Devil's Kiss series giveaway!!

Today is a GREAT day because I have 1 copy of Devil's Kiss and 1 copy of Dark Goddess to give away to 1 winner! This series is hands down one of my top five favorites, Sarwat Chadda is very talented writer.

To learn more about the books and the author

Read my interview with Sarwat Chadda (important for extra entries!)

My review of Devil's Kiss

My review of Dark Goddess


Sadly, it's U.S. only :( But hey, if you live in the UK you got to read these books a year earlier than us Americans! Other international readers I really am sorry. Hopefully I can have an international giveaway soon.

To Enter: Fill out this FORM

Ends: February 12, 2011

Best wishes and happy reading :D

PS I wanted a fierce theme for the form but all I could find was runners and runners are pretty beastly, so that's why there are runners on a book giveaway form.

BBAW: Treasure Catch Up (New, Unexpected, Forgotten, Future) + Giveaway

I fell woefully behind in Book Blogger Appreciation Week festivities. I truly adore this community-building lovefest between book bloggers :) The posts range from funny to inspiring and I like that mix. I didn't participate much last year either, but this year I took the time to make sure I at least commented on other blogs and tried to discover new ones.


Anyway, my form of participation will be catching up on the theme from each day this past week and sharing my thoughts on it. It won't be too long I promise. And if you read the whole thing, you'll discover a treat at the end ;)


This year's theme is BBAW 2010: A Treasure Chest of Infinite Books & Infinite Blogs

Monday: First Treasure. New to me blogs. There are SO MANY! I decided to include four.

A Few More Pages-Katy is such a dedicated and fantastic blogger. She gently reminds me when I forget to announce the monthly winner for the PoC Reading Challenge, introduces me to new blogs (I really like A Literary Odyssey, thanks Katy for shining a spotlight on Allie!), writes in depth reviews and shares awesome videos (plus we both love history).


Bookalicious-Creator of the PoC Reading Challenge and blogger extraordinaire (aka Pam). We didn't start talking until after she created the challenge because someone mentioned it and I knew nothing about it. But it's sorta up my alley ;) I offered to help in any way I can and I was put in charge of rounding up prizes (to be clear: if we couldn't have any prizes that would be OK, I thought it would be fun to have prizes). Working with Pam has been a joy and whether or not we continue the challenge, I will continue to visit her blog. She writes excellent reviews and is unafraid to speak out about issues affecting the blogging community. She rocks my socks =)


One Big Adventure-Newest-to-me blog for sure. I only recently discovered Najela and One Big Adventure and not a moment too soon! Probably one of my favorite things about Najela is her comment interaction. If she leaves a comment on one of my posts, she will come back to see if I responded. We then have a little conversation in the comments. She does the same thing at her blog, she always replies to comments and that is cool =D Sometimes we continue her conversations via email (she will help keep me sane once I have to start the dread college application process next year). Her reviews are short, sweet and quite helpful. I'm in awe of her 101 goals in 1001 days list. Najela is a writer and I enjoy reading about her writing classes and her writing process/tips. I like the fact that not only does Najela review books at her blog and post about racefails in publishing but she also talks about her goals and her life. And oh yeah, I interviewed her for All Eyes On (thanks for asking!)


Gal Novelty-I honestly can't remember if I first discovered Ah Yuan and the awesomesauce that is Gal Novelty in 2010. I think I knew about it earlier than that but we didn't become friends until 2010. We email each other a lot and I can ALWAYS count on her to understand when I need to vent about some teen/race/book issue. I don't really talk to that many teenage bloggers (I've always connected better with adults) and even though Ah Yuan is a few years older than me, it's nice to be able to talk to someone so close to my age. And as I said Gal Novelty is awesomesauce. This means it has great (and critical!) reviews, discussion posts that REALLY make me think, fun posts and tidbits of randomness. She talks about k-dramas, j-dramas and manga and I just learn SO MUCH from her and her blog. It makes my head spin and I sincerely believe I am a better person because of my interactions with her, even if they are only online. She's currently in France so she's not posting as frequently, but read up on her older posts, it will be rewarding. Why yes, I did interview her for my (recently named All Eyes On) Blogger Spotlight


Go.Visit.The.Blogs.I.Mentioned. Then check out my blogroll for other blogs that make my day including, Bookish Blather, Bibliophilia-Maggie's Bookshelf, Good Books & Good Wine and Book Gazing. <3 you all!

