But what if these changes were broken down into bite-sized manageable pieces? I’m thinking it would be a lot easier to make those changes stick, especially with continued and repeated effort.

This year I have many plans for this blog, including the reintroduction of the newsletter, more interviews, giveaways, general commentary, and, of course, book reviews. I’m also thinking of coming up with a proper publishing schedule (which, as I think about it, seems like a very good idea) with features on specific days. Once I get my personal life back in line, I’ll certainly be revisiting the idea.

For now, I’ll just post up a quick note about a nice boon that arrived on my doorstep recently: three copies of 52 Small Changes: One Year to a Happier, Healthier New You by Brett Blumenthal to giveaway to a few lucky readers.

I’ve already started to read a few of the tips and I’ll admit, some seem fairly common sense (i.e. drink more water), but there are a few in there that have grabbed my attention. I also like that Blumenthal offers a few helpful tips for actually making those small changes less painless. Once I’ve finished reading it all the way through and making notes, I’ll post up a proper review, along with progress reports.

With that, I’m going to finish up with: I hope you had a splendid, varied, and wonderful 2011 and I hope that your 2012 will be even better.

Marion uses excellent, sometimes poetic and often hilarious, prose to tell the story of ‘R’, a zombie trying to make sense of his existence. When he eats the brain of a man named Perry, he begins to experience Perry’s memories. Part of those memories include Perry’s girlfriend Julie. ‘R’ subsequently saves Julie and what happens next is an inexplicable connection that will have you glued to the pages.

Well, enough gushing about the book, on to the giveaway details. Rather than have the standard “leave a comment” to enter, I’m mixing things up a bit. For this giveaway, I’d like you to write a zombie haiku!

Yep. You read right. A zombie haiku. To enter, leave a comment with your haiku below.

In case you aren’t sure what a haiku is, it’s a short poem consisting of 3 lines. The first line contains 5 syllables, the second 7 syllables, and the final 5 syllables. Your haiku can be poignant or funny, gross or silly, just have fun with it. No profanity, please. Or, if you absolutely must include a profane word for effect, euphemize it. (Example: s**t.) Thanks.

This giveaway will run until 11:59PM EST April 26, 2011. You can enter as many haikus as you can write (however, duplicate or obviously spam haikus will not be eligible). For extra entries, you can also tweet about this giveaway or blog about it—just make sure to come back and leave a comment with a link to your tweet or blog post.

All entrants must use a legitimate email address (otherwise they’ll be no way to contact you if you win). If you do not have a website or blog, leave the space for a URL blank.

To finish up, there are a couple stipulations: You must be at least 13 years old to enter and the giveaway is open to those with a U.S. mailing address. And if you have any questions, just ask.

Last year I read, and reviewed, The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan. Although I didn’t care too much for Mary’s character, I did enjoy the intrigue and the world created.

When I was in my local Borders wishing them a heartrending farewell (sniff, sniff) I found The Dead-Tossed Waves on sale and I couldn’t resist. The reason I even waited so long was because I knew this book probably wouldn’t tell me anything I wanted to know about the Sisterhood.

Then I got to thinking, hey, I could be wrong. Maybe it’s going to be connected somehow and it will be like a slow reveal of how the zombie apocalypse in their world came to be. So I grabbed it and it’s officially in my TBR stack.

Then there are the wonderful elves as Scholastic who somehow seem to read my mind and send me books I start drooling over the moment I open up the package. Animorphs!! With lenticular covers! (Yes, I’m easily amused.) I remember reading K. A. Applegate way back in the day, so receiving these books made me smile–okay, I also did a snoopy dance, too.

I also received a promising dystopian urban sci-fi novel called Behind the Gates (Tomorrow Girls Book 1) by Eva Gray. When I read the back cover, I was curious, but shrugged. Then I read the actual release and thought, hey, this could be good.  And then I read the first chapter and thought, I need to move this up the TBR pile.

But let us not forget about the Simon & Schuster elves who also seem to have these amazing mind-reading powers and sent me books that made me pause and say, hmmm.

Deb Caletti is a brand-new-to-me author, but when I read the back cover for Stay, I knew I’d be in for an emotional ride. It may even hit a little close to home. Must start mental preparations now.

The other book was Between Here and Forever by Elizabeth Scott. This will be my third official Elizabeth Scott book.

The first one I read was The Unwritten Rule, which was fun and light and touching. It was filled with teen angst and drama and discovering oneself. Basically, I enjoyed it and it’s a great way to pass a lazy afternoon.

Then I just recently finished Living Dead Girl and…words…I don’t have any. I was not prepared at all for what laid between the virtual covers of that book (I read the ebook*). When I realized how jarring a read it was, I wanted to stop so I could set my head on straight, but I couldn’t because if I did and went to sleep, I would have nightmares. Finishing wasn’t any better. (Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad big, the subject matter is just…again, words fail me.)

