WHERE ARE WE?

Hi Swoonies!!
We have been crazy MIA, right? Not that we think you’re in constant-refresh mode (it’s not a One Direction fanpage after all, AMIRITE, PQ?) but we don’t mean to neglect this site. Cookie?

But as we all know, life is crazy. And with kids and work and writing we find ourselves sitting down to post and then think WAIT, DID I SERIOUSLY JUST PROMISE MY CHILD I’D MAKE 322 CUPCAKES BY TOMORROW?? *drinks*

BUT HEY, we got our #engagementphotos:

it’s us! hiiiiii.

And since we have you here, it’s time for the Goodreads Choice Awards! Have you voted? WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? Love an author? Love a book? Then vote! It’s an amazing way to be heard and support the stories and storytellers we all adore. So please, VOTE! (Love something that’s not listed on the official ballot? You can write it in! BOOM. DONE.)

We promise some epic posts soon. Also, we have a whole bunch of interviews we need to get moving, have an adorable Swoony Rec from Lo’s Smister, and all kinds of smutty swoony pics, so we’ll be doing more of those soon.

WE NEVER STOPPED LOVING YOU.

Comic Con 2012!

It’s time for our annual Comic Con wrap-up! aka why Lo and Christina are exhausted and totally scatterbrained this week.

First – and most importantly – we got to squeeze each other…

us.

Next,  Hall H.

To Coauthor or Not, aka Lo and Christina are Nuts

There’s one question we get waaaay more than any other: Why do you write together? Well of course there are the obvious benefits: two people to write, revise, research, blog, read, flail, post to tumblr, tweet etc etc. There’s the fact that writing is a stressful and lonely lonely business, and that going through it with someone else makes it not only easier, but fun. BUT it’s about way more than that. Lo and I aren’t just coauthors, we’re besties!

Better Than Pie

Happy Thanksgiving Week, Swoonies!

You have no idea how thankful we are for every single one of you. So for you, some sweet swoon…

Swoony Boy Alert!! Peeta Mellark (The Hunger Games)

Welcome Back!! It’s time for another Swoony Boy Alert!

So it’s been a little crazy around here. For those of you that missed this post, WE GOT AN AGENT!!! *hands you a sparkly party hat* And to put it mildly, we are… a little excited. OK, we’re THRILLED. Like running around screaming and kissing strangers thrilled (only a few protested). And as you might have guessed, it’s thrown our scheduling off a bit but NEVER FEAR, we’re back to our A-game and ready to share the swoon.

This weeks swoony boy was supposed to be Étienne St. Clair, because he is lovely and delicious and pronounces her name Ah-na. BUT BUT BUT…THEN. I. SAW. THIS.

Swoony Boy Alert!! Noah Shaw (The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer)

Welcome Back!!! It’s time for another Swoony Boy Alert!!

CAN I TELL YOU HOW MUCH I LOVE THESE POSTS?? I love reading your comments and tweets, and it’s so fun to be goofy and swoon right along with you. You’re all lovely and awesome and smart and I just ADORE you. Meep, sorry. Got a little nuts carried away there. Not everyone’s a hugger. Let me just fix your hair…

Read More »

Swoony Boy Alert!! Adam Kent (Shatter Me)

Welcome Back!!! It’s time for another Swoony Boy Alert!!

YES

We’ve had so much fun with these posts, and want to thank each and every one of you for the emails, comments and tweets about your favorite swoony boys. We love to hear what you have to say and adore talking to all of you about books, writing, life and of course, swoon.

For the newcomers: What are Swoony Boy alerts, you ask? SBA’s are random posts in which we, and you, YES YOU, awesome reader, gather around a cup of tea/coffee/latte/sparkly pink drink to talk about our favorite male characters in fiction. They can be old favorites *cough*Mr. Darcy*cough* or new boys we’re meeting for the first time. Coming soon, the SBA’s will be joined by the Basass Chick On Boards (BCoB), posts spotlighting the most kick-ass girls in the YAdom.

BUT BUT BUT you guys? The time has come for us to talk about ADAM! *the world faints*

In June, Lo told you all about the A-M-A-Z-I-N-G Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi. And while compiling our list of Swoony Boys, we kept squealing over coming back to one boy in particular: Adam (zomgswoonsflailsfaintsTATTOOS!) Kent. And stg, if there’s one fictional boy worthy of the title Swoony Boy, it’s Adam Kent.

