The Real Score Blog Tour + Giveaway

This could just about be the last blog tour that #romanceclass will have this year, and the honor goes to Kesh Tanglao's The Real Score. At first I thought that I might not be able to relate to the novella, but I was wrong. Ms Tanglao writes with a careful hand, managing the fine line between wish-fulfillment and reality, and knowing how to elicit the right emotions from her readers at just the right time. It's a lovely story that is already winning a lot of fans.

About the Book:
Caitlin's friendship with Marcus, the de facto frontman of the world's biggest boy band Gezellig, has long been an object of scrutiny by almost everyone--their friends and families, the media, and his fans--ever since they "went public" a couple of years back. Who wouldn't be interested? She was a nobody, catapulted into the limelight of his fame when he struck an unusual friendship with her.

To both Caitlin and Marcus, what they have is a "perfect little thing." But then something comes along and threatens it.

In a no-holds-barred interview, will they finally be forced to settle the score?

You can purchase the book through any of the following links:
• Amazon
• Smashwords
• Kobo
• Paperback: Order here

Just as Caitlin and Marcus were persuaded to participate in an interview, so too has author Kesh Tanglao. The questions she has to answer are easier than her characters' though!

Q: Have you been to London?
A: No, I haven't, but it's one of the places that I want to go to (along with Paris, Italy, and Amsterdam)!

Q: What kind of research did you have to do to make the place come alive?
A:Working around how to make places you haven't been to in stories is a bit tough, so as much as possible I tried not mentioning specific areas. For research, I watched movies / TV series based in London, and there's Google and Buzzfeed UK (weird source, but their lists are fun!).

Q:Was it difficult to write a male character who wasn't Filipino?
A:Yes, it was. I think we were cautioned about this in class before, since Brits have different cultures than Filipinos, and there are different language nuances too. Some research helped, although I wished I had talked to someone British (or well-versed in UK culture) to make sure it was genuine.

Q:Did you set out to give Marcus any characteristics that might not be typically Filipino?
A:On Marcus' characteristics, not specifically, but I do made him out as someone more mature for his age.

--

I think that Marcus' maturity was definitely evident in the novella. He was shown to be very patient and understanding. The little dance he's had with Caitlin over the nature of their relationship was depicted quite well. With a different lead, with a different author, it may have gone a different direction, but in The Real Score, his devotion really hit all the right notes. So show Caitlin and Marcus some love and get your own copy of this book!

About the Author:

Kesh Tanglao is a full-time market researcher. When she’s not crunching numbers, she spends most of her free time watching TV shows, listening to music, and reading. Also a self-proclaimed fangirl, she likes cheering for her favorite sports teams and supporting her favorite artists. The Real Score is her first published novella.



Contact Info:
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/KeshTanglao
• Twitter: @sparksfire
• 8Tracks: http://8tracks.com/sparksfire_
• Email: kesh.tanglao@gmail.com

Giveaway time! Get the chance to win one swag bag that contains the following items: a paperback and bookmarks of The Real Score, Marcus and Caitlin's mini-care package, and a charm bracelet.

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In Over Her Head Blog Tour + Giveaway

It's almost the end of the year and still, Mina V. Esguerra's #romanceclass is going strong. Ever since the class ended in early June, there have been eight contemporary romance novellas out in the market. Making a book tour stop on Ficsation is one that I devoured in one sitting, Anne Plaza's In Over Her Head.

About the Book:
All she wants is to get even...

Erika Apostol's quiet and unassuming life gets disrupted when she learns that Richard Javier, the very same person who broke her heart many years ago, is now back in the country. Her world is turned upside down as old feelings she thought were buried resurface to haunt her once more.

Determined to give Richard a dose of his own medicine, Erika finds herself involved in an outrageous plan devised by her friends. They enlist the help of Jerome Gonzales, an attractive and charismatic DJ (with a playboy reputation), to pose as her significant other.

As the plan goes in full swing, Erika discovers Richard's jealous side, and that there's something more to Jerome than meets the eye. Will this grand charade work out the way it should, or will she be left with nothing in the end?

You can purchase the book through any of the following links:
• Amazon
• Smashwords
• Paperback: Order here

One of the things I enjoyed about In Over Her Head is the Richard-Erika deal. Any child of the 80's will appreciate that! So I asked Ms Plaza more about her naming conventions and how she chose names and personalities for her characters. Did she know that she was going to name her leads over this iconic anime pair? Or did that come after?

Aside from forming a cohesive plot for a story, I take great pleasure in naming my characters. For me it's like a make or break thing that would either push me to finish writing or just get me stuck in a limbo of no return. Here are two main reasons why I personally give importance in naming their characters:

• A character's name is essential for me to be able to think of their personalities and visual pegs. Names that sound and feel right is something akin to inspiration—they usually hit me during the most unusual times (i.e., when I'm about to fall asleep, or when I'm taking a bath). And just like having that spark of an idea, I have to write it down; otherwise, I'd forget it.

• Thinking of appropriate character names for my stories is an exercise to show how characters come alive in the writing process—they evolve into distinct individuals with different personalities and quirks.

I never really thought to name my lead characters after the very famous anime couple, but when I was still just talking about the plot with my cousin, the idea was already there. I didn't have names at that time, and thought it would be great to go for it. I mean, who could ever forget Richard Hartford and Princess Erika? I was a sucker for romantic plots in the shows I watched when I was a kid, and Daimos takes the cake.

When it comes to fleshing out the characters, I try to come up with a visual peg (VP). When I outlined In Over Her Head for #romanceclass, I already had a mental picture of what my characters looked like. VPs help me describe the characters a lot more in detail, from their physical appearance down to their mannerisms and personalities.

For instance, my initial VP for Erika was Michelle Monaghan from the movie Made of Honor. Michelle's character in the movie was a go-getter, a person who takes things seriously career-wise, independent, and a hopeless romantic. On the other hand, my basis for Richard was Won Bin in the movie Friends (with Kyoko Fukada). In that film, his character was hardworking, youthful, and persevering. I imbued these characteristics in my leads, albeit with a few tinkering on the physical appearance.

I was also asked who I would cast for the role of Erika, Richard, and Jerome if the book was to be adapted into a movie. As much as I'd like to handpick the artists I earlier mentioned, I already have an idea which actors would be perfect for the part.

But names and characters are just one part of the equation. Beyond these, the novella really moved me by the way the romance was handled. It took a familiar story (getting back at the Ex) and deftly infused it with rom-com elements and tropes (a love triangle, a player, schemes and lies) to up the ante. I think Ms Plaza really dealt with this excellently. It was so easy for me to fall into the story and its premise without question. At its core, it was still anchored around a very realistic situation, one that tugged at my heartstrings. I liked how the leads danced around each other -- just slightly beyond reach -- so that we can have something to root for in the end.

About the Author:
Anne Plaza has a degree in Psychology, but has actively pursued a career in writing in her previous work as a reporter and online editor. She currently works in the field of marketing communications and spends most of her time writing fiction (while not on the lookout for the nearest cupcake and cronut store). Aside from writing, she loves to read contemporary romance, young adult, fantasy, and historical fiction. She also collects stamps and postcards, and loves everything about cats. Anne is based in Quezon City, Philippines. In Over Her Head is her first published work in English.

