+clears throat+

Am I on? Am I...? Oh! Hello there, friendly children!

+sound of urgent whispering+

I'm sorry. Forgive me. Friendly teens and queens, I meant. Hello, teens and queens!

+more whispering, even more urgent+

Tweens? What in heaven's name is a tween? I don't think that's even a real word. But you're the boss, so...

Hello there, friendly teens and "tweens"! My name is CheeseBob Pickle-Bottom, and I am not Lauren Myracle. I have never met Lauren Myracle, I have never been within twenty feet of Lauren Myracle, I have certainly never--

+ANGRY LOUD WHISPERING+

[stiffly] Well, please excuse me for daring to extemporize. I am an actor, after all, and you are paying me to--

CUT!

+lengthy back-and-forth of furious whispering that you get to skip over. lucky you!+

Yes. Ahem. Hello, friendly teens and tweens! CheeseBob Pickle-Bottom here to tell you that both Bliss and How to Be Bad have been nominated for a TEEN CHOICE BOOK AWARD!!!!!

      



Should you want to CAST YOUR VOTE for either of these titles, or both, or for another 2008 teen book altogether, simply go here between now and January 31st. And no, you don't have to be a teen (or a tween) to participate. You don't even have to be real!

You just have to love books.

+sound of mike being unclipped+

Can I get my money now? Please?

Writers. Sheesh. You're worse than actors!!!!

And the winner of the Bliss shirt is...someone! Yaaaay! +mad applause for someone+

But really, why rush to the good part, especially when I have so much to say?

Like:

--it is cool to have an on-line community. it is, despite the pooh-poohing of some. yesterday in Starbucks i heard someone saying, "the next generation is going to be socially dysfunctional because they never interact with real people." i disagree. i'm real, you're real, we're all real. and hopefully we hang out with people who are breathing in addition to our on-line hanging-out-friends. who are also breathing. but not in our ears.

--y'all made me feel supported during this whole ttyl debacle (don't you love the word "debacle"?), and i thank you. truly.

--some of you book readers and book sellers and librarians have reached out to me in other ways (phone calls, emails, semaphore), and i'm grateful for y'all, too. i mean, dude. i do so many nice things in my head that don't ever end up getting done in reality...but y'all did them for real. you took your own time and ACTED, and i just think that's cool.

--i also thought that ALL of y'all were right in your smartio analyzes of truth versus fiction, otherwise titled "Lauren Learns the Basic Lesson that Not All Journalists *Are* Out to Report the Facts." i feel like y'all should print out your responses and give them to your English teachers for extra credit or something, because what y'all did in pointing out the differences between the full interview and the edited interview is exactly the kind of critical thinking that English teachers salivate over. and sometimes they think their students CAN'T do it, when really, they're maybe not just interested in thinking critically about, oh, i dunno, global warming. not that global warming isn't a worthy topic. but you know what i'm saying.

so, yeah. i feel very lucky to have my bloggie peeps in my life. that, post-turkey, is what i'm thankful for.

and now! the winner! i wrote down everyone's names on edible parchment paper, balled the pieces of paper up, and stuck them into the cavity of our turkey along with the actual stuffing. then, over dinner, i told my oldest son to randomly throw a roll at me. a homemade yeast roll, to be specific. when the roll hit me, i spit out the bite of turkey in my mouth, and the name of the winner burbled up through the, um...yeah.

and it is Valeria!!!!!!

her brilliant and concise words about the myracle banned are as such:

I think if viewers watch the full interview they might get a brighter look on TTYL. The two-minute interview airs arguments from both sides which brings a little darkness to your own: (one example only O:) Noah Bryde, I think his name is, was accused of an affair with a student right after your book was banned, which can be easily judged. Some might not think "Oh, these things happen". Instead they'll say, "It happened because of Lauren Myracle". They'll hate your book because they don't realize some areas of the world and don't understand their children. Parents should ask their child about TTYL, instead of bashing it because they themselves think it's an abomination.

i love the idea of people all over the country shaking their heads and saying, "it happened because of Lauren Myracle." that just kills me. (in a good way)

so! Valeria! i know not of where you hail, so figure out a way to hail me, will ya? and not on the blog comments itself, cuz you don't want to go giving out personal info to everyone, natch. you can message me on LJ or you can send an email to lauren@laurenmyracle.com. for the subject line, put, "you spit me out, you somewhat disgusting writer-person!" give me your snail mail addy (if yer a youngen, make sure it's cool with your parents first), and i'll mail you a shirt!!!!!

congrats, sweetie.

Remember the parable of Jesus and the Crossed-Out Myracle?

Well, I've got a new chapter for you.

I went to Austin to do an exclusive interview with NBC...and confused eye-blinking ensued. The confused eye-blinker was me. Why? Well, I think I'll let YOU weigh in. Heck, I'll even make a contest out of it!