The differences between those two books was vast, but it gave me a whole new respect for Ms. Scott. She’s an automatic must-read author for me now and having finished the first chapter of Between Here and Forever, I know to be prepared for a roller-coaster of emotions.

So, to sum up, here’s what I received this week laid out in a neat list:

• The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan
• The Invasion (Animorphs Book 1) by K. A. Applegate
• The Visitor (Animorphs Book 2) by K. A. Applegate
• Behind the Gates (Tomorrow Girls Book 1) by Eva Gray
• Stay by Deb Caletti
• Between Here and Forever by Elizabeth Scott

I can’t believe it’s almost the end of March and I haven’t done a single giveaway yet. I must rectify that. In fact, I think I’m going to overcompensate for my lack of contests.

Coming up next month I’ll be holding a giveaway for Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion (oh my goodness am I excited about this one–and crossing my fingers that Mr. Marion will do a guest blog) thanks to the wonderful Mellony at Simon & Schuster.

I’ll also be giving away my soft cover copy of Radiance by Alyson Noel. One thing I love about this book is the deckle edge paper. Definitely a nice touch, not to mention a good read.

On the list of books up for giveaway is my ARC for Abandon by Meg Cabot. I have so much to talk about with that book, but I’m holding off until the official release next month. Until then, you can check out my scant book notes on the recent arrivals post.

Finally, I’ll officially be announcing my comment rewards. What are comment rewards? Well, a while ago I mentioned an idea of rewarding those who visit my blog by selecting a random commenter whenever comment milestones are reached. The commenter can then select a book from the comment rewards bookshelf.

Any comment, past or present, is game. Commenters just need to use a valid email address when commenting (no, I will not spam you or subscribe you to any mailing list and such) and are over the age of 13 (privacy thing–in case you win). Comment rewards will be open internationally.

To close up, since this post is now becoming rather unwieldy, after watching a recent preview for the movie Beastly, and seeing that it was based on a book by Alex Flinn, I trotted my happy behind over to the library website and (thank goodness a copy was available) downloaded the ebook. I’m just over halfway finished and have mixed feelings.

On one hand, I love the tweak on the classic story, but on the other I’m not loving the lack of a nod to Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont, or even Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, though a number of other fairytale creators (Hans Christian Andersen, The Brothers Grimm) and fairytale characters receive such nods (unless, of course, the Madames’ nods are through all the discussion of French literature–but maybe there will be a more discernable one in later chapters).

Also I’m not entirely thrilled with some of the character development and prose—sometimes it feels as though she’s talking down to her audience. But I’ll save that for an actual review though.

For now, I shall leave you to enjoy your weekend. Have fun, be safe, and don’t forget to read a book or two.

About the book:

For broken-hearted Olivia Larsen, nothing can change the fact that her twin sister, Violet, is gone… until a mysterious, beautiful gown arrives on her doorstep. The dress doesn’t just look magical; it is magical. It has the power to grant her one wish, and the only thing Olivia wants is her sister back.

With Violet again by her side, both girls get a second chance at life. And as the sisters soon discover, they have two more dresses-and two more wishes left. But magic can’t solve everything, and Olivia is forced to confront her ghosts to learn how to laugh, love, and live again.

In a breathtaking debut from Alexandra Bullen, WISH asks the question: If you could have anything, what would you wish for?

You can read the book through the widget or download a copy to your Kindle. Also, keep your eyes open for a Wishful Thinking giveaway (which will be open to international readers, yay!).

Had an unscheduled hiatus due to some familial duties. I’ve still been reading though (and updating my 2010 reading list if you’re curious), just haven’t been blogging about it.

Slowly things are getting back to normal so the blogging should pick up soon.

I had planned to do the 24 Hour Read-a-Thon this year—even had a book pool filled with books perfect for this Halloween season picked out—but I’d thought it was tomorrow. Turns out I was wrong and it was today. To all those officially participating in the read-a-thon, I’m there with you in spirit, reading unofficially. Press on, have fun, read lots.

For the infinitely curious, here’s a small sampling of my planned pool:

Plus a few short stories thrown in for good measure, selected from Nightmares & Dreamscapes by Stephen King.

And can you believe it’s October already? That means NaNoWriMo is less than a month away. I thought about whether I’d like to participate this year, and the answer is of course yes. It’s simply too hard to resist.

Although I’ve been feeling the creative juices lately, I hadn’t been writing as much. I’d jot a quick note here or there, or a sentence or two, but nothing serious. Instead I’ve been working mainly on short stories or outlines for longer stories. NaNoWriMo will give me an opportunity to take one of those seedling ideas and transform it into a shitty first draft.

