Maggie Stiefvater makes me see things differently; that’s one of the things I love about her writing. Tentacles. Who knew?
…he was polite in a way that was unlike anything Blue had encountered before. Gansey was polite in a way that squashed the other party smaller. Adam was polite to reassure. And this man was polite in a keen, questioning sort of way. He was polite like tentacles were polite, testing the surface carefully, checking to see how it reacted to his presence.
✻ Stiefvater, Maggie (2013-09-17). The Raven Cycle #2: The Dream Thieves (Kindle Locations 2566-2568). Scholastic Inc.. Kindle Edition.
Lauren Kate’s “Teardrop” will be released on October 22nd! I was fortunate enough to be able to interview Lauren twice already and to see just how passionate she is about the “Fallen” series, so I’m excited to read “Teardrop” and to see her venture into a new world and a new series.
Never, ever cry…Eureka Boudreaux’s mother drilled that rule into her daughter years ago. But now her mother is gone, and everywhere Eureka goes he is there: Ander, the tall, pale blond boy who seems to know things he shouldn’t, who tells Eureka she is in grave danger, who comes closer to making her cry than anyone has before. But Ander doesn’t know Eureka’s darkest secret: ever since her mother drowned in a freak accident, Eureka wishes she were dead, too. She has little left that she cares about, just her oldest friend, Brooks, and a strange inheritance—a locket, a letter, a mysterious stone, and an ancient book no one understands. The book contains a haunting tale about a girl who got her heart broken and cried an entire continent into the sea. Eureka is about to discover that the ancient tale is more than a story, that Ander might be telling the truth…and that her life has far darker undercurrents than she ever imagined.
Entertainment Weekly has the exclusive on the book trailer HERE.
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Another October release: Kami Garcia’s “Unbreakable” (October 1)! I’m excited for this as well.
I never believed in ghosts. Until one tried to kill me.
When Kennedy Waters finds her mother dead, her world begins to unravel. She doesn’t know that paranormal forces in a much darker world are the ones pulling the strings. Not until identical twins Jared and Lukas Lockhart break into Kennedy’s room and destroy a dangerous spirit sent to kill her. The brothers reveal that her mother was part of an ancient secret society responsible for protecting the world from a vengeful demon — a society whose five members were all murdered on the same night.
Now Kennedy has to take her mother’s place in the Legion if she wants to uncover the truth and stay alive. Along with new Legion members Priest and Alara, the teens race to find the only weapon that might be able to destroy the demon — battling the deadly spirits he controls every step of the way.
Kami Garcia and her publishers just announced that the audiobook will be narrated by the lovely Candice Accola a.k.a. Caroline from “The Vampire Diaries”! I love her! Yay!
There is a preview of the audiobook on Entertainment Weekly, but I think the media is blocked for users outside the US. You can still try, though! CLICK!
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Book Riot interviewed Neil Gaiman recently. Par for the course with Gaiman, there are so many quotable quotes in the interview, but this is the part that I really loved and the part that made me THINK. Yes, making his readers think—and think deeply—is par for the course with Gaiman, too.
A recurring theme in all your work is that the magical and fantastical lies mere millimeters below the surface of everyday life. After creating these worlds where gods walk among us and fairy lands are a mere crack in the wall away, do you ever get bored with everyday life? For example, do you ever wish Odin was propping up that bar?
What I find fascinating about the real world is that fantasy is one of the few things that allows you to talk about the imaginary. From what I can see, the imaginary is the thing that occupies most people’s lives and allows them to function.
Money is imaginary. It is a concept, an idea. Here’s some pieces of paper and metal. We are claiming they’re scarce when they are not. They represent something.
Scotland is right now arguing if it should be part of the UK or not. National borders are imaginary things. You get up high and look down you cannot see the border. There is none. It’s an imaginary thing that is agreed upon.
Let’s go even further into it. The World Trade Centre getting blown up. If you stand a little bit further back, Islamic-Christian antipathy, Islamic-Jewish antipathy, Catholic-Protestant antipathy, has all the reality of Odin sitting at that counter over there. You take just one step back and it is a bunch of people willing to pervert and destroy, kill and change the world just to say my imaginary friend likes me better than your imaginary friend.
