Category Archives: For Funsies

My Epic Blog Celebration of Epic-ness! Now With Uber-Giveaways!

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Earlier this month, I reached 100 followers on this blog.

100.

That’s about 98 more than I thought would ever care about this little scrap of the Internet or what I was saying on it. Couple that with having over 900 Twitter followers, and I’m feeling pretty damned flattered at this point.

But that’s not all! In less than two weeks – Monday, March 4th, to be exact – I turn 30. The big 3-0, as they say. A milestone I’m mostly excited about because the majority of my 20s were spent in an extended, teary flail as I tried to figure out real-life. And while I haven’t hit some of my big goals yet, especially in the realm of publication, I know that I am blessed and lucky and have a helluva lot to be grateful for as I enter a brand-new decade.

So I want to celebrate. Celebrate the blog, celebrate my birthday, celebrate you fabulous folks. Mostly that last one.

I’ve put together two prize packs that you can enter from now until 12:00 AM EST on March 5th. One of them is a collection of fantastic young adult and new adult contemporary books that I selected with the help of my personal contemp expert Dahlia Adler. (And if you’re not following her yet, she’s frickin’ fantastic.)

The second is a Merry Sisters of Fate prize pack, featuring works by amazing authors Tessa Gratton, Brenna Yovannof and Maggie Stiefvater.

(For the sake of convenience, I’ve linked to each book’s Amazon page so you can see what each is about. However, per winner’s request and subject to availability, I will order from Barnes & Noble or another ecommerce site.)

EPIC YA/NA CONTEMPORARY PRIZE PACK*
Featuring:

epic-ya-giveaway

EPIC MERRY SISTERS OF FATE PRIZE PACK
Featuring:

epic-fate-giveaway

Since WordPress.com doesn’t like Rafflecopter script, I have links to the entries. A bit of a pain in the ass, I know, but I promise the Rafflecopter itself is easy-peasy:

ENTER TO WIN THE EPIC YA/NA CONTEMPORARY PRIZE PACK GIVEAWAY

ENTER TO WIN THE EPIC MERRY SISTERS OF FATE PRIZE PACK GIVEAWAY

U.S. entrants will get paperbacks unless they prefer otherwise. International peoples, you’re also welcome to enter as long as you’re cool with ebooks!

Click the links! Spread the word! I’m excited to celebrate with you guys and give a couple people some epic gifts.

I <3 all you guys.

It’s a Happy Holiday Hiatus Post! With Movie Clips!

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With Pitch Wars over and no other contests, cover reveals or anything of that nature on the radar, I’m taking a bit of a blog hiatus while I get geared up for the Christmas holiday. I’ll have a Top 10 Blog Posts of 2012 before the 31st, but until then, here are some movie clips. Awesome movie clips. BECAUSE.

My ultimate holiday movie, White Christmas:

Love Actually:

National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation:

Wishing you and yours a wonderful rest-of-2012! And a happy holiday if you celebrate one, whichever one you celebrate!

Friday Nerd Round-Up

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Happy Friday, everyone! We’ve got a little bit of everything in the nerd round-up for this week – a little bit of TV, a little bit of books, a little bit of movies.

TV: TEEN WOLF
The Man and I are several episodes into the first season, and it’s pretty fun, really. It helps that the chemistry of the primary actors is so natural that it overcomes the over-the-top music that tends to wrap up every episode. But my favorite character, hands-down, is Stiles. He’s like the Norm of this show. Every time he shows up, we go, “STILES!” Dylan O’Brien kills it in every scene, nails the comedic timing, and manages to hit the downbeats just as spot-on.


Keep up the good work, O’Brien!

BOOKS: WHAT I’M READING AND WHAT I WANT TO READ NEXT

Sometime between the long work hours and wedding planning and showers and revisions and my project with Brenda, I’m managing to get some reading in. I’m loving Trisha Leigh’s Whispers in Autumn. The world-building is just fantastic – all pleasantly creepy in how beginning-of-Edward-Scissorhands the town is.

