Meet #TeamDarkSide: Jeyn Roberts

I'm so happy to be part of Pitch Madness again this year. Over the next week I'll be introducing you to my team so you can find out a bit more about us!


First is my co-host Jeyn Roberts. Jeyn has been an amazing friend to me for several years. We met on a writing site called Inkpop (that was bought out by Figment). We clicked, stayed in touch - despite living on opposite sides of the world. Her stories, Dark Inside and Rage within scared the beejeebus out of me, in a good way. And now I get to read her work before it hits the bookstore shelves (or the eBook website). 


So here's Jeyn!

Tell the Pitch Madness hopefuls a bit about yourself.  

I’m Jeyn Roberts. I’m the author of the Dark Inside series and The Bodies We Wear. I’m signed by the Greenhouse Literary Agency. The lovely Sarah Davies is my agent. When I’m not writing, I’m usually travelling. I spend a lot of time hiking with my puppy, Livy, or chilling on the couch with my cat, Hera.

What do you write? 

I write YA horror and mystery. I’m also working on my first adult horror and a screenplay.

Where do you get your inspiration from? 

Everywhere. I spend a lot of time just thinking about stuff. My favorite ‘thought’ places include the couch, hiking in the woods and long drives.

What are you currently reading? 

Revival by Stephen King. Joss Whedon’s autobiography. Full Tilt by Neal Shusterman. And I just finished The Falconer by Elizabeth May.

Describe your perfect read? 

Exciting. Scary. Characters that make me melt. If I can find a book that can make me laugh out loud or break down crying, I know I’ve found a good one.

What are you waiting for someone to write that hasn't been written yet? 

A book that scares me to the point I have to put it down.

Pitch Madness is all about connecting writers with agents by finding gems in the slush - what stories are you hoping to see? 

Anything horror. Western with a female protagonist. Street kids and runaways. A good old fashioned Nancy Drew type mystery. Survival story that’s not dystopian (think plane crash or lost in the woods). Ghost stories that are based in mythology. Subculture stories (think Skateboarding, punks, goth, etc)

If you could have dinner with three authors, who would they be? 

Stephen King. J K Rowling. Douglas Coupland.

What book do you wish you had written? 

The Stand by Stephen King.

What's your favourite movie adaption of a book? 

What’s Eating Gilbert Grape.

What 2015 release are you anticipating the most? 

We All Looked Up by Tommy Wallach

Rapid Fire Questions:

Yellow, Purple, Green? Green
Kombi, Porsche, Bike? Porsche
Marshmallow, Liquorice, Cupcake? Marshmallow
Unicorn, Gremlin or Cat? Aren’t all cats, gremlins? But are all gremlins, cats?

You can find Jeyn here and here and here. If you want to thank Jeyn for devoting her time to this contest then you can check out her books. 

Pitch Madness SORRY! Edition

Pitch Madness 2015 SORRY! Edition

 The Pitch Madness submission window will be open for 72 hours starting on February 20! Pitch Madness is a contest to win a request from one or more of the participating agents. I will have an agent introduction post up soon. 

The submission window will be open from 12:01 AM EST on February 20 until 11:59PM EST on February 23. You should have plenty of time to get your submissions in. 

There is no limit of how many entries will be accepted. All entries sent before or after the allotted times will be deleted. Make sure to perfect your entry. If you make an error, you may not resend. 

There will be 60 finalists moving onto the agent round. Pitch Madness will accept Middle Grade, Young Adult, New Adult, and Adult (never before published) fiction only, novel length (no novellas) completed and polished manuscripts only. All genres (i.e. fantasy, contemporary, sci-fi, and so on) are welcome to enter. This time around we will not accept non-fiction. Only one entry per writer. 

What do you need to enter? A 35-word (max) pitch and the first 250 words of your finished manuscript. If the 250th word falls in the middle of a sentence, go to the end of the sentence. I will post formatting instructions and where to send when the submission window opens. 

Pitch Madness will be on four blogs and each blog host will have a co-host helping them choose their top 15 entries. We’ll have a team of first readers who will check for formatting, grammar, and content and put their top picks through to the hosts. 

All the twitter fun will happen on the hashtag #PitchMadness!  
Introducing Round 1 Readers in alphabetical order by last name (because we love them  all equally) ...

  

Sarah L. Blair Website | Twitter  

 

K.T. Hanna Website | Twitter  

 

L.L. McKinney Website | Twitter  

 

Jami Nord Website | Twitter      

To help us choose the best pitches for the market, we have our Market Insider finding pitches that will appeal to agents ...

 

Lady Lioness, Assistant to a fabulous Literary Agent

Website | Twitter   

And choosing in the final rounds are your hosts and their teams ...  

________________________________________________________________

 

The Red Team 

On Brenda Drake's blog with Kimberly P. Chase ...  

 

Brenda Kimberly Twitter Twitter | Website   

Their support readers ... 

 

Naomi Hughes Twitter | Website 

 

Fiona McLaren Twitter | Website  

________________________________________________________________

 
The Green Team 

On Summer Heacock's blog with Dannie Morin ...  

 

Summer Dannie Twitter Twitter | Website

Their support readers ...

 

Rae Chang Twitter | Website

 

Stephanie J. Scott Twitter | Website  

________________________________________________________________

 

The Yellow Team (aka Team Dark Side) ... 

On Sharon Johnston's blog with Jeyn Roberts ...  

 

Sharon Jeyn Twitter Twitter | Website   

Their support readers ...