Contact Info:
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/anneplaza2013
• Twitter: @anneplaza
• Blog: http://thoughtsbrewed.blogspot.com
• Email: anneplaza@gmail.com

Giveaway time! Get the chance to win one swag bag including the following: In Over Her Head postcard and bookmark, floral memo pad, A7 memo pad, and sticky notes, Idea Dream Think Memory Draw Japanese Wallpaper Planner, Jouets Origami Pure Diamond necklace (note: it’s not a real diamond. Haha!)

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Hello Blog Tour + Giveaway

This will be the last blog tour I'm joining, for this month at least. It's been a crazy month but I'm looking forward to reading Addie Lynn Co's collection of short stories Hello when this is all over.

About the Book:
What if The One actually walks up to you and even says hello, would you greet back or turn your back unknowingly that you have actually met? Would you know when you’ve actually met?

Serendipity is a funny thing that brings a tinge of bittersweet bliss to anyone who is fortunate to experience it. Hello is a trilogy that explores how serendipitous life can sometimes be.

Definitely, Maybe is a story of how fate plays with two people as they meet each decade hoping that maybe this time around, they can finally be together.

Almost Mismatch tells how two people so right for each other be so wrong and no matter how much they try to suppress their feelings, true love will not stop at anything. What is meant to be will be.

Finally, Dinner Date portrays how two people’s search for love could take them to different places and people only to lead them back to where they started.

The world is just like a huge maze that no matter what direction one walks to, there will always be one final destination. There seems to be an invisible string that is handcuffed to two people on each end and unsuspectingly pulls these two people destined for each other back together no matter how long it takes.

You can purchase the book through any of the following links:
• Amazon
• Smashwords
• Nook
• Kobo
• Paperback

Ms Co was also in my #romanceclass, but I only knew a few details about her and this book. I knew she had written Hello before (and was writing something else for the class), so I wanted to ask her about some of the writing tips that she picked up from class that have helped her in writing next book. This was her reply, in her own words:

(Yes,) I wrote the book Hello before #romanceclass with Ms. Mina. It was really a lucky chance I was taking because as I was in the stage of editing it in preparation to self-publishing it, I stumbled upon the #romanceclass that Ms. Mina was offering for free so I didn’t hesitate and just joined the class since it is free and I have always been looking for someone who could mentor me.

I tried incorporating Ms. Mina’s lessons into Hello but something in my heart tells me that I want this book to come out to the world the way I would want it to be read and appreciated by the readers. I wanted to have the freedom to tell it the way I wanted to and not be limited by a formula. Sure, at first, I was a bit skeptical about it because I didn’t want my story to be too formulaic for fear that it might end up being too cliché. But it seems like the formula is what the people bite into so I gave it a try, slightly with Hello but mostly with the contemporary novella I finished in #romanceclass entitled Forget Me Not (formerly introduced by Ms. Mina as Second Time Around) which I might self-publish in the future if the first one would go well. I realized that the formula is not so bad after all as long as you give it a twist to make it your own.

Writing tips that I picked up from #romanceclass:

1. Work on a schedule and keep with it.

Or at least have someone set deadlines for you. This is the best way to keep you motivated and avoid procrastination. I’m really a procrastination queen and I tend to do other stuff and not focus on writing that I end up not finishing stories that I have started. But with the #romanceclass, Ms. Mina was there to constantly remind us of the fast approaching deadlines and just posts words of encouragement to keep us from giving up and leave our stories hanging.

2. Draft a working outline.

I used to write spontaneously meaning I just write whatever comes to mind as I write it. I don’t really plan on it. I just think of what to write scene per scene and hope that the beginning at ending would connect somehow as I finish it. But this is not really a good idea especially if you’re the type who wants everything to be in place and perfect. From my experience with Hello, I kept on editing and editing the manuscript because I felt like it was always lacking things or details of the story to make it more solid and connected as a whole. The editing never seems to end. I kept adding here and there which is very tiring and makes you doubtful of the perfection of your story in the reader’s eyes.

But working with an outline keeps the entirety of the book more solid and figured out even at the beginning of the project/ writing process. It would make you want to write, write, write to reach the ending that you have always pictured in your mind. The thought and continuity of the book would not go off track because you have got it all planned out. You just have to elaborate the scenes and have the characters act it all out for the readers’ imagination. Another good thing about outlines is that you’d be able to cut out the unnecessary scenes that seemed perfect to include before but just seemed blah now. You would not be wasting your time writing it and the readers’ time in reading it.

Now, I always have this outline or mini checklist of the scenes or details I would like to include and arrange it accordingly so that I won’t forget anything that I think should be included in my novella.

3. Keeping the romance while still being realistic and not sickly sweet.

I really think this is an important tip because it is hard to evoke the ‘kilig’ factor without making it ‘gasgas na’ which I really wouldn’t want my book to end up with. I guess keeping it simple is the key here. Ms. Mina advised me not to make it too complicated because the focus of the novella would steer away from the romance which is the point of the novella after all.

4. Letting go and being proud of what you have finally created.

Don’t dwell too much on trying to please everyone. Someone’s always bound not to like it no matter what. But what’s important is that you are satisfied with what you have created and proud to show it to the world.

There are a lot of steps to the first stage of self-publishing. The first would be finishing writing the first draft, then move on to editing it for grammatical/ technical errors while maybe dreaming of how the book cover design will be. Create it yourself or have someone create the art for you while you format the manuscript according to what is needed because from what I learned, Smashwords and Kindle formats are different with each other plus the format for having the book printed on paper. I definitely went crazy with all the different formatting requirements. And when you finally have the book in your hand or the formatted soft copy ready for upload to Smashwords or Amazon Kindle, there’s no going back now. You’ve come the long way now, all that’s left to do is go all the way.

Now that’s just the first half of the journey, the second half is marketing your book but that’s another story to tell. But what’s really important is to have your novella out there to the world. In no time, someone will discover it and take a chance on your novella.

What I’m really trying to say is don’t wait anymore and just let it out there for the people to read. The main goal to begin with really is for you to be able to tell your story. Getting the appreciation it deserves is just a bonus.

About the Author:
Addie grew up reading Sweet Valley High books and Nancy Drew mystery books. She finished a degree in Communication Arts and really wanted to pursue a career in filmmaking but due to high production costs of a film, she opted to tell her stories through her novels. Being the hopeless romantic that she was, she will stop at nothing to share her passion with everyone and hopes that she could infect others with it. She’s a daydreamer by day and an author by night.

Contact Info:
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/addielynn.co
• Wattpad: http://www.wattpad.com/user/addielynnco
• Blog: http://shelflifeofaddielynn.blogspot.com/
• Email: addielynnco@gmail.com

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Vintage Love Blog Tour + Giveaway

Full disclosure: Author Agay Llanera is a classmate from Mina V. Esguerra's #romanceclass. But when our online class started, I wouldn't know her from Eve. Since then I've actually learned a bit about her through our email exchanges and chats. I'm really pleased that she's making a book tour stop on Ficsation to share her contemporary romance novella Vintage Love.

About the Book:
26-year-old Crissy Lopez’s life is in dire need of a makeover. Her wardrobe revolves around ratty shirts and beat-up sneaks; her grueling schedule as a TV Executive leaves no room for a social life; and worst of all, she’s still hung up on the Evil Ex who left her five years ago.

