SQUEE moments! And Original Sin Teaser #27!

I'm on an airplane back to California right now. Thanks to all the amazing educators who hung out with us on the Science Fiction and Fantasy panel yesterday! It was great to meet all of you! So, while I'm heading back to CA, I thought I'd share my latest squee moment. There are not even words to describe how happy this makes me:

(Photo courtesy of Jade @DrawMe_jd)

This picture just makes my day. I am totally in love with Italy. This is where I'm going to retire:

It's Cinque Terre on the Mediteranian, and I've never been anywhere I loved so much. One of those houses on the cliff will me MINE! So the Italian release of Personal Demons, aka: Il Bacio Maledetto (The Damned Kiss) is super special to me. I know you've all seen this, but I love it, so here's the Italian trailer once again:


And, for those of you tuning in for the Original Sin teaser...Frannie's ex-boyfriend is back in Original Sin. Here's a scene at a party with Taylor's brother, Trevor.

#OriginalSin p68 Frannie: “Reefer’s on fire,” Trevor says in my ear, pulling me from my musing.

My heart leaps into my throat and my head jerks automatically to look at the bonfire, half expecting to see a flailing Reefer engulfed in flame.
Trevor rolls his blue eyes and points toward the house. “Over there,” he laughs, “with the guitar.”

I LOVE teachers and Original Sin teaser #26

I’m in Florida! I can’t tell you how excited I am to be here and part of the International Reading Association’s annual conference. I’m honored to be on a science fiction and fantasy panel with a slew of other talented authors. I love teachers and I know how instrumental they are in getting kids to read. The book choices they make for their classrooms can impact a child’s love of reading for their entire lives. So, I’d love to hear from you. Was there a teacher who inspired you to read? How did they do it? Was it a particular book they recommended, or classroom reading? If so, what was the book?

And now for our Original Sin teaser. Taylor, Riley and Trevor are back in Original Sin. Here’s a scene from with the crew:

#OriginalSin p68 Frannie: Taylor's fair skin flushes as she presses her tongue into the ring through the corner of her lip. She shoots a glare at her brother and spins, storming up the road toward the party. Riley shrugs and Trevor smiles at her, all tanned dimples, as they follow Taylor across the street.

Luc twines his fingers into mine. “There’s a project for you,” he says with a tip of his head toward my friends’ retreating backs.

I shove him. “Yeah, right. We’re talking about Taylor. Do you enjoy watching me fail?”

“I enjoy watching you do just about everything.”

Fourth of Many Contests-for-No-Reason Winner and OS Teaser #25

First, our daily Original Sin teaser. Matt is Frannie's guardian angel, and you can imagine he's having trouble coming to terms with Frannie's relationship with Luc. Here's a snippet from his POV.

#OriginalSin p62 Matt: I swear to God, I almost struck the demon with lightning when he grabbed Frannie. The judo lessons were her idea. Now that the demon’s vulnerable, she thought he should know how to defend himself. But the “judo” always seems to degenerate into something looking more like wrestling, except with a lot of kissing and giggling.

And, now...the reason you're all here!

The winner of my Fourth of Many Contests-for-No-Reason for a signed copy of these:

is...

Kristen-Seeing Night

Congrats! I will email you soon!

Thanks to everyone who entered! I'm sure you can guess, there are more contests to come! I loved If I Stay and am very excited to give a copy to Kristen, but the book that rocked my world is the sequel, Where She Went, and a signed copy will be up for grabs soon! =)

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Party Day and Original Sin Teaser #24

So many things to celebrate today! Happy Cinco de Mayo to our neighbors to the south!

And, if you check that Original Sin ticker in the sidebar, you’ll see that it’s quickly approaching 60 days! Exactly two months from today, Original Sin will be out in the world! Squee!! As I mentioned yesterday when I previewed the playlist, Original Sin is much darker than Personal Demons. I'm a little nervous, but so far, the reviews have been very good, so thank you, thank you, thank you!!

And! One more thing to celebrate! Today is also the Italian birthday for Personal Demons (or should I say Il Bacio Maledetto—The Damned Kiss). Also a squee!


So, while we’re all celebrating, here’s another Original Sin Teaser!

Today, we get more Frannie and Luc. Frannie is still trying to figure out who she can trust. Read and you’ll see why:

#OriginalSin p61 Frannie: “There was this guy, Alexander Graham Bell. He invented this thing called the telephone. You really should get one. They’re all the rage.” A smirk pulls at Luc’s lips, making me want to kiss him even more.
I force my eyes away from him before he completely sucks me in. “Ha, ha,” I say, waggling my phone in his face. “Don’t tell me—you were his Muse too.”
Out of nowhere, Luc lunges and twists my outstretched arm into an arm-lock. Panic sends my heart racing. He leans in from where he stands behind me. “No. Just Dante,” he breathes in my ear.

Don’t forget! Only one more day to enter my Fourth of Many Contests-for-No-Reason! Tomorrow I'll be drawing the winner of a signed hardcover of If I Stay and a signed Original Sin ARC! Go! And HAPPY EVERYTHING!

Original Sin Music Preview and Teaser #23

My muse is a wannabe rockstar. All the emotional energy in my books comes from music. I find when I get stuck in my writing, it’s because I don’t have the proper musical inspiration. When I find the song that sparks just the right emotion in me, the scene flows.

With all of my novels, each character has an overriding musical inspiration. This is the one song that embodies them as a character in that particular novel. So today, to celebrate release two months from tomorrow, in addition to our next teaser, I’m going to give you a sneak peek at Original Sin through its music.

First, the teaser. As always, there are sparks between Frannie and Luc. Here’s a scene when he stops by her house.

