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I Love Your Blog Award

I Love Your Blog Award

I Love Your Blog Award

Diana was nice enough to nominate me for an I Love Your Blog Award (wasn’t that awesome of her??). The rules are:

1. Add the logo into your blog.

2. Add the link of the person who awarded you.

3. Nominate at least 7 other blogs. (Feel free to do more!)

4. Add those links to your blog.

5. And leave a message to your nominees that you have awarded them in their blog!

So here’s the really hard part — 7 blogs that I love. How can I just pick 7?? First I’ll say right off the bat that I really like the other blogs that Diana picked, but since she’s already picked them, I’m going to pick different ones. Of course, that doesn’t really help much, since there are so many AWESOME blogs out there. So I’m going to try doing this like a writing exercise and just put down the first ones that come to me, rather than over-analyzing it too much. If I do that, I’ll never finish the list!

Alan Gratz’s blog, (which he shares with his wife) because he always makes me laugh. Plus, what other guy do you know actually sews his own doll clothes as part of a paen to Project Runway???

The Swivet. Because Colleen cracks me up, listens to great music, and is, in her own words, an unrepentent nerd. She’s now an agent, though she worked on the publishing side before (when I first began reading her blog she still was — though I came across her blog while being a Google-freak looking for mentions of my book…she happened to like the title when it came across in Publisher’s Marketplace. I don’t know if she’s ever actually read my book or liked it beyond the title, but I like her. And if my agent wasn’t nice, I’d so be querying Colleen.)

Bookavore. She’s Laurie Halse Anderson’s daughter, but that’s not why I like her blog. And she liked my book, but that’s also not why I like her blog. I like it ’cause it’s full of awesomeness and is interesting and pertinent and about books. Enough said.

Lara M. Zeises LiveJournal. Mostly because every time I stop by to check it out, I wind up staying for a while.

Brent Hartinger’s Blog AKA Brent’s Brain.  Brent also makes me laugh. He’s smart, he’s funny, he’s gay, and he’s a heckuva guy.

Cynsations – because in any list of blogs, you have to include at least one of Cynthia’s (there’re a few) because she is so awesome. And I learn something every time I visit her blog.

Notes from the Slush Pile. Another learning experience…I learn something new about children’s publishing every time I read this one. Smart blog with a bit of a wry sense of humor at times.

Okay…I made it to seven! Actually, I suppose I should say, Hey, I kept it to seven!

The mean girl's name…

Well, I did finally pick out the mean girl’s name for the sequel to Sucks to Be Me from all of the suggestions submitted during the Grand Prize contest. I’m not completely sure what her last name is going to be yet, but her first name is…

Kacie!

I was thinking either Kacie Kinsley or Kacie Chanson (both of those last names were also suggestions). I’m pretty sure Kacie’s got friends (hey, what mean popular girl doesn’t?) and I’m thinking maybe Courtney or Delaney there. Or maybe both. I’m not sure how many friends I’m going to really talk about or go in depth on yet…but doesn’t it always seem like mean girls have two lackeys?

The most popular suggestion was actually Scarlett, followed by Bella or Belle. I didn’t want to go with Scarlett since so many people have so many associations with that name. The same for Bella (and besides, someone might think I was trying to go all anti-Stephenie Meyer or something). But they are great names! Actually, all of the name suggestions were great. :-)

Thanks again to everyone who entered the contest and gave me names :-) I’ve saved all of them…who knows, I always need character names!

Photos in Bookstores…

Colleen from Roaring Brook Press (a great little press that’s part of Macmillan, by the way, if you’ve never checked out any of their books) sent me this camera phone shot of Sucks to Be Me at Union Square in a Virgin Megastore. :-) Right under a bunch of Twilight / Breaking Dawn books.

Virgin Megastore in Union Square

Virgin Megastore in Union Square

And here’s a picture of my lovely neice, who picked up a copy in a Barnes & Noble in North Carolina. Camera phones are great, aren’t they?? I’ve got another picture somewhere that my husband Tony sent me on the day the book came out when he found it at a Barnes & Noble near his office.

My neice Nat with my book in NC

My neice Nat with my book in NC

If you find my book somewhere and happen to take a picture with it, send it to me and I’ll post it. It’s kind of fun to see it in all the different places everywhere. Heck, it’s still fun to just see it. :-)

Fan Art!

How cool is this?? “Cloudburst,” who has read Sucks to be Me (and liked it!) had a homework assignment to create a new cover for a book. So she made this collage art (the coffee cups to represent something that happens at the end of the book…which I won’t give away). Isn’t that awesome?? Her teacher liked it and so do I. :-)  

Bloodbucks Coffee Cup