That’s all weird imaginary stuff. So the glory of fantasy is that it allows you to inspect that. It allows you to take one step away from a quotidian reality in which we accept imaginary things as real. Do you realise the amount of blood that has been spilled and is still spilled to this day about people arguing about whether or not a cracker, literally or metaphorically, becomes the body and blood of someone who may or may not have lived, and if he did, died 2000 years ago? And bombs go off. And people lose hands and lives. So, I figure that anyone who wants to tell me that fantasy isn’t dealing with the material of daily life is kinda missing everything that goes on in daily life.
Thank you for stimulating the Little Grey Cells, Sir!
And lastly, Maggie Stiefvater’s “The Dream Thieves”—the sequel to the magical “The Raven Boys”—was officially released yesterday, September 17th. I’ve been reading an ARC for the past 2 weeks. I had reservations about the first book despite liking it, but “The Dream Thieves” just took a hold of me from the first line of the Prologue. I wish I can read faster so I can review it faster!
Now that the ley lines around Cabeswater have been woken, nothing for Ronan, Gansey, Blue, and Adam will be the same. Ronan, for one, is falling more and more deeply into his dreams, and his dreams are intruding more and more into waking life.
Meanwhile, some very sinister people are looking for some of the same pieces of the Cabeswater puzzle that Gansey is after…
Goodreads posted this great interview with Maggie in celebration of the release of the book:
There were a lot of cover reveals these past few days but these are my favorites.
First up: The much-anticipated sequel to Maggie Stiefvater’s “The Raven Boys”, called “The Dream Thieves”.
There is no synopsis for this book yet, but Maggie announced that it will be published on 17 September 2013. And also, that’s Ronan on the cover, which is interesting, considering no particular character was featured on the cover of Book 1.
If you’ve been feeling neglected by the Goddess of Love lately, don’t worry — Hannah Maquiling, college sophomore, is in training to take over. The Original Goddess is missing, but Hannah is Interim Goddess now, and she should figure out how to solve humanity’s love problems soon. Quin (God of the Sun) is still her mentor, still really hot, but apparently isn’t as honest about his other earthly relationships as she thought. It’s frustrating, and enough to make her check out possibilities with Diego (God of the Sea) and Robbie (Cute Human).
In the meantime, she’s decided to spend some of her precious training time helping to break up a relationship, instead of putting one together. Why? Because the girl in question happens to be her best friend Sol, whose boyfriend is stealing not just from her, but from other people on campus. Sol didn’t exactly summon the Goddess, but this is what power over Love is for, right? Surely it’s not just about matchmaking, but ending doomed relationships too. (Even when it’s not what people want.)
The new covers were designed by the lovely Tania Arpa, and photographed/modeled by Rhea Bue. This is a great choice for the international editions because it immediately gives you that YA vibe, and it is rather eye-catching.
And this is the cover for IGoL’s Philippine print edition published by Summit Books:
While this isn’t my favorite among the covers of IGoL released so far, it’s still cute, and when displayed with Mina’s other books that were released by Summit, this one blends in with the aesthetic of the others nicely.
This edition should hit the bookstore shelves today, while you can check buying info on the other editions here: click!
And last, but definitely not least: The 15th Anniversary Edition of “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone”! (But but but…I don’t even have the 10th Anniversary Edition yet!)
This was designed by author/illustrator Kazu Kibuishi. Scholastic plans to release a boxed set of trade paperbacks of all 7 books with covers designed by Kabuishi come September of this year. The hardcovers and digest paperbacks will still be published with Mary Grandpré’s art. Kibuishi talks about the covers here: click!
I like the look of Kibuishi’s art, and this actually makes me want to check out “Amulet”. I love that he picked the Diagon Alley scene to illustrate because it captures that sense of awe that Harry felt when he first set foot in the Wizarding World, which is what I felt when I read this book for the first time. The only thing that threw me off here is the color scheme, which immediately called to mind Grandpré’s “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” cover.
I never believed in ghosts. Until one tried to kill me.
Now that the ley lines around Cabeswater have been woken, nothing for Ronan, Gansey, Blue, and Adam will be the same. Ronan, for one, is falling more and more deeply into his dreams, and his dreams are intruding more and more into waking life. 
The Girl Who Read and Other Stories 