Giveaway: Huff & Brennan
For the past week or so, most of my brain has been going into trying to write up proposals for a new series. I’ve got the first synopsis written, and my agent says it looks like fun. The second book … well, I scrapped that one and started over yesterday, and I think I’m on the right track. But I find myself skimping a little on the blog as I try to get these finished and submitted.
So this seemed like a good time for a book giveaway. I’ve ended up with extra copies of Marie Brennan‘s A Star Shall Fall [B&N | Mysterious Galaxy | Amazon] and Tanya Huff’s The Enchantment Emporium [Amazon | Mysterious Galaxy], and I’d love to find good homes for both of them.
To enter, you’re going to have to help me out with this synopsis I’m writing — leave a comment suggesting the weirdest/silliest/most bizarre twist I should add to my new series.
Yes, I know I haven’t told you what the series is about. That’s what makes it fun 🙂 Be as creative as you’d like, and make sure you say which of the two books you’d like to win. One entry per person, and this is open to everyone.
I’ll pick two winners at random on 10/20/10.
Kevin Stewart
October 13, 2010 @ 10:00 am
A giant ball of fire falls from the sky and into the ocean. The subsequent wave that ensues threatens to capsize thier ship, throwing off the evil doers who were attacking them. Saved, the heros have just enough time to gather their senses before the eerie glow from the ocean floor grabs their attention.
The end.
Jim C. Hines
October 13, 2010 @ 10:02 am
Actually, the giant ball of fire fits pretty well with the plot of Brennan’s book 🙂
Which book do you want to win if I pick your name?
Gerard D
October 13, 2010 @ 10:05 am
Having the main character’s sidekick going through the adventure as a sleepwalker only to wake up and find out he/she was actually the main bad guy. And while in sleepstate they thought they were going to defeat their twin which was really only their concious mind.
For the book I am interested in is “A Star Shall Fall”
Anita K.
October 13, 2010 @ 10:38 am
They join forces with a fire-breathing elephant (“Steve”)to bring down the evil empire of the vampire squash and their mad goddess-queen, the Pernicious Pachysandra, but driven mad by the bite of a particularly large squash, Steve attempts to serve them all en flambe at the victory feast. His madness can only be cured by the touch of the mystical and antisocial phoenix-unicorn. Then just stop on that cliff-hanger and pick up in book 2.
(If I won, I would want “The Enchantment Emporium.”)
MichaelM
October 13, 2010 @ 10:45 am
Monkey butlers, specifically a head butler called Winston Bananathribble the Third, and he punishes any misbehaving (Or useless) monkey butlers by thribbling them with a banana. What’s thribbling? I don’t know, and nor do I want to know.
Everything needs monkey butlers, right? Maybe I need to stop reading Pratchett…
(“The Enchantment Emporium” is my choice, too.)
Kevin Stewart
October 13, 2010 @ 1:06 pm
Wow, I didn’t realize I’d get to pick. A Star Shall Fall sounds like the most interesting of the two, but I’m not picky when it comes to FREE. And honestly, I don’t have that much experience in the land of the fey unless you count that short trip Talia took in The Stepsister Scheme, so either introduction would be lovely.
Kevin Stewart
October 13, 2010 @ 1:08 pm
Oh, and I was thinking more along the lines of the great ball of fire and glowing object Christopher Columbus and his men witnessed when they neared the Bahammas in 1742.
Steve Buchheit
October 13, 2010 @ 2:41 pm
Well, there’s my favorite, “That’s exactly when the dinosaurs executed their attack against their mammalian deniers.”
I’m going for “A Star Shall Fall”, almost had my hands on a free copy except I was nice and didn’t trip the person who pushed past me to the table at Context.
sean
October 13, 2010 @ 7:32 pm
it follows the adventures of Sir Jay. aside having 6 distinct personalities he is the worlds greatest hero and he/they will have to pull together save the world…..just think a single hero, he will be his own sidekick/comic relief, advisor, coward, fighter and lover……..from the evil head butler bananathribble and some annoying firebreathing elephant named steve (yeah i went there michaelm and anita k…. 😉 )
sean
Max
October 13, 2010 @ 10:51 pm
“In the year 1987, NASA launched the last of America’s deep-space probes. Aboard this compact starship, a lone astronaut, Captain William ‘Buck’ Rogers, was to experience cosmic forces beyond all comprehension. In a freak mishap, his life-support systems were frozen by temperatures beyond imagination. Ranger III was blown out of its planned trajectory into an orbit one thousand times more vast –an orbit which was to return Buck Rogers to Earth FIVE HUNDRED YEARS LATER…”
If that wins, contact Glen A. Larson at Universal Pictures. I think. Hard to say where he might be these days.