When her fashionable grand-aunt passes away and leaves behind a roomful of vintage stuff, the Shy Stylista inside Crissy gradually resurfaces. Soon, she feels like she's making progress -- with a budding lovelife to boot! But the grim ghost of her past catches up with her, threatening to push her back into depression. To finally move on, Crissy learns that walking away is not enough. This time, she needs to take a leap of faith.

You can purchase the book through any of the following links:
• Amazon
• Smashwords
• Paperback: Contact the author (links below)

As I mentioned earlier, Ms Llanera and I met through Mina Esguerra's online #romanceclass. While I knew that she had begun her novella even before the class started, I also wanted to find out how the class had helped her.

WRITE AND WRONGS
How I Finished My First Novella

A year before I finished Vintage Love, I attempted to write a Young Adult novella with the"inspiration-will-come-when-it-comes" approach. I had heard about writers talking about how their characters had written themselves, and how they had moved the story forward on their own.

After writing the prologue, I felt pretty good about it. So I moved on to writing Chapter one...and well, that was as far that I had gotten. My characters refused to budge. I didn't know what was going to happen. So after countless attempts to finish the chapter, I just gave up and shelved the story.

The following year found me pregnant with my first child. I felt the need to do something huge, to cross an item off my bucket list before I popped because I knew that being a mother would rob me of the luxury of free time.

I decided to write a chick-lit novella. Determined not to repeat history, I first did a bit of research on the net, on how authors wrote their novels. Then I read about five chick-lit novels just to get me in the groove.

First, I drafted a synopsis--nothing fancy; the important thing was I had an idea of how the story would begin and end. Then I stapled some sheets of paper together (recycled of course) and proceeded to write the synopsis for each chapter by hand. I felt like I was accomplishing more that way instead of staring at the blinking cursor on my laptop screen.

After I had mapped out the entire story, which took about a month, I proceeded to type at white heat, which meant I just wrote whatever came to mind without thinking of grammar or story flow. After finishing a chapter, I'd stop. Then I'd continue working on it the next day; this time, editing it as ruthlessly as I could.

I did this day after day, and after two months, I found myself with a finished novella.

The story didn't end there, what with the beta reading, editing, and publishing done a year later, but the main thing was that I finished it. And now, if you choose to, you can read it.

I'm really glad I picked up a copy of Vintage Love. I was hooked from the first page. Crissy and Vince are two extremely likable characters and their romance develops naturally. I could definitely imagine their story being on a Summit romance! I loved how going through her Nanay Maring's vintage things helped Crissy deal with her own past. But don't take my word for it -- get your copy of Vintage Love and read for yourself!

About the Author:
Agay Llanera is a freelance writer for television and video, and a published writer of children’s books. She is a member of KUTING, a private, non-stock, non-profit organization, which aims to be the Philippines’ foremost writers’ organization for children.

Contact Info:
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AgayLlanera
• Twitter: @agayskee
• Blog: http://agayisagirl.blogspot.com/
• Email: agay.llanera@gmail.com

Giveaway time! Get the chance to win one of three swag bags (including a paperback copy of Vintage Love and vintage-inspired jewelry and bookmark) Agay Llanera, one of three swag bags (including a paperback copy of Hello and trinkets) from Addie Lynn Co, and a grand swag bag from Addie Lynn Co, which includes a paperback copy of Hello.

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Well Played Blog Tour + Giveaway

What's great about being a blog tour stop is that you can ask author many things about the writing process. Author Katrina Ramos Atienza generously shares her experiences on writing the contemporary romance novella Well Played.

About the Book:
Patrice Reyes is starting her junior year at the University and she's convinced it's going to be the best semester ever. For starters, it looks like this is the year her team will win the regional football (soccer, for you Yanks) championships. Her subjects are looking good, and there's even a chance she might finally get somewhere with her rock star crush. But a new classmate—arrogant, cold Math nerd ( 'nuff said)—is seriously throwing off her groove. Will she ever get rid of him and have the awesome semester she deserves? Or is there truth to never judging (Math) books by their cover?

You can purchase the book through any of the following links:
• Amazon
• Smashwords
• Paperback: http://katrinaramosatienza.blogspot.com/2013/07/pre-order-wellplayed-paperback-now.html

This is the first time that I've read a Filipino adaptation of a famous novel so I really wanted to ask Ms Atienza what challenges she encountered. How did she decide which characters needed to stay close to their original versions and who would get big changes in the adaptation?

For me, LB was the perfect fit for Pride & Prejudice. Austen set her story in this small, very insular world; in many ways UPLB is like that, too: a small college town where everyone knows each other and, sometimes, get into each other’s business. From the moment I decided to do the retelling I already knew that I’d have the landladies and tenants of Alta Women’s Dormitory as stand-ins for the Bennets; I knew that Netherfield / Meryton would be U.S.A. (in real life, an apartment complex called White House). For the balls, the different college parties worked great. Once I did the outline I knew I had to streamline some plot points from the original. For example, although Mr. Collins and Lady Catherine are the funnest characters in P&P, adding them into the mix would complicate a story already teeming with plot points (though I did consider doing Lady Catherine as a bitchy dean or something!)

Once the stand-ins were chosen, their traits from the original were pruned or enhanced organically -- meaning I wrote it through. There was a lot of thinking along the lines of “does it feel right for this character to do this? Would ‘Jane’ actually say this, or would she be as passive as her original? Would ‘Mrs. Bennet’ still be as interested in matchmaking?” The answer to the last one, by the way, is yes to a certain extent; you’d be surprised to find a lot of well-meaning old ladies taking a keen interest in your love life in UPLB!

With all the many different characters, I was conscious of making sure I didn’t have one-offs in the story just because they were in the original. I had to ensure that everyone I introduced would have some resonance or contributed to advancing the plot later. I actually had to do a bit of rewriting so that “Caroline” and “Mr. and Mrs. Bennet” had something to do with the resolution.

The real challenge was just the timing of the whole plot. I knew that the Wickham paninira had to happen, but when, exactly? And what would be the fallout from that? There was the temptation to just throw all the plot developments after that, boom boom boom, but in actuality it’s only the middle of the book, so there was still some story-building to be done. It was probably at this point that I got my yearlong writer’s block! It took a lot of rewrites to fix the pacing after that, but I think once I figured it out it flows pretty well. That’s the hope!

One of the things that I enjoyed about Well Played is trying to figure out which character was which and anticipating how my favorite scenes from the original version would be given a new spin. There was really much attention to detail -- not just in the setting but also in the characters themselves. You can tell what a big P&P Ms Atienza is! So if you're a big fan of Austen (or just romance in general), don't forget to pick up this book.

About the Author:
Katrina Ramos Atienza, born and bred in Manila, Philippines, has been writing all her life. She's worked in the fields of PR and corporate communications while blogging, freelancing and writing fiction. Four chick lit novels (Pink Shoes, 2006; The Hagette, 2006; If the Shoe Fits, 2008 and Shoes Off, 2010) are available in paperback in the Philippines, while her earlier short fiction works have been published in Philippine publications and collected in the Growing Up Filipino II anthology. Well Played (2013) is her first independently published novel. She graduated from the University of the Philippines at Los Baños and is married with two kids.

