Back to School Deals: The Mall Fairies series! (Why you should go direct to publishers)

 Get The Mall Fairies: Exile and my other Mall Fairies titles for 30% off through September 30th!

Here's one reason why I'm a hybrid author. My publisher, Muse It Up Publishing, is having a great Back to School Deal. What did I have to do? Write my Mall Fairies series as well as I could.

And The Mall Fairies: Exile, The Mall Fairies: War and the stand alone short story, A foodie Fairy's First Foray are not the only Middle Grade, Tween and YA reads you'll find for sale, there's lots more (and having read several, I can say these are often great reads for adults too!). 

The reason to go direct to publishers? Two reasons are here: you get an additional 30% off the eBook already discounted sale price and the authors get a bigger royalty percentage of the sales  (as the publisher doesn't have to pay vendors).

Here's the directions and links (or just click on my titles). Enjoy!

The Mall Fairies: Exile by Conda V. Douglas

Save 30% this month during our BACK TO SCHOOL Event

Use discount code MUSEITYOUNG2015 in your Muse cart, save, then finalize the order.

Perfect time to stock up your child’s eReader for the holiday season or begin your pre-holiday shopping before the hustle and bustle begins.

Special exclusive at MuseItUp Publishing $2.99 plus an additional 30% off with code
MUSEITYOUNG2015 until end of September

http://bit.ly/TheMallFairiesExile

A Character Interview from Black Cats and Ballet Slippers

Black Cats and Ballet Slippers, a Fun Middle Grade Supernatural Mystery!

Today we have Gemma Mayfield here from Black Cats and Ballet Slippers. Great to have you here, Gemma! Can you please tell the readers a little bit about yourself?

Gemma: Hi guys! Thanks for having me! Well, to start off with, I go to Middleton Middle School. My best friend Izzie and I do A LOT of dance. I love ballet! I wish I could dance everywhere I go. Now that I think about it, sometimes I do! Anyways, one thing that really stands out about me is that I’m SUPER tall. I’m taller than Trevor Davis, who I have a huge crush on. I also keep having bad hair days, which doesn’t help the situation. It’s hard to explain these things to my parents or my little sister. Only my cat, Mungo, seems to understand me. Or maybe he just doesn’t say stuff because he can’t talk.

What type of conflict are you up against in Black Cats and Ballet Slippers?

Gemma: Everyone who’s been to middle school knows that it’s pretty weird. I mean, boys are from Mars! They are so strange. But I think something REALLY weird is going on at Middleton. I think that my teacher, Ms. Pruett, is a witch! She’s been casting spells on people, including Trevor! I just don’t want anyone else to get hurt, and I think it’s up to me to figure out how to save our school.

Wow, that seems super scary! You do a really great job writing down all of your adventures in your diary. When did you get your first diary?

I just LOVE my diary! I used to think that diaries were for silly people. Izzie gave me my first diary for my birthday. Now I write in it all the time. If you don’t have a diary, you gotta get one! Just make sure that no one steals it from you when you’re in math class. If some of the stuff I wrote about got out… sheesh! Especially the stuff about Ms. Pruett and her witchy shenanigans. And then, of course, the List of Cutest Boys is in there, too. Now THAT would be embarrassing to pass around!

Do you have a goal that you have recently set for yourself?

Well, I’d really like to get along better with Demonica… er, Monica. She’s this girl at my school. She is pure EVIL, but I’m wondering if maybe I’m just not giving her a chance. Maybe she’s a nice person underneath it all! I think there’s truly a possibility for goodness in all of us. Argh. Who am I kidding? She really is a demon in disguise!

Okay, so here’s a fun question to wrap things up: Name five things right now that are in your backpack.

Yay! This is sort of a fun question. Let me take a quick look…

1.     A hair scrunchie. This is an absolute necessity! You never know when you are going to have a bad hair day and your hair looks like a broom. It’s best to just put it back in a ponytail.

2.     My math homework. I actually finished this in class yesterday. Math… so easy! But I don’t really like saying that out loud—it’s not good for the popularity status. Which I need to work on, by the way.

3.     An extra pair of ballet slippers. These could come in handy at any time.

4.     My Bubblegum Bliss lip gloss. It’s supposed to make your lips look more pouty. Unfortunately, Trevor never seems to notice.

5.     Aha! Mungo’s cat collar! Now how did THAT get in here? Weird.

Thanks again, Gemma, for visiting today. Hopefully Mungo will be happy to get his cat collar back. It’s been great getting to know a bit more about you!

Iva Valentino lives in Arizona with her husband and their dog, Lupo. She graduated from the University of Arizona with a Bachelor’s degree in Biology and a Master’s degree in Education. She loves living year-round in the warm desert.

Iva spent many years as a middle school teacher, where she enjoyed teaching her students all about science. She currently works as a science editor at an educational publishing company. She loves travel, yoga, and photography. There is nothing that brings her more happiness than a good dance class!

