Spotlight: Bringing Book Covers to Life

Taken from the press release:

Random House Children’s Books (RHCB) and Transworld Publishers (TWP) have teamed up with
Aurasma, the world’s leading augmented reality platform, to bring bestselling authors Lauren Kate
and Sophie Kinsella’s book jackets to life.

When fans download a free app on their Smartphone then hold their device over the front cover of
the book, the jacket images will come to life. Special video messages from the author can also be
viewed by ‘scanning’ the author photos on the book jackets. The app, which works on iPhone and
Android Smartphones, as well as iPad 2 and iPod touch, uses Aurasma’s ‘virtual browser’ to
recognise trigger images through the phone’s camera, which then generate video content directly
onto the device’s screen.

Fans of Lauren Kate can download the FALLEN BOOKS app and bring the front cover of Fallen in Love
to life. The SOPHIE KINSELLA app will activate Sophie Kinsella’s new novel I've Got Your Number.

ABOUT AURASMA

Aurasma is the world’s first visual browser – a new augmented reality technology that merges the
physical world with the virtual. Available as a free app for iPhone 3GS, 4, 4S, iPad2 and high-powered
Android devices or as a free kernel for developers, Aurasma uses advanced image and pattern
recognition to recognise and understand real-world images and objects in much the same way as the
human brain does. It then seamlessly blends the real-world with rich interactive content such as videos
and animations called “Auras”. Auras can be created for printed images, product packaging, clothing,
physical places and users can even use the app to create and share their own.
Since its launch in June 2011, Aurasma has had more than three million downloads. Over 2,000 partners
in markets including retail, fashion, sport, automotive, consumer electronics, entertainment, advertising
and publishing are using the free technology in their campaigns, on their products or embedding the
technology in their own applications. Aurasma was developed by and is part of software company
Autonomy – an HP Company.

How cool is that.

Spotlight: Publishing Deals Revealed by Random House

I am totally excited for all of these books. How amazing all of them.

Keep a look out on UK BOOK TOURS for the Début Author Book Tours

Title: Starters

Series: Starters

Author: Lissa Price

Publisher: Doubleday Children's

Publication Date: 5 April 2012

Synopsis from Amazon

A gripping dystopian thriller by debut author, Lissa Price.

Screenwriter Lissa Price's STARTERS is the first in a futuristic thriller series featuring a society where youth is coveted at an impossible price, and one girls' ability to bring it all crumbling down.

Title: Struck

Series: I think so but am awaiting confirmation

Author: Jennifer Bosworth

Publisher: Doubleday Children's

Publication Date: 10 May 2012

Synopsis from Goodreads

Mia Price is a lightning addict. She’s survived countless strikes, but her craving to connect to the energy in storms endangers her life and the lives of those around her.

Los Angeles, where lightning rarely strikes, is one of the few places Mia feels safe from her addiction. But when an earthquake devastates the city, her haven is transformed into a minefield of chaos and danger. The beaches become massive tent cities, populated by millions of homeless. Downtown is a wasteland, where a traveling party moves to a different empty building each night, the attendees drawn to the destruction by a magnetic force they cannot deny. Two warring cults rise to power in the wake of the disaster, and both see Mia as the key to their opposing prophecies. They know she has a connection to the freak electrical storm that caused the quake, and to the worse storm that is yet to come.

Mia wants to trust the enigmatic and alluring Jeremy when he promises to protect her, but he’s hiding a more sinister truth. When the final disaster strikes, Mia must unleash the full horror of her strength to save them all.

Title: The Lost Girl

Series: Not confirmed

Author: Sangu Mandanna 

Publisher: Random House

Publication Date: Early 2013

Synopsis from Press Release

The Lost Girl publishes in early 2013 and centres around Eva, a feisty teen girl who technically has no true identity of her own. Eva is forced to abandon everything she's ever known and loved, finding herself torn between two worlds.

