Lisa Manterfield

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July 17, 2020 - Lisa Manterfield Leave a Comment

Em’s Book Birthday = Presents for You

Today is the 3rd Book Birthday of THE SMALLEST THING!

When the book came out in 2017, I never imagined we’d be living our own version of the story. But here we are.

Regardless, I am celebrating. I have birthday gifts for YOU.

Three winners will each have a choice of prizes. Up for grabs are:

THE SMALLEST THING in your choice of format: signed paperback, ebook, or audiobook

OR

A STRANGE COMPANION in either signed paperback or ebook

To enter, all you have do is leave a comment below by July 31. I’ll draw three winners on August 1, 2020.

If you haven’t checked out my podcast yet, please do. Each week I share a chapter of THE SMALLEST THING, along with some behind the scenes tidbits on the history and inspiration behind the story, as well as what’s going on in our pandemic world.

You can listen to the latest episode below and find the entire season here or on your podcast app of choice.

Filed Under: Book Love, The Story Behind the Story Tagged With: A Strange Companion, fiction, giveaway, podcast, The Smallest Thing, young adult Leave a Comment

April 2, 2019 - Lisa Manterfield 2 Comments

Welcome to the Spring YA Scavenger Hunt

The Spring YASH is now over. Thank you to every who participated. Hope you discovered lots of great new books.

And now, time for some winners…

The winner of the giveaway for a signed copy of The Smallest Thing is:

Annie L.

And the Green Team Grand Prize winner is:

Becky L.

Becky will receive books for all the Green Team authors, including a signed copy of A Strange Companion.

Congratulations to all the winners.

Filed Under: Author Love, Book Love Tagged With: books, giveaway, YA, young adult 2 Comments

April 1, 2019 - Lisa Manterfield Leave a Comment

YA Scavenger Hunt Starts Tomorrow

The YA Scavenger Hunt starts tomorrow. I hope you’ll join me for the chance to win all the books shown below, and more!

I’ll also be giving away a signed copy of The Smallest Thing.

See you tomorrow!

Filed Under: Author Love, Book Love Tagged With: books, giveaway, prizes, YA, young adult Leave a Comment

October 1, 2018 - Lisa Manterfield Leave a Comment

Hunt for Your Next Great YA Read

The Young Adult Scavenger Hunt (YASH) starts tomorrow. Are you ready? This year 120 of your favorite YA authors will be offering copies of their books as prizes, along with top secret bonus material, such as deleted scenes, related short stories, cover reveals, and more.

I’m on the GOLD Team, where I’ll be giving away copies of The Smallest Thing and offering up the very first look at the cover and first chapter of my forthcoming book, Thicker Than Water. You definitely won’t want to miss this.

If you’ve never hunted before, you can find out more about it on the YASH website, or check back here October 2nd at 12pm for all the details and the first clue in the GOLD team hunt.

See you then!

Lisa

Filed Under: Author Love, Book Love, Cool Stuff for Book Nerds Tagged With: books, fiction, giveaway, Scavenger Hunt, YA, YASH, young adult Leave a Comment

July 9, 2018 - Lisa Manterfield Leave a Comment

A Tour of my Character Graveyard

A Tour of my Character Graveyard by Lisa Manterfield - lisamanterfield.com

The road to a finished book is littered with discarded characters. As subplots are cut and the main character’s story is streamlined, some characters no longer serve a purpose in the book and are bid farewell.

In an earlier version of A Strange Companion, Kat had a second brother. He was the Golden Child with the perfect family, who could do no wrong in Kat’s mother’s eyes. But he and his family didn’t serve the story, so they were cut and Jon inherited some of his former brother’s traits.

In another draft, Kat sought spiritual counsel from an elderly Chinese woman who had strange mystical powers and operated from a dusty old shop on a backstreet. She was a wonderful character, but I needed Kat to get more pragmatic advice and a bump back down to reality, and so Marjorie Gladstone took over the role.

One of my favorite characters, now residing in the character graveyard, is Victoria, Kat’s classmate and a potential rival for Owen’s affections, or so Kat believed. In fact, Victoria, with her huge purple glasses and plummy private school speech, was an innocent, completely oblivious to the effect she had on men. But after the “watch incident” and Kat and Owen’s break-up, Kat went to Owen’s dorm room to apologize, only to find Victoria sitting cross-legged on Owen’s bed, supposedly getting help with her chemistry homework. Although nothing ever transpired between Owen and Victoria, she raised the stakes for Kat, showing that Owen had other options if Kat didn’t get her act together.

Victoria was part of a storyline that would have thrown Kat and Owen together at a conference later in the book and forced them to decide if they had a future together. But alas, the conference would have taken Kat away from Mai and the main storyline of the book, and so it—and Victoria—bit the literary dust.

I do miss Victoria and many of the characters and scenes that didn’t make the cut. But I’ve kept all their scenes, and maybe they’ll make a comeback in another story. Who knows?

Filed Under: The Story Behind the Story Tagged With: A Strange Companion, Author, young adult Leave a Comment

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