You can visit Iva at the following sites:

Website: www.ivavalentino.com

Blog: www.ivavalentino.com/blog

Facebook: www.facebook.com/ivaavalentino

Purchasing links for Black Cats and Ballet Slippers:

MuseItUp Publishing: https://museituppublishing.com/bookstore/index.php/now-available-in-ebook/black-cats-and-ballet-slippers-detail

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Black-Cats-Ballet-Slippers-Valentino-ebook/dp/B00ISW6BAA/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1410125518&sr=1-1&keywords=Black+Cats+and+Ballet+Slippers

Conda here. Thanks for being on my blog, Iva (and Gemma too). It was a delight to find out more about a character in Black Cats and Ballet Slippers. Readers, questions for Iva or Gemma?

  

 

In Honor of Tell A Fairy Tale Day today, a FREE book with Fairy Tales and Recipes!

FREE today and full of fun stories and recipes!

It's Tell A Fairy Tale Day! What better than The Mall Fairies Sweet Tooth Cookbook, full of tales of my Mall Fairies? And to give you a taste, here's a story and a recipe from the cookbook, with our heroine, Swoop. Enjoy!

SWOOP SAVES THE COOKIE LADY

Now, I don’t like humans. Overall, they’re not a good thing for fairies. Overall, they’re dangerous for fairies. Overall, they’re fatal for fairies. Yeah, sure, we fairies live in the attic of a shopping mall that is full of humans, but they don’t know we’re here. If they manage to spot us, they think we’re birds or, ugh, bats. And that includes the Cookie Lady. We sure know the Cookie Lady exists, though. Her store in the mall’s Food Court is our favorite. Or it was. A couple of weeks ago, a sign showed up in her window saying the Cookie Lady would close soon.

We fairies panicked. No more snickerdoodles (my favorite), chocolate toffee squares or even the chocolate peanut butter no-bake oatmeal cookies? Unthinkable. So I snuck into the air conditioning vent to spy. And while almost freezing to death, I discovered that the Cookie Lady’s sales had fallen way off. The stupid humans had gotten bored with her selection. Who could get bored with snickerdoodles?

At first, I believed we were doomed to be cookie-less forever more, but then when I spotted the Cookie Lady working on the her computer and leaving it up and running, I got a great idea. It took three hours of me surfing the Internet by jumping up and down on the keys (I’m only five and a half inches tall) but I found a great new recipe for the Cookie Lady to try. I added directions for a “cookie launch” and left the printout where she’d be sure to find it. She took the idea and added more new cookie selections including mine, and now all the fairies and humans are gaining weight from eating all her cookies. And the Cookie Lady’s store is saved!

Here’s the recipe I found:

 WALNUT SHORTBREAD

Ingredients:

1/2 cup walnuts                                    

1 cup white flour

1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, or baking margarine, room temperature, plus more for pan

1/2 cup chocolate bits (mini baking choc. bits work best, but any chocolate is great)

1/4 cup powdered sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

Preheat oven to 325. Pulse walnuts in grinder until finely ground. Transfer to bowl, add flour & stir thoroughly. Beat butter, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy, add flour mix and beat until combined. Stir in chocolate bits. Butter 8 inch round cake pan, place dough in pan, cover with plastic wrap and press until dough is spread evenly in pan. Cut with sharp knife into eight wedges, prick all over with fork. Bake until golden and firm in center, 30-35 minutes. Re-cut into wedges and prick again. Done!

VARIATIONS: This works well with other nuts, especially pecans. But cashews, Brazil nuts and macadamia nuts may be used. Be sure the nuts are unsalted and not roasted and check the shortbread often to make sure it's not getting overdone. May also substitute coconut oil for the butter.

If you've enjoyed this story, check out my 3 in 1 book bundle, The Mall Fairies and save a bundle on these two novels and stand alone short story!

And to my readers, what's your favorite shortbread recipe? Mine is the one above, as it's simple and easy, two of my favorites!

 

Three Reasons To Bundle Books For Author Success! (One you'll never think of until you do it!)

 The Mall Fairies Boxed Set

Tis the season, when authors are working maniacally hard to promote/sell their titles. One useful instrument is the eBook boxed set or bundle. Why? Read on.

1. You will expand your readership.

Because they love to read, readers are always looking for a bargain. Book bundles provide that bargain. For example, the book bundle above provides the first two novels in my Mall Fairies series, plus a stand alone short story, for an estimated 602 pages of reading, all for $1.99!

They are also looking to discover new authors with little risk. Bundles provide that, whether with a single author as above or with several other authors as in another bundle I'm in, Sirens on Death Starke Blvd. 

With five authors and four mysteries, and 825 pages for $1.99, why not?

Sirens on Death Starke Blvd.

I know this is all true because as a reader, I often buy bundles.

2. You will add to your brand.

Book bundles are one strong way of promoting your brand, especially when you have a one author (you) bundle. It's another way of having the readers find you. It sends out the message that you are not a one book wonder and can be trusted to provide more reads, always important to readers.

If you are in a bundle with other authors, your brand is strengthened by association with those authors' brands. For example in Sirens on Death Starke Blvd., it is obviously a mystery genre bundle, and if you like one book, you'll like another. It brands me as a mystery author.

3. And least thought of: Oddly enough, bundling my books led me to more story ideas! I never expected that. But seeing three of my Mall Fairies books together reminded me of what the whole series was about...and what the next could be about, or wait, here's an idea for another short story. Sometimes revisiting the prior work provides inspiration.

So dear readers, do you buy book bundles? If you're an author who has a book bundle out? If so, provide a link in the comments!