Last week on FYFA (and in my life):
Well, everything’s settled with my husband’s job. He’s actually switching companies, and we’re happy with the decision, but it has been really stressful getting there. There were a lot of factors playing into it (including LOTS of guilt heaped on us), but we’re hoping that now that the decision’s made we can move on and all will be well. To make our week even rosier, both my daughter and I got sick. We both had a fever for a couple of days and then my daughter ended up with a sore throat and a rash on her hands and feet. Figured out it was hand foot and mouth. Anyway, hopefully I’ll be posting less whiny Sunday Posts from now on because I’ve decided life is going to be stress-free and pleasant from here on out. (I can decide that, right?)
In more fun news, last weekend I attended the YA Literature Conference (and Fandom Frenzy) at Anderson’s Bookshop. There were 33 YA authors there, including a few of my favorites like Jennifer Niven, Adam Silvera and Sharon Cameron. (Jennifer and Adam were also both keynote speakers, and I loved hearing from both of them)—plus, I was introduced to quite a few new-to-me authors. I’m going to try to get a recap of the conference up next week, and I’ll have a giveaway as well!
Here’s what you may have missed on the blog this past week:
- Holding Up the Universe by Jennifer Niven – Review
- Bite-Sized Reviews: Gemina, Our Chemical Hearts, The Lovely Reckless, Spindle
- I Don’t Do Scary (But Books Don’t Scare Me). Let’s Discuss!
Next week on FYFA:
- Time Traveling with a Hamster by Ross Welford – Review & Welford’s humorous list of Top Ten Addictions
- Let’s Discuss: Something bookish! 🙂
Book Blogger Birthdays and Blogoversaries:
Just one blogoversary this week! Hope you’ll head over and wish Samantha many more years of blogging joy! Also, check out the calendar to see what you might have just missed or what’s coming up. (If you want to be added to the calendar, you can always fill out the birthday/blogoversary form!)
- October 19th – Book Minx’s Blogoversary
YA Lit Conference:
These are the books I bought at the YA Lit Conference, so these are all signed (Leigh Bardugo wasn’t at the conference, but they had a signed copy of the book, and I really wanted it, so …)
And these are the ARCs that my mom and I got from Fandom Frenzy.
Purchased:
Won:
I won this from the Shattering Stigmas event! Thanks so much to Erica @ Novel Ink (and to Shannon @ It Starts at Midnight for running the event)!
For Review:
So excited to get the audiobook version of this! Thank you, Macmillan Audio!
If you’d like to hear a clip, check it out here! (I’m sharing it with permission, of course)
From NetGalley:
Great Discussions/Goings On Around the Blogosphere:
Here are some posts I especially loved this week:
- AJ @ Read All the Things explains why she doesn’t review ARCs
- Allison @ Alison’s Wonderland Recipes shares this super fun Edgar Allen Poe inspired recipe: Deviled Raven Eggs (There are more Halloween recipes on her blog too.)
- Lory @ Emerald City Book Review talks about How you build a following for an event.
- Puput @ Sparkling Letters tells us It’s NOT COOL to Hate on Books You Haven’t Read!
Other Current Giveaways on FYFA:
(Besides the ones listed above)
- September Monthly Wrap-Up Round-Up Giveaway
- Remember Yesterday by Pintip Dunn – Still time to enter to win a Limited, Annotated Hardcover of the first book in the series!
- Wendy Darling: Seas by Colleen Oakes – Fall Favorite Things Blog Tour Spotlight & Giveaway – Still time to enter to win an ARC of the book!
- October Discussion Challenge Link-Up & Giveaway
Pre-Order Deals:
- Pre-order WAYFARER by Alexandra Bracken and receive a personalized holiday card from Bracken, as well as an 8×10 print.
- Preorder THE EDGE OF EVERYTHING by Jeff Giles to receive a keepsake metal bookmark!