Again I plan to use the Liquid Story Binder software. (Jesse might even give the same 50% discount throughout the month of November that he did last year, so if you haven’t already, it’s time to set your sights on it.) Although I have a fairly good system worked out for new novels, I’m planning to tweak that system to incorporate more Builders (which I absolutely love for writing short stories).

But, for the non-writerly types, I plan to keep this blog mainly about books and my readings and other musings and keep all my writing and NaNoWriMo stuff to my actual writing blog (which is in sore need of an update or three).

Finally, this has been clunking around in my head for some time now, but I’m planning a number of changes around the blog. The first of which might be the design. Although I’ve grown quite fond of it, I think it’s about time to change the look, especially since I’m planning to expand the blog a bit.

Which brings me to my second point: I’m planning to expand the blog a bit. Right now I have a sidebar which lists the books I’m “currently” reading and books which I’ve “recently” read, but they’re dreadfully out of date. Rather than fight with them every so often, I plan to move the “currently” reading section to its own page where I’ll just list my entire TBR pile. I’ll keep the recently read section and update it periodically.

Also, I’ll be starting up a Comment Rewards program. Basically, I have a ton of books which need new loving homes. Some I’ll inevitably donate, but I figure my readers might enjoy some of them. So I’ll set up a comments rewards bookshelf where I’ll select a commenter at random once every couple of weeks to choose a book from the shelf.

All commenters are eligible (as long as a valid email address was provided during commenting), past or present or future. More comments equal more chances to be chosen. That’s it. Assuming all goes well, it will become a long term feature of the blog. I’ll make a formal announcement post when I’m rolling out with it.

And that…is the update.

In my recent review of Morpheus Road: The Light by D. J. MacHale, I basically gushed. It’s been a while since I’ve been able to gush about a horror novel. And thanks to the wonderful book fairies at Simon & Schuster, I’m able to giveaway 5 copies of the finished book. (Hooray for book fairies!!)

The last few giveaways I’ve held, I’ve asked you to help me create a story, but this time around, I’m going to be different…

One common thread throughout this book was fear, complete and utter.

Imagine for a moment that there was an entity which could climb inside your head and make you believe the most heinous things are happening all around you. What would you see? What is that deep dark fear lurking in the outer reaches of your mind?

To enter the giveaway, all you need to do is leave a comment answering the question above. If you’d like extra entries, there’s a couple ways you can do it:

• Follow me on Twitter +1
• Tweet about the giveaway (include a link to your tweet in the comments) +2
• Add a link to the giveaway in your sidebar +2
• Blog about the giveaway +3
• Become a confirmed newsletter subscriber +3
• Leave a comment on the Morpheus Road: The Light review +1
  (No spammy comments please. Spamminess of comments measured at my sole discretion.)

Entrants must be at least 13 years old. The contest is open only to residents of the U.S. and Canada. (My apologies to my international readers, but I’m limited by the publisher’s shipping restrictions.) The contest is open until 12 Midnight EST on Sunday May 16th, 2010. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to email me.

The blue one I made for my sister and the white with green stripes, I made for Belle (aka Ms. Bookish).

If you’d like me to make a padded journal for you, there’s still time to enter the giveaway.

In some roundabout way, I landed on a YouTube video of Raven-Symone making a padded journal.

And that was the beginning of the end, because it was also when I remembered I had a bunch of fabric left over from my wannabe fashion designer and plenty of glue sticks and ribbon from my crafty diva phases.

So far I’ve already made two journals (and they were a hoot), with plenty more in the works.

You can click on the picture for a ginormous view

I’ve been using the first journal (the black & white leopard print) as my everyday random thoughts journal and the second (the orange plaid) as my random book notes and grocery list journal.

Frankly, I have no idea what I could use the remaining journals I plan to create for. In that vein, I thought I’d reach out to you. Maybe you could use one to pen the next great memoir. Just don’t forget me when you become rich and famous and have a movie made out of your life.

If you’d like me to make you a padded journal, just leave me a quick comment. In two weeks, I’ll select two* people randomly to choose the desired fabric and ribbon and I’ll get to gluin’. Yes, international readers may partake in the fun.

I can’t take all the credit for this idea, though. It was a post over at Ms. Bookish that got the wheels turning. I offered to make one for Belle, fully expecting her to laugh at me, but she said she was serious about wanting one and then I thought, I wonder if anyone else would be interested in receiving a padded journal.

(*I’d love to make and send a journal to everyone who asks for one, but I do have budgetary constraints. Sorry.)