Contact Info:
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/katrinaramosatienza
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/iggyatienza
• Blog: http://katrinaramosatienza.blogspot.com
• Email: mailto:kratienza@aol.com

Giveaway time! Get the chance to win one of three swag bags (containing 1 medium,gray Well Played shirt + 2 Pride & Prejudice Bookmarks + Think Free Bag Tag) from Katrina Ramos Atienza or one of three swag bags (containing 1 paperback copy of All's Fair in Blog & War, 1 unique trinket, 1 pocket journal, ebook voucher, postcard and bookmarks) from Chrissie Peria.

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All's Fair in Blog and War Blog Tour + Giveaway

I've had this blog for close to seven years, but this is the first time that I've actually participated in a blog tour. That's why I'm so glad that the first to be featured through it is my good friend Chrissie Peria and her contemporary novella All's Fair in Blog and War.

About the Book:
Five Cuevas @5travels Three guesses to where I'm going next. Starts with an M. Ends with a U. Has a lechon named after it. #travel

Twenty-something travel blogger Five thinks she has hit the jackpot when she gets invited to glittering Macau for an all-expense-paid bloggers tour. Think majestic old churches, sparkling casinos, exhilarating bungee jumps, and the world's most unforgettable egg tarts. The trip is practically perfect, except for one little glitch. She gets assigned to be travel buddies with Jesse, the world's most infuriating photo blogger, and it's definitely war at first sight.

Will Five let Jesse turn her dream vacation into a total nightmare? Or will falling in love be on the itinerary?

You can purchase the book through any of the following links:
• Amazon
• Smashwords

Even if All's Fair in Blog and War is about blogging and travel, food also played an important role in the book. That's why I wanted to ask Ms Peria how this came about. Did she expect readers' strong reaction to egg tarts?

It's always nice to hear from readers. They make you realize things you didn't realize about your book. In my case, I found it surprising that most everyone was reacting to egg tarts. All's Fair in Blog and War is set in Macau, a land most known for casinos. It's Asia's Las Vegas. In fact, a lot of the big Vegas hotel and casino chains have set up shop here.

A trip to Macau made me realize that the place is more than just a mini Las Vegas. It has a rich culture drawing from a shared Portuguese and Chinese heritage. A lot of UNESCO Heritage sites make its home here. So steeped is it in its past that even the McDonalds and Starbucks branches are dressed up traditionally, ensuring that they don't stick out like sore thumbs amidst the architecture. We spent the days walking the usual tourist attractions and the narrow, dimly-lit side streets at night. We hopped from fancy hotel dinners to hole-in-the-wall eateries where food was brought in from street carts. It was a Macau that was more than just Casinoland.

When the time came to write the book, I drew heavily upon my personal experiences in Macau to bring the setting to life. Unfortunately, I am also a food blogger, so food is heavily entrenched in all my travels. Macau was no exception: bacalhau, bakkwa, almond cookies, Phoenix egg rolls, peri-peri chicken, serradura, street side noodles---I ate it all. The star of the trip, and subsequent trips as well, were the egg tarts from Margaret's. I was not a fan of eggy confections, but for this particular treat, it was love at first bite. Eggy, flaky, with just the right amount of sweetness. It's so good, that I always bring home boxes of it. But it was only after people pointed it out did I realize that my love for egg tarts made it to the book, and to people's imaginations as well.

If you're one of the readers who suffered from egg tart cravings while reading All's Fair in Blog and War, please accept my apologies. If you haven't read the book, consider yourself warned: Do not read on an empty stomach.

What's nice about Ms Peria is that she even thought of making social media links for her characters. Five and Jesse are bloggers after all! Talk about leaving no stone unturned!
• Instagram: @fivetravels
• Twitter - Five: @5travels
• Twitter - Jesse: @wanderingcamera

About the Author:

Chrissie's first trip to Macau was in the summer of 2010. Like her main character, she fell in love there. Unlike her main character, she didn't fall in love with a guy; she fell in love with egg tarts.

An advertising copywriter in her past life, she now spends most of her time writing, taking photos, cooking and babysitting. She tweets about food and writerly things as @kitchencow. For thoughts longer than 140 characters, she blogs on http://thewriteside.kingdomcow.net. She still plays with dolls and she thinks that bacon is the answer.

This is her first novella.

Contact Info:
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/kitchencow
• Blog: http://thewriteside.kingdomcow.net
• Instagram: @kaoko25

Giveaway time! Get the chance to win one of three swag bags (containing 1 medium,gray Well Played shirt + 2 Pride & Prejudice Bookmarks + Think Free Bag Tag) from Katrina Ramos Atienza or one of three swag bags (containing 1 paperback copy of All's Fair in Blog & War, 1 unique trinket, 1 pocket journal, ebook voucher, postcard and bookmarks) from Chrissie Peria.

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The Distance Between Us (Kasie West)

The trope is as old as Cinderella, as Bathsheba. Still, readers continue to be fascinated by the rich guy-poor girl romance. Some days I might complain why we keep on falling for this story, but then I'd have to come out and admit that I'm not entirely blameless. [Full disclosure: My longest obsession with this was over Hana Yori Dango, a manga turned anime, more popularly known in Manila as the Taiwanese drama Meteor Garden or as its recent Korean reincarnation Boys Over Flowers. Somebody just gave my high horse a good slap on the behind and it went off running without me.]

But what I enjoyed about Kasie West's The Distance Between Us is that it infused the trope with a needed amount of levity and spirit. I was expecting something akin to Pretty in Pink but I was pleased that I didn't get it. Here, Caymen helps her mother run a struggling doll store that caters to rich collectors. Two things she likes poking fun at are dolls and rich folks. But when Xander Spence walks into her shop, she finds herself striking an unlikely friendship with him. Together, they question labels and explore the boundaries of the world they thought they knew.

As the cover implies, this is a romance. It evolved at a steady pace, which made their relationship extremely believable. Caymen's character -- sassy, snarky, and loyal -- is a breath of fresh air for me. I like how she's sarcastic but not hard. Her insights and her banter with the people around her keeps things from being too predictable. She was one of the reasons I couldn't put this down! Aside from constantly worrying about her mother's shop (which she personally doesn't care too much for), she's candid enough to admit that she doesn't know what to do when she gets to college. While that may not stack up against the more dramatic issues of YA literature, I appreciated its purpose in this story. Xander has all the self-assurance that one would expect from someone as rich as he was. Caymen takes it for arrogance in the beginning, but I really liked how Ms West shows that there was more to him. He is confident without being abrasive, encouraging without being patronizing. The supporting characters, from Caymen's friends to her mom, were also tightly-drawn.

I had a few concerns with the story, but nothing that really took away from my enjoyment. There was a plot twist coming, which Ms West had already primed the reader to expect, but when it came it was unlike what I was thinking that it jarred me. But upon re-reading, I finally picked out the subtle hints that pointed to that direction. They weren't a lot but if I had been sharper during my first read, I might have had less misgivings about the twist. The story also tends to skew deeper into wish-fulfillment territory. Not a bad thing of course, because the drama and the pay-off can be greater, but I wish it had been more consistent. Still, this was more a personal preference than anything. Caymen and Xander really won me over that I was ready to forgive everything. Overall, The Distance Between Us is something I'd heartily recommend to someone looking for a sweet and charming contemporary YA book.