I just found out about this one today, but I think it sounds amazing. Desert fantasy worlds and trickster gods? Yes, please!

MOVIES: PERIOD ROMANCE AND ’80S PROPAGANDA
The Man and I watched a lot of movies on Monday afternoon after all our visiting relatives vacated the house. If you were on Twitter, you probably saw me live-tweeting my reactions to Red Dawn and Logan’s Run. I freaking love ’80s movies. So much glorious cheese!

On Tuesday, I worked from home and I turned on the miniseries North & South and got all caught up in the drama and history and sexiness of Richard Armitage. That man can put on a serious smolder, and I have been officially diagnosed with Richard Armitage Smolder Disorder (RASD). There is no cure.

I don’t write romance because I’m kind of terrible at it. I’ve tried, but every romance-y thing I write sounds like stuff that any old asshole could put together, so I leave it for the many other authors who are much better than I. When it comes to reading or watching romance, I’m particular about contemporary stuff, but period romance? Hell yes. Give me some Austen or Bronte or – in this case – Gaskell. I am all about it.

Allow me to demonstrate by providing a video of the last five minutes of North & South – both the Armitage sexiness and the swoonworthy romance:

 

TO END IT: NOM NOM NOM NOM BABIES
Yeah, you read that right.

 

Question for this lovely Friday: What’s your stance on romance? Love it? Hate it? Qualify it? Take it to the comments!

7 Fun Facts About Me (Full Blackmail Not Included)

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Valerie R. Lawson gave me a blog award! My very first – the Kreativ Blogger Award! Thank you, Valerie, I will love it and squeeze it forever! Here’s a Tenth Doctor gift in return:

  1. Thank the blogger who gave you the award and provide a link.

    2. Check! Thanks again, Valerie!

  2. List 7 interesting things about yourself that your readers might find interesting.
    • I am a Renaissance Festival fanatic. I go to the one in KC every year at least once, and in college, I blew precious dough on a full-out costume. It appeals to so many things about me – my history love, my theater background, and the total joy that comes with getting to pretend you’re in another world.
    • I’m a cleaning extraordinaire. Some Pine Sol and a buck of soapy water, and I am a happy person.
    • If I could start my career over knowing what I know now, I probably would have done web development and design. I love learning aspects about it, and I try to pick up things where I can. Responsive web design is my new favorite thing. It’s fabulous.
    • I get very wrapped up in video games quite easily, whether I’m watching The Man play or playing myself. I stopped Dragon Age about halfway through after I made a decision that pissed off Alaric so much that he yelled at me and I lost 20 affection points. It actually upset me, and I didn’t go back for a very long time.
    • When I was around 11 years old, I was sure I was turning into a vampire. My canine teeth are a bit longer than my others, and I’m a very pale person with light-colored eyes, so I’m extremely light-sensitive. Add to that the fact that I was a night owl, and my imagination just couldn’t stop itself.
    • I have an autographed photo of James Marsters from Buffy that I got when I was 15, and he came to the KC Comic Con. There was a photo, too, but it didn’t turn out. Still, it was a highlight of my teenage years, and I was so proud of myself for actually being able to string together a sentence and not just throw up from excitement.
    • I went to small high schools, so the only thing I didn’t participate in was sports. I was involved in pretty much everything else, including journalism, the elite choir (yes, I can sing), theater, forensics, and lots of academic-y clubs. I was one of THOSE kids in school.

  3. Nominate 7 other bloggers, provide links, and let them know!

Some of you guys have already been nominated, so I by no means expect everyone to do the whole song and dance all over again, but I did want to call out some people whose blogs I enjoy reading on a regular basis:
Depression Cookies
Bonnie Rae
Michael Haynes
Samantha
Leigh Caroline
R.L. Naquin
The Barenaked Critic