Lisa Manterfield

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September 3, 2019 - Lisa Manterfield Leave a Comment

The Smallest Thing Audio Tour

The new audiobook of The Smallest Thing is heading out on tour next week!

From September 12-18, you can follow Em as she visits audiobook bloggers and reviewers. I’ll be doing interviews and Q&As, as well as sharing some Top Ten lists. some of the bloggers will be sharing their reviews of The Smallest Thing.

Here are all the stops Em and I will be making:

Sep. 12th:
Valerie Ullmer | Romance Author (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Author Interview, Giveaway)
Viviana MacKade (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Author Interview, Top 10 List, Giveaway)

Sep. 13th:
Locks, Hooks and Books (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Giveaway)
The Book Junkie Reads . . . (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Giveaway)
Turning Another Page (Review, Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Author Interview, Giveaway)

Sep. 14th:
Country Road Reviews (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Giveaway)
All the Ups and Downs (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Author Interview, Giveaway)

Sep. 15th:
Jazzy Book Reviews (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Top 10 List, Giveaway)
Nesie’s Place (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Author Interview, Giveaway)

Sep. 16th:
Reading A Page Turner (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Giveaway)
Dab of Darkness Book Reviews (Review, Giveaway)
Eileen Troemel (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Author Interview, Top 10 List, Giveaway)

Sep. 17th:
Smada’s Book Smack (Review, Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Giveaway)
Nyx Blogs (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Top 10 List, Giveaway)
Always Love Me Some Books (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Giveaway)

Sep. 18th:
My Creatively Random Life (Review, Spotlight + Audio Excerpt, Giveaway)
KayBee’s Bookshelf, A Literary Blog (Spotlight + Audio Excerpt)
The World As I See It (Review, Top 10 List, Giveaway)

As the tour progresses, I’ll be updating these links so you find each blogger’s post. I do hope you’ll join me; it’s going to be a lot of fun.

You can find out more about the tour—and sign up to be a host stop—at the Audiobookworm Promotions website.

Filed Under: Book Love, Cool Stuff for Book Nerds Tagged With: audiobook, audiobookworm, blog tour, book review, fiction, The Smallest Thing, YA Leave a Comment

July 11, 2019 - Lisa Manterfield Leave a Comment

Fave Read: Grace After Henry by Eithne Shortall

If you’ve read (or heard me talk about) my first novel A Strange Companion, you’ll know I do love a good grief story. I have a bit of an obsession with grief, mostly because it’s such a complex topic, and yet so universal, and I’m always interested to read the point-of-view of others. Grace After Henry, a story about the aftermath of loss, examines the question of whether a lost love one can ever be replaced.

After the sudden death of her partner, Henry, Grace is trying figure out how to go on with the life they had planned together. She’s struggling along, when Henry’s long-lost twin brother turns up on her doorstep looking at lot like a good replacement for the man she’s lost. Suddenly, “Henry” is back in her life, and Grace is pulled into the way things were…until she realizes that things aren’t the same at all, and that she’s hiding from her grief in a make-believe world. 

Why I Loved It 

I enjoy a book that gets real about grief, without sliding into the maudlin. Bonus points if it captures the humor that so often accompanies grief. Set in Dublin and capturing that wicked Irish sense-of-humor, Grace After Henry is a funny, poignant, and very real look at life after loss. It doesn’t linger on the sadness, but focuses instead on the way the mind works when grieving, and the stories we tell ourselves in order to cope with loss. 

What I Learned as a Writer 

While story is key, what really brings the world of a book to life is the cast of supporting characters. I looked forward to scenes with Grace’s outrageous parents, her no-nonsense BFF, and her cadre of fellow mourners at the city cemetery.

Read This Book If… 

You enjoy a wry sense of humor (think Derry Girls, but further south) and stories populated by colorful, quirky characters.

My Rating:

Filed Under: Author Love, Book Love, Love, Loss, and Grief Tagged With: book review, Eithne Shortall, Grace After Henry, grief, Irish Fiction, loss, reading, writing Leave a Comment

June 6, 2019 - Lisa Manterfield Leave a Comment

Fave Reads: All the Missing Girls by Megan Miranda

I love the kind of book that immediately makes me want to read it again to see all the hints and little stitches I missed the first time. This was the case when I finished All the Missing Girls, Megan Miranda’s clever, twisty psychological thriller about small town secrets and unreliable memories.

Nicolette Farrell is fored to return to her home town of Cooley Ridge a decade after she left. Her father’s health is declining fast and Nic and her brother have some decisions to make about his future. Nic left behind a lot of memories in Cooley Ridge, along with the man she thought she’d marry, and the mystery of what happened to her best friend Corinne, who disappeared one night and was never found. But days after her arrival in Cooley Ridge, another girl goes missing, and Nic must relive her nightmare all over again. 

As she tries to unravel what happened to the missing girl, secrets about her family, her friends, and her former love emerge. As Nic begins to see the events surrounding Corinne’s disappearance through fresh eyes, she soon realizes she, and the residents of Cooley Ridge, know more about that night than she first acknowledged. Corinne’s killer might be closer to Nic than she knew.

Why I Loved It 

All the Missing Girls is a great psychological thriller with a wicked twist. What makes this book stand out is that the story is told in reverse, beginning fifteen days after Nic’s arrival, backtracking one day at a time, and coming full circle to solve the puzzle. 

This structure makes for some mind-bending reading as the reader gets the clues in reverse order, while the main character is days ahead.  As I was busy gathering clues along with Nic, I had to remember to reorder them in my mind, and then review them again through the filter of new information. Add to that a great twist at the end and you’ve got a wholly satisfying read and a fascinating re-read

What I Learned as a Writer 

This would have been a totally different book if told in chronological order. It’s a simple story, with some good twists, but Megan Miranda’s decision to tell it backwards leaves readers guessing to the very end. Giving the characters more information than the reader heightened the level of suspense from fun to riveting. 

Read This Book If… 

…you love, dark, twisty psychological thrillers with interesting structures. This one will keep you turning the pages.

My Rating: 

Filed Under: Book Love Tagged With: book review, favorite books, fiction, Megan Miranda, psychological suspense, reading, writing Leave a Comment

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