Scribbled: Cover Story

If you've been following this blog, you would also know that I've been working on a romance novella called Cover (Story) Girl. One of the things that I enjoyed most about this whole process is watching the cover come together, something which my friend and former boss, Mike Calvan, volunteered to do. I readily jumped at the offer, because I know how skilled he is at illustrating and designing. Even if he's done countless of billboards, print ads, TV storyboards, and brochures, he has yet to design a book cover, which made both of us very excited about this project.

(Note before you proceed: Not every illustrator/designer will work this way. Mike and I are good friends so he's very generous with his talent. We've also worked together for many years and have built an efficient system between us. If it's your first time working with a designer, it's always good to have a general idea of how s/he works -- portfolio, timetable, expectations, etc -- before entering into a contract.)

I knew Mike wasn't going to read a romance book so instead I gave him a detailed brief, similar to what we expect from our advertising clients. It outlined the novella's characters, the setting, the synopsis, and all the important events. It also explained to him what I basically wanted: a cover that had tropical elements, a light K-pop feel, and a large title font. Simple, no? How he would interpret this is up to him -- that's what he does best after all! But to show him my perspective of things, I added links to Korean/Japanese videos and movie posters for inspiration. (You know, just to be clear that I meant something closer to this than this.) Artists and designers usually appreciate initial direction so that they know where to take the project. Make a wish list or even a list of things to avoid -- and don't change your mind halfway! Trust me, it will help both of you stay on track.

After about ten days, Mike showed me two different cover ideas. The sketches (or thumbs or croquis) were accompanied by pegs so that I could imagine the final product better. He also recommended some illustration styles that he could do (not shown here).

I think I was swayed by the Niji no Megami poster. It's one of my favorite movies.
After weighing the pros and cons, I decided to go with the sketch on the left. I love the way that it establishes that the novella is about an island romance. It also manages to include the calamansi muffin (an important element in the story) in a smart yet subtle way. Though I liked how eye-catching the other cover was, I thought that might be more appropriate for a younger-themed work. The left one definitely answered what I requested.

Next, Mike worked on the background, which he applied it to different layouts. I had to pick one again and this is what won:

I like the white and flirty font, but something bolder would be more readable.
By then, Mike had already moved on to the main image. Because we had clear direction since the beginning, we didn't need to go back and forth on the details. Now it was just a matter of putting everything together and tweaking things here and there. I placed my trust in his skills because I know he wouldn't steer me in the wrong direction.

At this point, we even discussed what they should be wearing. These were Mike's first sketches; the final illustration looks different.

Gio and Min Hee, sitting on a muffin island...

Initial pass at the front and back cover layout. The clouds have parted!
Making a book cover takes a lot of hard work. But collaborating with Mike was such a painless and enjoyable experience. I really appreciate how much time and effort he devoted to Cover (Story) Girl, as though it were his baby, too. He kept me updated and showed me his works in progress. He even applied the final illustration to wallpapers, bookmarks, postcards, and other things we could think of. In the end, I have a lovely cover that captures the spirit of the story I had written. What more can an author want?

So if I haven't said it enough: Maraming salamat, Boss.

Nowhere But Home (Liza Palmer)

I heard of Liza Palmer's Nowhere but Home from Chachic's Book Nook. Intrigued by the pretty cover, I checked out the premise and realized instantly that this was a book that I needed to read. The protagonist, Queen Elizabeth (Queenie to friends) Wake, has spent most of her adult life moving from place to place. She's never settled in anywhere, especially since her temper and exacting culinary demands keep on getting her fired. Finally, she decides to move back to her hometown. North Star hasn't exactly been a safe harbor for the Wake women and now it's going to witness how Queenie confronts her ghosts.

The small-town girl who leaves home to find herself in the big city is a familiar trope, but Queenie's story has just the right amount of uniqueness and familiarity to it that I kept on reading. Her sister Merry Carole, who had an unsavory reputation after getting pregnant early, has never quite shaken old rumors, even as her son is named starting quarterback of the town's prized football team. Her old flame Everett Coburn -- the one who got away and broke her heart in the process -- is back again and looks eager for another shot. Her new job has her cooking final meals for convicted criminals, their last request before dying. All these elements made for a smooth yet very compelling read for me.

What really pulled me in were the final meals that Queenie would cook. Ms Palmer begins each chapter with notes of what Queenie is eating (Chapter 4 when she comes back defeated to North Star aptly notes 'Crow'), reminding us how food is an institution, especially in small towns. Food that unites a family, food that forgives a wrong, food that heals a soul. Queenie was given the burden of cooking for anonymous criminals and she made sure that these men and women were given some moment of peace before they died. I thought those scenes were very powerful images that resonated with me.

It's not too heavy on the romance and I like it that way. Ultimately, I think it is about Queenie coming to terms with her past: her family's reputation, her life decisions, her mother's death. Personally, I thought the romance part was like a sugar flower on the side of an already satisfying cake. It wasn't a bad sugar flower when you stop to consider it, but it wasn't the reason why I kept on reading this book nor did it seem to be very important to Queenie's journey. It had its heart-tugging moments but none as striking as those that Queenie faces on the job. Ms Palmer won me over with Nowhere but Home, and I hope to read her A Field Guide to Burying Your Parents next.

In My Mother's House (Joni Cham)

The strained and complicated relationship between mother and daughter comes to a head when Nina, the dark-skinned and introspective child of Chinese immigrants, returns to care for her ailing mother. Joni Cham's In My Mother's House peels back the layers of a Chinese family in the Philippines. Mother and child stand as opposites: Le Bi wishing that her daughter becomes more Chinese in appearance and in manner, Nina accepting another culture and language as the emotional divide between them grows.

There are so many things about the Chinoy experience that this review may completely miss or misinterpret. But what the author deftly does is to include the readers into her protagonist's experiences, regardless of how much they know about Chinese-Filipinos. I found Nina's recollection of her middle-class upbringing an almost Proustian experience; I had to stop to savor my own memories that Ms Cham's writing would manage to dredge up. Key here is Nina herself, the self-proclaimed 'Rat' of her family, silent and lurking and painfully observant. The protagonist notes small details, like '... the image of words written on red sheets hanging on walls, remembering how as a child, she had sat among the pieces of paper fluttering in the wind from the ceiling fans (p42),' she writes. Or, describing an uncle, she notes his 'perpetually smiling mouth with dried saliva on is corners and a voice made raspy from years of tobacco-smoking (p72-73).' The narrative has a tendency to meander from present to past as if we're floating along Nina's stream of consciousness but she keeps the readers well-anchored, careful about which piece of her relationship with her mother Le Bi she will reveal in each chapter.

Ms Cham relies on metaphors and images to build the story. The first is the rat, after Nina's birth year and the physical parallels that Nina draws to this creature. At an early age, Nina has accepted that she is not her mother's favorite, preferring to stay in the background or in the company of her beloved Yaya Pasing, who has turned into the maternal ideal in her life. Another is the odor of her mother's house, stale and suffocating. Scent is a strong element of the book. It is a point of struggle for mother and daughter in the beginning of the story, but throughout the novel it symbolizes the insular lifestyle that Le Bi clings to and hints at the divisive turning point in their family's lives.