And without further ado…

Here’s the group story that the contest generated (and I have to admit, I’d love to see what becomes of it):

I never believed in fairy godmothers until one showed up on my doorstep with a broken wand.

With a purple frilly dress and hair all done up in wringlets, she truly looked like something out of a children’s fairy tale book.

Sparkles even covered her entire body, making her shimmer as she shifted her weight from foot to foot.

I stood in shock, not sure what to do or I was supposed to invite her inside or not.

I let her in, unsure of what to say, I offered her some honey tea and crackers.

The fairy godmother kindly refused my offer, she asked me to come with her, it was a matter of great urgency.

She reached for my hand and pulled me into the dark and icy night.

As my feet flew out the door, the most amazing thing happened, I never touched the ground, we were flying!

“Just enjoy the flight, you’ll find out soon enough,” she smiled.

Ever since I was a child I had dreams of flying over the New York skyline, but nothing compares to the real thing.

The lights below, shining in the buildings, sparkled like a million stars.

All of a sudden, the wind beneath me started to calm and I realized we were coming to a stop.

I panicked a bit, as I feared for the landing.

To my surprise it was a very soft landing in a strange place I’ve never seen before.

So, I asked my fairy godmother, “Where are we?”

Her answer was one I was definitely not expecting.

She told me that although our surroundings might look familiar, we were actually in an alternate realm known as Magictasia. (Congratulations, Emily!)

She also told me to get ready to expect the unexpected within this realm.

Because beneath the breathtaking appearance of Magictasia lies the truth and history of what she really is.

With that said, we departed deep into the realm of Magictasia.

We knew we had many grand adventures yet to come perhaps many important lessons yet to learn.

I was ready to take on whatever was in store for us because I had a gut feeling that here, in Magictasia, something extraordinary was going to happen.

And I knew I was bound to find out sooner than later.

We stepped through a giant door I had not seen until now.

A warm golden light washed over us and for the first time in my entire life, it felt like I was at home.

Which after the year I had had, I didn’t realize how much I craved that until now.

Using the power that is Random.org, I popped in the total number of approved comments on the giveaway post and asked it to show me the winner—not including my own summary comments. (I’ve made the winning sentence bold.)

I’ve sent an email to the winner. If I don’t receive a response within 72 hours, I’ll select another entry.

That’s all for now. Thank you again for participating and keep an eye open for upcoming giveaways!

Here’s a rundown of the story:

For broken-hearted Olivia Larsen, nothing can change the fact that her twin sister, Violet, is gone… until a mysterious, beautiful gown arrives on her doorstep. The dress doesn’t just look magical; it is magical. It has the power to grant her one wish, and the only thing Olivia wants is her sister back.

With Violet again by her side, both girls get a second chance at life. And as the sisters soon discover, they have two more dresses-and two more wishes left. But magic can’t solve everything, and Olivia is forced to confront her ghosts to learn how to laugh, love, and live again.

In a breathtaking debut from Alexandra Bullen, WISH asks the question: If you could have anything, what would you wish for?

Since my Hush, Hush giveaway was such a success (and a ton of fun to boot), I decided to keep the format. Basically, to enter the giveaway, you must help write a story…this time around, a fairytale.

In this post will be a sentence which will serve as the beginning of our story. The first person to comment must copy the first sentence and add another sentence to the story, the person after that must copy the previous commenter’s sentence and add another sentence, and so forth.

I know, I know…the torture! the agony! the inhumanity!! You’re probably naming all the ways you aren’t creative, but I beg to differ (don’t you remember that awesome finger painting you did when you were six that could rival a genuine Van Gogh?) and plus, wouldn’t it all be worth it if you win a copy of Wish?!?

So without further ado…

Here’s the first sentence:

I never believed in fairy godmothers until one showed up on my doorstep with a broken wand.

Soooo…LET’S GET CREATIVE PEOPLE!

Some end notes:

• Yes this giveaway is open internationally, so even if you’re on the other side of the world, feel free to jump in. (If you’re under the age of 13, please make sure you have your parent or guardian’s permission first.)
• If you wish to have more entries, I suggest subscribing to the comment thread, telling your friends, and adding more sentences–one at a time–to the story. (Only one new sentence at a time, meaning no back to back sentences are allowed…so, more participants = more chances for you to win. Also, please don’t try to cheat because I’ll know and you’ll be disqualified.)
• Please, let’s keep the profanity to a minimum. I don’t have a problem with it, but my readership has varying sensibilities…
• Questions? No problem, just shoot me an email (todayiread[at]gmail[dot]com) and I’ll answer ASAP.
• Most important note of all? HAVE FUN!

The contest will be open until 11:59PM EST Friday January 29, 2010. I’ll comb through the entries and select a winner on Sunday January 31.