New YA Contemporary Romance Coming Soon!

Okay, so I know I haven't been around much, especially here on this blog. I had so much going on over the summer, from hitting the USA Today bestseller list and trying to keep up with my insane pen name publication schedule.

But somehow, during everything, I managed to get a couple of YA contemporary romances written and edited and ready for publication!

The first is called JUST FRIENDS and it's coming out on December 12. The second TO BE YOURS, will be out on January 16. I'm getting the cover finalized with my designer right now, but it should be up for sale soon!

About JUST FRIENDS: High school senior, Mitch Houser, is thrilled to have multiple colleges recruiting him because of his record-breaking times on the track, but Mitch hasn’t told anyone the real reason he’s been setting records.

He’s trying to outrun his girl problems.

It’s bad when his friend starts dating his younger, freshman sister. It gets worse when his best friend from childhood, Holly Isaacson, pulls away from Mitch. They used to switch phones during AP History and type each other random notes throughout the day, but lately, Mitch has been keeping his phone safely in his own pocket.

Lance, Mitch’s only competition on the track and good friend, tells Mitch over and over that Holly isn’t ten years old anymore, that she’s worth taking a second look at. Mitch rolls his eyes and tells his friend to shut up, the way he has for years.

And worst of all is the idea of Holly becoming buddy-buddy with Jade Montgomery, who is Mitch’s latest crush. He wants to move Jade from a girl he invites to eat dinner with his family to a girl he takes out to dinner—and maybe kisses afterward. Mitch, who isn’t a great conversationalist, struggles to find the right way to ask Jade out and explain his “just friends” status with Holly.

So Mitch runs, and he runs fast. Things progress with Jade at the same rate they fall apart with Holly. Mitch is under pressure from his parents to fill out his college applications. He’s unsure what to do about Holly. He argues constantly with his sister about her boyfriend. And Lance’s voice about Holly refuses to be silenced.

Most days, Mitch can’t change into his running clothes fast enough. But running from his problems isn’t a good solution, and Mitch has to face both Jade and Holly—and decide which one of them to put into the “just friends” category.

I hope you'll get a copy today! Available in Kindle Unlimited or for $2.99.

New #YA #scifi coming to an eReader near you!

Okay, so it's been a while since I've released any YA novels. I'm still plugging away on them. I still like writing them. I just think they require so much more brain power than I sometimes have!

 But I have a duology coming: The Rift Walkers duology will be published very soon! And they got new covers!

You can get RIFT, the first installment in the series, on October 17. That's my mom's birthday, so I was pretty stoked to release a book that day.

And the second and final book in the series, MEND, will be out on December 11. That's MY birthday, and I've always wanted to release a book on my birthday! So I am going to! It's going to be epic.

 I love the covers the fabulous and award-winning Steven Novak did for me. Don't you think they're amazing? (Lie to me!)

Anyway, here's a bit more about the books, with buy links if you're so inclined to pick up a copy.

About RIFT: Seventeen-year-old Saige Phillips can’t help holding on to the hope that she’ll find Chloe, her twin who went missing five years ago. After all, Saige sees echoes of Chloe sitting in the window and skipping down the stairs. Though there’s never been any sound associated with Saige’s “hallucinations,” she’s freaked out by the breathing she hears in her bedroom.

The breathing is definitely real, and it’s definitely not coming from Saige. It’s echoing through a time rift that originates in Saige’s bedroom. Then a grayed-out guy shows up, saying his name is Price and he’s from the future. He has the same blue film clinging to him that Saige has seen on Chloe, and she seizes onto the idea that her twin went through the rift.

As Saige searches for answers in her time, she’s met with secret after secret, all coming back to one source: her physicist mother.

Price lives in the year 2073 with his Time Keeper father and a whole slew of global initiatives that regulate time travel. He knows time shouldn’t be played with. What he doesn’t know is why the rift opened now, or how he can stop it.

The deeper Price digs, the harder the truth is to swallow. His father willfully violating the global time travel initiative is one thing. Stealing the rift site from Saige’s mother is quite another. And kidnapping—or worse—to cover everything up takes things too far.

When the rift begins to show signs of overuse and instability, Price is desperate to close it before it explodes while Saige will do anything to keep it open long enough to find Chloe.

 In this dangerous game with time, someone’s bound to lose.


BUY for only $2.99 on Amazon.

About MEND: The high-octane conclusion to the time travel thriller, RIFT.

With Cascade gone through the rift, Price is determined to fix everything and find her. It doesn't matter if there's somebody that could become him--steal his life--on the other side of the rift. What does matter is that he figure out how to mend it.

But he doesn't even have access to it anymore. When he wakes up to a new, different existence than what he's used to, he realizes that everything about time is fluid. And anyone with the power to walk through time can change his entire future.

Cascade knows this all too well, having lived in dozens of realities over the years. And the one she lives in now, she doesn't want. Because it still harbors secrets about her father, who her sister Saige is determined to find.

Find him they do, but no one--not Price, not Saige, not Cascade--is prepared for what they'll find on the other side of the rift...

BUY for only $2.99 on Amazon.

Free and Discounted YA Science Fiction and Fantasy!

Okay, so for the next five days, you can load your e-reader with some of the best YA science fiction and fantasy out there.

My book, ELEMENTAL HUNGER, is part of the sale. It is only 99-cents for the next five days. I hope you'll go get it!

About ELEMENTAL HUNGER: Sixteen-year-old Gabriella Kilpatrick can shoot fire from her hands, which would be great if she didn’t get blamed for a blazing inferno that kills 17 schoolmates. When Gabby is commanded to Manifest her Element, everyone knows what she is: a genetic abnormality. Not to mention guilty.