- Pre-order THIS IS OUR STORY by Ashley Elston and get a pouch, signed bookmark, sticker, tattoo, pin, and deer antler necklace. Added bonus is that everyone will be automatically entered to win the mega prize: signed copies of The Rules for Disappearing, The Rules for Breaking, and This is Our Story.
- Pre-order DIE FOR YOU by Amy Fellner Dominy and receive a personalized signed copy of the book along with a hand-crafted necklace (while supplies last). Open most places internationally.
- Pre-order BLOOD FOR BLOOD by Ryan Graudin to receive Storm After Storm—a Wolf by Wolf digital short story in Adele Wolfe’s point of view.
- Pre-order GLITTER by Aprilynn Pike and get a fun Glitter swag bag!
- Pre-order DEAD GIRLS SOCIETY by Michelle Krys & get an invite to join the Society, a code to access exclusive content & signed poster!
- Pre-order HEARTLESS by Marissa Meyer to get a Heartless branded magnetic bookmark.
Even More Awesome Giveaways on Other Sites:
- Shooting Stars Mag has several Harry Potter giveaways going on right now! You can enter to win Harry Potter Coasters, a Harry Potter Dreamcatcher, a Harry Potter Purse, and Harry Potter Ornaments.
- Lots of blogs participating in the October New Release Blog Hop!
- Check out Clean Teen Publishing’s Halloweenized covers and enter to win a $25 gift card!
- It Starts at Midnight just turned three and Shannon is celebrating with a giveaway!!
- Lots of blogs participating in the Fall into Romance Giveaway Hop!
- With Love for Books has MANY giveaways going on: Eight YA Books, Three book necklaces & a book of choice worth $10, and the Books to Movies Giveaway Hop! (just to name a few)
- Lilybloombooks hosts Middle Grade Madness, a link-up for MG reviews. Link up and enter to win a MG book! You can also head to her blog for a chance to win an autographed copy of Wishapick: Tickety Boo and the Black Trunk, the Wishapick: Tickety Boo and the Black Trunk soundtrack, and a Fitbit Alta
- Enter to win a trip to meet Marissa Meyer!
- The Bookavid is celebrating its two year blogoversary with a giveaway! Enter to be one of three people to win $20 worth of books from The Book Depository (INTL)
Lots of good stuff! Have any giveaways or great discussions happening on your site right now? Feel free to share them in the comments!
Glad stuff with your husband’s job is figured out. Ugh for HFM. Hope you all feel better soon. The conferences sound like they were fun and lots of great books from them!! Can’t wait to see what you think of Heartless audio. Have a great week!
I’m really looking forward to listening to Heartless. I’ve been enjoying audiobooks lately, and so I jumped at the chance to get this one.
I’m glad your husband’s job issues got sorted out, but being sick sucks. I hope you guys are feeling better. Enjoy your new books!
Yeah, I think we’re finally done being sick, but lately it just feels like one thing after another. Ugh!
Glad you all got things sorted out, I hope this week is better for you all and you are feeling better.
It is ok to decided only positive, I do it everyday even if somedays it doesn’t work I still try to make positive outcomes! lol
That is a great book haul! I hope you enjoy them!
Have a great week, Nicole! Happy Reading! ox
Yeah, even if you sometimes can’t make life be stress-free, your attitude about it makes all the difference!
Glad you enjoyed the event at Anderson’s Bookshop! They always seem to have a lot of cool things going on. I really need to work my way over there at some point.
And thanks for the blogoversary well wishes! I can’t believe I’ve had the blog for 2 years now. 🙂
Time flies, doesn’t it? My blog is coming up on four years old now and sometimes it seems crazy I’ve had it so long and others it feels like I’ve been doing this forever!
Glad everything with your husband’s job was sorted out satisfactorily. I hope his former employer wasn’t heaping the guilt? I feel that just crosses an ethical line. (Although I know it does happen.)
