Weekly Masque Run Down

Goodreads is giving away 25 copies of Masque. That's over in a matter of hours, so I won't bother to link.

YA Fusion- win the Annotated ARC http://yafusion.blogspot.com/2012/03/overcoming-writers-block.html

There's a contest for a signed ARC at the story siren. Also you can see my totally hot interactive book cover.

I've been sending out swag for other contests...if you are doing a giveaway let me know so I can post it here, and let me know if I can help you by sending you some swag. Gearing up for April, my blog tour (so excited) guest posts about Poe here on my blog (so so so excited) a huge give-away, and a beautiful book out in the world! Oh, also April is my birthday! Celebrate my birthday by reading Masque of the Red Death, or some other good book!

Questions and Answers

Okay, so I'm picking a few of  the questions posted on my blog last week to answer.  I'm looking forward to jumping in to annotating the ARC this week, and hope to write some insightful stuff inside! (and also to buy a new and expensive pen).

But I decided to answer some of the questions here.

What character do you relate to the most?
That character would be Araby. Because the book is in first person, in many ways, I became her for long stretches of time, if you know what I mean. For several months, I was dreaming from her POV, waking up, and thinking about her, going over dialogue as I went to sleep. I was immersed in her.

What do I love about Araby? Her honesty. Here's something I know about myself, as much as I like to imagine post-apocalyptic scenarios, I wouldn't survive long without pizza and Mountain Dew. If it was a zombie apocalypse, they'd get me in the morning because I'd be so groggy without my caffeine. I'd be no good in a hopeless world. Araby, in my mind, is a quintessential teenager. Obsessed by her problems, overwhelmed by hopelessness. And it's not just adolescence and everything that goes along with it...she has a legitimate reason to be hopeless. Her world is in shambles. Her future is gone. Her prospects of happiness seem dim. And she has so much guilt. Yes, I love her. Is she weak? In some ways...until she discovers her strength. Will some readers hate her? Absolutely. I hope more will love her.

What scene did you have the most trouble writing, and why? Obviously, I'm going to have to be cryptic on this one, since the book isn't even out yet. I'm going to say, the scene with Araby and Elliott on the Prince's pleasure cruise, because I loved the emotion of that scene, and the darkness that is revealed, but I also wanted to avoid melodrama...and it's a dramatic scene!

Do you write in order or not? That sort of depends on the story and how well it's flowing. For Masque...yes..I wrote all of the scenes in order, with the exception of a few scenes that were added in during revisions.

Will you see The Raven? Yes, absolutely! I'm very much looking forward to it!

Ask me Questions for my Annotated ARC

Okay, so I've got one ARC of Masque of the Red Death left, and I'm going to use it to practice annotation. As an English major (more than a few years ago) I'm quite familiar with annotation, I even read some annotated Poe as I prepared to write Masque. But the real inspiration for creating an annotated version came from the fabulous Hannah Moskowitz, who has given away annotated copies of many of her books.  I asked Hannah what she did, exactly, for her annotated versions and she said,  basically I just write stuff
about the process of writing this scene, if it's from a newer draft,
if it's changed a lot. I circle lines tat are allusions to other
things and write what they are. I say which chapters are my favorite
and which are my least favorites.

I LOVE that idea, and also love the idea of anyone being interested enough in my books and my process and the writing process to care about it. I'm going to do an annotated version of the final copy of the book (I just saw the book jacket this week, and let me say that it is STUNNING). And if you are looking for  something stunning, do check out my interactive book cover, along with a contest for a signed ARC over at The Story Siren . 

But for practice, I'm going to annotate my last ARC, and I'll give it away over on YA Fusion next Sunday, March 25. 

This week, I'm collecting questions for the annotation. What do people want to know? This can be a general question that you would like to ask any author, or a  specific question question for me, or for Masque. If you will comment that you have a spoilerific question, and then email me, I'll try to email you and answer your question! It'll give me a chance to practice answer these types of questions. 

One out of every 10 commenters will get one of my beautiful leather bracelets, with quotes from Masque. The black leather bracelets have been mailed, so you can have a choice. I also have a few white leather ones that no one has even seen yet. Exciting! 

I look forward to digging into the ARC with my special writing pen, and getting some insightful questions! 

I'm also so excited, April is so very close! 

Get ready for a Poe-Stravaganza!!!!

Updated- everyone who enters my upcoming Masque contest will get a signed bookplate and a bookmark if they still need one!  

To celebrate the release of Masque of the Red Death, I'm going to be celebrating all through April, with guest posts about Poe's artistic influence, give-aways, contests, and other exciting stuff.

Right now I'm giving away some of my GORGEOUS bookmarks. These are the deluxe ones with tassels, as seen below...

Since I'm going to need addresses to mail these to, go ahead and email me, rather than putting requests in the blog comments, though blog comments are always read, too!  Let me know if you want one or two bookmarks, assuming with two that you want to keep one and give one away! If you want a whole stack of bookmarks, or a class set, I'll be getting a shipment of slightly less fancy ones next week, and I'll be glad to send some to you if you let me know how many you'd like!

I've got some other exciting swag lined up, including leather bracelets engraved with passages from Masque (I haven't gotten these yet, and am so excited to see how they look!).

And various prizes... these are the ones I've already purchased and am dying to actually keep, but I'm not going to, these are all for prizes and giveaways...

A Poe inspired reed-diffuser, complete with a quote from A Dream Within A Dream. the scent is cardamom, absynthe, and sandalwood

This cool Masque of the Red Death inspired domino- necklace charm...from Etsy.

A 16" tall Raven hand puppet with a movable beak, it can say, "Nevermore," all day long!

This awesome Masque of the Red Death hoodie from Woot!.com

This awesome copy of Poe's Tales of Mystery and Madness, which has Poe's Masque, illustrated. 

A Poe inspired candle. Also with the Cardamom, absinthe, and sandalwood scent.

I'll also be giving away an annotated copy of Masque of the Red Death with notes, written inside, author insights (not sure how insightful those will be!) and maybe even a few hints about book 2.

These are the things I've picked up already. I'm still scouring the internet for fun Poe-inspired stuff.

April is going to be exciting!