#OriginalSin p60 Frannie: Luc looks crazy hot in a blue button-down, one tail untucked and laying over black jeans. “You look…” and I can’t finish. There’s not a word. “Nice shirt.”

“It’s the color of your eyes,” he says and stops my heart.

And now the music…

Personal Demons was on the dark side, but Original Sin is darker. The music that was running through my head while I wrote was very dark and angsty for all three main characters.

Gabe is my most conflicted character. He has never before found himself in the position of questioning his purpose. But, with Frannie, the lines between duty and desire blur, and he struggles with basic questions of love and loyalty. He vows to always be there for her, no matter what, but what if keeping that promise means risking everything? In Original Sin, the song that embodies this is Anthem of the Angels by Breaking Benjamin.

Luc is the character who goes through the most change. As Personal Demons ends, he’s pretty sure of what he wants, but getting it and figuring out how to keep it are two different things. And when outside forces intervene, things don’t go exactly how he planned. His song from Original Sin is World So Cold by Three Days Grace.

And, Frannie. She finds herself caught between two worlds. She’s trying to hold onto a normal life, but her life is anything but normal. Hell won’t give up and Heaven won’t give in, and some people dear to Frannie get caught in the middle. Her song from Original Sin is How to Save a Life by The Fray.

If you get a chance to read OS, you can tell me if you hear these songs in the story.

Original Sin Teaser #22 and waiting...

I’m reminded this week that writing is a waiting game. We write, we submit, we wait. Since Personal Demons sold a year ago December, I feel like everything has happened in a blur. PD was on an accelerated publication schedule, and getting it onto shelves in nine months meant everything happened fast. In addition to revisions, edits and first pass pages for PD, I was finishing up Original Sin, which was due to my editor last June. Then, I had to write The Novel Formerly Known as Hellbent.

So now, for the first time in a year and a half, I find myself waiting again. The Novel Formerly Known as Hellbent is in my seriously cool editor’s hands, and I’m eagerly waiting for her editorial letter. My next finished novel is in the hands of my truly fabulous agent, and I’m waiting for her feedback. And, a big chunk of my current pet project, which is a nearly finished first draft and very unconventional, is also in my truly fabulous agent’s hands, so she can tell me if it even works.

I’m waiting, and I’d forgotten how nerve wracking it is. It was only made worse when I read this post by the fabulosity that is agent Jen Laughran about what happens when your agent hates your masterpiece.

But, I’m lucky to have an amazing critique partner to keep me busy while I wait. And, I'm picking away at the WIP, hoping to have it finished this week =)

So, the question of the day: If you write, how do you deal with all the waiting?

And, now the Original Sin teaser! It is impossible to tease from a sequel without spoiling some of the fun from the previous book, so if you don’t want any PD spoilery, stop reading!

Okay…for those of you still here, we know Matt is Frannie’s guardian angel. He’s also her dead twin brother. Here’s an exchange between the two siblings about their younger sister, Maggie:

#OriginalSin p54 Frannie: “Do you remember when we tried to sell Maggie to the neighbors?” Matt says.

I laugh with the memory. “’Cause we wanted a puppy and Mom said to start saving our money.”

“And Mom made us go talk to Father Mahoney about it—”

“And he told us we weren’t asking enough for her,” I finish for him, cracking up.

If you haven’t entered to win an OS ARC and a signed If I Stay hardcover, you have until Friday! And—one more chance to win an OS ARC: My truly fabulous agent is giving a copy away on her blog, so check that out here! Good luck!

The Fourth of Many Contests-for-No-Reason and OS teaser # 21!

We'll kick off today's post with our Original Sin teaser du jour! In our last teaser, we met Rhenorian. His appearance at the pizza place Frannie works at has left her pretty shaken. Here's some of her thoughts:

#OriginalSin p43 Frannie: Nightmares of the ground opening up and swallowing Luc in some demonic earthquake kept me awake all night. I kept getting up and going to the window to be sure the Shelby was still there. When he pulled out this morning, I felt sick. I thought about telling Matt to go with him.

I always expected Hell would keep coming after me, but I never thought about Luc—that they’d want him back too. Acid churns in my tight stomach as I drive, too fast, to get to him.

And now, the fun stuff! I fangirled Gayle Forman for you yesterday so I could get you guys some signed books and share the If I Stay and Where She Went love.

You heard my OMG moment with Cassie Clare when I met her last month (she has Personal Demons on her Kindle!!!) and meeting Gayle was totally amazing too. It’s no wonder that such authentic characters flowed from her, because she seems a very genuine person. If you get a chance to catch her on the road, do it. =)

You all know how I feel about these books. I’ve raved all over If I Stay here, and you’ve heard how Where She Went totally rocked my world here. It’s the wave of inspiration from reading Where She Went that has me on the edge of finishing a 70K word novel in three weeks, which would be a record for me.

So…here’s your chance to win a signed copy of the first of these incredible books, If I Stay (Hardcover), and a signed Original Sin ARC. Squee!! All you have to do is comment below before noon PST on Friday May 6^th. So easy! In addition to commenting (for which you get one point) you can accumulate extra points as follows:

Old blog follower: +3 points
New blog follower: +2 points
"Like" the Personal Demons Books Facebook page +2
Follow me on Twitter (@LisaDez) +2 points
Link to my contest post on your blog or twitter: +1 point
Dedicated post with link to my contest on your website/blog: +3 points
Add me to your blogroll: +2 points
Original Sin widget in your blog sidebar +2

Also on your entry, please remember to tell me how to find you (email address). And ADD UP YOUR POINTS because I can’t be trusted with math…just sayin’.

As always, the contest is open internationally. You must be at least 13 years old to enter. The winner will be chosen by the randomizer and posted on the blog after noon on May 6^th. SQUEE!! Enter early and enter often! (Joking--one entry per person, please :p) Good luck!!