Annika Sharma's Blog, page 10

The Rearranged Life has a release date!

You are cordially invited to the release of Annika Sharma's novel The Rearranged Life on May 15th, 2015 (51515!) {with a special advance release date for Penn State on April 25th, 2015} Both launch parties time and location TBA! Well, that was nice and sweet, wasn't it? Now...for the real lowdown.The Rearranged Lifeis coming to e-book and print on May 15th (5.15.15, for easy remembering purposes!) and I want you to come celebrate with me! Time and location TBA but keep an eye out! Let's

Happy New Year! Love, the girl still dreaming of London and Barcelona

Hey, guys! HAPPY NEW YEAR! Okay, I'm 5 days late, but it's the thought that counts. As some of you know from Facebook and my Instagram, I got back from a trip to England and Spain about a week ago...and hit the ground running! My friend and I planned a trip to London and Barcelona. She's a medical resident and it can be really tough for her to get time off--so when I asked her if she was up for a trip anywhere, and she mentioned the week of Christmas, we jumped at the chance. Keep in mind, we

Pinch me, I HAVE A BOOK DEAL!

The Announcement in Publisher's Marketplace! My birthday was a few weeks ago. My best friend Liz and I were born four days apart, and we have this joke—every year, we tell each other “This is the year!” and we talk about all the fabulous things we’ll do and the astounding things that will happen to us. We’ve said it as we turned all the ages between 13 and 28. Some things happen. Other things don’t. That’s the way life is. But when those Big Things do happen, sometimes it defines an entire

A Very Hogwarts Halloween!

Happy Belated Halloween, friends! What a great Trick-or-Treating day it was. The preschool I used to work at has a competition each year for the most impressively decorated classroom. Last year, we won with an Enchanted theme. We made a cardboard tree, had castles, stars and balloon clouds hanging from the ceiling, and each of the teachers wore wings. This year, we wanted to do something a little bit different..."To Hogwarts!" we decided. Luckily, because of me and my co-teacher Melissa's

Happy Diwali!

Happy Diwali! You know how certain smells take you back to certain memories? The smell of sparklers always reminds me of Diwali, no matter what time of year it is. For those of you who don't know, Diwali is a festival full of light, food and merriment in India. Some families celebrate King Rama, the righteous king who was banished for 14 years from his kingdom by his jealous stepmother, winning a war of good over evil and coming home to claim his kingdom. It is said his citizens lit lamps all

Simple words with so much weight.

Hey, all! I posted a piece from the Tyler Knott Gregson's Typewriter Series today. Like I mentioned on the post, poetry usually isn't my thing. Occasionally, I will run across something that speaks to me, but I'm primarily a fiction reader. Tyler Knott Gregson's work, however, is one absolutely mindblowing exception. His words carry honesty, raw emotion and often take the most mundane description and turn it into something of magic. How often have each of us hoped to capture the essence of

It's been a while!

Hi, friends! It's been a little while since I've posted and I wish I had a better reason than "things were busy," but the road got a little bumpy over the last few weeks, in ways both good and bad. Here's the Cliffnotes version: friends had weddings, announced babies, needed support through breakups and made job changes. We had family, then friends visit, all while my parents left for India for some family events. Both friends and family had health scares. I made an enormous change to

Monday Mantra: Let's take a risk.

Well, the last few weeks have been a little crazy. The blog post I wrote last talked about how I got an agent and, as expected, I freaked out. It was probably one of the coolest moments in my life. It took me a full three hours to stop typing text messages to my brother in all capital letters. The funny thing, as I touched on in my last post, is that on Sunday morning, I woke up grumpy because I thought I'd be waiting another year with this book business. There were tons of edits to make, more

I HAVE AN AGENT! Is this real life?

Sometimes things crash land in your life and it is completely okay. I HAVE AN AGENT! A real, live literary agent! On Sunday afternoon, I received a phone call from Stacey Donaghy of Donaghy Literary Group, an agency I had sent my manuscript to in January. The number from Ontario had me fooled--I thought it was a telemarketer when I first saw I had a missed call. Then I received an email: "I would like to talk to you about your story." At which point I listened to the voicemail, hyperventilated,

Monday Mantra: We need to believe wonderful things can happen.

This week's Monday Mantra (I changed the name, do you like it better?) is "Always believe that something wonderful is about to happen." Perhaps it's because I am currently in that state of mind. It often takes something wonderful happening for us to realize that wonderful things can happen at any time, not just when we expect it. How often has a grumpy day been turned around by something super-awesome suddenly coming our way? That's exactly what happened to me yesterday. I woke up frustrated