Title: ACID

Author: Emma Pass

Publisher: Random House

Publication Date: Early 2013

Synopsis from Goodreads

This action packed novel introduces us to Jenna Strong. A truly kiss ass heronie who is serving time in a all male prison for the murder of her parents. Set one hundred years in the future in a big brother society. Britain is now under control of ACID a terrifing all seeing police force.

I don't know about you but I have already added these to my wish-list, how on earth is my wish-list ever going to get smaller with all these fabulous books. 

For more great 2013 Débuts check out this fantastic blog THE LUCKY THIRTEENS which features Emma Pass, believe me your wish-list will explode.

Spotlight: Piccadilly Press Competition

Seriously you just cannot afford to miss this one.

Competition

Sign up to receive the Piccadilly newsletter 

between now and 4th December 

to be entered into the draw to:

 win every book 

we have published this year!

Go HERE

How completely awesome is that *dashes off to sign up*

Spotlight: Lauren Kate News that Makes Me SQUEEEE

You know how much I adore the Fallen series by Lauren Kate - well I do love, love, love it and cannot wait to find out what happens next. I literally squeed out loud when this news came through my inbox.

Title: Fallen in Love

Series: Fallen

Author: Lauren Kate

Publisher: Doubleday Children's

Publication Date: 2 Feb 2012

Synopsis from Amazon

Unexpected. Unrequited. Forbidden. Eternal. Everyone has their own love story.

And in a twist of fate, four extraordinary love stories combine over the course of a romantic Valentine's Day in Medieval England. Miles and Shelby find love where they least expect it. Roland learns a painful lesson about finding-and losing love. Arianne pays the price for a love so fierce it burns. And for the first -and last- time, Daniel and Luce will spend a night together like none other.

Lauren Kate's FALLEN IN LOVE is filled with love stories . . . the ones everyone has been waiting for.

True love never says goodbye . . .

Fallen in Love Chapters Amp WEB

Title: Rapture

Series: Fallen

Author: Lauren Kate

Publisher: Delacorte Press Books for Young Readers

Publication Date: 12 Jun 2012

Synopsis from Goodreads

The sky is dark with wings. . . .

In RAPTURE, the highly anticipated fourth and final novel in the FALLEN series, Luce and Daniel are together . . . but for how long? Can history be rewritten? Or are some punishments eternal?

Arghhhh with a synopsis like that how on earth can I be expected to wait until JUNE (needs book NOW)

Must Read: The Dark Divine: The Lost Letters of Brother Gabriel

Synopsis: From Amazon
A prodigal son. A dangerous love. Haunted yearning...Grace Divine, daughter of the local pastor, always knew something terrible happened the night Daniel Kalbi disappeared and her brother Jude came home covered in his own blood. Now that Daniel's returned, Grace must choose between her growing attraction to him and her loyalty to her brother. As Grace gets closer to Daniel, she learns the truth about that mysterious night and how to save the ones she loves, but it might cost her the one thing she cherishes most: her soul.

Review Here


For anyone that has read The Dark Divine they will now the importance of the letters from Brother Gabriel to his sister Catherine. They add beneficial information to the origins of the curse and valuable insight into the moral character of not only Brother Gabriel but Daniel as well.

So for all fans of The Dark Divine I urge you to read The Lost Letters - 5 in total scheduled every Thursday from 6th January to 3rd Feb:

Schedule:

Thurs, Jan 6th- First Letter hosted by Manga Maniacs Café

Thurs, Jan 13th- Second Letter hosted by Page Turners Blog

Thurs, Jan 20th- Third Letter hosted by Dark Faerie Tales

Thurs, Jan 27th- Fourth Letter hosted by The Story Siren

Thurs, Feb 3rd- Fifth Letter hosted at Bree Despain's Blog

I am now literally gnashing my teeth in anticipation of The Lost Saint.