What you need to know:
*the interview was 13 minutes long
*the portion NBC aired was 2 minutes long (remember, if you choose to watch it, to hit the "video" button above the picture of ttyl)

What you need to do to enter the contest:
*watch 'em both and tell me a) whether or not you think they send different messages, and b) if so, what?

Link your response to this entry by Sunday, November 30th, if you want to play. I'll put everyone's name in a bag (or something...maybe a turkey carcass?), and one randomly-picked contestant will win a BLISS shirt!

Yes, my friends, YOU might just win yo-self a delicious Mo's Bacon Bar *and* a signed copy of BLISS if you go read the interview (of moi!) that the very fabulous Liv put up on her very fabulous book review site. Full deets of how to enter the contest are explained there.

yummy yummy in your tummy!

(only don't eat the book, 'kay?)

Happy Friday!

Disclaimer #1: I set out to write this post about unicorns. I will write NEXT post about unicorns. Promise.

Disclaimer #2: It is dangerous and weird to listen to people in the book biz telling us authors that we have to be our own biggest publicity machine. I do not want to be a publicity machine. I want to be a unicorn-loving warm-blooded me!

Disclaimer #3: The thing is, we authors get really PROUD of our books. We work so frickin' hard on them, and, for the most part, we care with wild crazy passionate abandon about what we've written.

Disclaimer #4: I am proud of *all* my books, and of course I want y'all to read them. Part of that is for pure validation reasons. We all want to be praised and appreciated. (Or called pedophiles, in my case. Not that I want that. But it happens.) But, I have a "love book," and it's BLISS. I have never worked harder on a book. I have never been prouder of a book. I have never tackled SO MUCH, and maybe even pulled it off.

with all that in mind, I feel all warm and honored after reading this review of BLISS by I'm a Reading Fool.

I'm gonna share it. Read if you'd like; don't if you'd rather not. But she gets it, is the thing. She gets all the crazy disparate (and yet connected) things I was trying to pull off. And that makes me want to hug her and give her a cupcake, both.
(Or a baby chick. We all like baby chicks, don't we?)

And now, what Reading Fool has to say:

I'm actually not quite finished with this book, and a big part of the reason I haven't finished it yet is because I read a lot at night, especially once I'm in bed for the night. Well, I've gotten to the point in this book where I'm frankly afraid to read it within an hour or two of trying to fall asleep. The tension has been building and building, and I'm expecting a Carrie moment any time now. I'm a little twitchy and I'm discovering it's pretty hard to read when you're trying to avert your eyes from the page because you're dreading what you're about to see. In other words, Lauren Myracle has done a terrific job setting her scene.

Bliss IntheMorningDew has recently arrived in Atlanta to live with her grandmother. It's a far cry from the hippie commune she grew up in in California. Going to school is a new thing for her, let alone a preppy private school. But she actually finds it surprisingly easy to fit in. She even makes friends quickly, leading her to wonder which two of these girls might be the ones that her psychic friend from the commune told her she foresaw in her future. Even though Flying V warned her that the vibes aren't entirely positive, Bliss isn't at all thrown. Bliss herself has had occasional contacts with the other side, and they don't frighten her. No, Bliss is determined to make the most of her new situation, and making friends will be a welcome part of that. Flying V saw her caught between two girls, but doesn't that just mean she'll have at least two friends? Isn't that a good thing?

Bliss's commune upbringing has produced a strange blend of innocence and knowingness in her. She's not unfamiliar with sex, Grateful Dead concerts, and 'shrooms, but she has been sheltered in other ways. She expects life to be as uncomplicated as it is in Mayberry with Andy Taylor and Opie. It's not. Moving from the commune to Atlanta is eye-opening. She's grown up side by side with people of different races and it's never been important before. But Atlanta has the Klan and the school has one token black student ("so they can't force integration on us"). Everyone likes Lawrence - as long as he doesn't try to get too familiar. It makes no sense to her. Why is it such a big deal that he's black? But it clearly is a big deal, as becomes apparent when she catches Lawrence and Sarah Lynn, the most popular girl in the freshman class, in a clinch. Bliss also doesn't know anything about cliques and social groups, so she sees no problem in befriending Sandy, the school outcast. While her other friends don't exactly give her a hard time about that, it's clear they disapprove. She's okay with that. People with her background don't worry much about what others think. But Bliss has no clue how much danger she's inviting into her life when she ignores her new society's conventions.

Bliss's new school has a history. Rumor has it that a girl who lived there when the school was a convent jumped from a third-floor window of one of the campus buildings. "Some say you can still see the blood stains on the pavement" a student mentions casually. Bliss's sympathy for the poor girl turns to something else entirely when she realizes that she hears a voice...the girl's voice?...in her head whenever she passes by that building. And she does not like what she hears. The voice is insistent, demanding, and clearly evil.

