Amanda Meuwissen's Blog - Posts Tagged "blog-tour"
Incubus Blog Tour - Stop #7: Review!
Another 5 star review for Incubus, this time from SensualReads.com! Be the first to comment and win a FREE eBook!
"Amanda Meuwissen begins a great new series with the first book called Incubus. This is one book you do not want to miss."
There is actually still more to come on the blog tour, so stay tuned for further promos, reviews, and an interview.
Have a great Labor Day weekend!
"Amanda Meuwissen begins a great new series with the first book called Incubus. This is one book you do not want to miss."
There is actually still more to come on the blog tour, so stay tuned for further promos, reviews, and an interview.
Have a great Labor Day weekend!
Paladin Pawn by Michael Young - New Release this Friday!
Fitting that today is my 70th blog post here, as I'm happily part of one of my fellow BWN author's blog tours with Silverbow Promotions.
Michael Young has been one of our dream authors; always on time, always with something new, and with a very fun variety of stories, from historical fantasy, religious supernatural, and even sci-fi end of the world.
Michael is a graduate of Brigham Young University and Western Governor’s University with degrees in German Teaching, Music, and Instructional Design. He puts his German to good use teaching online German courses for High School students. Though he grew up traveling the world with his military father, he now lives in Utah with his wife, Jen, and his two sons. Michael enjoys acting in community theater, playing and writing music and spending time with his family. He played for several years with the handbell choir Bells on Temple Square and is now a member of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
He is the author of the novels The Canticle Kingdom Series, The Last Archangel Series, and the Chess Quest Series. His also authors several web serials through BigWorldNetwork.com. He publishes anthologies for charity in his Advent Anthologies series. He has also had work featured in various online and print magazines such as Bards and Sages Quarterly, Mindflights, Meridian, The New Era, Allegory, and Ensign.
Follow Michael...
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Twitter
Blog
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Today's featured book for Michael is his upcoming middle grade fantasy release with Trifecta Books, Paladin Pawn, which comes out this week on Black Friday.
Book Synopsis:
When nerdy Rich Witz unwittingly becomes a Paladin, a white knight, in training, he is thrust into a world where flunking a test can change the course of history and a mysterious bully is playing for keeps with his life.
Rich’s grandmother leaves him with one thing before disappearing for good: a white chess pawn with his initials engraved on it. The pawn marks him as the next in an ancient line of white knights. He must prove himself in a life or death contest against his Nemesis, a dark knight in training, all while dealing with math homework and English projects. With the ghost of an ancestor for his guide, he has seven days to complete four tasks of valor before his Nemesis does, or join his guide in the realm of the dead.
As Rich rushes to complete the tasks, he realizes the chilling truth: his Nemesis is masquerading as someone at school and will stop at nothing to make him fail. As the tasks grow ever harder, the other knights reveal to him that his failure will break a centuries-old chain and bring the Paladin order to ruin. If he fails, the dark knights win the right to control the fate of the world, a world without hope or the possibility of a new dawn. So this is one exam Rich has to ace, with no curve and no extra credit.
And finally, here is a teaser to get you hooked on wanting to pick this up this weekend!
On the way to the door, something caught Rich’s eye, two boxes about the size of harmonicas sat on his dresser. One was wrapped in shiny silver paper and the other in black paper. His mother’s calls momentarily forgotten, Rich reached for the package and fumbled to find a place to tear the paper.
And it’s not even my birthday.
Working rapidly, he peeled back the paper and lifted the lid on the first box, ready for either surprise or disappointment.
What he felt next was a mixture of both. Inside the box in a black velvet casing, lay a hand-carved chess piece, a white pawn. He turned it over in his hands and found that the letters HWW had been etched into the surface.
“My initials,” he muttered, turning the piece over in his hands. He knew right away that he wasn’t going to put this piece where anyone could see it. They might ask him about his name.
As he had lifted the lid, a slip of paper had fluttered out. He replaced the pawn in its case and picked up the paper. Squinting in the low light, he made out the words written in his grandmother’s familiar script.
“For Heinrich—you will know when to use it.”
Rich laughed out loud. He already had a chessboard, and all of its pawns were working great. The last thing his social life needed was for him to join the chess club.
