A few things...

Updates and info and fun stuff--list style:

1. I am starting a critique collaboration with Tara Kelly, Jessica Spotswood, and Elizabeth Richards. We each have two published novels with more on the way. All four of us love to critique query letters and manuscripts. We're offering competitive pricing for a variety of services and even student discounts on full MS critiques. Our official launch date is October 1. Come check us out at Manuscript Critique Services.

2. I am participating in YASH, the YA Scavenger Hunt which will run from Oct 3rd to October 6th. I will be giving away a signed copy of BELLADONNA, as well as running a secondary international contest for a gift card to Powell's Books. My exclusive material is a deleted scene from BELLADONNA, as well as a little teaser from STARLING. There are 60 authors participating this year! If you love books, you don't want to miss YASH.

3. It has come to my attention that some of you have not read the amazing GOING BOVINE, one of my favorite books of all time, so I will be rambling on about its awesomeness on the YA Valentines blog on October 8th. If you have not read it, come find out why you should.

4. My cover reveal for my first contemp, THE ART OF LAINEY, will be on October 9th at Ensconced in YA. I don't want to give away all of the fun details, but let's just say if you ever wanted to be in a book, you should probably stop by and enter the contest :)

5. I will be launching a Paula Stokes website/blog in October. More info on that soon. I will still post relevant Fiona-esque things here.

6. Someone left this random sunflower in the hallway of my building and it brightened my day. I have decided I really like sunflowers :)

That's all I got! Happy reading, writing, and whatever :)

BELLADONNA playlist

So I came across this list when I was finishing up the edits for Starling and figured I'd share. Once again, I've tried to include more contemporary choices along with the dark 90s music that is my favorite. Sorry, I am not linking these, because I worry about linking to websites that will go dead and/or are in violation of copyright.

PRETTY GIRL by Sugarcult

VOODOO by Godsmack

BLOODSTREAM by Stateless

GET OUT ALIVE by 3 Days Grace

DOWN BY THE WATER by PJ Harvey

COSMIC LOVE by Florence and the Machine

AERIALS by System of a Down

PASSIVE by A Perfect Circle

INFECT by Bad Religion

LEAVE by Jojo

LYING FROM YOU by Linkin Park

DOWN IN A HOLE by Alice in Chains

Blog tour winner!

Winner of the entire signed trilogy is: Rebecca Herman!

Email me or DM me on twitter, please. Let me know if you want the books signed, personalized to someone, etc.

Thanks to everyone for your comments. I responded to some of your blog tour ideas at the bottom of the comments of the previous post. I will definitely revisit your ideas in the future :) Thanks to all the Australian, US, and Canadian bloggers for being part of my fabulous and fun blog tours and thanks to everyone who came along for the ride. I had a blast. See you next time!

When blog tours COLLIDE! + GIVEAWAY!!

Hi guys. So today is the day--the end of the blog tours and BELLADONNA's release day. Man, it seems so long ago that I finished writing that book. Publishing is weird like that--by the time your book comes out you're like, "Wait, which one is that again?" :)

So I had big plans for this contest. I was going to turn the whole Where in the World thing around and do a Where in St. Louis, featuring some of my local hangouts and some of the things I love about my city.

But then I got another edit letter for my first contemp, and some unrelated distressing news. And then I wasted some time being sad and anxious and going through the whole "I am working twice as many hours for half as much money. Is this whole writing thing worth it?" line of questioning.

And it is. It really is. But my work-life balance sucks right now. I can't remember the last day I quit work before midnight and I don't foresee doing that anytime in the next week until my next round of edits are done. So instead of spending all day wandering the city in search of fun photo ops for this contest, I'm going to do something different with the contest and spend today working on revisions. I hope you understand.

To some lucky US or Canadian person, I am giving away a VENOM paperback, a BELLADONNA hardcover, and a STARLING ARC--a trilogy of books for one big winner. All signed to whomever you want. All with matchy-matchy covers. I am going to select the winner of the contest randomly, from people who comment in the comments below, but I am giving everyone an extra entry (up to 15 total entries) for each of the US/CA blog tour posts they comment meaningfully on.

I don't normally angle for comments/likes/etc. in this manner, but I worked hard on the tour posts and all of the awesome US and CA bloggers worked hard too, getting everything up on time and laying out their posts in a visually appealing way. (Australia--you guys also rocked, but I can't send books overseas at this moment and you guys wouldn't want our US covers anyway, but for realz, I love you too). All of my lovely blogger peeps retweeted each other and supported each other and I feel so lucky to know them. They deserve your page hits and your comments.

For your comments on this post, I am curious to know how you feel about blog tours: Why do you like being a tour stop? Do you only read the posts with giveaways? Do you ever follow an author's entire tour? What do you wish you could see more of in blog tours? What do you want to see less of? I offered a stop to one US blogger who said, politely but frankly: "No thanks--I don't want an excerpt." You won't offend me with any of your thoughts. For your first entry, tell me anything you want to tell me about blog tours so next time I can make mine even better :)

This contest will run from now until the morning of July 22nd at which point I will close comments on this thread, count up the comments elsewhere, and use a random number generator to pick a winner. BEST OF LUCK!

Get a signed copy of BELLADONNA

Hi guys! BELLADONNA releases in the USA one week from today and I just wanted to let everyone know if you want a signed/personalized copy, and you live in the USA, you can preorder your copy from my local indie bookstore, Left Bank Books. I live about a mile away from the Euclid Left Bank store and will don my walking shoes (actually, they're Nike running shoes I designed myself on the NikeID website!) and hoof it to the store just to sign your book :)

Just order from this link and in the special comments let them know that you want the book signed and if you want it personalized what name I should write. Easy, breezy! If you're looking for a signed VENOM paperback, those should be available also. Thanks for all of your support <333