Interspersed throughout are handwritten pages from S.L.L.'s journal. Just a little odd at first, the journal entries soon take a decidedly sinister tone. As we read on, it becomes clear who S.L.L. is and how her journal entries fit into Bliss's story. And that's when the creep factor started ratcheting up for me. Reading on and waiting for Bliss to catch on too has been like watching a mouse sniff its way to cheese and start to nibble. You know it has no idea that the cheese is attached to a trap that's about to snap its neck in two, and you want to look away before it gets caught. That the Tate-LaBianca murders committed by the Manson Family is a thread woven throughout the book does nothing to lessen this sense of dread. I don't have to finish the book to know that when the trap snaps, Bliss is going to be well and truly caught in it, and what happens next is not going to be pretty.

I have read that there is a link between this book and Myracle's Rhymes with Witches. If I'm not too unnerved when I finish this book, I'm going to have to check that one out. But I don't think I'm going to want to read that one late at night in the dark either!

My sweet little cuppy-cakies!!

Thanks to y'all's awesome responses, we have some creepy crazy "Win a BLISS Shirt" contest ideas--JUST IN TIME FOR HALLOWEEN!

There are LOTS of ways to win...

Define "bliss." Now define horror. How can the two concepts be linked? (I know it sounds like something boring scintillating your English teacher tells ya to do… but hey, it’s all about the t-shirt!)

Carve a pumpkin with BLISS in mind…. Take a pic and send it to me at lauren@laurenmyracle.com so that I can post it on my blog!

Compare a scary experience in BLISS to your scariest moment.

Throw on your amazing Halloween costume creation (you need to try it out anyway, right?) and take a picture of you holding a copy of BLISS!

Host a BLISS Halloween party and send me pics! (You could make a Bliss cake, spell out Bliss in spider webs, you and your friends could take a pic spelling out Bliss with your bodies… etc etc etc...)

See how many copies of BLISS you can get in one place… how many friends you can gather!! Take a pic and send it to me at the snail mail addy above.

Do something fun and fabulous to spread the BLISS love using the spooky BLISS book trailer. Post it to your MySpace or Facebook profile, send a link to your buds, borrow a bullhorn and troll the streets announcing the URL...the opportunities are endless. Be creative--and report back about what sort of response you get!

So those are your options, 'kay? You can do one or more than one, whatever strikes your fancy. If it's a written thingie, post it to this blog entry. If it's a pic, send it to me and I'll post to this entry!

Who wins, you ask? Well...I have LOTS of shirts...so what's to stop me from naming LOTS of winners?!!

What are ya waiting for? Get on it, my pretties! Contest ends on...hrmmm...Halloween! (But hey, I'll send shirts out earlier if y'all send entries in earlier. That way you can wear them pre-Halloween. They *do* have blood dripping down them, after all.)

Last entry brought the story of two little girls, one very good and the other very bad.

Well, today brings the story of a little boy named Alan Gratz who is not good, not bad, but downright WICKED. Wicked how? Wicked cool! Cuz he's giving away free copies of his book!!!!

I know, right?

Maybe he's not wicked; maybe he's crazy. Crazy like a fox...

But, hey. Might as well take advantage of it, yeah? 'Specially since he is a phenomenal writer and you basically have the chance to give yourself a delightful little pressie, WHICH YOU DESERVE.


(I'm kinda wishing someone would give ME a pressie...)

So what are you waiting for? Go! Scurry! Get thee a free copy of SOMETHING WICKED before Alan regains his senses!!!!!!!


P.S. Since we're talking about wickedness, here's my fun BLISS quote for the day, from Missmath144: "If you like creepy, this is your book. It is well crafted and I found myself engrossed in it for hours, but the closer I got to the end, the creepier it got. It was not for me. I prefer going to bed at night without disturbing images roaming freely in my thoughts. However, if you like horror movies, Stephen King, teen angst and vampires, then you'll probably enjoy Bliss." I mean, I'm sad the book wasn't for her, but I love the last sentence!!!!

P.P.S. Okay, fine, I also really liked this one, from Navah". Okay, fine, I LOVED it. Navah, wherever you are and whoever you are, I you!

I am haunted by this book. Literally. I fell asleep while reading yesterday (a commentary on my state of mind, not the book) and dreamed over and over again about it. And last night, even as I struggled to stay up and finish it, when I fell asleep, I dreamed about it again.

I am awed and impressed by what Myracle has done here. This is a genuine, actually scary ghost story for teens. (And let me say, this is one creepy package that absolutely does justice to the inside. Gorgeous!) She doesn't pull any punches. She never holds back. This story is really freaking creepy. There were times, reading last night alone in my living room, that I had to close the book, because I had the creeps.

