December 1, 2011
Catching Jordan
2012 Goodreads Choice Nominee!
Read an excerpt from my YA romantic comedy, Catching Jordan. What girl doesn’t want to be surrounded by gorgeous jocks day in and day out? Jordan Woods isn’t just surrounded by hot guys, though – she leads them as the captain and quarterback on her high school football team. They all see her as one of the guys, and that’s just fine. As long as she gets her athletic scholarship to a powerhouse university. But now there’s a new guy in town who threatens her starring position on the team… and has her suddenly wishing to be seen as more than just a teammate.
In addition to STEALING PARKER and THINGS I CAN’T FORGET, there will be three more books in the Hundred Oaks series! Read the announcement here.
October 1, 2012
Read an excerpt from Stealing Parker, an LA Times Most Anticipated Books of Fall 2012 pick and a Junior Library Guild selection. Companion to Catching Jordan. This book is about a girl named Parker, who has a crush on the 23-year-old coach of the school baseball team. Parker goes to the same school as Jordan Woods and Sam Henry, so you *might* see some familiar faces in my second book. 
Parker Shelton pretty much has the perfect life. She’s on her way to becoming valedictorian at Hundred Oaks High, she’s made the all-star softball team, and she has plenty of friends. Then her mother’s scandal rocks their small town and suddenly no one will talk to her.
Now Parker wants a new life.
So she quits softball. Drops twenty pounds. And she figures why kiss one guy when she can kiss three? Or four. Why limit herself to high school boys when the majorly cute new baseball coach seems especially flirty?
But how far is too far before she loses herself completely?
March 1, 2013
Read an excerpt from THINGS I CAN’T FORGET, coming in March 2013. Companion to Catching Jordan and Stealing Parker.
Kate has always been the good girl. Too good, according to some people at school—although they have no idea the guilty secret she carries. But this summer, everything is different…
This summer she’s a counselor at Cumberland Creek summer camp, and she wants to put the past behind her. This summer Matt is back as a counselor too. He’s the first guy she ever kissed, and he’s gone from a geeky songwriter who loved The Hardy Boys to a buff lifeguard who loves to flirt…with her.
Kate used to think the world was black and white, right and wrong. Turns out, life isn’t that easy…
This book features many characters from Catching Jordan and Stealing Parker, and Parker herself is one of the main characters! Also, you’ll get to learn more about Jordan’s college plans.
December 3, 2013
Read an excerpt from RACING SAVANNAH, coming December 3, 2013!
A contemporary romance set at Hundred Oaks High in Tennessee, this book is about an underprivileged girl training to be a horse jockey at a high stakes horse farm while dealing with her on-again/off-again relationship with the farm owner’s son.
You’ll get to catch up with characters from my first three books… and there might even be a wedding.
EDITOR OF THE DEAR TEEN ME ANTHOLOGY
Dear Teen Me
(October 30, 2012)
Dear Teen Me includes advice from over 70 YA authors (including Lauren Oliver, Ellen Hopkins, and Nancy Holder, to name a few) to their teenage selves. The letters cover a wide range of topics, including physical abuse, body issues, bullying, friendship, love, and enough insecurities to fill an auditorium. So pick a page, and find out which of your favorite authors had a really bad first kiss? Who found true love at 18? Who wishes he’d had more fun in high school instead of studying so hard? Some authors write diary entries, some write letters, and a few graphic novelists turn their stories into visual art. And whether you hang out with the theater kids, the band geeks, the bad boys, the loners, the class presidents, the delinquents, the jocks, or the nerds, you’ll find friends–and a lot of familiar faces–in the course of Dear Teen Me.
Random Thoughts and Resources for Writing
I often get emails about queries and writing, and while I try to answer all of them, here are some of my general thoughts on writing and the industry:
Writing is hard, hard work. It takes a lot of time and practice to write a book. Trust me, I’ve practiced my ass off. 
My editing process is this: Write something, have people read it, make edits based on what people say. I stay true to myself, but seriously consider everything I’m told. If I disagree, I don’t take the suggestion. If I do agree, I implement it. I find that I write well-rounded books that way.
Some of my influences and favorite books are listed here.
Some books that’ve helped me learn to write are:
Randomness
- Read my original query letter at Guide to Literary Agents
- Think your First Draft Sucks? Don’t Quit! Read this First
- The First Draft vs. the Final Manuscript of STEALING PARKER
- The Importance of Being Ridiculous When Writing YA
- My Thoughts About Sex in YA
- Interview with my Agent, Sara Megibow
- How My Books are Born
- Writing Can Be Very, Very Lonely
- What’s in a Title?
- Read about The Continuing Evolution of My Writing Abilities (or lack thereof)
- Don’t Give Up on Writing!