Tuesday-New Treasure: BBAW Interview Swaps! I got to interview Lynne from My Word Playground. She is so sweet and her first picture book comes out in May 2011 (Hedgehog Goes to Kindergarten). Hooray for Lynne, hedgehogs, picture books and tea parties (read the interview to know what I mean) :)


Wednesday-Unexpected Treasure. This was tough. An unexpected treasure is a book you wouldn't have tried without the influence of another blogger. I can think of several books bloggers have influenced me to read. But ultimately, I realized that hands down I have to credit Doret, Jeanette, Lisa for influencing me the most in what I read, it's because of them that I really got in to reading adult fiction. And without them, I would not have read 32 Candles by Ernessa T. Carter (one of my favorite books of the year! READ IT). That would have been a tragedy. Besides 32 Candles, I've read other fabulous books in the adult fiction category and I've added many many more to my TBR list. Thank you ladies!

Also I don't remember who first recommended this book to me but Perfect Chemistry was surprise read. I don't read romance, but I very slowly attempted to wade in the waters of YA romance. Perfect Chemistry was a great way to be thrown right in, it was a very authentic and even though it's mostly about romance, it had great sub-plots.


Thursday-Forgotten Treasure. This was tough because there are many books that I review here that receive less coverage. I decided to pick two books, one YA, one MG, both published in 2010.

8th Grade Superzero by Olugbemisola Rhuday Perkovich. I wish I could give every single middle school student a copy of this book. I read the book back in January but the characters have remained with me even to this day. They are an absolute delight and the writing is just...lovely. I don't know how to describe it. Just read my review. Plus I love all the topics that are brought up in the novel and I like how it shows young people in a more positive light, helping others.

Bleeding Violet by Dia Reeves-Another fantastic debut. Everyone should just give this book a chance. It is so unique and the cover is gorgeous (matches the content within). I see some reviews of this book, but not many. More, more, more! It''s not creepy as in scary (i.e. monsters jumping out at you, nightmares, etc.), it's more of a bizarre world that showcases the author's creativity.

Friday-Future Treasures. I didn't really participate in BBAW this year (yet again. *heavy sigh*) but my favorite part that I did participate in was the interviews. I loved looking at the creative questions asked (I wish I could steal them! haha sort of) and seeing the fun/informative/inspiring responses.

Blogging Goals: If you look at my 2010 New Year's Resolutions you can see that I fulfilled some of my goals (well fulfilled part of them). I finally got three columns and pages so the blog looks more organized. I'm doing a slightly better job at replying to comments via the blog or through email. There are two goals on the list that I really want to focus on

1. More author interviews. Ideally one a month. Not as many authors of color have an online presence (at least not YA/MG authors of color) but there are still plenty who do and there are so many authors I want to interview!

2. Have more guest posts. This is especially vital during the school year. Feel free to email me anytime with guest post ideas.

I also want to work harder at responding to comments and fix my header!

Happy BBAW!

What was your favorite part? Share the link with me, since I don't know where to start in order to catch up on the week's festivities!



I'm late on this but giveaway time! In honor of BBAW (if it counts). International giveaway (as long as The Book Depository ships for free to your country. Or you can pay for shipping). The Prize? $20 worth of books from the Book Depository. No requirements. Just fill out THIS FORM

Blogaversary Giveaway #3, Winners, Update

I'm baaaaaaaaacccccckkkkkkk =) I had a blast (I visited Brown University). I didn't get a chance to check my mailbox
so I'm not sure what I got, but I'm excited to check on Monday.

The winners of the POC on Covers/Whitewashing giveaway are...

Katie PB! (Magic Under Glass)
Diana Dang! (Liar)
Niranjana Iyer! (Silver Phoenix)
Vidisha! (His Own Where)

Congrats to all winners and thank you to all those who entered! Of course I realized for the Whitewashing giveaway that I forgot to include a space for your email address. So winners of that giveaway please email me within 48 hours, but since I messed up I will allow you an extra day for 36 hours, but 48 is ideal.

If you didn't win, cheer up, I have another giveaway! Author Lyn Miller Lachmann has kindly offered a signed copy of Gringolandia. It's U.S. only My REreview of Gringolandia My original review

To enter: Must be a U.S. follower. Fill out THIS form Ends: July 24, 2010 11:59 CT

I was pleased to see that most people who entered my giveaways so far are old followers. I'm not throwing these giveaways to get more followers, I want to thank my followers, the people who have been with me and supported me for quite some time. Besides, if you only follow me for giveaways, you may want to unfollow me now because after July ends, giveaways will be over for awhile (unless an author offers to mail out the book) due to my lack of a steady income.

I also want to share my Summer reading list updates.