 

Lauren K. McKellar Twitter | Website

 

Meagan 

________________________________________________________________

 

The Blue Team

On Rebecca Weston's blog with Marieke Nijkamp ...

 

Rebecca Marieke Twitter Twitter | Website 

They'll be on their own in the slush scouring for the best of the best.  

Here’s the schedule …

• Agent Introduction on February 12
• Rules of the Game on February 13
• Submission window opens February 20 and will be open for 72 hours
• The top 60 picks for the agent round will go up on the blogs on March 2 at 12:01AM EST (NY time)
• March 4 at 12PM EDT (Noon) the agents requests are revealed, and right afterward is the tying agents challenge round
• There will be a #PitMad Twitter Pitch Party on March 11 from 8AM to 8PM EST. Check here for rules of the Twitter Pitch Contest.

Don't forget to come back for the instructions and to meet the agents!

New Release: Fractured Immortal by E.L. Wicker

 

The first in a new series aimed at New Adults, Fractured Immortal is the tale of Ilia Rose, a vampire and a tortured soul and Nathaniel Dayton, a vampire with secrets that will force them together. For a chance to win a digital copy of Fractured Immortal see the end of this post.

After a terrifying vampire attack in 1810, Ilia Rose spends the next two centuries hunting Sol, the man responsible for turning her and her friends into vampires.When Ilia discovers he’s run to the one place she’s running from, she’s forced to face her most painful memories back in her hometown, Bearwood. There, Ilia finds herself face to face with Nathaniel, an insanely hot vampire, and despite the evidence he’s working for her enemy, Ilia can’t fight her attraction to him, especially when he seems to show up whenever she needs him most. But Nathaniel is keeping secrets and as they begin to unravel, instead of running away from him, Ilia finds herself falling for him. When his last secret is revealed Ilia’s past comes together in a way she never imagined and she’s left with only one option: trust Nathaniel to help her kill Sol, or risk relinquishing her new found strength thus causing catastrophic and devastating consequences for her and everyone she loves. Ilia begins a gut-wrenching battle to save her life and the lives of her friends, a battle which not everyone will survive. A vampire tale like none other, love, pain, devastation and revenge, all weave together to create the first in a dark and unmissable new adult series.

E.L. Wicker lives in England with her husband and two children. A connoisseur of not having the foggiest about anything and an intrepid dreamer, writing became the obvious choice. After ditching a pursuit of a professional career in psychology, E.L. Wicker chose to immerse herself in her own little world where bullying characters vie for attention, demanding she put them on a page. So she did.

Connect with E.L. Wicker on her Blog or Facebook or Twitter.

Enter here to win a digital copy of Fractured Immortal. Open to everyone and running from 21st December 2014 to 7th January 2015

Cover Reveal: Eleven Weeks by Lauren K. McKellar

Eleven Weeks (Crazy in Love #2)

by Lauren K. McKellar

Release Date: 01/2015

Summary from Goodreads:

Excerpt

I wake to the sound of a drill-saw attempting to channel through a concrete pylon right next to my head.

“Why?” I grunt. Only it sounds more like “uggghhh”, even to my ears. Apparently being woken by drill-saw seriously impedes my ability to form words. I reach my hand out and slam something in front of me, presumably the drill-saw, most likely a clock radio. Regardless, the action makes the noise stop, thank hell.

Ugh. While the blast of noise has stopped, there’s still a ringing in my head of dizzy-making proportions. Not to mention that my tongue tastes like I’ve been eating road-kill. Yuck.

I squint one eye open and then scrunch my lid shut immediately as protection from the harsh yellow light coming in through the window framed by black-flowered curtains. What fresh hell is this? Who has opened my—

Shit.

I don’t have black-flowered curtains.

I inch open my lid at snail’s pace, this time preparing myself for the assault of light from the left of the room. Yep. Black floral curtains still there.

I open my eyes wider and take in more of the room in front of me. Aside from the window, there’s a black bedside table with a digital clock on the top of it, right next to a red lamp. The floor is covered in a shaggy-looking cream carpet, a black skirt and red lacy bra lying on top of it.

Oh, no. Please, please no …

I slowly raise the white sheet from my body. Yep, exactly as I’d suspected.

My black skirt and red bra.

This, of course, leaves only one question. But do I really want to look? Can I?

I rack my brain, trying to put together the pieces of the night before. There was the party at Joe’s. I’d gone there with Kate, because Dave and the band were playing. Michael. I saw Michael. Tequila. Lots of tequila.

I glanced down at my hand. Seven little lipstick lines mar its surface. One for each shot. At least I can remember that.

But how the hell did I get here? And, more importantly, where is here?

Books in this series:

(Cover links to Goodreads)

Praise for The Problem With Crazy

“Heartbreaking, life-affirming—one of my all-time favourites.” Glass Paper Ink Book Blog

“This story is beautiful, heartbreaking and will leave you thinking about it for days to follow.” A.K.A. The Book Harlots Review

The Problem With Heartache will be released in February, 2015, and is the conclusion to Kate’s story.

About the Author

Lauren K. McKellar is a writer and editor of fact and fiction.

For more information on her editing services, click here.

For more information on her YA Contemporary (Escape Publishing, Harlequin Australia) Finding Home, or her NA Contemporary The Problem With Crazy, please click on the appropriate links.

In her spare time, she likes long walks on the beach with her puppies and drinking delicious cocktails prepared by her bar-owning husband.

Author Links:
  

WIN

To celebrate the cover for Eleven Weeks, enter the competition today to win one of three $10AUD Amazon gift cards.

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