I’m trying to give away books over here!

The funny thing about trying to give away books is that sometimes you just can’t do it. When my publisher lists a giveaway for copies of ALL THE UGLY AND WONDERFUL THINGS on Goodreads, like a thousand people enter. Right now, at this very moment, only 18 people have entered my giveaway for my own personal copies of the book. The good news is that you still have four days to enter! Your odds are awesome! Go here to see all the ways you can enter. Or if you’re really lazy, just go to my previous blog post and tell me what kind of love stories you like. You’ve got til Monday, February 29th.

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Give love, get love

It’s one of the best Valentine’s Day gifts I’ve ever received: a box of advance reader copies of my new book.

Naturally, having received the love from my publisher, I want to spread the love on to my readers. So this blog post kicks off a series of giveaways that I’ll be doing over the next six months as I wait for the book to be released.

To see all the ways you can enter to win the first ARC and a trinket–your choice of a necklace or a keychain–visit the full giveaway site.

But the first step starts here. If you follow my blog, you can enter by commenting on this post and telling me what your favorite love story is. Do you love tragic and doomed like Romeo and Juliet? Do you love tragic but then requited like Maurice? Are you a Pride and Prejudice reader or a fan of Gone with the Wind? Wuthering Heights or Like Water for Chocolate?

All the Ugly and Wonderful Things is ultimately a love story, because for me, those are often the stories that shape our lives. Who we love, how we love, what we’ll do to be with the one we love. So tell me about yours and you might win a copy.

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Let the swag making begin!

There’s something special about All the Ugly and Wonderful Things. It’s not just that it’s my first Big 5 publishing deal or that it sold at auction, or even that after 100+ publishing professionals told me it wasn’t commercial enough that it sold at auction to a Big 5 publisher. Sure, those things are exciting, and to some folks that will be what makes this novel special. For me, the something special about this book is that it’s a book of my heart. There was nothing plotted or planned about it. The whole story from stem to stern came from my heart.

Because it’s so special to me, all along I’ve wanted to do some book swag that was different. Something beyond bookmarks and postcards. Something substantial.

Last week, I started on it with a big box of crafting supplies:

Never let it be suggested that I do anything half way. I’m an all in kind of girl.

In addition to a hand-stamped copper tag with the title of the book on it, I decided to 1969 pennies stamped with Wavy’s name and 1956 pennies stamped with Kellen.

I love how the different levels of patina look together. The 1969 pennies I got are actually uncirculated, while the 1956 come used from a bank vault. All together, they look like this, and I’ll either put them on a key chain on ball chain necklace.

The real question now is what kind of giveaway to have to get them into your hands …

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