This is not the Chinese-Filipino equivalent of The Joy Luck Club. Far from that. It is not filled with obscure Chinese references and rituals from the old country. It is not festive or warm, though there are moments of light and release. It may start as a slow read, but keep to it. The conclusion is moving and forceful, as startling and as deceptive as a rat behind the walls.

Scribbled: revelations from #romanceclass (Part 02 of 02)

More things that I have learned from Mina's #romanceclass:

Revelation #5: Research is key. I checked the tide tables and lunar calendars so that everything was legit. (I'm an astronomy hobbyist, so things like this are interesting to me.) I didn't want anyone to say, "You know, if you're in Boracay in mid-March and there's a new moon, the tide would have risen too high for them to be walking along this particular stretch of Station 1 at 10 in the evening."

Even if I am Aklanon, I still tried to double-check my info. All the places mentioned in the novella are places that I had previously visited but I found myself asking a lot of questions. Has it changed since I was last there? I'm situating a particular event there; is that even possible? Research helped me clear up my assumptions and allowed me to remain within the realms of reason.

I realized that it wasn't about how accurate I was at replicating real life, but how I can make the story feel like a realistic experience for the reader.

Location, location, location! This made research fun. 

Revelation #6: It's challenging to make authorial intent and reader expectations meet. It was particularly challenging for me since I tried writing from a male perspective! My beta readers and editors are all different, which means they also have different views on how guys should act and behave. Their insights and observations had me questioning myself a number of times throughout the writing process. Believe me, even after the final chapter had been written, I still have the same questions. Never-ending fears!

So why did I persist in writing a male POV? I believe this particular story called for it. I don't think it would have worked if I had written from my LI's point-of-view, because I think that would have been a bigger challenge for me, so much that I was likelier to get her voice wrong than to get it right. I also didn't want to switch genders; I thought a guy would have been too unsympathetic in the LI's role. There was far too much power in that role (at least in my story) that making the role masculine would have tipped the balance. So it wasn't just a whim. I wanted to try telling this story, and this to me felt like the best way to do it.

Revelation #7: I got by with a little help from my friends--and not just from the writing group. A lot of this I wouldn't have done without my reluctant consultant Da Kyong, whom I met at just the right time.

I'm not in my twenties anymore, so I was pretty lucky that I spent part of the summer hanging out with fresh college graduates, most of them sociology and anthropology majors. They treated me like an ate, so in a way I felt that I was getting in touch with the sort of people my MC would befriend. I was able to visit several small collections and exhibits thanks to them; in fact, the Anding Torres collection in my novella is patterned after a collection inside a university library, one that I would not have had access to if it weren't for them.

Revelation #8: Writing is hard work, but it shouldn't be all about hard work. I'm glad that I still greatly enjoyed this whole process. It really tested and inspired me and I'm going to try applying what I learned to my still-unfinished mystery. So thank you again, Mina! No matter what happens to this one, I have really learned a lot. Someday I hope to see a novella of mine on a shelf next to yours.

Scribbled: revelations from #romanceclass (Part 01 of 02)

Early this year, I took an online #romanceclass under Mina V Esguerra. Her challenge for the class was pretty straightforward: write a contemporary romance novella in less than a year. But I wasn't sure how far I was going to go with it. At that time, I was already writing two separate stories. One was a cozy mystery; the other, a contemporary romance. Although the latter seemed to be a good fit for the requirements of the class, I wanted to experiment with a plot that had intrigued me before but never got around to writing.

Fast-forward to five months later.  I religiously attended the first couple of face-to-face meetings but when it became apparent that I wasn't going to finish my Act 1 on schedule, I skipped the rest. Good thing Mina reminded us that it was okay to continue the class; I started really buckling down to work with about a month left. Thanks to Mina's class, I realized so many things:

Revelation #1: I liked having so much time devoted to plotting. I've always done outlines.  But while my previous outlines were written in very general strokes, writing things down as class assignments made them seem set in stone. I tried to work out my plot and my character's motivations early on. That way, I had enough time to puzzle out (and solve) the loopholes and pacing dilemmas that would always plague me while writing.

My #romanceclass notes. I broke things down into chapters and decided

what each chapter's purpose was to the story. Look, muffins!

Revelation #2: Forced (daily) writing time worked for me. When the deadline was looming, I cut myself from the internet every 11PM so that I could have 1 hour and a half of uninterrupted writing. Then during my last week of writing, work eased a bit, and I could now keep my file open from mid-morning until late at night. I forced myself to finish before work deadlines came in. The result? I finished the novella in 27 days.

My friends and I used a chart to track our progress and it was very helpful for me to note how many words I had been writing each day and how close I was to finishing the novella. I would usually set different deadlines for myself. Once I noticed that my daily word count had an interesting pattern (today, 1k words; tomorrow, 1.5k words; the next day, back to 1k). It became almost like a game to make sure I met the night's output. (Sorry, I'm OC-OC that way.) Or I'd tell myself I'd finish certain scenes first (today, first fight; tomorrow, kilig). Whenever I felt my eyes drooping, I'd just push myself to just meet whatever personal goal I had set myself for the day.

Revelation #3: I like writing with friends. I felt that I wasn't in this alone. We cheered each other on. We brainstormed for solutions. When there were days that I felt depressed about my writing, all I needed to do to feel better was to see how far my friends' works have progressed.

Revelation #4: I didn't write straight. Sometimes I skipped around. It was my way of moving on when I was stuck. And because there was a plot outline to follow, I knew where to take my characters without losing the flow. Of course when I was tying things together, I had to re-read and double-check. But that was an easier task to me than forcing myself to finish a scene that I wasn't feeling.

It's hard to capture every little bit that I learned from class. Trust me, this isn't even half of it! I'll gather the rest of my thoughts and just post my other realizations soon.

[EDITED: Part two here.]

The Girl with Glass Feet (Ali Shaw)

Summer in the Philippines can be unforgiving. Eventually I start wishing for sandy beaches or colder climates, so I didn't hesitate to pick up three books that had winter settings sometime last March. Call it wishful thinking. One of those books was Ali Shaw's The Girl with Glass Feet.

The Girl with Glass Feet's St Hauda's Land delivers just what I had expected: a northern setting of ice and bog, harshly cold but also strangely magical. Deep within this icy archipelago (I am never sure if it's meant to be a country in itself) are magical things: a pale glow in the woods, albino creatures, tiny winged animals. It's also the setting of a love story told in multiple perspectives, mostly through the eyes of Midas Crook, a reclusive photographer, and Ida Maclaird, a tourist who never left. Not that she could: St Hauda's Land is slowly transforming Ida. An icy splinter has begun to spread and turn her feet into glass.

There's a deep sense of melancholy in the narrative. Mr Shaw's words fall heavy, as you would imagine Ida's feet to be within her thick boots. He also has a gift for description: 'In the curve of her instep wisps of blood hung trapped like twirls of paint in marbles (p62).' or 'He thought of Evaline, and white dragonflies skimming by a river, and husks of the larvae bodies they had left behind in the reeds and green stalks, and the way back then he'd thought love had been hatching (p 123).' Instead of marching into the fairly straightforward and unforgiving fate awaiting Ida, the language uses flashbacks and details to make the plot richer. In a way, this also hides some of the book's weaknesses. Readers never fully understand why this is happening to her. I would have been fine just chalking it up to the general logic of magical realism, but given that the source of her malady was already tackled, I thought that eventually we would get some explanation as to why it even started in the first place. Unfortunately, I didn't get that. Or if it had been explained, I must have missed the significance of a few lines within the flowery prose.