Classics Reading List

1. Middlemarch by George Eliot (currently reading, longer than I expected!)

2. Kindred by Octavia Butler

3. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

4. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

5. Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes

6. Persuasion by Jane Austen (I want to read this by August)

7. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens

8. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

9. Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw (I want to read this next)

10. The Living is Easy by Dorothy West (I want to read this next along with The Wedding)

Adult Fiction

1. Bless Me Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya

2. The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende

3. Children of the Waters by Carleen Brice

4. Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead

5. Tryin' to Sleep in the Bed You Made by Virginia DeBerry and Donna Grant

6. Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley (Book 1 in Easy Rawllins series)-currentyl reading

7. White Teeth by Zadie Smith

8. Waiting to Exhale by Terry McMillan

9. Feminista by Erica Kennedy

10. Bloody Waters by Carolina Garcia-Aguilera (Book 1 in Lupe Solano Mystery series)

Off Color (To reiterate: These books will not be reviewed here. I may review them on Goodreads)

1. Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver (plan to read next)

2. Graceling by Kirsten Cashore

3. Rampant (Killer Unicorns #1) by Diana Peterfreund

4. Eyes Like Stars by Lisa Mantchev

5. The Deathday Letter by Shaun Hutchinson

6. The Daykeeper's Grimoire (Prophecy of Days #1) by Christy Raedeke

7. Violet on the Runway by Melissa Walker

8. The Eternal Kiss: Vampire Tales of Blood and Desire (anthology), edited by Trisha Telep

9. White Cat by Holly Black

10. Levithian by Scott Westerfield

As you can I'm not doing so well. Ideally I want to read every book I have listed, but I'll settle for reading all the books on my adult fiction list and half on the classics list.

Check out this fun link, it lists 50 novels to read when you need a good laugh. I haven't read any books on the list but I do intend on reading many of them. I would also add Catcher in the Rye to the list and a host of other YA books. What would you add? Leave a comment here or at that post.

New Crayons, Blogoversary giveaway #2

New Crayons is hosted by Color Online. It's when we share what new books we got this week. Crayons being a metaphor for multicultural lit. These are books I got last week and didn't get to share because it was my blogaversary and I was celebrating :)

Thank you all so very much for the well wishes and congratulations!

Due to the fact that I'm out of town, you'll have to wait for the announcement of the winners of my Used to be Whitewashed giveaway. While you wait for the announcement why not enter my giveaway for His Own Where by June Jordan? The Rejectionist, Neesha Meminger and I did a June in June event to celebrate her. Read the Rejectionist's review, Neesha's post and my review. It's a fantastic, revolutionary book. You want this book on your shelf.

To enter: FILL Out THIS form (open to U.S. and Canada only. I'm sorry!) Must be a follower

Ends July 17 11: 59 PM CT

From the Publisher


Yummy: The Last Days of a Southside Shorty by Greg Neri, illustrated by Randy DuBurke (ARC)

A graphic novel based on the life and death of Robert "Yummy" Sandifer, an eleven-year-old gang member from Chicago's Southside who was killed by his own gang members.

-I'm almost done with this novel and it absolutely broke my heart. Especially because this happened in Chicago in 1994 and things haven't changed much since. Thank you Lee & Low Books!


The Red Umbrella by Christina Diaz Gonzalez

The Red Umbrella is the moving tale of a 14-year-old girl's journey from Cuba to America as part of Operation Pedro Pan—an organized exodus of more than 14,000 unaccompanied children, whose parents sent them away to escape Fidel Castro's revolution.

In 1961, two years after the Communist revolution, Lucía Álvarez still leads a carefree life, dreaming of parties and her first crush. But when the soldiers come to her sleepy Cuban town, everything begins to change. Freedoms are stripped away. Neighbors disappear. Her friends feel like strangers. And her family is being watched.

As the revolution's impact becomes more oppressive, Lucía's parents make the heart-wrenching decision to send her and her little brother to the United States—on their own.

Suddenly plunked down in Nebraska with well-meaning strangers, Lucía struggles to adapt to a new country, a new language, a new way of life. But what of her old life? Will she ever see her home or her parents again? And if she does, will she still be the same girl?

-I've had my eye on this book since at least December of 2009. And now I have it. Thank you Christina and Dominique!

