And the winners are...

Congratulations to the winners of the EMBRACE Blog Tour Giveaways!

Grand Prize:

Tammy Sparks

e-book Winners:

Tiff P., Sarah Guthall, Tayte Hunter, Kelly Fox,

Nata ArtistaDonna, Crystal Williams Fulcher, Vivian, Christina,

Linda, Krista Bookreview, Shadow Kohler, Rob Zimmermann

The tour officially ended last night with a Twitter chat. It was so much fun to talk to readers. Thank you everyone who joined us! Some of you already know that I'm working on a sequel. Last night I announced the title on Twitter. For those who weren't able to join us, the title is...

drum roll please...

HOLD TIGHT

Which fits this book because Madison will be forced to hold onto everything she knows and holds dear to her in the next book.


With the tour over, I'll be focusing on finishing this book. The first draft is done. I already gave myself a couple of weeks to enjoy this accomplishment and now I'm working on draft two, focusing on the intricate details of the plot and the small details of each scene. It's been so much fun to be back with Madison and her friends. Plus there are new characters being introduced along with new supernatural elements. I really can't say much more. For those of you who read the back cover of EMBRACE, you already know I like letting the reader learn what's happening right along with Madison.

That's all for me today. 


Today's Thursday, which means it's time for Omnific Publishing's Author! Author! Blog Bounce. For more information click here.

Join me on Twitter, Wednesday, April 25th

Thank you everyone who participated in the Embrace Blog Tour! A special thanks to the host of the tour, YA Bound, and to all the bloggers who participated. I had a lot of fun following along and reading the reviews. I'm thrilled that Embrace was received so well. If you'd like to check out the stops, click here.

(image to follow me on Twitter)

This Wednesday, YA Bound will be hosting a live Twitter chat with me using hashtag #EmbraceNovels. I’d love to hear from you. The chat starts at 7pm Eastern time, and we’ll be announcing the winners of the giveaways and Grand Prize.  

I hope you'll join us!

~

Feature & Follow April 20th

Welcome to Feature & Follow

Feature & Follow is hosted by Alison of Alison and Parajunkee of Parajunkee's View. It's a fun way to make new friends and to interact with old ones. Click the links above to learn more and to join the fun.

Q: Fight! Fight! If you could have two fictional characters battle it out (preferably from books), who would they be and who do you think would win?

Hmm... this is a hard one, but the first two characters to pop in my head are from adult novels. Bones from Halfway to the Grave and Harry Dresden from the Dresden Files. Bones is a master vampire: very smart and cunning. Harry is a crafty wizard who manages to find his enemies weaknesses. If it came down to a fight to the death, I do think Bones would win just because he is a master vampire and has powers to go along with the title. But in the end, both Bones and Harry fight for good so they may realize this and team up. Look out bad guys if they do. 

There are a couple days left of my Book Blog Tour and there's still time to enter the giveaways. Grand Prize is a signed copy of EMBRACE plus some cool swag. Click here to learn more.

~

Kick start an idea

Any writer will tell you that ideas for stories come from everywhere. That spark that turns into a novel might have come from an eccentric neighbor or a group of kids playing at the park or an abandoned building that appears to have popped up out of nowhere. Our minds twist and blend a brief thought into an intriguing character with a problem she must overcome. We put her in danger, push her down and test her inner strengths as we help that character find her way. But how do we kick start the writing process? I tend to ask myself the four W’s: 

Who?

What?

Where?

Why?

For me, the who is usually the easiest question to answer. My ideas often start with an image of a character that I want to get to know. No. That I have to get to know because I just can’t get her out of my head.

To discover the rest, I start asking myself a lot of questions. What is this person doing? Where is she? Why is she there in the first place? Each question has multiple answers. The process starts in my head and percolates there for awhile until I narrow my thoughts down a bit. Then I pull out a few sheets of notebook paper and start jotting everything down. My notes end up looking a lot like the picture below only imagine that I’ve already crumbled up a few pieces of paper that have been thrown toward the garbage can. At least half have missed their target. (My family loves this stage of the process.) What can I say? I’m too busy jotting down ideas to aim. 

I love the feeling I get when I have a new character to write about. While I don’t outline before I start writing, the scene that has developed in my head becomes the foundation for my story. My characters become three dimensional. They learn and grow right along with the story.

How do you kick start your ideas?

Embrace Book Blog Tour

Welcome to the EMBRACE Book Blog Tour host by YA Bound. First, I’d like to thank the incredible ladies at YA Bound for hosting the tour. A special thanks to Trisha Wolfe for helping make this tour a great one. There’s an amazing list of reviewers. Thank you for being a part of the tour! And I’ll be stopping by a few of the bloggers to share my playlist for EMBRACE, we caught part of a Twitter conversation between Madison and her friends, there's a steamy Dream Cast, and more.

