Win an ARC of Sophie Jordan's Firelight!

The winner of Dead Beautiful is...

Candyland!


Congrads and please email your address to sjohannes@bilaninc.com


Today's Arc Giveaway is Sophie Jordan's Firelight.

This was one of the books on the YA Buzz Panel.

Don't you love the cover? And the premise is awesome!

With her rare ability to breathe fire, Jacinda is special even among the draki—the descendants of dragons who can shift between human and dragon forms. But when Jacinda’s rebelliousness leads her family to flee into the human world, she struggles to adapt, even as her draki spirit fades. The one thing that revives it is Will, whose family hunts her kind. Jacinda can’t resist getting closer to him, even though she knows she’s risking not only her life but the draki’s most closely guarded secret.

Today, all you have to do to enter is sign up for my new monthly Market My Words newsletter to enter.

Starting the end of this month, I will be sending out marketing tips, scoop on upcoming contest news, book giveaways, marketing book reviews, special newsletter interviews, and more.

Good luck to all on the Pitch Contest! They were great! :)

Update: Bree says she will have the winners by Monday!!

Just because it looks dead, doesn't mean it's dead!

Couple Things:

• What are you waiting for? If you are searching for the right agent, you still have time to enter the Agent Pitch Contest! What do you have to lose? It lasts until tonight at midnight! So if you do not have an agent, go enter a 3 sentence pitch. Bree Ogden (from Martin Literary) will choose her top 3 who will get a full read, a partial read, and a query critique.

• I've hit 1,000 followers on Twitter. Only 130 more here and a HUGE marketing prize will be given away to a loyal follower.
  

• Next week, Suzie Townsend (from Fine Print Literary) will be here doing another agent contest. Details will be announced later this week :) You can enter more than one agent contest so no need to choose. :)

• Someone asked me why I doing the agent contests? I have a simple answer and I will share it with you all. Because I want to pay it forward. Someone gave me a break and recommended me to their agent which opened so many agent doors for me. I need to pay it forward for me. That is the only reason.

Just because you think it's dead, doesn't mean it's dead!

Do you ever feel like you should just give up? Put your book aside? Your goals? Your dream of being published?

Do you ever feel like putting one book down and starting to write something else?

I do.

There are days where I ask myself - why am I doing this? There are days when I look at a couple old books, wondering if I should pick them up again. Then I think, maybe I should put this book out of its misery!

Whether you have an agent or an editor, these insecurities always pop up and various points in your process. In your journey.

I was thinking about this the other day at the pool as I watched my kids play.

When do we give up? When is the right time? I think this can apply to anything we are struggling to work for? struggling to conquer. On this particular day, I wasn't feeling too great about this whole writing thing.

I was puled out of my pending pity party when I heard my daughter yell for me and saw her pointing to something in the water.

A huge yellow swallowtail butterfly.

Now due to a book that will never see the light of day, I have a special place in my heart for butterflies, especially yellow swallowtails.

The butterfly was not moving and was floating in the water, still. Peaceful.

I scooped it and up and watched its wings sag as the life left its little body.

I laid the butterfly in the pine straw and waited.

It was clearly dead. No movement.

For a while, my daughter (6) and son (3) stood by watching. Waiting. For more than 20 minutes this went on.

"It's dead you guys. It's not moving."

Daughter: "But why?"

"Maybe God needed more butterflies in heaven."

Daughter: "But i tried to save him."

"Well sometimes things can't be saved - no matter how hard we try."

Daughter: "Maybe he's just resting. Maybe he got tired swimming. I get tired when I swim."

"Maybe."

She starts blowing on the butterfly's wings. "Maybe Ill do CPR."

"I don't think that works on a butterfly honey."

Daughter: "Well I can try?"

I pick up the butterfly and take it into the sun. I lay it on the end of my chair and we wait some more. Like another 15 minutes!

Inside, my heart sank. I don't know why. I mean, it wasn't my fault. It'd been in the water too long. The chlorine had probably been so toxic. The water too much for his lungs to overcome.

But its sad to watch the life leave something and try so hard to save it. But not knowing what to do, you feel so helpless. So incompetent.

And then.....




So never give up because you think something is dead. Just think about how you can breathe life back into it. If you believe, it can happen!

Back to the WIP!

So to celebrate this little butterflies journey to the dead and back. To celebrate his fight to live, I'm giving away an ARC of Yvonne Woon's Dead Beautiful (Hyperion) !! Doesn't release until September 2010. A haunting love story about desire, danger, and destiny. Dead Beautiful is both a compelling romance and thought-provoking read, bringing shocking new meaning to life, death, love, and the nature of the soul.

Just answer this question for a chance to win:

Have you ever felt your book was dead? And then magically it came back to life? If so, what did you do to get it breathing again?

It's time for the Agent Pitch Contest!

Winner of the Arc of Sapphique is..

Stina!

Congrads and email your address to sjohannes@bilaninc.com


Pitch Contest!

Rules:

1) You can only enter one query so pick your best one.
2) You must be a follower of my blog to enter
3) Follow Bree's blog. Bonus! (FYI you can also follow Bree on Twitter)
4) Leave your query pitch in the comments. It can be no more than 3 sentences and one sentence pitches are fine! Sometimes they are more effective than 3 sentences.
5) You have until June 8th, Tues 9 PST/12 EST PM to enter. I will go by the time stamps in the blog comments so check your clock!

Some Tips:

• Go to my announcement for an example of a query pitch.
• Nathan Bransford had a great posting on pitches.
• Information on a one-sentence pitch
• Writing a logline.

Prizes:

• 1st place winner can submit the entire manuscript
• 2nd place winner can submit a partial (first 3 chapters)
• 3rd place winner will get a query critique

Now, here is Bree Ogden!


