.S. and £1.49 in the U.K. It’s only available on Kindle right now. I hope to have a paperback edition out by the end of the year.

Where can readers find you and your books?

Amazon author page
Wesbsite


The Lost Dreamstone:

Amazon US
Amazon UK
Book Trailer