The characters' isolation is self-imposed. It's as if the remoteness of St Hauda's Land has pushed them away from most kinds of physical and emotional attachments. Each one is flawed and hungry and weighed down. Even Ida, whose demeanor and perspective has often been positive and open, has moments that lead her to shun contact and dependence. When she meets Midas, the two of them recognize the similarities in their characters, despite their obvious contrasts.

But what really kept me reading was the transformation of Midas and Ida as people. Their relationship was both sudden/glacial, realistic/surreal. Strange. There were so many things that I loved about The Girl with Glass Feet but I don't think I'm ready to reread it any time soon. There is already some bitterness, sharp like an icy crystal splinter, working its way into me.

That Kind of Guy (Mina V. Esguerra)

Author Mina V. Esguerra is on a roll these days. Her previous self-published books Fairy Tale Fail, Love Your Frenemies, and Interim Goddess of Love have been released under Summit Publishing. She's just finished the sequel to Interim called Queen of the Clueless, currently available on Amazon. She's also giving out talks and workshops for budding writers. With her familiar characters and engaging writing style, it's no wonder that her books are getting new fans every day.

While some of her books have reached near local cult-favorite status, not too far behind is her solid offering, That Kind of Guy. I think Ms Esguerra does best when she works with older characters. They seem to me a little more well-rounded, a little more flawed, a little more realistic. That Kind of Guy follows playboy Anton (best friend of the lead character in No Strings Attached) and Julie, a self-admitted manang (though it literally means 'older sister,' it is used to refer to very conservative women). Julie thinks that a so-so first date was the last she'd see of Anton. But to her surprise, the charming and outgoing guy pursues her, even attending Christmas dawn masses for her. Despite their differences and her preconceived notions of him, it is easy to see how they made a connection. Ultimately it is Julie's ideas of how her manang self stacks up against Anton's past hook-ups, how she feels that she's treated differently than those other girls, that puts their relationship in jeopardy. In an almost masochistic exercise, she keeps a journal of Anton's past hook-ups as a way to reassure herself of her decision.

In Julie, Ms Esguerra fleshes out a different kind of manang. The term usually conjures images of the spinster schoolteacher sans makeup or the pious churchgoer in long skirts. Julie is none of those. Perhaps she has a manang's candor, opinionated and unafraid to let people know. She has her own kind of confidence. But if it hadn't been mentioned many times over in the book, manang would be one of the last things I'd associate with her. For me, a manang's uncompromising old-fashioned values extend towards most every aspect of her life. Clearly based on her actions in this book, Julie was far removed from my definition. But what's important to note that despite this, she still regards herself as a conservative woman. She feels that she is less adventurous or less sexually aggressive than the norm. It's a surprising revelation and one that makes me rework my own definitions of the term.

But that's what the novella is getting at. We are so hung up on labels that we tend to box everything else that way. Anton was a playboy, therefore he was expected to act this way. Or Julie was a manang, therefore she was expected to act differently. In his Course in General Linguistics, linguist and literary theorist Ferdinand de Saussure rejects the idea that a word corresponds to one set object and acts as a symbol for that object. For him, language is a sign-system that connects the signifier to the signified, from one idea to another concept. But a reader's interpretation of the word 'playboy' varies. Jacques Derrida came up with term differance to convey that the way meaning shifts between signifier and signified. The word has a field of meanings: "The written sign can break its 'real context' and can be read in a different context regardless of what its writer intended. Any chain of signs can be 'grafted' into a discourse in another context." As Julie discovers, her expectations of Anton fail her because she expects him to act in one set way. Language, as with human nature, shifts.

If I have a minor complaint about the whole book, it's that in No Strings Attached, I had a different impression of Julie's social life. She hung out with Dante and an intellectual, academic crowd. In That Kind of Guy, she's almost like a social wallflower whose real friends pre-Anton were barely mentioned. Maybe their absence helped reinforce the manang stereotype. Or maybe their inclusion would have been confusing in a short novella that is already full of secondary characters. I'll never know, but I missed them. (Fine, I missed Dante.)

That Kind of Guy also contrasts two different dating styles. Again we go back to the idea of labels: the bad guy and the good guy. The book plays along with reader expectations and then twists them at the end so we see what can be emulated in the 'bad' guy and what is flawed in the 'good' one. On two separate occasions, I found myself defending why Henry was the poorer choice of the two.

I read this so many months ago but I can still remember how hooked I had been. I was in a car running errands and I could not put this down. (And from the looks of this ultra-long review, I'm still quite hooked!) As much as I love Ms Esguerra's other books, ones like No Strings Attached and That Kind of Guy are the ones that draw me the most.

Raw Blue (Kirsty Eagar)

Thanks to my friend Chachic of Chachic's Book Nook, I was introduced to the work of another fine Australian writer: Kirsty Eagar. Ms Eagar's prose turns poetic in Raw Blue, which centers on Carly, whose life now revolves only around work and surfing after a traumatic incident. She barely keeps in touch with her family. School is a distant affair. Friends are few and far between, especially as she strives to keep her walls about her. The last thing Carly seems to want is someone like Ryan, a fellow surfer: strong, intense, and mysterious. But they're slowly drawn together and Carly has to deal with her past to figure out if she can have a future with Ryan.

What I enjoyed most about Raw Blue is the gradual unfolding of the story. Carly and Ryan are both flawed but the story doesn't choose to focus on how they became broken. Instead it explores the quiet days after -- the mundane rituals of everyday, its surprises and challenges, how life stubbornly goes on. It took me a while to really get into the story despite enjoying the lyrical language. It's easy to figure out what happened to Carly, but the blurb and even Carly's thoughts remain guarded about it, the proverbial white elephant taking up space among the pages.

Still, it's Ms Eagar's very visually descriptive narration that kept me reading -- and eventually made me appreciate the slow and gentle pace that the story took. No shortcuts. No sudden epiphanies. Ms Eagar tosses around images like honey and devil moons and the raw blue of the ocean. 'My happiness is crunchy. Snapping, crackling and popping in the sun,' Carly thinks, and suddenly I could feel what she meant. This smooth and well-thought out language keeps Carly's story from descending into the full pity-me drama of a Telemundo show. Instead it feels realistic, at least to my limited experience (and I accept that I can't fully judge what is realistic in this sense).

I'm no surfer so all the surfing terms were lost on me, but everything else about Raw Blue is a revelation. If you ever find yourself with time and patience to spare this summer, I suggest picking this one up. It's intimate and philosophical, gentle and courageous. This was my first 'new adult' read -- or at least the first one I've read ever since I was introduced to the sub-genre -- and Raw Blue certainly doesn't disappoint.

The Peach Keeper (Sarah Addison Allen)

There's much comfort to be found in a Sarah Addison Allen book, and a lot of it has to do with her small town settings. They invite you to sit down in someone's kitchen, eat some homemade pastry, and gossip about the local characters. In The Peach Keeper, the former logging town of Walls of Water in North Carolina is front and center but there's something darker that's lurking beneath the surface. This scenic place, surrounded by waterfalls and hiking trails, has some buried secrets that are about to come to light with the re-opening of the Blue Ridge Madam.