The tour runs through April 21st. Be sure to follow along and enter the giveaways!

EMBRACE

by Cherie Colyer


Madison is familiar enough with change, and she hates everything about it. Change took her long-term boyfriend away from her. It caused one of her friends to suddenly hate her. It’s responsible for the death of a local along with a host of other mysterious happenings. But when Madison meets a hot new guy, she thinks her luck is about to improve. 


Madison is instantly drawn to the handsome and intriguing Isaac Addington. She quickly realizes he’s a guy harboring a secret, but she’s willing to risk the unknown to be with him. 


Her world really spins out of control, however, when her best friend becomes delusional, seeing things that aren’t there and desperately trying to escape their evil. When the doctors can’t find the answers, Madison seeks her own. 


Nothing can prepare her for what she is about to discover. 

Dangerous, intoxicating, and darkly romantic, Embrace is a thriller that will leave you spellbound.

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | GoodReads

Website | Follow me on Twitter | Friend me on Facebook

Blog Tour Schedule:

Host: YA Bound plus entry form for Grand Prize giveaway

www.novelsontherun.blogspot.com : April 9 - Review

adiaryofabookaddict.blogspot.com/ : April 9 – Review*

winterhavenbooks.blogspot.com/ : April 9 – Review

youngreadersathome.blogspot.com/ : April 10 – Quote Battle*

www.epiloguereview.blogspot.com : April 10– Review*

www.thebookhookup.com : April 11 – Review

iheartyabooks.blogspot.com/ : April 11 – Review

www.loveofbooks409.blogspot.com : April 11 – Review *

mtgreviews.wordpress.com/ : April 12– Review

www.rachelsbookreviews.com/ : April 12 – Review

www.booklovewitch.blogspot.com : April 12 – Review

www.thehauntedrose.blogspot.com : April 12 – Review

www.jjireads.com : April 12 – Character Tweets*

www.living-fictitiously.blogspot.com/ : April 13 – Review*

www.angelafristoe.blogspot.com/ : April 13 – Review*

hackaroosreviews.com : April 13 – Review*

jana-thebookgoddess.blogspot.com/ : April 15 – Dream Cast

journeywithbooks.blogspot.com : April 15 – Review

storybookescape.blogspot.com/ : April 16 – Review*

http://everyfreechancebookreviews.blogspot.com/ : April 16 – Spotlight

readbetweenthelinesbookclub.blogspot.com : April 17 – Review

bookmarksbookshelves.blogspot.com/ : April 17 – Review

www.chapter-by-chapter.com/ : April 18– Review

willingtoseeless.blogspot.com/ : April 18 – Review

http://artsymusingsofabibliophile.blogspot.com/ : April 19 – Review

twochicksonbooks1.blogspot.com/ : April 19 – Playlist

jessysbookends.blogspot.com : April 19 – Review*

alwaysyaatheart.blogspot.com : April 20– Review

www.mandikayereads.com : April 20 – Review

fictionaldistraction.blogspot.com/ : April 20 – Review

BooksandSparkles.Blogspot.com : April 21 – Review

readinglittlebitofeverything.blogspot.com/ : April 21 – Review

http://themagicatticreads.com/ : April 21 –  Excerpt 1*

behindamillionandonepages.blogspot.com : April 21 – Review

Feature & Follow April 6th

Welcome to Feature & Follow

Feature & Follow is hosted by Alison of Alison and Parajunkee of Parajunkee's View. It's a fun way to make new friends and to interact with old ones. Click the links above to learn more and to join the fun.

Q:  Have you ever bought a book BECAUSE of a bad review?

I can't say that I have. And to be honest, I don't read many 1 or 2 star reviews to start with. I tend to think that the book simply wasn't for those readers. The exception to this is if the bad review is written by someone I follow and know has similar taste in books as I do. The review won't spark my interest to buy the book though.

How about you? Ever buy a book based on a bad review?

Guest Post: Hannah Downing's Dream Cast for Pieces of Us

Welcome to the next stop on the Blog-Hop! Huge thanks to Cherie for having me on her blog!! 

I’m so excited to do this post because I’ve never done a Dream Cast before. For those who are unsure what a dream cast is – it’s me dreaming about which actors I would choose to play my characters if the novel was ever turned into a movie. I have to admit that I had a lot of fun with this!!

 Dream Cast – Pieces of Us

CHARLOTTE

For Charlotte, I wanted someone pretty but who still looked like the girl next door. She is described in the book as being brunette and she has to be able to pass for 28 through most of the book but also be able to pull of 18 for the flashbacks. My top pick is – Rachel McAdams.

It was hard to choose though because there are so many gorgeous brunettes so I have also picked two alternates. Alexis Bledel and Eliza Dushku would both make excellent Charlottes as well.