Max
October 13, 2010 @ 10:56 pm
Oh, wait. I forgot the silliest part. Include disco roller-derby.
Kim
October 13, 2010 @ 10:57 pm
Bob’s had a rough day. As the produce manager at his local grocery store, he’s had to contend with nasty wilted lettuce, three large banana spiders, and an irate lady tossing a honeydew melon at his…well, his melon.
But all that changes when he’s called to aisle 3, where a demon named Manfred is dithering over pickles.
There was not a number of synopses limit…so here’s option 2:
Take whatever you have and add high heels and lip gloss. Ie, Conan the Barbarian meets Heidi Klum. Don’t hate. It could work. 😉
And just for kicks, option 3:
Add chocolate and cayenne pepper. Marilyn’s bakery, right under your characters’ apartment/abode, holds a gateway…to a septugenarian Norwegian farmer’s living room, circa 1961. Ole’s a sweet guy, bit hard of hearing and prone to thinking every other word is “lefse.” All he really wants to do is pass off Thor’s Hammer to the next carrier…and if you purchase one of Marilyn’s “Lightning Hot Chocolate Cupcakes,” you’re en route…
Cheers! Kim 🙂 (“A Star Shall Fall”)
zvi
October 13, 2010 @ 11:01 pm
Then it turns out the cat is a changling when it gives birth to a litter of intelligent, cannibalistic tree frogs, instead of a litter of kittens.
I’d be interested in the Marie Brennan book, if you pick me. 🙂
Jim C. Hines
October 14, 2010 @ 7:24 am
Actually, I think Anton Strout already wrote the grocery store demon story 🙂
Kim
October 14, 2010 @ 9:32 am
Oh dear! I had no idea. 🙁
Jim C. Hines
October 14, 2010 @ 9:35 am
Oh, it’s nothing to feel bad about! I was just amused that you came up with a scene I had actually read before.
Anton writes light, fun urban fantasy — worth checking out, if you like that sort of thing.
mattw
October 14, 2010 @ 12:02 pm
One of the side characters falls into a vat of radioacitive pudding and gains the ability to take on a liquidy, semi-gelatinous state, which he/she has kept as a secret for his/her life and later allows him/her to ooze through the bars of a cell that the group has been trapped in to free the group and save the day.
Chris
October 14, 2010 @ 12:08 pm
You should make it where at the end, everything that happened *may* have just been in the protangonist’s mind (or antagonist, or…) i.e. from schizo or some other factor. But you’re not sure… BUM BUM BUM. Oh, and end it with him eating a raspberry. Strawberries, apples, cherries…they have all had their perpetual limelight. But the raspberry? Never sees his day. I call it edible discrimination.
Ivana Broner
October 20, 2010 @ 10:53 am
There’s a unicorn that is an outsider because he is cursed. He is cursed because he once chose to help a human. The curse: Anytime he helps anyone (human or otherwise), he becomes more evil and his color becomes darker, starting with his horn working down the rest of his body. But he can’t help it, he always wants to help someone in need of help. So, by the end of the book, does he stop helping those in trouble, does he give in completely to the curse?
Anakin
October 20, 2010 @ 11:55 am
The heroes fall into an alternate dimension where everyone is *happy.* Through some twists and much confusion, they eventually discover the psions who are forcing everyone to be cheerful to power their inter-dimensional rift generator.
(I pick “A Star Shall Fall” if you think this is interesting.)
octopedingenue
October 20, 2010 @ 5:04 pm
There’s never a wrong moment for ballerina ducks. Or sheep performing opera.
I shall swing for “A Star Shall Fall,” please.
Andrew Zimmerman Jones
October 21, 2010 @ 3:47 pm
And as the entropic energy swept over the horizon, devouring the last of the Clown Empire, Bonzo looked imploringly out from the balcony of the palace.
“Knock, knock,” he said, the teardrop painted on his cheek quivering with emotion.
In response came only silence.
(Okay, well, it’s more of a closing scene than a synopsis plot twist, but you said you’re picking the winner randomly, so I guess it’ll be good enough.)
“The Enchantment Emporium” would be my choice.