Hi Bree! Thanks for having fun with us this week! Tell us about yourself and how you got into agenting?

Hi Shelli, thanks for having me. I'm excited about the contest. Well let’s see…I’m a girl who loves books and everything about them. That is the number one most important thing about me (how is that for melodrama?) I have my masters in journalism and I left Northeastern University thinking, “Wonderful! Every newspaper in America is dying a slow painful death, and here I am with a shiny new certificate to work for these sinking ships.” For some reason (that I like to call kismet) I moved to the Seattle area, where I interviewed for an executive assistant position at Martin Literary Management. I fell in love with the business. I mean, head over heels, Prince Charming love. So here I am today!

What do you feel sets you apart from other agents?

I’m probably not all that different from other agents. We all love books, we all want to see this industry grow and improve, and we most definitely always have our clients’ best interest at heart. I’m a very hands on agent. If a book is great, with the exception of one little part, I’m not going to turn it down. I’m going to work with my client to better their book.

Tell us, so far in your submissions, what is your biggest pet peeve when receiving submissions?

I talked about this in another interview but I relish the opportunity to elaborate on it: I hate when I get a query letter that tells me everything BUT the plot of the book. And it happens more than you would think. The author will tell me about a character in the book, or tell me why this is a book I should represent. But there will be no plot line in sight. And I simply cannot ask for a manuscript if I have no idea of the plot. Which is unfortunate for both the author and myself…because it might be an amazing bestseller book. Your query letter is your KEY to opening up that magical door called ‘getting published.’ Put as much thought into the query letter as you put into the book. You won’t regret it.

What are your top 3 books of all time? And why?

Ahhh! I can’t answer this question! It’s so hard. I can tell you that Wuthering Heights is one of the greatest pieces of literature this world has ever seen. Heathcliff is the most profound character I’ve ever come across. He is complex and passionate, and not necessarily in a good way. Sometimes it is hard to breathe while reading Wuthering Heights. I love Maus: A Survivor's Tale by Art Spiegelman. It’s a graphic novel about the Holocaust. The dichotomy of the comic book structure and the seriousness of the Holocaust is simply stunning. I love every Chuck Klosterman book and every Nick Hornby book. Okay, I know that’s more than 3 books. I cheated.

If you could have a special power, what would it be?

Awesome question. The little kid in me really wants to say, “fly!” Because, well, how amazing would that be?! But the 26-year-old me wants a special power to…yea, fly. I’m sticking with that.

Tell us something about yourself that might surprise us.

I’m not really full of surprises. I wear everything on my sleeve. But I can tell you something that I am getting into that is surprising me. Recently I started taking Beekeeping classes. I have been deathly terrified of bees and wasps since I was a little girl. But I made a Bucket List, and darn it, I’m going to fulfill it! (Being a Cheese Connoisseur is also on that Bucket List.)

What are you looking for and how can authors submit to you?

I rep Young Adult, Graphic Novels, and Children’s books. So obviously, I am looking for books in those genres. I’m not looking for anything specific, per se, but I know that I am not looking for vampires or werewolves. It’s hard right now for YA writers to pull themselves away from the paranormal. But there are so many untapped territories. Also, it doesn’t hurt to utilize real life people with real life problems in real life situations. I have to believe that there are still teens out there that want to read about what can actually happen to them or what their life might actually be like.

Any writer in these genres should query me by sending a well thought out and creative query to Bree@MartinLiteraryManagement.com.

GOOD LUCK everyone!

BEA Bonanza - Day 4 Agent Pitch Contest!

The winner of Kody's The Duff ARC is....

Carolina Valdez Miller!

(congrads, email me your address at sjohannes@bilaninc.com)

Don't worry, I have 2 more copies of The Duff to giveaway this month and Kody is stopping by next week :) Here is just a sample of what else is coming this month:

• Firelight
• Paranormalcy (2 ebooks)
• Matched
• Nightshade
• The Duff (2 more copies)
  
• 13th Reality (James Dashner)
• Replacements
• Virals
• The Enemy
• and much much more! (you saw the pile!)
  

So don't be discouraged, there are plenty more chances to win some awesome. I'm also giving away books on Twitter sporadically, so you can try there as well.

Agent Pitch Contest

Bree Ogden (with Martin Literary Management) is stopping by on Monday. I've asked her some questions and she has also agreed to judge a query pitch contest. (so nice right?)

Rules:

• You must be a follower of my blog (sorry but this is for those who visit me more than once :) I'd love to meet you if you are just stopping by)
  
• You must follower her blog too. (which is really just a bonus reference for you! :)
  
• You can only enter one pitch - be sure it is something she is looking for.
• Your pitch can only be 1-3 sentences long. (not long run on sentences!)

Here's mine as an example:

After dying in a car accident and witnessing her own funeral, Gabby becomes a 14 year old Bright-in-Training (BIT) and Transfers up to Cirrus, where SkyFones, SkyPods, and InnerNets are all the rage. As if her death isn’t bad enough, Gabby is assigned to protect her school rival, Angela Black, who is now dating her lifetime crush, Michael. As this tween angel moves through her Bright Training, instead of protecting Angela as pledged, Gabby illegally sabotages her and learns what happens when you hate someone to death.

Prizes:

• 1st place winner can submit the entire manuscript
• 2nd place winner can submit a partial (first 3 chapters)
• 3rd place winner will get a query critique

So come back on Monday and join in the fun!

And be sure to work on your pitches over the weekend!

Now, today I'm giving away an ARC of Sapphique by Catherine Fisher. It is not released until Dec 2010. Incarceron is a prison so vast that it contains not only cells, but also metal forests, dilapidated cities, and vast wilderness.

All you have to do is answer this question in the comments - what are the top 3 things you look for in an agent?