Taste of Kiwi

Fellow New Zealander and friend Amanda Ashby has produced a delightful trailer for her book Zombie Queen of Newbury High. It’s a great book – I enjoyed it very much and chuckled my way through Mia’s adventures, so if you enjoy Young Adult stories or have a daughter who enjoys reading, this is the book for you.

And speaking of Amanda, have you grabbed your free downloadable bookmark yet? Get your free bookmarks here.

In book news I’ve sold my third book to Samhain Publishing. Seeking Kokopelli is a paranormal m/m story and is scheduled to come out in July 2010.

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Bumpy – that just about sums up the entire plane trip from Auckland to San Francisco. We flew through quite a bit of the storm front bearing down on New Zealand. That teaches us for smugly saying we’d miss the incoming weather front. Oh, and long. Thirteen hours on a bumpy plane is a long time.

We finally managed to catch up with Amanda Ashby and Sara Hantz, along with Ellie Huse and Vanessa from Australia. I also ran into Nalini Singh at both the airport and the hotel. I think I’ve seen more Kiwi writers in the last day than I’ve seen for months. I really need to get to some of the chapter meetings at home. Mr. Munro arranged for a limo from the airport. Here’s the photo of us all waiting to pile inside.

From left to right: Me, Sara Hantz, Amanda Ashby, Ellie Huse and Vanessa.

Each time I visit America my first visit to the restroom is always traumatic. Toilets flush differently over here and when all that water gushes into the bowl I worry it mightn’t stop. Ours don’t do that in New Zealand.

Another difference is the dairy creamer. We don’t have this horrid white powder in New Zealand. We have these tiny milk pottles or the hotel/motel usually provide real milk. Ugh, I’d forgotten about creamer and the fact I’d have to use it for the next six weeks.

I attended the Kiss of Death AGM and had the pleasure of listening to guest speaker, Allison Brennan. She gave every attendee two of her recent releases. I enjoy Allison’s books and loved her inspirational talk on writing.

Well, that’s me for tonight. I’ll try to post this tomorrow, but meantime my eyes are really tired. I’m going to catch some sleep.

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I don’t know much about Zombies and have had little to do with them. (Probably a good thing!) I’ve read about them in the Laurel K Hamilton’s Anita Blake series and know they’re popular in teen fiction. Today I decided to learn about Zombies. This is what I discovered.

1. A zombie is a reanimated human corpse. They are among the lower forms of the undead, and often appear in large numbers.

2. According to the tenets of Voodoo, a dead person can be revived by a bokor or Voodoo sorcerer. Zombies remain under the control of the bokor since they have no will of their own.

3. Zombies became a popular device in modern horror fiction after the success of George A. Romero’s 1968 film Night of the Living Dead.
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My guest today is Amanda Ashby. Amanda lives in New Zealand, or rather she’s just returned to New Zealand from the UK, and we’re happy to claim her back. You Had Me At Halo is Amanda’s first book. It’s a funny paranormal with a unique slant and has garnered great reviews, including a nomination for the RT Reviewer’s Choice award in the contemporary paranormal romance category. It had me grinning. Amanda is currently immersed in the world of zombies as she works on a young adult novel. She has an interesting life.

CONTEST: see the details below to enter. We’ll draw the winner’s name on Thursday so don’t forget to check back in the comments section to see if you’re the winner.

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