Possess by Gretchen McNeil

From the summary: Fifteen-year-old Bridget Liu just wants to be left alone: by her mom, by the cute son of a local police sergeant, and by the eerie voices she can suddenly and inexplicably hear. Unfortunately for Bridget, it turns out the voices are demons – and Bridget has the rare ability to banish them back to whatever hell they came from. 

Terrified to tell people about her new power, Bridget confides in a local priest who enlists her help in increasingly dangerous cases of demonic possession. But just as she is starting to come to terms with her new power, Bridget receives a startling message from one of the demons. Now Bridget must unlock the secret to the demons’ plan before someone close to her winds up dead – or worse, the human vessel of a demon king.

Christina:  So let me start out by saying that this book scared the hell out of me. But in a totally awesome creeptastic way.

**Warning: Spoilers and creepy giffage ahead.**

Bridget attends St. Michael’s, a Catholic school in San Francisco.  Since the gruesome death of her dad a year ago, she’s heard voices – demon voices – and has been learning how to send them back to wherever it is they came from.

This book had everything: creep factor, mystery, humor, and of course, a touch of romance. We’ll get back to the romance later because Matt Quinn = sweet adorable swoony boy.

Bridget is snarky and awesome (a bit sarcastic at times but very realistic for a 15-year-old), and a total badass in the making. Though she starts out harboring some resentment toward her new-found abilities, it was really fun watching her character evolve and kick some demon king ass.

Matt Quinn is just… sigh. He’s sweet and adorable and always watching out for Bridge and her entire family. I mean COME ON, he plays baseball with her little brother just to help him fit in. And of course, first kiss swoons:

When his lips touched hers, she was afraid to move. She’d never kissed a guy before and she was terrified that she’d do it wrong. But Matt’s lips were surprisingly soft, his touch light and calm. And when he finally broke away from her, he looked nervous, as if he’d been afraid he would break her.

Awwwwwwww.

Swoony Boy Alert!

Today is all about our favorite swoony boys in fiction.

Take notes, boys.

We all have a favorite (or two, or three…). You know the one, that boy that makes your heart beat faster, the one you catch yourself thinking about long after the book is closed… um you all do that, too, right?

:::awkward pause:::

He’s the fictional boy who’s stolen your heart, the one you compare ALL other male characters to, and when confronted with a love triangle you find yourself yelling NO NO NO FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT’S HOLY PICK HIM! PICK HIMMM!

Yeah, that one. So we set out to write a single post on our favorite male characters in fiction. And because reading is so much more fun when you can swoon with your friends, we asked a couple of them to give us their thoughts, too. The problem was, nobody could sum it up in a few lines.

So, rather than cut the swoon, we decided to make this a reoccurring post. Each week or so we’ll showcase a new swoony boy – some will be from old favorites (well hello, Colonel Brandon), and some from books we’ve yet to discover. WIN/WIN.

Aaand here we go…

Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion

From the book jacket: R is a young man with an existential crisis–he is a zombie. He shuffles through an America destroyed by war, social collapse, and the mindless hunger of his undead comrades, but he craves something more than blood and brains. He can speak just a few grunted syllables, but his inner life is deep, full of wonder and longing. He has no memories, no identity, and no pulse, but he has dreams.

After experiencing a teenage boy’s memories while consuming his brain, R makes an unexpected choice that begins a tense, awkward, and strangely sweet relationship with the victim’s human girlfriend. Julie is a blast of color in the otherwise dreary and gray landscape that surrounds R. His decision to protect her will transform not only R, but his fellow Dead, and perhaps their whole lifeless world.

Scary, funny, and surprisingly poignant, Warm Bodies is about being alive, being dead, and the blurry line in between.

From christina:

I was hesitant to read this one. The main protagonist is a zombie? And wait, I’ll love him? Really? Pfft. Aren’t we supposed to like, chase them with baseball bats and stuff? But because my friends are pushy persistent,  I gave it a go, and THANK GOD because within the first few pages, I knew this was something special.