CAMERON

I always pictured Cameron as the tall, dark and handsome type so, as horrible as it was, I forced myself to stare at hundreds of pictures of hot, dark haired men. It was a real burden! *wink* After much deliberation and drooling I finally decided that my top pick is – Milo Ventimiglia.

As with Charlotte, it was very hard to choose just one so my alternates for Cameron are Orlando Bloom and Jason Behr.

OWEN

Owen was a tough choice. He’s described as a blonde police officer and his character is a caring, sweet but strong man who wears his heart on his sleeve.  For me, that screams one actor – Tom Hardy.

But again, there were some close runners up. Ryan Reynolds or Ryan Gosling could also do Owen justice.

MICHAEL

Charlotte’s Father

Michael had to be the ‘every day’ guy. He’s a Sheriff and can have trouble showing his emotions, but he loves his daughter deeply. I saw this picture of Harrison Ford and it screamed Michael to me.

JOHN

Cameron’s Father

John is a professional man who has aged well and is still very handsome. I couldn’t go past George Clooney for this role.

ELLEN

Cameron’s Mother

I always imagined Cameron to have a slight Latino look so I thought that Penelope Cruz (makeup to look aged) would be perfect for his mother.

RYAN

Cameron’s Brother

Ryan needed to be someone who had a cheeky, fun type of personality and looked enough like Cameron to be believable as his older brother. I think Freddie Prinze Jr would be perfect!

SARAH

Ryan’s Wife

Sarah’s character is bubbly but calm enough to keep Ryan in line and she is described as being a beautiful redhead – who better than the gorgeous Aussie, Isla Fisher to fill this role?

LUCY

The Other Woman

Lucy needs to be someone who is likable enough that Charlotte would be best friends with her but who is sultry and a bit of a vixen – Scarlett Johanson fits the bill perfectly.

BONNIE

Cameron’s Sister

Bonnie is Cam’s annoyingly loveable, little sister. She had to have the same dark features as the rest of the family and a fun, playful energy. I think Nina Dobrev would be perfect!

ALEX

Bonnie’s Boyfriend

Alex is a sweet, logical guy who sees the family from both the inside and the outside and gives Charlotte some invaluable advice. For this role I need someone who is hot (of course) but also who can pull off some emotional scenes. I think Zac Efron is just the guy.

I want to thank Cherie for hoping my Dream Cast, it was so fun for me to picture my characters as real people!!  For those of you who have read the book, did you picture the characters like this or do you have some other suggestions?

Don’t forget to collect your LETTER to create the winning word to post back on my blog!!  

Pieces of Us

by Hannah Downing 

Charlotte Barnes was living the perfect life, until a series of events forced her from everything she knew and loved. Now, five years later, she’s ready to face her past, and the truth. But will that truth destroy her new-found happiness? Pieces of Us is an emotional roller-coaster about lost love and how one small indiscretion can ultimately change your entire life. In the end, Charlotte will question every decision she has ever made and find that, sometimes, you need to lose everything to truly find yourself.

Find Hannah Downing

Website | Facebook | Twitter 

Goodreads | Amazon  |  Omnific

Cover reveal: Astarte’s Wrath by Trisha Wolfe

Astarte’s Wrath by Trisha Wolfe

e-book

Expected publication: July 2012

A Kythan Guardians Novella

Prequel to Destiny’s Fire

Two thousand years before Dez Harkly developed her secret powers, Kythan Astarte vowed to free the Kythans from the binds that enslaved them to the Egyptian pharaohs and sorcerers. Discover the prophecy that originated from a very different time, and spans generations to link two very different girls...This is the beginning.

Set against the backdrop of the Battle of Actium, in the city of Alexandria, Star struggles with her guardian duties as her feelings for the newly named pharaoh of Egypt grow deeper. Not only is Caesarian her duty, he’s the son of Cleopatra, and he’s…human. All of which makes their love forbidden.

But when a conspiracy linked to Caesar, Caesarian’s own father, creeps its ways into Alexandria, Star must choose between helping her fellow Kythans free themselves of their servitude, or protecting her charge—the last pharaoh—while Egypt burns around her.

Author Website | Goodreads | Twitter | Facebook

Excerpt:

Whenever the sky bleeds, covering the once-blue pallet with crimson, and the bright ball of fire burns through billowy puffs of white, staining them and the earth in hues of red-orange and amber…and ash floats on a non-existent breeze, I know the Narcolym Guardians are waging a battle.

            Shuttering my window, I unloose the hemp thread, and a sheer curtain veils the sand-covered horizon from my vision. My fingers trail the cream fabric, the tips tracing the darkening clouds against the light material as my other hand curls into a fist by my thigh, dousing the swirling vortex rising up at the charge in the air.

            “Star…?”

            Astarte, I correct inwardly, but pinch my lips closed. “Yes, Habi?”

            Habi’s footsteps echo throughout the mud-brick room as he approaches. “It’s time…”