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Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Interview with Amanda Ashby + Giveaway info

Today I have Amanda Ashby with me, author of Fairy Bad Day, to answer a few questions. First, a little bit about her:

Amanda Ashby was born in Australia, has spent eight years in England and currently lives in New Zealand. When she's not moving country, she also likes to write books (okay, she also likes to eat chocolate, watch television and sit around doing not much, but let's just keep that amongst ourselves, shall we?) She has a degree in English and Journalism from the University of Queensland and is married with two children. As well as writing, she works part-time at the children/teen desk of her local library, which basically means that someone pays her to talk about books. Her debut book, You Had Me at Halo was nominated for a Romantic Times Reviewers Choice award, and her current book Zombie Queen of Newbury High was listed by the New York Public Library's Stuff for the Teen Age 2010 as well as being nominated for the YALSA popular paperback 2011.


Describe your book in five words or less.

Cute boys, skittles and swords

How did you come up with the title?

I’m a big fan of pun titles and they always seem to fall into my head. Anyway, ages ago my critique partner wrote a book that I nicknamed Bad Heir Day and then I once attempted a werewolf book called Bad Hair Day and then when I finally decided to write a fairy book I figured waste not want not and so recycled my title for the third time and Fairy Bad Day was born (which I think is the cutest of the versions!)

Do you hear from your readers much? What kinds of things do they say?

I tend to mainly hear from readers via Facebook, Twitter and my blog but I do get some lovely emails as well, which always thrills me (hahaha—spot the needy author!). For Zombie Queen of Newbury High most of the emails I receive are from people telling me that they think the book is funny and that they loved Candice (who was the classic case of a hypochondriac sidekick who did not know her place!)

What are some of your favorite books?

So many favorite books that I’ll just list a few! The Earthsea Trilogy by Ursula Le Guin (there are actually 5 books now but I only liked the first three!) The Bartimaeus books by Jonathan Stroud, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, Graceling by Kristin Cashore, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead, Magician by Raymond E Feist, Dragons of Pern by Anne McCaffrey

What's next for you?

I’ve got a midgrade series coming out next year about a girl who gets turned into a djinn (genie) the day before sixth grade starts and I’ve also got a new YA book that should hopefully be out next year as well that is tentatively titled Demonosity and has demon knights in it (gorgeous, tortured, beautiful demon knights).

Wow Amanda, I'm excited to read those upcoming books. Thanks for stopping by today.

Check out my review of Fairy Bad Day.

This tour is also a scavenger hunt. Be sure to visit each of the stops on the blog tour and collect the bolded letter at the bottom of the post. On June 25th, you will have the opportunity to enter the word you created from the mixed up letters on Amanda's blog (http://amandaashby.blogspot.com/) to win a fun prize pack. The pack includes a signed copy of Fairy Bad Day, some candy, and cute cell phone charms.

The letter for this stop is I.


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2 comments:

  1. Interesting interview and I really like the title of the book. I'm looking forward to reading it.

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  2. Who wouldn't like cute boys, skittles, and swords! Thanks for sharing today.

    ReplyDelete

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