Lisa Roecker's Blog, page 36

The Bookinistas: BETRAYAL

You might remember us going all fangirl over DECEPTION (Book 1 in The Haunting Emma series) last year. There was snark, a totally new take on ghosts and a killer mystery. It was love at page 1. What we didn't love was having to wait AN ENTIRE YEAR for the next book in the series, BETRAYAL. The good news is, it's FINALLY here! BETRAYAL will hit shelves March 1st and you guys are gonna love it. 
Here's what the back cover has to say: Emma Vaile is the most powerful ghostkeeper in centuries. Which is great when she's battling the wraith-master Neos, but terrible when she's flirting with fellow ghostkeeper (and soul mate) Bennett. When ghostkeepers fall in love, the weaker one loses all power, and that's not something Bennett can handle. 
Heartbroken and alone, Emma tries to lose herself in school with fellow ghostkeeper, Natalie. When a new team of ghostkeepers arrive-one a snarky teen boy, the other a British scholar-Emma finds solace in training for the battle against Neos. But as the team grows stronger, they are threatened by an unknown force. One they thought was good.
As chilling and page-turning as Deception, this sequel will grab readers and hold them to the last page. No one is safe from suspicion as Emma closes in on the traitor.

Lila's Take:
We LOVED this book and here's why you're going to love it too:
1. Emma is just as fun and smart and spunky in BETRAYAL as she was in DECEPTION. My very favorite thing about Emma is that she never, ever falls into that tired damsel-in-distress routine that we see in so many YA paranormal novels. She never stops kicking ass and she never wallows. Love. Her.
2. The mystery is well crafted with loads of twists and turns. Trust me, you will NOT be able to predict how this one ends.
3. Bennett. *Sigh* Bennett. So. Dreamy. Even when he's being mean and distant he's STILL dreamy. He'll totally make you swoon.
4. There are ghost jocks and they're hilarious. Well, they're hilarious if you like jokes about the male anatomy and really, who doesn't?
5. Emma was kind of on her own in the first book, but this time around we get to see her become a part of a real team and it's AWESOME. One ghost keeper was cool, but a whole team of them? Bad. Ass.
STILL don't believe me? Think I'm biased or lame? Well, check out what Kirkus had to say. Those dudes NEVER lie. And they're kind of mean. So rest assured that if they liked it, you'll LOVE it.
You should also know that we have a raging girl crush on Lee Nichols. She's one of those uber cool established authors who is fun, approachable and extremely generous with her time. You guys all need to start stalking her. Like immediately. Click here to follow her blog and here to stalk her via Twitter. And if you haven't read DECEPTION yet (Um, what are you doing reading our lame blog?!? GO READ THAT BOOK. *Ahem*) Lee is giving away 5 copies on Goodreads. Enter! Enter!

Here's what the other Bookanistas are up to this week!

Elana Johnson raves over BIRTHMARKEDChristine Fonseca is dizzy for DELIRIUMShannon Messenger features WHERE SHE WENT plus an ARC Giveaway!Carolina Valdez Miller is loco for LIKE MANDARINBeth Revis is remembering MEMENTO NORAJessi Kirby is sweet on XVIShana Silver is pumped for BUMPEDCarrie Harris gets hexed by HEX HALLRosemary Clement-Moore is enraptured by WARPEDKatie Anderson covets the cover of Myre McEntyre's HOURGLASS       Corrine Jackson is dazzled by I AM NUMBER FOURStasia Ward Kehoe leaps for LEVERAGE  

