Contest

Interview with Rion Amilcar Scott, Author of The World Doesn’t Require You

Saturday, October 5, 2019
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I am so excited to welcome Rion Amilcar Scott to The Debutante Ball. Rion and I are both Kimbilio fellows. Kimbilio is a national residency for fiction writers from the African diaspora. Rion Amilcar Scott is the author of the story collection, The World Doesn’t Require You (Norton/Liveright, August 2019). His debut story collection, Insurrections (University Press of Kentucky, 2016), was awarded the 2017 PEN/Bingham Prize for Debut Fiction and…

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Interview with Meghan Scott Molin, Author of The Frame Up and The Queen Con

Saturday, September 21, 2019
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I am so excited to welcome Meghan Scott Molin to The Debutante Ball! Meghan and I share an agent (the excellent Joanna MacKenzie), and I was on the preorder train for both of Meghan’s published novels, The Frame-Up and The Queen Con. These books truly have something for everyone: smart writing, clever mysteries, swoon-worthy romance, and the most wonderful nerdy bad-ass main character, MG Martin. Meghan promises a third book…

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Interview with Lisa Barr, Author of The Unbreakables PLUS BOOK GIVEAWAY

Saturday, September 14, 2019
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  Lisa Barr is the author of The Unbreakables (HarperCollins) a delicious, sharp novel about a Chicago woman who jets off to France after her “perfect” marriage collapses, putting the broken pieces of herself back together while rediscovering her own joie de vivre—a lust for life, art, and passion. Artful, feminist, and emotionally gripping, The Unbreakables is a remarkable tribute to a woman’s strength in the face of heartbreak and adversity.        What’s one book that made…

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Interview with Lana Wood Johnson and Giveaway for TECHNICALLY, YOU STARTED IT

Saturday, August 10, 2019
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  I am beyond thrilled to be hosting my agent sister, YA author Lana Wood Johnson, on the ball today! Lana was born and raised in Iowa in the time before the internet but has spent the rest of her life making up for that. After years working in wireless communication for companies of all sizes, she now works doing the same for a local youth shelter. Lana lives in Minnesota…

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Interview with Lillian Li and Giveaway for NUMBER ONE CHINESE RESTAURANT

Saturday, June 1, 2019
6 comments

    I’m so excited to be hosting author Lillian Li this week! Lillian Li is the author of the novel Number One Chinese Restaurant, which was longlisted for the Women’s Prize, the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize, and an NPR Best Book of 2018. Her work has been published in the New York Times, Granta, One Story, Bon Appetit, and Jezebel. Originally from the D.C. metro area, she lives…

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Interview with Roselle Lim and Giveaway for Natalie Tan’s Book of Luck and Fortune

Saturday, May 25, 2019
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I could not be more thrilled to be hosting author Roselle Lim this week on the Ball! I’ve been waiting many months for her magical debut, Natalie Tan’s Book of Luck and Fortune, to come out, and now it’s almost here! Roselle Lim was born in the Philippines and immigrated to Canada as a child. She lived in north Scarborough in a diverse, Asian neighbourhood. She found her love of…

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Sam Hawke Interview + City of Lies Giveaway

Saturday, October 20, 2018
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I’m so excited to welcome Sam Hawke to the Debutante Ball this week! Sam is a delightful human being who writes epic fantasy in Canberra, Australia, where she lives with her two dogs, two small ninjas, and her husband. Her debut novel CITY OF LIES, the first in the Poison Wars series from Tor, came out just this past July to critical acclaim and lots of excited hand wavings. It’s been…

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Interview with Rebecca Fish Ewan and GIVEAWAY

Saturday, July 28, 2018
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I’m so excited to introduce everyone to Rebecca Fish Ewan, author of By the Forces of Gravity. I met Rebecca last year at Hippocamp, Hippocampus Magazine’s annual Creative Nonfiction conference. She approached me after my breakout session on Experimental Writing and talked about her work, which combined drawings and free verse. It was exactly the type of thing I wanted to add to my presentation, so I was extremely grateful! She even…

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Happy Birthday, FROM UNSEEN FIRE!

Tuesday, April 17, 2018
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  I love that my normal posting day is Tuesday, which is the day new books come into the world. (No one knows why this is, not even Judy Blume. I know this because I was in her bookstore on a Tuesday when they were shelving new books and I asked Judy Blume why books always release on Tuesdays and she said that she had no idea. Investigative journalism at…

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Interview with Laurie Jean Cannady + Giveaway for CRAVE

Saturday, November 11, 2017
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I first met Dr. Laurie Jean Cannady at HippoCamp—Hippocampus Magazine’s 2016 writer’s conference. I have to admit that I was so awestruck to meet her in person that I didn’t talk to her for more than 96 seconds.  Writers are my rockstars, and I’m easily intimidated. It’s not that she was that terror-inducing as a person, it’s just that I loved her book, CRAVE: SOJOURN OF A HUNGRY SOUL so…

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