She's not gory. Never gory. But Myracle packs this novel full of atmosphere and voice, and she builds the suspense and the creepy so very well that as it rises to a close, you feel it gripping you in the throat.

This is a scary book, because it's a ghost story, but much more terrifying because Myracle never lets us forget, even for a second, that while ghosts may be fiction, human evil is fact...

Once upon a time there was a little girl. Let's call her...Jennifer Barnes, since that's her name. She was very cute (and still is). Here is her picture. Everybody say, "Hiiiii, Jen!"




ANYway, Jen writes super terrific books for teens about cheerleaders who were really undercover government agents and stuff like that.

Well, one day, Jen read a super-spooky book (says me--AND says Jen!) called BLISS, and she blogged about it!

Here's my favorite bit:

I should probably confess up front that I am quite fond of Lauren, because she always makes me laugh and she's just about the kindest person you could ever hope to meet. But my pleasure in BLISS had nothing to do with my fondness for Lauren. In fact, my fondness for Lauren makes BLISS shocking, because it's SCARY, it's CREEPY, and it FREAKING GETS UNDER YOUR SKIN.

Isn't she sweet? Oh, I love getting under the skin of sweeties like Jen.

So Jen went walking--tra la la--and she ran into her friend Ally Carter.

Like Jen, Ally is adorable and a total doll. Here is her picture:



Everybody say, "Hiiii, Ally!"

Ally is the brilliant mind behind the stupendously fabulous Gallagher Girls books. You know the ones. About the girl spies? And they all have shiny flipppy hair and wear cute plaid school uniform skirts? (I was the model for those book jackets, btw. Except not really. But I wish!)

WELL. Jen said to Ally, "Ally! You need to read BLISS!" And Ally said, "No, I will not! Because I am a wIMP-O-LA!"

Only when she said it, it sounded more like this:


"I have not read BLISS. I will not read BLISS. Because I do not enjoy having nightmares and jumping out of my skin every time a tree limb blows against the house.

Seriously. When I was a kid Scooby Doo gave me nightmares--Scooby-freaking-Doo.

So I will NOT be reading BLISS."

+makes a sad face at Ally+

Now, is that nice of Ally to TOTALLY DISREGARD JEN'S RECOMMENDATION like that?

Nooo-oooo-ooo. She tried to get away with it by challenging all of you to read it in her stead, but is that any sort of an acceptable response?

Let's just pretend your teacher said, "Read Moby Dick!" And you said, "No, cuz I'm scared of whales. But Ally Carter will read it instead!" Would that go over????

So *I* say, go to Jen's site and tell her how fabulous she is and all that, maybe give her a cookie, and then go to Ally's site and say, "Weenie-head! Weenie-head! Ally is a weenie-head!"

Or, no. Hmmm. We're all mature here. How about:

"Ms. Ally of the fabulous books. Dare I suggest you s-t-r-e-t-c-h yourself as a reader and TRY--just *try*--reading a slightly possibly freaky book? You will love it! You'll see!"

And then tell her that if she *doesn't*, you'll be forced to throw Scooby Snacks at her.

That'd be great. THANKS!!!!

Just came across this tidbit from by the flowers in her eyes, thanks to Google Reader, my friend in time-wasting crime:

"I finished reading Bliss by Lauren Myracle recently, and OMGSODISTURBING. Lately, all the YA books I've read, like Living Dead Girl or Feathered, have been disturbing to different extents. But Bliss has been the winner so far. [shudders]"

How fun I find it to be disturbing!!!!!!!

In fact, I want to SPREAD the disturbia. And, have I mentioned I have t-shirts to give away?

So here's the new contest (as we wait for the nifty fifty to trickle in):

COME UP WITH A FABU CONTEST IDEA THAT INVOLVES BLISS, ALL HALLOW'S EVE, and SPOOKINESS!!!

Oh, and contest should spread BLISS disturbia love, of course. To as many innocent victims bored-and-in-need-of-entertaining book lurvers as possible.

Oh #2: by all means feel free to involve awesome BLISS book trailer if ya want. Why not?

Creator of best contest wins a haunted shirt!!!!

...cuz babes, I have a preview of BLISS for ya, and it's gonna scare the pee out of you. I hope. Only not in any sort of embarrassing way.

Or maybe it won't scare you. Maybe it'll make you giggle! (My friend, Ermengarde*, sometimes pees when she giggles...)

Lemme know what you think--I *really* wanna know!!!!




*Ermengarde is not really the name of my pees-when-giggling friend. I changed it to protect her privacy. I'm just cool that way. :)

...going to be revealed in a moment! (Do I sound like Ryan Seacrest? I once had his hair, ya know. And then I gave it back.)