From Book Fairy #1-Thank you Lyn! *hugs*

Between Sisters by Adwoa Badoe

The future looks bleak indeed for 16-year-old Gloria. Living in a poor area of Accra, she dreams of becoming a dressmaker, but after failing 13 out of 15 subjects on her final exams it seems unlikely to happen. Then a distant relative, Christine, offers to move Gloria to Kumasi to look after her son. In exchange, Christine will pay for Gloria to go to dressmaking school. In Kumasi everything seems possible, and life is grander than anything Gloria has ever experienced. But Kumasi is also full of temptations, like the popular boutique where the owner takes a fancy to Gloria and encourages her to buy clothes on credit. There’s also the smooth-talking Dr. Kusi, who gives Gloria rides in his red Passat and invites her to bring food to his apartment. Eventually betrayed by those around her, Gloria must reconcile her future, her family, and her desires.

-I like that it's YA set in Africa and not about an American traveling to a foreign country to reconnect with their roots.

Payback by Rosemary Hayes

Like some of her friends, 18-year-old Halima, a Muslim, has moved with her family to London, and her horizons are beginning to expand. Then, just as she is about to start university, she discovers her father's secret plan: to marry her to the son of a distant relation in Pakistan who once did him a favor. Halima is to be the repayment of the debt, and it's payback time. The question is, will Halima, who is now immersed in a new life far from her former village, find the inner resources to resist? Or will she give in to the pressures of family and culture and forsake her new life in London, along with her dreams? This timely book offers an exciting story of courage and friendship set against a background of traditional cultural attitudes in conflict with contemporary feelings.

-I actually haven't read many books about arranged marriages in the 21st century so this should be interesting.

Summaries from Amazon.com or indiebound.org

What new books did you get this week? Any POC titles?

*I will be out of town until July 17th. I have posts scheduled and I will have limited computer access.

Teaser Tuesday & Why The Lack of POC Contests?

As always thanks to MizB for this meme!

"Now my clunky clogs come in handy-because I kick Zeus on his left Adidas under the dining room table. After a few seconds of silence, Caterina realizes that we aren't going to break away from twenty years of covert tradition, not even for our five minutes of fashion footage, so she continues probing with supa-catty questions."
-Catwalk by Deborah Gregory pg. 155

Now for my question. It's the same as a question I posted on my No New Crayons post but there was so much information in that post and I was being random so I decided to ask it again because I really do want to know people's thoughts about this and I'm basically just thinking out loud (or typing out loud!)

Question: Why are there very few (I can think of one right now and it's a challenge!) contests for YA books about people of color? In my case it's due to a sad lack of funds and I don't receive ARCs or anything like that (although from what I've read/seen there don't seem to be a whole lot of ARCS being sent to teens about people of color) so I'm way limited (my contest ends at midnight!). Am I missing something or has anyone else noticed this?

So I got to thinking, what can I do? And I realized I have no idea. I'm very shy about contacting authors/publishing companies because I don't want to seem too rude or forward. I'm certainly not blogging for the free books and I'd be giving them away so it's not so bad, but I just don't know. So authors or my more experienced fellow bloggers is that the way to go? Should I email the authors or the publishing companies or both?

Here's what I was thinking. My birthday is in September and I would love to throw a huge contest with YA books that are ONLY about poc. Ideally I would have at least one book or two books from each culture (Asian, Native American, Latina, African American). It'd be great if I could do multiple packs (like a historical fiction pack, realistic fiction, sci-fi, etc.) or a different culture a week kind of thing. So either I can try to contact authors or publishing companies and if that fails (or even if it succeeds) I can reach out to my fellow bloggers and see if they'd be willing to add a book to the giveaway or offer another idea or something.

Contests Galore!

Mrs. Magoo reads is having a contest! You can win nine (9!) books. My deal with contests is I only spotlight contests that are giving away YA books about people of color or books by people of color. Mrs. Magoo is giving away Work What You Got by Stephanie Perry Moore, which I've been wanting to read for so long! ends August 9th (I'm a little late, sorry!) . Oh and I suggest you follow Mrs. Magoo, her blog is pretty cool and she's reviewed some great books!

Also Bookworming in the 21st Century is giving away an ARC copy of Ash by Malinda Lo and it's autographed! Oh and she's giving away a poster of Ash. I.need.this.book. I've heard so many good things about it, and I love the Cinderella lesbian aspect of it! It's new, cool and different :D Ends Aug. 15

Taste Life Twice is giving away Played and Jason & Kyra, both by Dana Davidson. Read my review of Played. I liked both (Jason & Kyra was my fav though). Ends Aug.14

Enter, Enter, Enter! I know I will be :) Eventually, I will make the time to link to these contests in my sidebar. And obviously don't forget about my contest!

Also stay tuned for a review of Shine, Coconut Moon later tonight (Yes I finally go it!)