bea 2011

photo (c) Julie Strauss-Gabel Photography

Don't these books look happy together? I think they do. Many thanks to my editor for sending me this picture.

I'm at BEA in New York City this week, promoting CROSSED. While I'm here, I'm doing two awesome events on Wednesday, the 25th. The first is a signing in the Penguin booth, where we'll have copies of CROSSED from 10-11 a.m. only. The second event is a YA Panel at the Mulberry Library in Soho. My fellow panelists will be Maureen Johnson, Scott Westerfeld, James Dashner, Lauren Kate, and Ellen Hopkins. This seems too good to be true but I've been assured by reliable sources that, in fact, it is actually true. Click on the Events page for more details.

CROSSED is an ARC* now. Which feels so wonderful. I am so happy about this book. I've talked about my dad's favorite thing I've ever written (Being Sixteen) and my husband's (the short story in ENTHRALLED). And CROSSED–this book is my favorite thing I've ever written. This story was very, very important to me to get right, and thanks to my editor and agent and awesome longtime readers, I feel that I did. That's a good feeling. I feel like writing this book has been like running a marathon (you knew a running comparison was inevitable) and that we've crossed (pun intended!) the finish line completely spent and happy because we've given it all. No regrets.

Now I'm working on Book 3, and I'm so excited about it too. This writing gig really is a wonderful thing.

And, last but not least, the winner of the ARC of ENTHRALLED is commenter melissa @ 1lbr! Congrats, Melissa! And many thanks to all of you who entered. You all had very awesome reasons and I wish I had enough copies to send to everyone.

* ARC stands for Advance Reading Copy, which are the copies of books that publishers print up before the "real" hardcover book. The ARC gets sent out to book reviewers, etc. a few months early to generate buzz. Before anyone asks, I actually don't have any ARCs of CROSSED yet to distribute myself. But if I do get any extras, I will be sure to have a giveaway here on the blog. So stay tuned.