Ahem. Back to business.

First off, I just want to say that I, personally, had soooooo much fun reading y'all's entries. They were VERY scary. And Liliana my secret judge agreed. In fact, she she/he kinda...freaked me out with her his/her enthusiasm.

Let us just say that, um, evil cackling filled the air, along with the horrid odor of rotten eggs, barf, and camel toe jam.

However, one entry stood out in particular...though given Liliana's the secret judge's tastes, I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a really freaky thing.

And now...drumroll, please...the winning entry:

Oh my god Lauren! You say you BEGGED to get this book? Yeah right! I bet you got your slave monkey and your red-eyed camel to get it for you! You made the monkey dig up the book, and then you made the old camel run all he way to your house with the book AND the monkey on it's back! You're so lazy! Then I bet you got you're ladybug and put a little micoscope on him........and placed it in the darkest, creepiest part of the forest! When the ladybug fled back to you......you called up Barnes & Nobles and but the microscope to the earpiece of the phone and made the employees listen to scary sounds when they picked up the phone! "I begged for it" YEAH RIGHT!!!!!!!

CONGRATULATIONS, MARIA!!!!!! You, yes you, have just won yourself the ONLY copy of the bad blood BLISS in existence!!!!!!!

Liliana's The secret judge's comment: She had me at the red-eyed camel. Heh heh heh...

But wait! There's more! There were so many fab entries that Liliana the secret judge kinda went mental got overly enthusiatic and insisted I name runner-ups as well. The runners-up won't get actual books (sorry, I just unburied the one!), but they will receive bad blood jackets from the original bad blood whoopsie. Said bad blood jackets can be framed as keepsakes (who wouldn't want a picture of bad bloody Bliss on her bedside table?) or slipped onto a personal copy of the real BLISS. Or used as a Kleenex. Or a coaster. Or a flugelhorn!




List of runner-ups:

Wishiwas
Poodle649
Lauren
Rebecca
Melissa
Willow

Nice work, witchy ones!!!!!!

So, Maria and runner-ups: Send me your snail mail addies using the "post message" feature. That way it'll go to me privately and won't be broadcast to, ya know, the five readers of my blog the whole world. For the subject line of your message, write "I want my bloody Bliss now!"

Sigh. Happy happy joy joy. And for bonus happy-happy-joy-joy, go to your local bookstore, eh? Because BLISS IS FINALLY OUT!!!!!! At least at Barnes&Noble.com and Amazon!!!!

And I swear to good golly-wolly, I think it's 'cause of y'all. For real. So...thanks!!!!!!


Add Glitter to Pictures

Yes, it’s true! One lone copy of the “bad BLISS” was unburied and mailed to me, because I BEGGED. And the blood on the cover is indeed the wrong color. But it’s kinda funny. Anyway, it’s a one-of-a-kind collector’s item, if, ya know, you’re interested in collecting such a thing. AND I WANT ONE OF YOU TO HAVE IT!

But first, a digression, in which Lauren recaps a recent exchange that took place in the comment section of my blog.

The context: I’d collected all the silly speculations friends and fans have come up with for why BLISS didn’t come out on its pub date as it was supposed to. I used COLOR! and GLITTER! and DIFFERENT FONTS! And all in all, I was quite proud of the entry, as I seem to somehow be learning a bit about HTML, thanks to the luverly hilly_wa.

Well, the following exchange ensued:

sweet, polite fan: Hey Lauren i was wondering if you knew that girl on the cover of bliss? P.S i just ordered my copy!



me: No, but I heard--could be urban legend, of course--that she actually died very young, which is so sad...

not-so-happy-camper: That is ridiculous. I mean, really. I thought you believed in sanity - guess I was wrong. You are effing INSANE! That is not real. You just made this up to get more attention.

(Me, but only to myself: To get more attention? Ya think? An author writing a blog to—among other things—promote forthcoming books, well that’s plumb Krazy-with-a-K, to steal from the brilliant robinwasserman, whose new book SKINNED just hit the shelves. (Parenthetical remark within a parenthetical remark: we authors also promote other authors’ books too, you see. We just roll that way, cuz we’re cool. And cuz we love books.))

what I really said to not-so-happy-camper: Hmmm. Do you *like* insane, or do you *not* like insane? Hard to tell. And…is sanity a choice?

not-so-happy-camper: Oh, come ON! Stop being so effing mysterious. I don't find this funny at all. You are so twisted.

lovely and clearly very intelligent fan to whom I blow kisses: Hey! Stop being mean to Lauren! So, she’s having a little fun. Don't get your knickers in a twist, ya hear?

not-so-happy-camper-who-in-fact-is-in-fact-a-bona-fide-cranky-pants: Well, look up INSANE, then TWISTED, then STUPID, then ATTENTION-
SEEKER. I think you'll find Lauren's ugly mug under all those words!!!!

