For more on Veronica Roth, check out her blog  twitter  goodreads  

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1. Describe DIVERGENT in five words.   

Virtue, vice, and fear. Chicago!    

2. This book is full of heart pounding action, which begs the question, are you a thrill-seeker at heart?    

Absolutely not. I am terrified of heights. And speed. And danger of any kind. Sometimes writing DIVERGENT gave me vertigo. Like in the zipline scene—even if you paid me a billion dollars, I would never do what Tris does in that scene. I don’t think I’m a coward, but I don’t like to take unnecessary risks. Also, I’m a writer, and as a group, we tend to be built for coffee shops, carpal tunnel syndrome, and comfortable chairs rather than jumping off buildings.    

3.  Okay, we just have to ask: Katniss vs Tris. Who wins? *ducks head*    

The world will never know!    

4. We understand you’re currently working on the sequel, is there anything you can tell us? Please?    

I can tell you a few things: first, you get to see a lot more of the factions that you didn’t get to see much of in book one—more of the factionless, too. Second, Tris learns more about what it means to be a Divergent. And third, you’ll understand a lot more about Four.    

5.  We love to know what authors are reading, what’s currently in your STACKS?      

Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Home by Marilynne Robinson, False Memory by Dan Krokos (which doesn’t come out for awhile), and I’m working on getting myself the complete Calvin and Hobbes box set, because, let’s face it: sometimes you just need to read comics.  

  

Make sure and read to the very end and enter for a chance to win a copy of BRANDED!

  1. I read that you were inspired for Branded by watching “Phantom of the Opera,” can you elaborate and tell us more about the term “angel of music?”
 
A little back story of “The Phantom of the Opera” is that Christine Daae’s father always told her about the “Angel of Music”.  When she met the Phantom she started referring to him as that.  But is seemed so strange, calling the Phantom an Angel.  Normally when you think of an angel you think of glorious beings who help people, play harps, and have halos.  But the Phantom was terrifying and didn’t think twice about committing terrible crimes.  So the idea of unjust angels came to mind and the idea kept turning until I came up with the angels from my book!
 
BRANDED has a gorgeous cover, very captivating. I love it (as well your other covers too!) and believe that no one will be able to walk by the book without picking it up. As an indie author I imagine you had complete control over the cover design. Can you tell us a little about it, the cover designer and the process?
 
I always had the idea for showing Jessica’s scars for the cover.  When I came to the point of needing one designed though I didn’t think it was possible to create them.  Guess I was wrong!  I hired a graphic designer who lives in Ontario and he created a beautiful cover for me.  After a couple of months though I decided I wanted something a little different.  I have another writer friend who also happens to be an amazing photographer, Jenni Merritt, and enlisted her to help me create the gorgeous new cover.  She got her sister-in-law to model.  We emailed back and forth nearly every day until the final product was ready!
 
Jessica, the angel who is wrongly condemned night after night, how would you describe her? Was she easy to write?
 
Poor Jessica, I haven’t been very nice to her…  Jessica has had a lot to deal with her entire life.  Everyone always thought she was crazy and in a way, the things she’s gone through have kind of made her a little bit.  She’s a strong girl though; she’s still functional and hasn’t given up, despite everything she’s gone through.  Surprisingly, she was fairly easy to write.  Some characters are easily born into your imagination and Jessica was one of those.

FORSAKEN, the next book in the Fall of Angles series will be out fall 2010. Will this wrap up the series, if not how many books do you have planned?
 
I actually had to push the release date back a bit.  The new release date is January 11, 2011.  There will be one more book in the series.  The title in the works is VINDICATED.     
 
We “girls” love to hear what our favorite authors are reading, what inspires them or simply what distracts them enough to keep reading… what’s in your STACK, anything you can recommend?
 
I’m currently reading Nevermore by Kelly Creagh and it’s awesome so far!  I admit, I’m a big Twilight fan.  I loved Shiver, Hush Hush, Beautiful Creatures.  Another one not quite in the same genre that is one of my top 3 favorite books is The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson.  His writing is simply beautiful!

Now for something fun…

STACKGirls interesting author tidbits:

*salty or sweet  Sweet
*cook at home, take-out or dinner out  Usually end up cooking at home. 
*do you say pop, soda or coke  Soda
*thesaurus or dictionary  Thesaurus
*country, hip-hop, rock or classical  Rock
*Star Wars, Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings  Hum… all 3?
*fiction or non-fiction  Fiction
*texting, emailing or talking on the phone  Emailing
*truth or dare  Yikes!  Um… dare?
*werewolf or vampire  Definitely Vampire!

GIVEAWAY NOW CLOSED.

If you know me at all, you should know that I love Nothing Bundt Cake (not from Southlake!!), and I love STAY by Allie Larkin. You can read my review here. It was one of my very favorite books of 2010!!  Go buy it. You won’t regret it!  Read her interview below and let me know if you think she is as awesome as I do (just so you know, you will).

Allie, I want to tell you again how much I love STAY!  It was a lovely surprise! 

Thank you so much, Shannan!  I’m thrilled to hear that you enjoyed it!    

1. How long did it take to write Stay and get published?  Because you are a debut novelist, I have to know what you were doing when you got the letter that you were going to be published. 

STAY started as a writing exercise in a creative writing course I took in 2002.  I turned the writing exercise into a short story.  The short story got filed away for several years.  I pulled it out again to take to a writing group, but in the course of trying to make the story stronger, I wrote the wedding scene from STAY.  That scene made me realize that the scope of what I wanted to write was bigger than just a story.

