Good Morning World,
Today I am stoked to introduce you to Brett Jensen, leading lady of my latest novel (a Contemporary YA / Mystery), The Language of Silence.
I want to thank Shannon Alexander for tagging me to jump on board. Her novel, Love and Other Unknown Variables (Entangled Teen October 2014) is creating quite the buzz! Let’s learn a little bit more about her before we get started….
Love and Other Unknown Variables
Charlie Hanson has a clear vision of his future. A senior at Brighton School of Mathematics and Science, he knows he’ll graduate, go to MIT, and inevitably discover the solutions to the universe’s greatest unanswerable problems. He’s that smart. But Charlie’s future blurs the moment he reaches out to touch the tattoo on a beautiful girl’s neck.
The future has never seemed very kind to Charlotte Finch, so she’s counting on the present. She’s not impressed by the strange boy pawing at her until she learns he’s a student at Brighton, where her sister has just taken a job as the English teacher. With her encouragement, Charlie orchestrates the most effective prank campaign in Brighton history. And in doing so, he puts his own future in jeopardy.
By the time he learns Charlotte is ill—and that the pranks were a way to distract Ms. Finch from Charlotte’s illness—Charlotte’s gravitational pull on Charlie is too great to overcome. Soon he must choose between the familiar formulas he’s always relied on, or the girl he’s falling for (at far more than 32 feet per second).
Click here to read an excerpt from Love and Other Unknown Variables.
Visit Entangled Publishing’s webpage for more information and to order Love and Other Unknown Variables.
To learn more, visit Shannon on her website at www.shannonleealexander.com.
Sign up for Shannon’s newsletter for news, games, and special contests and giveaways.
Shannon Lee Alexander is a wife and mother to two kids and one yellow terrier named Harriet Potter. She is passionate about coffee, books, and cancer research. Math makes her break out in a sweat. Love and Other Unknown Variables is her debut novel. It comes out October 7, 2014 from Entangled Publishing. She currently lives in Indianapolis with her family.
Now…let’s meet Brett from The Language of Silence
What is the name of your character? Is s/he fictional/historical?
Brett Mallory Jensen, and she’s purely a work of fiction. Or who knows, readers and friends, maybe, just maybe, she’s a bit like you, a collection of characteristics that make each of you so darn interesting. Just a fancy way of saying, she’s a female character that I really enjoyed writing. Eccentric, witty, and damn smart; she’s the girl who’s just on the edge of becoming an exceptional woman. Beautifully flawed and naive, but within her is a strength that she can’t even begin to suspect exists….and I think that’s true for a lot of us.
When and where is the story set?
The story is a contemporary romance / mystery set in the fictional town of Wendall, Georgia. The setting is extremely important in this story. A horrifying hodgepodge of Gilmore Girls’ Stars Hallow and Vampire Diaries’ Mystic Falls, Wendall is a town built on age-old seemingly hokey traditions with a dark tendency to keep secrets at all costs.
What should we know about Brett?
She’s a go-getter. In fact, she’s pretty much in every after school activity that she could sign up for (but that’s mostly because she is trying to run from her feelings for her brother’s best friend, the brooding, sarcastic Ed). She might, just might, be a klepto. And despite her innocent and virginal status, she’s not afraid of who she is or what she wants. Unlike so many other YA stories where the girl sits in the corner waiting for some hot-shot boy to ask her out, Brett chooses to be single because she knows what she wants, and she won’t waste her time on anything else.
What is screwing up Brett’s life (main conflict in writerly speak)?
At the start of the novel, Brett is grieving for her brother, Tristan, who died in what has been ruled a drunk-driving accident. But she knows her brother wasn’t drunk the night of his death, and she begins to suspect he was murdered. If that wasn’t enough, she is now left alone with Ed, the one boy who she knows would make her happier than any other, but also the same boy who she is sure will break her heart.
What is the title?
The Language of Silence. It’s about all the things we say to avoid speaking the truth.
When can we expect the book to be published?
It released on August 22, and you can read the first five chapters for FREE by clicking here.
Kate Jarvik Birch is a visual artist, author, playwright, daydreamer, and professional procrastinator. As a child, she wanted to grow up to be either a unicorn or mermaid. Luckily, being a writer turned out to be just as magical. Her essays and short stories have been published in literary journals including Indiana Review and Saint Ann‘s Review. She lives in Salt Lake City, Utah with her husband and three kids. To learn more visit www.katejarvikbirch.com
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