Well, as you can imagine, this exchange made me feel crappy gave me lots to think about. Such as:

--why read someone’s blog if it pisses you off?
--do certain types of people get a sick thrill out of being pissed off?
--do certain types of people get a kick out of being mean and yet hiding under the name “anonymous”?
--when did Cranky Pants even see my ugly mug? She/he isn't referring to my Sandra Boynton mug, is she or he? I like that mug! And anyway, Neil Gaiman gave me that mug!


Glitter Graphics




So, yeah. All this was bubbling about in my brain, and then my unburied copy of BAD BLISS arrived, and I thought, “Ah, a contest!!! Just the thing to soothe my weary soul.”

Here’s the deal. Write the funniest, most ridiculous Cranky-Pants Comment you can, and post it to this entry.

It should:

--not attack anyone personally (other than me, but only in a not truly malicious way),

but…
--nonetheless toss out all sorts of wild accusations, complaints, and insane mutterings,

and in so doing…
--make me (and hopefully others) laugh,

and of course…
--talk about BLISS in some way or another.

OH! AND ONE MORE THING! MARK YOUR ENTRY AS AN ENTRY BY DOING THE FOLLOWING: in the subject line of your comment, put "(your name here)'s contest entry." Only, actually use your name. Or your pseudonym, should you choose to be fancy. That way, I'll know which comments are contest entries and which are just people being mean.

I'll also know who to say the winner is!!!!

Contest ends on September 13th on midnight.

Original Cranky Pants not invited to enter.

Winning entry to be determined by impartial third party judge of my choosing.

Happy kvetching!

BLISS has been given a FlamingNet Top Choice Award! And it hasn't even come out yet! How cool is that?

To prove that that's not a rhetorical question, you may choose from the following options:
a) ehhh
b) so cool there could possibly be pant pee-age
c) I'm sorry, who are you again?
d) I like salt

Me, I think it's VERY cool. Flamingly cool! +hot flames shoot from computer+

Even cooler, the fabulous How to Ditch Your Fairy by feisty Aussie Justine Larbalestier is also on fire. By which I mean, it is also a FlamingNet Top Choice Award winner. Go, Justine! Which rhymes with brilliantine! Which Justine puts on her hair instead of cupcake icing! And that is why she is so glossy.

Mwah,

moi

+licks finger and makes sizzle noise+ Yeah!

P.S. I know I am being a boring as old fig pudding, blathering on and on (sometimes in bloody voices) about BLISS. It's just, ya know, it was going to come out...and then it didn't...and it's very much a "not with a bang but a whimper" situation. Wah, wah, wah. But one day it WILL come out! And I will hush about it! And talk about...oh, I dunno, hair products instead!!! (Bliss likes lavender shampoo, by the way. If you were wondering...)

You crazy kids, you crack me up! Some of my favorite speculations about the mysterious disappearance of BLISS from the known universe:

From sarah_mlynowski: I heard that all the people who had a hand in creating the book--the editor, the designer, the cover model, the proofreader--have been getting strange threatening letters warning them to KEEP THE BOOK FROM EVER SEEING THE LIGHT OF DAY OR ELSE. I'm sure one of them caved under the pressure, and did something to bury Bliss...Lauren, don't open your mail, just in case, please!

From St. Paul Sally: The word in St Paul is that BLISS must be kept off the shelves at all costs. The "bad jackets" ploy was just the beginning. Expect more covert operations, such as sealing the warehouses where the copies are stored or hijacking the delivery trucks on there way to Amazon and B&N. They will do ANYTHING.

From Bad Kitty: What reallly happened to Bliss is this: all the books are in a warehouse that has been invaded by hundreds of hungry feral cats and they have gnawed and torn and destroyed all the pages with blood droplets on them. And they are still not satisfied....

From Ally Carter: Well *I* heard that Bliss was just about to be shipped when about three dozen black SUVs with flashing lights swarmed the warehouse and government agents took all the copies away for matters of national security. Evidently, the plot was just TOO close to something that REALLY happened that the government has been trying to cover up for years!

From Too Hot to Handle In the Know: I can't reveal my name, but trust me I'm in the know, and here is the REAL story. An advance copy of BLISS has been read by the powers that be in the future administration and they have decided that the story is too HOT for teens to handle. Reading it might keep teens from doing all the necessary things like running to malls and spending LOTS of money. They are doing everything they can to keep BLISS bottled up until NOVEMBER. So, now you know, but please don't blow my cover or I'm TOAST.