So she does two logical things to survive.
1. She runs.
2. She hacks off her hair to assume a new role—that of “Gabe”, because in her world, only boys are Firemakers.

Not only does she have to act like a guy, she has to pretend to know everything a Firemaker should know. When Gabby meets Airmaster Adam Gillman, he believes her act and pledges to serve on “Gabe’s” Council. But Adam has the mark of a sentry and spent years obeying Alex, the Supreme Elemental. And Alex wants Gabby-the-genetic-freak dead and gone before she can gather the magical protection of a full Council.

With Adam’s lies that sound like truths and rumors that Alex isn’t really a Firemaker—or a man—Gabby sets out to charter a Council of her own. In order to uncover the truth, Gabby will have to learn who she can trust, how to control her own power, and most of all, how to lead a Council of Elementals, most of whom have more control over their power than she does. If she can’t, she’ll find herself just like those 17 schoolmates: burned and six feet under.

Go to the YAASFF site: Your Adventure Awaits: Summer Fun and Freebies. You can see all the books that are 99-cents and free, and enter to win one of 5 amazing prize packages! 

5 days. Tons of free and discounted books. 5 prize packages. Now until Friday, August 21. Your adventure awaits!

Go now by clicking the banner below!

Guest Post: Setting in YA Novels

So today I'm welcoming Jason Mosberg to the blog! He's here talking about setting in YA novels. Let's let him take it away, shall we?

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Writers tend to put a ton of thought into their concept, genre, characters, and storylines, but I think sometimes not enough analysis goes into choosing the right location. What’s the absolute best place for a story to take place?

Setting was very important to me in writing my first novel Grift.

Grift follows a crew of orphaned teenage con artists. Piper, the main character, masquerades as a prostitute to con rich men. Unlike the others, she must split her time between hustling and raising her younger sister Sophie. Disaster strikes when Sophie gets kidnapped by the mafia, and the crew must rally to piece together the ransom money before the clock runs out.

Where does this story take place?

In Las Vegas…

Piper and the crew of con artists live with their mentor Max in the penthouse of a major hotel & casino. The lavish suite is modeled after the deck of a cruise ship with a pool, hot tub, and various rooms.

While the characters are relatable through their emotions, relationships, and conflicts, the setting really helps give the novel a larger-than-life element. These young adults live the high life in this amazing penthouse in a city nicknamed “America’s Playground.” Relative to other young adults, they’re flush with cash. They get to experience the greatest shows on the planet: bands, comedians, plays, circuses, magicians, sporting events.They meet other teens in the young Vegas social scene (which mostly consists of UNLV students). They basically inhabit some 21st century teenage version of Neverland.

From a logistical standpoint, Las Vegas is the perfect setting for this particular novel. It’s the ideal city for a con artist to operate. The easiest people to con are those looking to get rich quick. Take Mars, the pool shark. At any given pool hall in America, it’s fairly difficult to get in a game for money with strangers. In Vegas? It’s hard to go to a pool hall and not play for money. Plus, most of the people in Vegas are tourists. There are 40 million people who visit the city each year with the average person staying a mere three and a half days. Tourists make the best marks.

Setting the show in Las Vegas also facilitates making the con artists more sympathetic. They’re not conning soccer moms in Boston. They’re taking money from gamblers and men paying prostitutes.

At the beginning, I considered setting Grift in another city like Los Angeles or New York. But now, having written it, I can’t imagine the story taking place in any other city than Las Vegas.

And that’s the way it should be.

Jason Mosberg lives in Los Angeles where he works as a screenwriter. His debut novel Grift is available at Amazon and iBooks. You can follow him on Twitter @ThreeStoryJason.

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Time for me to get working on my setting!

He Can't Handle the Truth!

Okay, so I'm terrified of today's post, but I asked for it. Give a warm welcome to Mr. J aka, my husband. I'd give you a whole bio complete with picture, but well, I don't really have one. He teaches sixth grade, and he puts up with me. That should be all the bio you need. Ha!

And he's tackling protags in YA fiction... so *gulp* here we go.

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It’s not that I don’t like teen fiction; it’s just that it scares me. Or, to be more specific, the protagonists scare me. Now I don’t mean to offend anyone here. I’m truly curious to know if my point of view is inaccurate in some way. Elana and I have argued this point many times (true) and I think I’ve finally convinced her I’m right. At least that’s what I tell myself in order to successfully fall asleep at night. (Ha!)

Why don’t I like the protagonists? Simply put, I don’t want my daughter, or the girls I teach, turning out like many of the female protags I see in teen novels. This point of view stems back to my first and only reading of Twilight. (For the record, I liked Twilight, and this is in no way a free pass for anyone to bash Twilight.) I was surprised that so many people loved a book whose main character is a young girl basing her entire self worth on the attention of a dude.

My concern is that many teen novels are filled with examples of unhappy or unfulfilled adolescent girls who are waiting for some pubescent boy to come along and make them feel good about themselves. Really? That’s not the woman I married or the kind of girl I’d like my son to fall in love with. My Elana is tough. She’s strong. She’s beautiful and quite frankly magnificent! Our lives twist and turn together as we support each other and try to build each other up. I hope to be a compliment to her. But never do I think I made her. I just try to keep up!

I want my daughter and my young students to read about girls and women like that! I want my boys to want to be around females like that! Is that so wrong?

Of course, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe there are some YA novels filled with examples of strong teenage girls. Perhaps all of Elana’s loyal readers (thank ye) can help me understand if this is my problem or an actual issue with the genre. Point out the error of my ways. I CAN handle the truth!

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So...can he handle the truth?? Are YA novels somewhat centered on girls looking for validation? Someone to love them? Can they love themselves without being reassured by a boy? Lots of things here, people. Discuss (nicely).