*drumroll*
Ashley with beautiful AND treacherous: “the ocean” – I’ll send an email.
Both OH and I grew up in a seaside town, in and out of boats, fishing and sailing so it really struck a chord.
Such a difficult choice as there were so many wonderful answers. Thanks so much everyone!
You may have noticed the sparkly loveliness in my sidebar, counting down until the 16th of August, 2012.
This is because it is now 100 days until The Treachery of Beautiful Things launches in the US. *Throws confetti*
To celebrate, it’s giveaway time. To win one of the last ARCs I have, leave a comment below telling me something beautiful and something treacherous. The winner will be picked in an extremely subjective manner — maybe by asking a kid, maybe by asking the Patchwork Cat, maybe by selecting random number.
Remember you can find out more about Treachery and read an exclusive preview on this site.
It’s available for pre-order in all these shiny places -
Indiebound | Book Depository | Amazon.com
Amazon.co.uk | Barnes & Noble | Powells
Please spread the word, tell your friends, RT, Tumbl (is that a word? It is NOW) and let’s make this as much fun as possible. The competition is open from now until the 15th May 2012, a whole week. Remember, one post each – something beautiful and something treacherous. It can even be both.
___
fireworks by Dreamstime.com
So right, well, due to matters beyond my control… well actually due to responsibilities which I can’t ignore and the massive headache that followed it… I didn’t manage to blog yesterday, which is annoying because I totally meant to.
Because *drumroll* *taa-dah*
yesterday was May Day.
That would have been so much more effective yesterday when it was “today is May Day”, you see? But never mind.
The reason May Day is important (not just because it’s what I frequently shout. Ok, when I’m in trouble in France anyway) is that The Treachery of Beautiful Things is in part based on the legends and folklore surrounding May Day. It is the first day of summer here in Ireland (notable this year for the pheNOMinal ammount of rain we got). It’s Bealtine, one of the quarter days when the veils between worlds become thin enough to let things slip through. It’s a time of magic.
Alright I never actually got around to writing the blog post, but luckily for me The History Girls had a fantastic one written by Mary Hoffman, so I am totally linking to that. 
It even has a lovely picture of the May Tree, aka the hawthorn.
The hawthorn we planted in the garden is doing well by the way. It has little buds. So pretty! Next year we’ll have pictures of it, I promise. At the moment… it’s a stick with some little green buds on it, so not that interesting.
Today (NOT May Day) I’m over at the Australian blog Treasured Tales for Young Adults celebrating its Blogoversary, and talking about Jenny from The Treachery of Beautiful Things. I love Jenny. She’s a complicated girl, who learns and grows over the course of the book, growing into herself as a confident and self-assured young woman by the end of the story. I like characters who develop over the course of a book, rather than being the same the whole way through and I think Jenny shows this. Anyway, see for yourself what I had to say.
And finally, here is my May Day song (late) which is one of the most important songs from my Treachery Playlist – Rabbit Heart (Raise it up) by Florence + the Machine. (I can’t embed it, so follow the link to YouTube).
This is another quick blog update but with some super news.
I’m going to be a guest at TitanCon in Belfast in September. I’ll be reading on the evening of the 21st September in McHugh’s and I’ll be at the con all day on Saturday 22nd. Anyone there, please come and say hi!
Also up today is a guest post I wrote for Tangled Up in Words and their Why I Write segment. It almost sounds sane. Well, sane-ish. Maybe. But most importantly the Tangled Authors are have a massive giveaway which is open for about 3 more days and includes, among many other shiny & spectacular things, one of those elusive ARCs of The Treachery of Beautiful Things. Go and enter! While you’re there maybe leave a comment for me, pretty please?
I saw the final jacket for The Treachery of Beautiful Things today. It’s so beautiful. Will share as soon as I know I can.
In other news for those of you in the US, there’s a goodreads giveaway of Treachery going on at the moment.
And I’ll be doing another giveaway somewhere soon. In the meantime back to work I go…
I’ve a guestpost up on The Book Pushers today, as part of their Fantasy Appreciation Week, on fairytales in modern fantasy – Fairytales in a modern dress. And if that’s not lure enough… oh all right, you can enter to win an author review copy of The Treachery of Beautiful Things!
The giveaway ends on 13th April, and it’s open internationally.
There is an interview with me up at the Open Book Society website today – talking about writing, worldbuilding, & The Treachery of Beautiful Things
Come along and say hello.
It’s Fantasy Appreciation Week at the Book Pushers.
I’ll be there on Friday, talking about Fairytales and giving away an ARC of The Treachery of Beautiful Things… Just a little advance notice for you.
The Treachery of Beautiful Things comes out on the 16th August, 2012. Which, as some people have pointed out, is a very long time to go. 168 days according to Book Depository! I’d be hard pressed to wait that long.
Sooooooo
(We revealed it at the YALitChat livechat last night, but just in case you missed it.)
I’ve got an exclusive peek into the book right here on my website – the prologue and first two Chapters of TTOBT all there for you to read right now. Just click the link here, or use the menu above. I’ll add more features to the section as time passes so check back every so often. Hope you enjoy it.
Just a quick headsup to let people know that I’ll be doing a twitter live chat with YALitChat tomorrow at 3pm EST (which is handily 8pm GMT over here). I’ll be talking about The Treachery of Beautiful Things and we’ll also be having a give away. There may even be a surprise (fingers crossed). So look out of the #yalitchat hastag on twitter tomorrow afternoon/evening.
And YALitChat will continue on into the evening/middle of the night when at 9pm EST (which… no, I don’t want to think about what time that is over here — I will be snoring, sorry!) many many more 2012 debut authors will be having another chat.
But at 3pm/8pm it’s all me and Treachery (which is occassionally called #TTOBT).
More on the hopedfor surprise as soon as I can!