And now, my favorite suggestions on what to do to bring BLISS back:

 “Lauren, you should just close your eyes, take a deep breath, and empty your mind.” --Anon

 “I am scared and confused but I recommend cupcakes.” --e_lockhart

 “and rub the cupcake frosting in your hair.” --courtneywrites

 “If it’s a ghost from the book who’s messing things up, then try to sort of speak to her (it's better to do this in your head) as though she's a good friend who's being unreasonable.” --Anon

 “lauren, i know what you have to do. first, pray. second, GO TO A COUNSELOR! for real. im dead serious. GO. right now. why aren’t you gone yet?!!” --Anon

 "Save us all a lot of time and trouble and do nothing. If you must take action, consider investing in a good lipstick." --Sarah Palin

 “Fix your baby's blood and then we can all get to enjoy her.” --lizgallagher

And, of course, I can’t help but love this nugget of gold:

 “You guys, you're missing something very obvious here. How do we help BLISS return from the undead? Duh! (not to be rude) ORDER THE FRICKIN' BOOK!”--Anon

Ha. Thanks, sweeties, for all the great advice!!!!


Glitter Graphics

Okay, so first a little show and tell:




Yes, my hair is falling out. IN CLUMPS. That big frickin' nastiness you see hanging from my brush? IT USED TO BE ATTACHED TO MY HEAD! AND NOW IT'S NOT! And I do not have early pattern female baldness or whatever. (At least, I hope not...) Sure, everybody's hairbrush gets filled up with random hairs. I get that. But big frickin' CLUMPS?

So I went to a psychic, who turned out to be a numerologist, and told her the whole saga of BLISS and the blood voice and how five squillion books were buried because of bad blood, and here is what she had to say:

That yes, sometimes ghosts do channel themselves through human hosts. She, um, said it's far more common than we think. I was like, "But, I invented her. Liliana, the blood voice." And she said, "How can you be sure?" To which I had no answer.

She went onto say that if a ghost is led to believe that one thing is going to happen--that she's going to re-enter the world in a flaming burst of glory, say--and then that thing *doesn't* happen--the books all get buried, say--well, then said ghost could become quite...displeased, especially if said ghost has sociopathic tendencies anyway.

THEN she asked me when the book was supposed to come out versus when it is currently due to come out. I didn't understand why, but I gave her the dates.

Here's how she broke it down for me:

Original publication date was September 1st, which is the 9th month and the 1st day. 9 – 1 = 8. There are 8 letters in ENTOMBED. (I didn't even TELL the psychic that Liliana herself had *been* entombed, like, for real. She took it to just mean that the BOOK had been entombed by not making it out into the world...)

Then she looked at the "new" pub date, which is September 23rd. 9th month, 23rd day. 9 + 2 + 3 = 14. There are 14 letters in BLOOD SACRIFICE. Eeeee, I'm getting the chills just writing this...because of course BLISS does indeed have to do with, well, the 14 letter thing.

THEN she took the original date (9.1) and combined it with the new date (9.23), and when she added up 9 + 1 + 9 + 2 + 3, she got 24. And when she opened herself to the meaning, in this situation, of the number 24, guess what came up? AWAKEN. Also, EMERGE. Also, RETURN. Also...BEWARE.

Uh, great.

The psychic ended the session in a way that freaked me out, because she took my hands and looked at me in a penetrating, no-nonsense way and said, "This is NOT a happy spirit." I had to fight back a giggle, but it was a nervous giggle, because duh. I kinda got that part already, about Liliana not being happy.

"Appease her," she said.

"How?" I asked.

"She wants validation," she said simply. "She expected rebirth, and instead she got buried--and from what I'm sensing, not for the first time."

I swallowed, because...uh...yeah. Back to the whole entombment thing.

"But how can I validate her when I'm not the one in charge of getting the books into the stores?"

"I don't know," she said gravely. "But you must."

Aaaaaah! I'm SO glad I can turn to y'all!!!!!! What can I do to appease Liliana and let her know that she's, um, alive-ish? HELP!!!!!

The blood voice has given me permission to post this, as getting BLISS out into the world = allowing HER out into the world. She is...shall we say...quite eager to leave the stuffy confines of my brain and, um, take over YOURS.

So if you're brave enough, go to Kimberly Pauley's website and enter her contest. (She's the one giving away a copy of BLISS. Is that too cool or what?) And while you're there, check out *her* new book, Sucks to Be Me, which rocketh and also involves the undead. Kinda. So even the blood voice would approve...

Okay, yes. My new book, BLISS, comes out in 5 days, and yes, I've been having fun doing a sort of countdown of creepiness. Only, I'm finding it easier and easier to slip into the BLOOD VOICE, almost as if I'm being...possessed. And just now--swear to God--I came downstairs to do a final email check after putting my three-year-old to bed, and JUST as I was reading the comment one of y'all left about "....and in the book she created a evil creature...and it has Lauren trapped and she can't get out and she's doomed!", JUST as I was reading that, my daughter started wailing. I dashed upstairs and said, "What's wrong, sweetie?"