“With a monogrammed piece. That takes me from nerd to über-nerd.” He shook his head and replaced first the paper and then the lid. His curiosity piqued, he turned to the second box, picked it up, and shook it as he might a mysterious Christmas present. It did not make a sound. He thought his grandmother might have gotten him a black pawn to match, but the box didn’t feel heavy enough for anything like that.
He unwrapped the black paper, and the instant he slid off the lid, a fine black powder exploded from within and hung in the air. Rich jumped back, at first wondering if this was some kind of prank. It wouldn’t have been the first.
The sparkling black dust swirled in the air, forming into the form of another chess piece: a black pawn as long as his forearm. The lights in the room dimmed, giving it the feel of night though it was still the late afternoon.
Feeling his skin prickle, Rich stepped forward, thinking that if this were a prank, he’d have to ask how they pulled it off.
“You have been challenged,” came a deep voice from within the cloud of particles. “Do you accept?”
Rich glanced around the room, trying to see if someone had managed to hide in his room, or plant some kind of speaker. This was one committed prankster.
“Uh, who’s challenging me?” asked Rich. “Are we playing chess? ‘Cause I just got a lucky new piece.”
“Answer yes or no,” came the voice again.
Rich rolled his eyes, and played along. “Sure. Why not?”
“Answer yes or no,” insisted the voice.
He checked around his room to see if he could see the light of a camera somewhere filming him. Even if he couldn’t see it, he decided to give whoever was watching a good show. He bowed theatrically and said in a dramatic voice.
“Yes.”
The dust swirled back into the box and the lid snapped shut of its own accord. The lights returned to normal, and not a speck of the blackness remained in the air.
Michael Young has been one of our dream authors; always on time, always with something new, and with a very fun variety of stories, from historical fantasy, religious supernatural, and even sci-fi end of the world.
Michael is a graduate of Brigham Young University and Western Governor’s University with degrees in German Teaching, Music, and Instructional Design. He puts his German to good use teaching online German courses for High School students. Though he grew up traveling the world with his military father, he now lives in Utah with his wife, Jen, and his two sons. Michael enjoys acting in community theater, playing and writing music and spending time with his family. He played for several years with the handbell choir Bells on Temple Square and is now a member of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
He is the author of the novels The Canticle Kingdom Series, The Last Archangel Series, and the Chess Quest Series. His also authors several web serials through BigWorldNetwork.com. He publishes anthologies for charity in his Advent Anthologies series. He has also had work featured in various online and print magazines such as Bards and Sages Quarterly, Mindflights, Meridian, The New Era, Allegory, and Ensign.
Follow Michael...
Blog
Today's featured book for Michael is his upcoming middle grade fantasy release with Trifecta Books, Paladin Pawn, which comes out this week on Black Friday.
Book Synopsis:
When nerdy Rich Witz unwittingly becomes a Paladin, a white knight, in training, he is thrust into a world where flunking a test can change the course of history and a mysterious bully is playing for keeps with his life.
Rich’s grandmother leaves him with one thing before disappearing for good: a white chess pawn with his initials engraved on it. The pawn marks him as the next in an ancient line of white knights. He must prove himself in a life or death contest against his Nemesis, a dark knight in training, all while dealing with math homework and English projects. With the ghost of an ancestor for his guide, he has seven days to complete four tasks of valor before his Nemesis does, or join his guide in the realm of the dead.
As Rich rushes to complete the tasks, he realizes the chilling truth: his Nemesis is masquerading as someone at school and will stop at nothing to make him fail. As the tasks grow ever harder, the other knights reveal to him that his failure will break a centuries-old chain and bring the Paladin order to ruin. If he fails, the dark knights win the right to control the fate of the world, a world without hope or the possibility of a new dawn. So this is one exam Rich has to ace, with no curve and no extra credit.
And finally, here is a teaser to get you hooked on wanting to pick this up this weekend!
On the way to the door, something caught Rich’s eye, two boxes about the size of harmonicas sat on his dresser. One was wrapped in shiny silver paper and the other in black paper. His mother’s calls momentarily forgotten, Rich reached for the package and fumbled to find a place to tear the paper.
And it’s not even my birthday.