In Which We Decide to Go Pink

Laura: Must start filming vlogs for the blog tour.
Lisa: I refuse to film without pink hair.
Laura: You're such a diva.
Lisa: Does Amazon sell pink wigs?
Laura: Probably. I mean, they sell this.
Lisa: Wait, what does a beer bong have to do with pink hair?
Laura: Nevermind. The good news is that they have wigs. The bad news is that crazy-colored wigs make you look ugly.
Lisa: Me specifically?
Laura: Well, really anyone. One year, I was Christina Aguilera for Halloween and wore a platinum blonde wig. I had to burn the pictures.
Lisa: You were also wearing leather chaps. Maybe that had something to do with it?
Laura: Well, maybe. It also might have been the do-rag...
Lisa: Perhaps.
Laura: Either way, you're on your own. With the wig, I mean.
Lisa: You underestimate my power to pull things off.
Laura: Like when you got clear braces?
Lisa: For the record, from a distance, they were totally invisible.
Laura: Are you forgetting about the colored rubber bands you opted for? You spent 3 years looking like you had color coordinated pieces of food stuck in your teeth.
Lisa: Yeah, in retrospect that might not have been the best choice.
Laura: You know what was worse? When you let me give you chunky orange highlights.
Lisa: Ooh, highlights...that's a good idea! A compromise perhaps?
Laura: I don't know....
Lisa: Don't make me go all 7th Grade Sleepover on your ass and dye your hair pink while you're sleeping.
Laura: Fine. You win. I'll wear the damn fake hair.
Lisa: Fabulous. Go ahead and place the order for a few sets.
Laura: Wait, I'm paying?
Lisa: Obviously.
Laura: I hate you.
Lisa: I know.

Tell the Truth Tuesday

1. It's Valentine's Day party week in the nursery school circuit where "keep it simple" (teacher's advice in the newsletter) turns into "Who can bake the most outrageous gluten-free (a classmate has Celiac disease) Valentine-inspired pastry?" I bought lolipops.

2. We enjoyed a little spring shopping on Sunday and scoffed at all the oxfords claiming we'll never be caught dead in the floppy-looking shoes. This after making fun of ourselves as we tried on skinny jeans last year in NYC. Famous. Last. Words. And what's this about wide-leg, '70s style jeans making a come back? I'll never wear them...never! Mark my words...

3. I'd rather do just about anything than go to the dentist. Especially during preschool. Especially when I think I have a cavity. Especially when I'm due for x-rays and it feels like the plates are made out of broken shards of glass.

4. I hope no one gets this for Valentine's Day. Jane Seymour freaks me out. I think it's all that hair.

5. I thought the Glee Super Bowl episode was kind of meh.

6. We're scared to send out the eVites for our launch party. We've had it ready for weeks, but it's so awkward. Feels like we're selling Girl Scout Cookies only instead of Thin Mints we're hawking copies of our book. Honestly, it would be less awkward selling the Thin Mints.

7. We want to go to BEA. Bad.

8. The Regulator confessed to hitting the "Tell the Publisher! I'd like to read this book on Kindle" button at least once a day. We apologize to both Sourcebooks and Amazon on her behalf.

9. I find the Justin Bieber movie trailer kind of inspiring.

10. I didn't watch one single second of the Super Bowl. Not. One.

What's your truth this Tuesday?

P.S.
The WriteOnCon team is looking for a talented web designer to help us give our website some lovin'. If you or someone you know might be interested in the job, please check out the official post here!

#speakloudly FINALLY

 The post office is not one of our favorite places to go--just ask Lisa. She spent approximately 45 minutes in a stand-off with Mia who wouldn't thank a kind postal worker for a candy cane. We don't mess around with thank-yous.
Anyway, I finally mailed off our Regulator-donated copies of Speak (thanks, Mom!) as apart of the #speakloudly campaign.
The box to the left made its way to Jen Bigheart who will deliver to the Austin Children's Shelter. It sounds like an incredible place and we're so happy that our copies of Speak and some others we really enjoyed will find a good home!

The box to the right is on its way to the Cleveland Rape Crisis Center. A librarian suggested the organization and they were really excited to get the books!
Speak is a difficult story but is ultimately a hopeful one. We can only imagine the good these books will go on to do! Work your magic special books!

Top 5 Things We Learned This Week

5. Veronica Roth can write. We'll have a full review of DIVERGENT once the release date is closer, but WOW. I'm only halfway through and I can already tell you that this is one of the books everyone is going to be talking about in 2011.

4. Pink hair FTW. What started out as a joke to make Laura laugh has turned into a may-jah fashion statement taking Twitter by storm. Pink is the new blonde. Or something like that.

3. Dear Lisa Three Days ago, 
There are things less fun than spending a snow day trapped inside the house with three children under the age of five. Try spending the entire day trapped in the emergency room with one angry five year old with a huge gash in his head that requires 8 stitches and a sick 3-month-old who pooped through his only outfit. Yeah. That ice storm is lookin' pretty good right about now, isn't it?
XOXO,
Future Lisa

2. Sometimes it's ok to lie. For example, let's just say you have a newborn baby who is refusing to take a bottle. And you've got this spa weekend planned with your mom and your sisters and there's no way that you're missing it or taking the baby with you. So your husband is going to be stuck at home with three kids, one of whom is a hungry, breast fed, 4-month-old who has recently started acting like he's Damon Salvatore and you're trying to feed him vervain whenever you break out a bottle. It's totally ok to not mention this tiny fact to your husband and then when he inevitably calls you and says the baby refuses to eat and is screaming, you can just pretend like he's doing it wrong.

