DRAGONFLY GIRL and A Few Other YA Books You Should Read

I can’t believe it’s already February and I haven’t yet shared a review roundup here on the blog! However, I’ve been reading quite a few ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies) for fellow #the21ders, and I plan to feature those books closer to when they release so you can actually get the books and/or request them from…

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MOST LIKELY and A Few Other Books You Should Read

For the second year in a row, I completed author Jessica Brody’s 30 Books in 3 Months summer reading challenge on Instagram. You can see all of the books I read over the summer in the image below, and I already posted mini-reviews on a few of them. Keep reading for a few more, but…

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10 BLIND DATES and A Few Other YA Books You Should Read

I intended to have another MMGM this week–this time from my fourth grader–but some other school work took precedence, and my sixth grader didn’t have another one prepared to jump in. However, I’ve been catching up on my own reading and realized I’d piled up quite a few mini-reviews. So here are a few young…

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SOMEWHERE ONLY WE KNOW and A Few Other Books You Should Read

It’s time for another mini-review roundup! As a music lover, I was immediately intrigued by SOMEWHERE ONLY WE KNOW by Maurene Goo, about a K-pop star, an industry I know absolutely nothing about. I loved Lucky’s character right from the beginning—a girl who was passionate about her music career but trying figure out how to…

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YA Review: SCARS LIKE WINGS by Erin Stewart

Back in May, I was supposed to go to New York and have lunch with my editor and agent. There were crazy storms going on around New York City, and my flight got cancelled three times in a row. Finally we had to give up on the trip. The next week, I received a surprise…

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MMGM: NIGHTFALL by Shannon Messenger

It’s been a while since I’ve written a review on the blog. My life has been a little consumed by Pitch Wars, and I now have my manuscript out in agents’ hands, awaiting their verdicts. But I did pre-order the Barnes & Noble special edition of Shannon Messenger’s NIGHTFALL, the latest installment in her Keeper…

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YA Interview & Giveaway: CATALYST & FORGOTTEN by Kristin Smith

As promised, today I’m featuring an interview with the second of my Pitch Wars mentors, Kristin Smith. Her debut, CATALYST, came out in 2016, followed by the sequel, FORGOTTEN, just last month. I’m thrilled to be giving away e-books of both CATALYST and FORGOTTEN, and Kristin is adding swag–signed bookmarks, a postcard, and a magnet!…

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New England SCBWI Conference: So Worth the Trip!

This past weekend I traveled to Springfield, Massachusetts, for the New England Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators Spring Conference. It wasn’t my first SCBWI Conference. I’ve attended the Missouri conference multiple years, and it’s been very valuable. However, the New England conference is significantly larger and offered the draw of my long-time critique…

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YA Review: WINTER by Marissa Meyer

Anyone who was following me on Twitter last week was probably expecting this review. For that matter, if you’ve been following this blog for any length of time, it won’t surprise you either, considering I reviewed the first three books in The Lunar Chronicles series and CINDER, SCARLET and CRESS made it onto my favorite…

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YA Recommendation: Alex Flinn’s Modern Fairy Tales

I won an ARC of MIRRORED, Alex Flinn’s Snow White retelling (scheduled to come out in September) from Cynthia Leitich Smith’s blog. After finishing it, I had to go back and read the rest of these modern fairy tale retellings. I wouldn’t call them a series, but a few of them are connected through Kendra,…

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