Working rapidly, he peeled back the paper and lifted the lid on the first box, ready for either surprise or disappointment.
What he felt next was a mixture of both. Inside the box in a black velvet casing, lay a hand-carved chess piece, a white pawn. He turned it over in his hands and found that the letters HWW had been etched into the surface.
“My initials,” he muttered, turning the piece over in his hands. He knew right away that he wasn’t going to put this piece where anyone could see it. They might ask him about his name.
As he had lifted the lid, a slip of paper had fluttered out. He replaced the pawn in its case and picked up the paper. Squinting in the low light, he made out the words written in his grandmother’s familiar script.
“For Heinrich—you will know when to use it.”
Rich laughed out loud. He already had a chessboard, and all of its pawns were working great. The last thing his social life needed was for him to join the chess club.
“With a monogrammed piece. That takes me from nerd to über-nerd.” He shook his head and replaced first the paper and then the lid. His curiosity piqued, he turned to the second box, picked it up, and shook it as he might a mysterious Christmas present. It did not make a sound. He thought his grandmother might have gotten him a black pawn to match, but the box didn’t feel heavy enough for anything like that.
He unwrapped the black paper, and the instant he slid off the lid, a fine black powder exploded from within and hung in the air. Rich jumped back, at first wondering if this was some kind of prank. It wouldn’t have been the first.
The sparkling black dust swirled in the air, forming into the form of another chess piece: a black pawn as long as his forearm. The lights in the room dimmed, giving it the feel of night though it was still the late afternoon.
Feeling his skin prickle, Rich stepped forward, thinking that if this were a prank, he’d have to ask how they pulled it off.
“You have been challenged,” came a deep voice from within the cloud of particles. “Do you accept?”
Rich glanced around the room, trying to see if someone had managed to hide in his room, or plant some kind of speaker. This was one committed prankster.
“Uh, who’s challenging me?” asked Rich. “Are we playing chess? ‘Cause I just got a lucky new piece.”
“Answer yes or no,” came the voice again.
Rich rolled his eyes, and played along. “Sure. Why not?”
“Answer yes or no,” insisted the voice.
He checked around his room to see if he could see the light of a camera somewhere filming him. Even if he couldn’t see it, he decided to give whoever was watching a good show. He bowed theatrically and said in a dramatic voice.
“Yes.”
The dust swirled back into the box and the lid snapped shut of its own accord. The lights returned to normal, and not a speck of the blackness remained in the air.
Blog tours and initial reviews for Life as a Teenage Vampire
With the successful launch of my new book, Life as a Teenage Vampire, the start of my first blog tour is now underway with Bewitching Blog Tours.Today starts with an interview at Ramblings of a Coffee Addictive Writer. And what fun questions! When you do a lot of interviews for a book release, sometimes the questions can get repetitive, because generally people want to know similar things, so I always appreciate when they ask some questions I haven't seen before.
Here's as example:
Do you read reviews of your books? If so, do you pay any attention to them, or let them influence your writing?
I do. It can be tough sometimes when you encounter something negative, but I think it’s important to take the risk of encountering trolls to see 1) the really positive comments that can make your day, and 2) the constructive criticisms that help improve your writing for the next book.
You can also sign up for the blog tour raffle, giving you a chance to win one of three free eBook copies.
I've also already had a slew of reviews for this new title, some from early access eBook copies I sent out, some early reviewers from blog tour stops coming up, but one in particular really touched me when it went up this weekend on Goodreads. Here's an excerpt:
As someone with a disability, one of the main characters being differently abled is a very welcome addition, as is how the character is crafted - his disability is not the most interesting or important thing about him. It doesn't somehow drive the plot, it just is a simple part of him, and it affects his life in an extremely realistic manner, in a story with fantastical elements. This was a personal highlight for me. Connor is just Connor who happens to require a prosthesis, and is in no way defined by it. he's just another kid, whose life is just a little different to someone without that disability.
I can't say enough how much it means to me to read a response like that.
So starting out strong and feeling pretty amazing with the reception the book has had so far, even from people I met at my events this past weekend, Gaylaxicon and Fall Con in Minneapolis, with people who bought the book one day, stopping by the next day to say they are already loving it.
Read all of the reviews so far right here on Goodreads.