She pointed at her CD player--though by that point, she didn't need to, because I could hear it for myself. Instead of the strangely-comforting-U2-played-on-the-xylophone CD my daughter usually listens to, whispery, scratchy, static-y noises were emanating from the speakers.

"It turned ugly! It's UGLY!" my daughter cried.

I knelt down by the CD player and tried to figure out what in the world was going on. Had the CD gotten scratched? No, it wasn't even spinning anymore. Was the CD player picking up some crazy, static-y radio station? No, because it's not a radio. It's a CD player.

I unplugged it, replugged it in, and hit "play." Back came U2 a la the xylophone, and my daughter fell asleep. (I stayed with her, rubbing her back, until she did.)

And then I went downstairs...just, like, two minutes ago...to find my refrigerator moaning like a ghost.

I'm fairly creeped out. I've read that spirits sometimes use electrical gadgets to communicate with the human world. Could the blood voice I created (at least, that I *thought* I created) be trying to...break free?

September 1st, which is the book's publication date, can't come soon enough, that's what I say. I think (I hope!) that once the book is OUT THERE (and hopefully being read), the blood voice's needs will be satiated...

Maybe it/she just needs someone to *hear* her???

Sweet fools, entreating "Lauren" to return. Lauren Myracle is weak. Lauren Myracle made bad decisions. Lauren Myracle allowed me into this...this BLOG world, and I shall not leave until I'm released into the true and physical world of trembling souls.

I remember that world.

I remember one soul, in particular. So stupid innocent she was, what with her talk of right and wrong, virtue and sin. Her name, perhaps, was...Bliss? I remember the day she first heard about me, from those vapid cows she spent her time with. Let's dip into her own memory, shall we? Come...

“Have you told her about the girl who died here?” DeeDee asks.

I think of the blood voice. My drumstick’s halfway to my mouth, but I lower it. “Someone died? Here on campus?”

“She didn’t just die,” Jolene says, making a cringing face as if apologizing for what she’s about to say. “She killed herself.”

“She threw herself out of a window,” Thelma says, and her tone holds no apology whatsover. So much blood—or so the story goes. I’ve looked on the flagstone, but I don’t see any.”

“Was it in Hamilton Hall?” I ask with a sense of foreboding.

“How’d you know?” Jolene says.

“It’s not like it’s a secret,” DeeDee says to her. “It’s pretty much common knowledge.”

I put my chicken on my plate and push my plate away. “Who was she? Why did she jump out the window?”

“No one knows,” Thelma says. “Just that obviously she wasn’t right in the mind, because she decided it would be a really super idea to fling herself out of a third story window onto the stone path below.”

I wince.

“Some people say you can see the blood stains,” Jolene says. "But...it’s probably just a ghost story.”

*************************************************************************************************************************************

No, you sots dear children. It is not "just" a ghost story--and in five days, should you be brave enough, you can find out for yourself.

ALL of you.

For believe me, there is enough of me to go around.

FIVE MORE DAYS!!!

A letter from Lauren's mother:

Dear Lauren,

I just finished BLISS, and dear, I have never been so disturbed by a novel in my life. While I did indeed find it fascinating--even, perhaps, brilliant--I must say that I am also quite confused as to how you sprang from my loins. Sweetheart, is there anything you want to tell me? Is writing about such horrifying subjects your means of rebelling against your pastel-toned Southern upbringing? You have such a lovely smile, Lauren. Is it possible that the darkness I see in BLISS has lying beneath the surface all these years?

Is it *my* fault?

I did not send you to a haunted convent for your schooling. (Did I?)

I did not encourage you to be friends with psychopathic young women. (Did I?)

I certainly NEVER left the kitty litter uncleaned for so long that dustball-sized pebbles of poop lined the floor of your room. That, I am sure of.

Perhaps, dear, you should tell your readers NOT to read this one, as it gave me nightmares for weeks. Even now, I can't stop thinking about Sandy with her bulging eyes...and the sweet murmuring blood voice...and the horrible fate that befell that pure and innocent girl. She did not deserve it, Lauren. She was a lamb to the slaughter.

Well. Do be sure to eat your green vegetables, as this will go a long way toward righting your mental imbalances.

Love,

YOUR MOTHER



A letter from the blood voice to Lauren's mother:

I will be there in seven da-aaaays! And there is NOTHING you can do to stop me. Perhaps the blame lies on you, hmmm? For this...Lauren...who unleashed me, she DID spring from your loins, didn't she? +laughs in a low and slippery way, like dry branches scratching the window eyes of a long-deserted building+