Synopsis: From Amazon

True Love's First Kill ...Grace Divine made the ultimate sacrifice to cure the boy she loves - Daniel. She gave her soul to save him, but in the process she lost her beloved brother, Jude. Desperate to find Jude, Grace befriends Tal - a newcomer to town who promises that he can help her be a hero. But as the two grow closer, the wolf grows in Grace, and her relationship with Daniel begins to crumble. Unaware of the dark path she is walking, Grace becomes prideful in her new abilities - not realising that an old enemy has returned and a deadly trap is about to be sprung.

Saturday Spotlight: News/Trailers/Cover Love

So many things have being happening lately that I wanted to put on my blog so I thought I would do a random post and put it all in together.

Synopsis:
In Boys Don't Cry, bestselling author Malorie Blackman explores the uncharted territory of teenage fatherhood.
You’re waiting for the postman--he’s bringing your A level results. University, a career as a journalist--a glittering future lies ahead. But when the doorbell rings it’s your old girlfriend; and she’s carrying a baby. You’re fine to look after it, for an hour or two, while she does some shopping. Then she doesn’t come back and your future suddenly looks very different.
Malorie’s dramatic new novel will take you on a journey from tears to laughter and back again.

Malorie Blackmans My CriBaby – is the official iPhone App for her book Boys Don’t Cry. 
Available to purchase from the iTunes App Store.

My CriBaby is a virtual baby that lives inside your phone. You’ll need to look after him/her for a month, and the happier your baby is, the higher your score.
The app also contains a sneak preview of Boys Don’t Cry.
Features:
- Name your baby
- Choose a boy or girl
- 8 ways to interact with your baby: including feeding, playing, putting to sleep and changing dirty nappies. Gesture controls, too:
- tap the screen to burp your baby after a meal
- rock the phone to show baby how much you care
- Babysitter—take a well-earned break
- Post your scores to Facebook
- Read the first chapter of Malorie Blackman’s novel Boys Don’t Cry

Synopsis:
'The same questions whirl round and round in my head:
What does he want from me?
How could I have let this happen?
AM I GOING TO DIE?'
17-year-old Grace wakes up in a white room, with table, pens and paper - and no clue how she got there.
As Grace pours her tangled life onto the page, she is forced to remember everything she's tried to forget. There's falling hopelessly in love with the gorgeous Nat, and the unravelling of her relationship with her best friend Sal. But there's something missing. As hard as she's trying to remember, is there something she just can't see?
Grace must face the most important question of all. Why is she here?
A story of dangerous secrets, intense friendships and electrifying attraction.

UK cover reveals:

Synopsis:
Freak.
That's what they call seventeen-year-old Donna Underwood at Ironbridge High School. A horrific fey attack that killed her father when she was just a child left Donna branded with iron tattoos that cover her hands and arms - and magically enhanced strength, that she now does all she can to hide.
Now, after ten years of wishing for a normal life, Donna finally accepts her role in the centuries-old war against the darkest outcasts of Faerie - the dark elves. Aided by Xan, a gorgeous half-fey dropout, Donna must save her best friend's life - and that means betraying one of the world's greatest secrets and confronting the very thing that destroyed her family.

Synopsis:
A steamy Southern beauty makes one fatal mistake

Natalie Hargrove would kill to be her high school’s Palmetto Princess. But her boyfriend Mike King doesn’t share her dream and risks losing the honor of Palmetto Prince to Natalie’s nemesis, Justin Balmer. So she convinces Mike to help play a prank on Justin. . . one that goes terribly wrong. They tie him to the front of the church after a party—when they arrive the next morning, Justin is dead.
From blackmail to buried desire, dark secrets to darker deeds, Natalie unravels. She never should’ve messed with fate. Fate is the one thing more twisted than Natalie Hargrove.
Cruel Intentions meets Macbeth in this seductive, riveting tale of conscience and consequence.

I cant tell you how excited I am about all of these. *SWOON*