1. No matter how bad your week sucks, the promise of the spa makes EVERYTHING ok. Stuck in the emergency room for 8 hours? No biggie. Car battery dies? Whatever. Basement floods? Oh well. Baby is sick as a dog? He'll live. All this (and more!) just rolled off my back this week because we're celebrating Laura's 30th birthday at the spa this weekend! Can't. Wait.

Hope you guys have a fabulous weekend!

The Bookinistas: Between Shades of Gray

I've read a few WWII books over the years. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Sarah's Key and The Book Thief come to mind as well as Unbroken which is on my wish list and I've heard is excellent.But Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys tells a story I have never heard. A story so tragic and heartbreaking and yet hopeful all at the same time. Before you read on, check out Ruta's video. It is absolutely incredible.
Here's what the back cover has to say: Lina is just like any other fifteen-year-old Lithuanian girl in 1941. She paints, she draws, she gets crushes on boys. Until one night when Soviet officers barge into her home, tearing her family from the comfortable life they've known. Separated from her father, forced onto a crowded and dirty train car, Lina, her mother, and her young brother slowly make their way north, crossing the Arctic Circle, to a work camp in the coldest reaches of Siberia. Here they are forced, under Stalin's orders, to dig for beets and fight for their lives under the cruelest of conditions.

Lina finds solace in her art, meticulously and at great risk documenting events by drawing, hoping these messages will make their way to her father's prison camp to let him know they are still alive. It is a long and harrowing journey, spanning years and covering 6,500 miles, but it is through incredible strength, love, and hope that Lina ultimately survives. Between Shades of Gray is a novel that will steal your breath and capture your heart.

Lila's Take:

This book was not easy to read. In fact, I cried during the first chapter and consistently throughout. It's the kind of book that makes you question humanity and makes you wonder how people could ever be treated in such inhumane ways. And yet woven through the story was a thread of hope--Lina's will to survive, her mother's spirit and generosity despite the circumstances, the power of all different types of love. And it was in these storylines that I was able to maintain my sense of faith in people.

My favorite part of this book was Lina's character. Like any other teenager, she questions everything and struggles to come to terms with what is happening all around her. At one point, her mother shows kindness to a woman who Lina hates and she can't understand why. But as the novel continues, she grows and learns and finally understands. I love the similarities between Lina's character and any other teenager. It allows the reader to connect and imagine how or if they could prevail under the same circumstances. Honestly, I don't know that I could. It's truly unbelievable that anyone survived.

Most shocking is the fact that this story had been kept a secret for many years. Some survivors didn't make it home until 1954. This was unbelievable to me. And then when they made it home, they couldn't tell a soul about their story for fear of death or deportation back to Siberia. Everyone should read this to uncover the secret and learn about the will to survive and the cost of freedom. It's hard to believe anything like this ever happened and yet we haven't truly learned from our past mistakes either. Let's hope that books like this can help.

Here's what the other Bookanistas are up to this week!

Elana Johnson thinks Delirium is dope
LiLa Roecker falls for Between Shades of GreyChristine Fonseca soars Across the UniverseThe Shannon is hosting an epic Invasion giveawayShelli Johannes Wells is giving some Liar Society lovin'Myra McEntire is spreading some cover love for Siren and UndercurrentBeth Revis is thanking her fellow BookanistasCarolina Valdez Miller swoons for ScrawlMegan Miranda falls for Dark GoddessBethany Wiggins is Entice(d)Jen Hayley and Shana Silver ignite for AngelfireMatt Blackstone convinces us That Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to YouCarrie Harris marvels over The Mockingbirds

WTF Wednesday: An open letter of apology to Gwyneth Paltrow

Hi Gwynnie,

(Is it cool if we call you Gwynnie? No? Oh well.)

We're writing to apologize. We've said some pretty awful things about you in the past and we were so SO wrong. After reading snippets of your most recent interview (thanks to Sarah and Emily) and seeing this quote: "People are so mean to me....But then I was like, 'Who cares what some lame person out there says?'"