The Blue Ridge Madam is a town landmark, built by Willa Jackson’s great-great-grandfather who lost his fortune when the logging business died out. Now the Women's Society Club, under the leadership of golden girl Paxton Osgood, has restored it and has invited Willa to the big day. But that's before they find a skeleton on the grounds, and both women -- never friends -- must now band together to solve a mystery that threatens both of their families.

There's an awkward but steady friendship that develops between Willa and Paxton, as the novel delves into the beauty of discovering friends and allies when you’re at a vulnerable stage of your life. These two women not only had shared history; they had shared interests and beliefs as well, including the importance of family and the love for their small town. It's the gradual unfolding of their friendship that I admired most in this book, rather than the inevitable romance between Willa and Paxton's twin brother Colin. In fact, I was a little more interested in the secondary romance (though somewhat improbable to me) between Paxton and Sebastian than I was in the former. Willa and Colin were just too cookie-cutter to me. There were no surprises there, though I admired how their relationship issues were later addressed.

Both Willa and Paxton become privy to their family secrets as they try to get to the bottom of the mystery and I like how these were slowly introduced into the story, even if it was easy to guess how things really happened. I also thought the whole police involvement in this cold case was glossed over but I suppose it wasn't the purpose of the novel. The Peach Keeper is meant to celebrate women and their friendships: friends like Agatha and Georgie, and later, Willa and Paxton. The tone and themes in this novel is somewhat heavier than the ones I've come to associate with Sarah Addison Allen's work but they still make The Peach Keeper worth a quick afternoon read.

The Scorpio Races (Maggie Stiefvater)

Every autumn, wild capaill uisce (water horses) emerge from the sea and into the small island of Thisby. Men brave enough to catch these flesh-eating, sea-mad horses -- the fastest steeds on land -- ride them in town’s Scorpio Races, held every first of November, a day when someone is sure to die.

How I just devoured this book. As characters, Puck Connolly and Sean Kendrick have their own baggage and sorrows, their own hopes and desires but the story doesn’t choose to dwell on just these things. What it is about is a race, told from the perspective of two people who want to win for two different reasons. Puck joins the Scorpio Races almost on an impulse, a last-ditch attempt to keep her brother Gabe at home before he goes to the mainland. Later she realizes that her family’s future on the island depends on how well she does.

"Boys just aren't very good at being afraid," one character says, and this cuts into Puck's own bravery. She isn't going out there to make a feminist statement. In fact, she's not even doing it to save the house (in the beginning, at least); she's doing it because this is how she thinks she can keep her family together. She's not afraid of the capaill uisce; what she's most afraid of is losing what's left of her family. I like Puck’s fire. She dares to race on her island-bred horse Dove in a race for water horses. She is reckless because she has much to lose. She is brave because she needs to brave for others. "I have my own reasons for riding. [...] Just because I'm a girl doesn't make those reasons any less (p196)," Puck declares, and this made me cheer for her every time. I also like how Ms Stiefvater made sure that Puck had all options available to her, like the chance to run the race on a real water horse. It made the decision to race with Dove a practical, rational one instead of a purely emotional one.

The other protagonist of the story is Sean Kendrick. At nineteen, he’s got an almost otherworldly bond with the capaill uisce, especially the red capall Corr. Sean’s won the Scorpio Races for Malvern Stables four times now but no race has ever been more important than this one. This year he’s got a slim chance to win it all but not without risking it all too. Sean is a perfect foil for Puck’s character. He’s cool and steady, no matter the challenges being leveled at him. His is another story of bravery, one that is quiet and firm, like a cornerstone, something that cannot be shaken. The bond he has with Corr just moves me on so many levels. (Also, Sean is a great romantic lead. He’s the swoonworthy, silent, and brooding guy that most romance novels wish they had but can never perfect.)

Thisby is an imagined place, but I could easily picture it off the coast of Ireland or Wales. I like how this is fantasy world is a given, the magical woven into the mundane without any explanation. No one here is Dorothy bewildered by the loss of Kansas, no one is subjected to a mythological infodump. If anyone dares voice out the strangeness of the Thisby world, it is George Holly, the American horse breeder, but his question is more out of sociological curiosity, not "Why in the world are there things like flesh-eating water horses?" kind of way. I thought Ms Stiefvater showed a lot of skill and restraint when exploring the characters and culture of Thisby, especially in the way the island both revered and feared the water horses. She revealed just enough for the story to retain its mystery. I thought this way brought both Thisby and the capaill uisce to life. Ms Stiefvater carefully shows the readers just what these strange vicious horses mean to Thisby.

I was reluctant to let go of this even after I was done with the last page. I could feel myself still in Thisby, still standing on that shore and not wanting the moment to end. I guess it shows in the way I've gone on and on about this. Shutting up now. In my dreams, there's a capall waiting by the water's edge, daring me to come closer.

Attachments (Rainbow Rowell)

Because of its genre's standard set pieces, some romance novels utilize different conceits to stand out from the pack. With its Sleepless in Seattle-reminiscent and partly epistolary love story, Attachments makes an effort to be memorable both in structure and in content, asking the readers to cheer for characters who are struck by 'love before first sight.'

Attachments is the story of Lincoln the IT guy who, during the early years of the internet has been hired by the local paper to read and flag emails sent through the company system. This is how he gets to know Beth, The Courier's resident movie critic, who can't get enough of emailing her friend Jennifer about the details of her personal life. As the two women email back and forth, Lincoln finds himself becoming more and more attracted to Beth.

True, what he does sounds awfully stalker-ish on paper. But what I admire about Attachments is how Ms Rowell turns him into a sympathetic character -- the reluctance to do his job evident on each page; in fact, reluctant to do much of anything at all, after a devastating break-up. That particular break-up is one of the highlights of this book, written in a poetic punch-in-the-gut kind of way. Thanks to that, Lincoln easily slides into the sweet spot of any romance protagonist: handsome enough to want as a lead, flawed enough to be within reach.

The novel itself lives within the early stages of most love stories. It thrives in that crushing-on-the-guy-at-the-water-cooler moment, the creative interpretation people do when they begin to attribute certain characteristics to their prospective loves, the awkward admiration at a distance. It's why the voyeuristic element works here. Lincoln, after keeping everything in his life at arms' length, is making slow but steady attempts to build himself anew. Situating the story on the cusp of the millennium also helps the plot as it's framed by the delicious anticipation of a new age and the dread that everything might come crashing down.

[Just an aside. The book is not particularly religious; in fact it has its share of slight profanity and taking of the Lord's name in vain, if you want to get technical. Despite that, I still admired one character's honesty about praying: 'I pray for everyone we care about. Plus, I like to pray for things that seem possible (p191).' It was an unexpected declaration of faith that to me seemed liked it didn't have an agenda or was meant to to be didactic. That, and the mention of two Catholic weddings didn't hurt either.]

There are no real highs and lows in this story but I don't think it needs it. Attachments is less about the thrill of will they-won't they and more about the journey to get yourself back on your feet and reconnecting with others. It's heartfelt, unpretentious, and satisfyingly patient.