Sick sucks. I’m sorry! I’ve never known anyone who has had HFM, but I understand it can be quite painful and miserable. I hope it clears up quickly!
Yeah, there were some big things going down at the (almost) previous job that we had no idea about. So, when my husband gave his notice they were pretty upset and they really wanted him to stay because they were worried that him leaving would look bad for the company and potentially affect some of those things. The guilt was laid down pretty darn heavily, but in the end, we decided we had to do the thing that’s going to make him happiest and keep his career moving in the direction he wants to go. It was NOT an easy decision, though, because there were lots of factors at play (including money, of course).
I’m happy that things seem to be better for you. What are your thoughts on the Pixie Mania book?
I haven’t read it yet, but I’ll definitely put up a review once I have!
The conference sounds exciting. And I see you got some fabulous new books! Sorry you and your daughter were sick and hope uyou feel better soon. It’s also good to hear your husband sorted things out:)
The conference was lots of fun! I always love that type of event!
So sorry to hear that you’ve been sick, but glad that you had a good time at the Frenzy. And good luck to your husband at his new job.
I got the Momotaro audiobook from the library today. I have to finish up a few “in progress” books first, but then I’m looking forward to listening to it. Thanks again for the nomination.
Sunday Summary #24
You’re welcome! I actually haven’t listened to all that many MG audiobooks, but it just so happened that I’d listened to that one recently with my kids and we all enjoyed it. (It was especially fun for us because my son’s so into Japanese culture.) I saw that you were hoping for more nominations and figured I’d hop over and nominate that one. 🙂
You’re welcome to whine as much as you like. I’ve been doing a bit of that recently too.
I’m glad you’ve made the decision re your husband’s job and hope you’re all well soon!
Lately, I feel like every Sunday Post is about how busy, stressed or sick I am. I don’t think of myself as being a whiny person usually, but lately I’ve definitely fit the bill! 🙂
It can be a hard decision changing jobs, so I hope everything works out well for you guys!
I currently have a bit of a cold, so I’m sharing your pain there girl!
So jealous of your haul… so many awesome books. Enjoy them all!
Ugh, I hope you’re feeling better! Kiddo had hand foot and mouth disease several months ago – and passed it onto my father (his grandfather) somehow. It’s not pleasant.
And wishing you luck with adapting to a new situation, it’s always tough when things get shaken up.
I’m hoping to get a copy of Crooked Kingdom soon, I read Six of Crows last week and really loved it!
HFM disease has been going around New Jersey as well, and I went on a tirade for everyone to wash their hands religiously for a few weeks. I’m sorry you guys got it! How awful. Hopefully it’s run its course now.
The YA author event sounds like a good time!
Sounds like things will pick up for you based on positivity alone! Wishing you the best of luck for this week and I hope you feel better!
Thanks for those few interesting links or to other blogs – I particularly enjoyed the not reviewing ARCs post. Very interesting!
I hope you have a great week!
Oh no, sorry you and your daughter were sick! Never fun. That’s great your husband has a new job. I hope that relieves a lot of stress! That author event sounds so amazing. Wow, so many great authors. I just love Adam Silvera so that’s cool he was a keynote speaker. 🙂 How fun! I can’t wait to hear your round up for it.
Thank you SO much for sharing my HP giveaways – lots more to come 🙂
-Lauren
Hand and Mouth is fairly common. Hopefully, everyone is on the mend today. Glad things are moving forward for hubby’s job. You need to do what is right for your family, even if others are upset. So many good authors, and books in your stack…enjoy!
Yay for having everything settled! And I’m sorry you guys have been sick. I had something similar last week, 102 fever for 4+ days, blah. Here’s hoping we’re both on the mend!! Although I was left with a croupy cough and congestion…… totally sound like Phoebe on that sick episode of Friends haha. Here’s hoping you didn’t get that part of it too!
Can’t wait for your recap of the conference and your review of Heartless!