I was in Target when my agent, Rebecca Strauss, called to tell me that Dutton wanted STAY.  She told me I should sit down, but I didn’t. We’d just submitted to Dutton and I didn’t think it could possibly be what she was calling about.  Then she told me, and my knees almost gave out.  I had to sit down on one of the bottom shelves in one of the aisles. 

2. Is the character of Van based on anyone you know?  What about Joe?

Van is purely fiction.  We have a few similarities.  If Van were real, I would absolutely want to be her friend, but she’s not based on me or any of my friends.  Joe, however, is something of a combination of our two German Shepherds, Argo and Stella.  But, I swear, neither of them were drunken internet purchases.

3. What was your drive to write a novel about a girl and her dog?

Van existed as a character way before we got Argo, our first dog.  I had already established that she was in love with her best friend’s fiancé, but I hadn’t figured out how she would move forward after the wedding.  Then, I was in the backyard with Argo one day raking leaves.  I looked over at him lying in the grass chewing on a stick and started thinking about how much he changed my life.  I knew Van needed a big change, and I realized a dog would do that.  But how I decided she would drunkenly order a dog off the internet from Slovakia is beyond me.

4. Did you have any input on the cover?  Is that your dog???

Yes!  That is Argo on the cover!  Apparently, stock photos of black German Shepherds are a little hard to come by, so we offered to take some shots of Argo and see if any would work.  But the design of the cover was all done by Monica Benalcazar at Dutton.  They asked me what I thought, but ultimately those things are better left to people who know what they’re doing.  There’s a reason I’m not a designer.  And I’m so thrilled with the way the cover turned out!

5. Would you please tell us about your website, TheGreenists.com? Do you still use baking soda to wash your face?  Do you love it?

Yes, I do love to wash my face with baking soda!  I do it about once a week to exfoliate and it’s amazing! 

Back in 2007, I started writing a green tips column called Allie’s Answers for a website.  The website ended, but I wanted to keep going, so I started my own website as Allie’s Answers.  My friend, Courtney, started writing with me and I realized it was silly to be Allie’s Answers when it was more than just me writing.  Courtney and I pulled together a team of our favorite bloggers and started TheGreenists.com last year.  We’re all about simple ways to make greener choices that won’t hurt your pocketbook or cramp your style. 

6. What are you working on now?

I’m working on an essay about Stella for an anthology about dog ownership called I’m Not the Biggest Bitch In This Relationship.  And I’m working on a new novel with new characters, but someday, I’d really love to hang out with Van again.

7. What is in your STACK?

SEVEN YEAR SWITCH by Claire Cook is one of my favorite reads so far this summer.  I’m reading THE ONE THAT I WANT by Allison Winn Scotch right now.  And, in the to be read pile: NOT READY FOR MOM JEANS by Maureen Lipinski; I’LL HAVE WHO SHE’S HAVING by Liz Fenton and Lisa Steinke; DIAMOND RUBY by Joe Wallace; HOW TO SLEEP ALONE IN A QUEEN SIZED BED by Theo Nestor; BACKSEAT SAINTS by Joshilyn Jackson; MY NAME IS MEMORY by Ann Brashears

*salty or sweet –  Salty
*cook at home, take-out or dinner out – Takeout
*do you say pop, soda or coke - Soda
*thesaurus or dictionary -   Thesaurus
*country, hip-hop, rock or classical -  Rock
*Star Wars, Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings –  Lord of the Rings
*fiction or non-fiction –  Fiction
*texting, emailing or talking on the phone –  Emailing
*truth or dare –   Truth
*werewolf or vampire – Time Lord

Awww, isn’t she and Argo sweet? Now, go and get the book. You won’t be disapointed.

Also, please feel free to leave comments on how great my hair looks (and Shannan’s too), we found the best stylist there and we will share her info! The little girl you ask, oh we picked her up on the way…she was too cute to leave behind.

As you can see from the pictures below we were all smiles while hanging out with the authors on the Smart Chicks Kick It! tour…we were  definitely having our rock star groupie moment!!

 
Shannan and Nancy with Kelley Armstrong, Alyson Noel and Melissa Marr!!

Stacy (yep, that’s me all alone with some amazing minds) with Rachel Vincent, Kami Garcia, Holly Black and Cassandra Clare (who btw is an Austen <3er too)!!

Now, on to the actual interviews (and not just pictures of the interviews)…

We’ll call this interview the ‘organizers who kick it and have chicks who kick it too’ with  Melissa Marr, Alyson Noel and Kelley Armstrong *swooning fangirl moment*.  Wanna know what they thought about chicks that kick it?

We’ll call this interview ‘holy moly was I actually talking to them!? and I think their chicks could totally have kicked my &%$’ with Holly Black, Cassandra Clare, Rachel Vincent and Kami Garcia!! Which kick it character (in the whole literary world) would they want to be…think you know the answer?

We also had the unexpected pleasure of meeting the other half of Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl!! We call this one ‘isn’t she cute, I just had to include her in this post!!’ Just so you know, she has some killer orange glasses (not pictured, of course) - me wants them badly though they would probably clash with my red hair.

feel free to re-post any video, they all can be found on our YouTube channel, again look at the bottom right for the link!

For more information on Caorlee Dean and to read a deleted scene from the book check out her site. To read my review of Take Me There click here.

**yes, I meant Ellen Hopkins in the video, not Laurie Halse Anderson**  

 Here is what you will find out from this interview:

       *The object that is pictured on the cover of the book.
       *An exclusive on her next book in the series, Desires of the Dead.
       *Her  “research” techniques.
       *If she is a Harry Potter fan or a Star Wars gal. 

  
The first video is the “edited for YouTube” and the second is extended version. Oh, and sorry for the shaky hand photography, someone *coughShannancough* forgot the tripod.