WE are those lame people, Gwynnie..er...Gwyneth. And I know you don't care what we say, but here's our official apology:

Remember that time we made fun of you for struggling to GAIN weight. You said, "Yeah, I tried to gain more, but I think I was also working so hard and such long hours that, you know, it was offset -- my Bridget Jones attempt." And we said that we hated you on behalf of all women in America? Yeah, we totally take that back. I mean, eating Twizzlers and not exercising is HARD WORK. It takes real dedication to maintain bootyliciousness.

We totally take back our scathing response to your  helpful tips on balancing motherhood and a career. The other day I tried on like three different shirts in Target and it was EXHAUSTING. I seriously can't imagine how difficult it must be for you to spend so many grueling hours with a personal stylist slipping gorgeous frock after gorgeous frock on your svelte body. We now fully understand the depth of your pain, Gwynnie-eth.

You made us snort when you told us we should attempt to live off of juice for five days . But we were so wrong. Chewing is totally overrated. Who needs solids when you have an array of delicious organic juices to slay your appetite? In fact, we're totally going to try your juice fast ASAP. Just out of curiosity are you liable if we should happen to go batshit crazy due to lack of sustenance and tear through the grocery store on a mad spree of destruction that may or may not end with us ripping open containers of (non-organic, gasp!) raw meat with our teeth? No? Crap.

And that $52 fly swatter that you recommended on your holiday gift guide this year? At first we thought it was a little ridiculous. I mean, does anyone really need an embossed leather fly swatter? Do people even USE fly swatters, like ever? What's wrong with a good old fashioned newspaper? But then we thought back to that time when Lisa had flies in her basement and she was so freaked out at the thought of them breeding maggots or something horrible that she hired a professional cleaning company to clean everything out and we realized that the entire experience would have been so much less traumatic if only she had a monogrammed fly swatter on her hands. Once again, YOU WERE SO RIGHT.

Ah, Gwynnie (What? Still not ok? Sorry...) we are so sorry to have misjudged you. All your tips and tricks were meant to teach us how to be cool, you know, like British people. So thank you, Gwyneth. Thank you for being so down to earth and for showing us the error of our ways. The next time we need a recommendation for a five star hotel in London or help finding the perfect khaki hooded poncho, we will turn to you, dear G.

Your soul sisters and besties 4 eva,
L&L

Tell the Truth Tuesday Lydia Style

Lisa had a migraine and started a blog post I was supposed to finish. This is what happens when she leaves me to my own devices. It's like she went into labor all over again...

1. Just this past weekend I bragged that I've never had to deal with a pukey kid. I even went so far as to knock on wood. Lydia threw up all day yesterday.

2. During a playdate someone cued up Toy Story. Lydia's eyes bugged out and she said, "Mommy! Those toys are talking!" Apparently, we live under a rock. Or we don't own a DVD player. Or both.

3. We are having some work done on our house right now so a contractor has taken over the kitchen. Lydia went to the bathroom the other night and refused to let me pull up her pants. She wanted the contractor to see her underwear. Um...NO.

4. My cell phone does absolutely nothing but make phone calls. Lisa jokes that it's a Jitterbug. Lydia got her little paws on a friend's iPhone and proceeded to foam at the mouth while pushing all sorts of buttons. Apparently squishing ants and flipping through alphabet flash cards is toddler crack.

5. Lydia, Jack and Mia are obsessed with playing "light up swords," which means they go in a dark room with flashlights and jump around like crazy people. Today at Target marks the second time Lydia's said, "Hmm...that's a light up sword" referring to a person walking with a cane.

Sorry, Lisa, I just couldn't resist.

Any good truths out there this Tuesday?

Live From New York...It's MONDAY MORNING!!!

Do you guys remember Mr. Wizard? The Roecker gals were mega couch potatoes when we were growing up (shocking, I know) and lucky for us The Regulator was usually on board. As long as she could pretend it was educational. As a result we watched a lot of Mr. Wizard.

This SNL spoof made me laugh so hard I cried. It's PG-13 but it's hilarious.

Happy Monday!

In Which We Get So Excited That We Just Can't Hide It

It's not every day that one of your friends hits the New York Times Best Seller List and when we got the news last week that Beth Revis debuted at #7 on the list with ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, The Bookanistas couldn't contain their excitement.

Enjoy!