Your Tu Books holiday book-buying guide

Hanukkah is in full swing, and Christmas is right around the corner. Thinking about getting a book for that teen or kid in your life? Or for the adult YA reader in your life (you are welcome in this no-judgement zone; we love YA too!). Don’t forget to include Tu Books in those plans! Here are a few examples of people you’re looking to find a gift for.

For the reader looking for comedy (sometimes light, sometimes a little morbid):

Cat Girl's Day OffGalaxyGames-FinalFront

For the teen looking for something with an edge:

Diverse EnergiesWolf Mark front cover FINALTankborn-Cover-Final

For the middle-grade reader or young teen looking for a “clean” read:

Summer of the MariposasCat Girl's Day OffGalaxyGames-FinalFront

For fans of folklore and fairy tales:

Summer of the Mariposas

For fans of science fiction, especially technology and space-related:

Tankborn-Cover-FinalGalaxyGames-FinalFront

For fans of Twilight:

Wolf Mark front cover FINAL

For fans of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off and Chicago:

Cat Girl's Day Off

 

Got any other kinds of readers in your life that need a Tu Book recommendation? Ask away in the comments!

Obligatory holiday buy-my-books post

Hey, remember how I published three books this fall? If you’re looking for great reads for the science fiction or fantasy buff in your life, you should remember Tu’s go some great books! Here are some links for you in case you need them, or go down to your local bookseller. If they don’t have the books in stock (B&N has Tankborn and Wolf Mark, but sometimes an indie might not), ask them to order them in! The more a book gets bought in a local indie, for example, the more they take notice and think maybe it should be on their shelves.

Galaxy Games: The Challengers by Greg Fishbone


Indiebound: Find a copy at your local independent bookstore! Google e-book

Amazon: Hardcover  E-book

B&N: Hardcover and E-book

Ipad & Iphone: E-book

Things are looking up for Tyler Sato (literally!) as he and his friends scan the night sky for a star named for him by his Tokyo cousins in honor of his eleventh birthday. Ordinary stars tend to stay in one place, but Ty’s seems to be streaking directly toward Earth at an alarming rate. Soon the whole world is talking about TY SATO, the doomsday asteroid, and life is turned upside down for Ty Sato, the boy, who would rather be playing hoops in his best friend’s driveway.

Meanwhile, aboard a silver spaceship heading for Earth, M’Frozza, a girl with three eyes and five nose holes, is on a secret mission. M’Frozza is the captain of planet Mrendaria’s Galaxy Games team, and she is desperate to save her world from a dishonorable performance in the biggest sporting event in the universe.

What will happen when Ty meets M’Frozza? Get ready for the most important event in human history—it’ll be off the backboard, around the rim, and out of this world!

Tankborn by Karen Sandler

Indiebound: Find a copy at your local independent bookstore! Google e-book

Amazon: Hardcover  E-book

B&N: Hardcover and E-book

Ipad & Iphone: E-book

Best friends Kayla and Mishalla know they will be separated when the time comes for their Assignments. They are GENs, Genetically Engineered Non-humans, and in their strict caste system, GENs are at the bottom rung of society. High-status trueborns and working-class lowborns, born naturally of a mother, are free to choose their own lives. But GENs are gestated in a tank, sequestered in slums, and sent to work as slaves as soon as they reach age fifteen.

When Kayla is Assigned to care for Zul Manel, the patriarch of a trueborn family, she finds a host of secrets and surprises—not least of which is her unexpected friendship with Zul’s great-grandson. Meanwhile, the children that Mishalla is Assigned to care for are being stolen in the middle of the night. With the help of an intriguing lowborn boy, Mishalla begins to suspect that something horrible is happening to them.

After weeks of toiling in their Assignments, mystifying circumstances enable Kayla and Mishalla to reunite. Together they hatch a plan with their new friends to save the children who are disappearing. Yet can GENs really trust humans? Both girls must put their lives and hearts at risk to crack open a sinister conspiracy, one that may reveal secrets no one is ready to face.

 

Wolf Mark by Joseph Bruchac

Indiebound: Find a copy at your local independent bookstore! Google e-book
Amazon: Hardcover  E-book

B&N: Hardcover and E-book

Ipad & Iphone: E-book

Luke King knows a lot of things. Like four different ways to disarm an enemy before the attacker can take a breath. Like every detail of every book he’s ever read. And Luke knows enough—just enough—about what his father does as a black ops infiltrator to know which questions not to ask. Like why does his family move around so much?

Luke just hopes that this time his family is settled for a while. He’ll finally be able to have a normal life. He’ll be able to ask the girl he likes to take a ride with him on his motorcycle. He’ll hang out with his friends. He’ll be invisible—just as he wants.

But when his dad goes missing, Luke realizes that life will always be different for him. Suddenly he must avoid the kidnappers looking to use him as leverage against his father, while at the same time evading the attention of the school’s mysterious elite clique of Russian hipsters, who seem much too interested in Luke’s own personal secret. Faced with multiple challenges and his emerging paranormal identity, Luke must decide who to trust as he creates his own destiny.

 

 

And just a reminder that in the spring we’ll have two more great books for you to check out!

Cat Girl’s Day Off by Kimberly Pauley

Never listen to a cat. That will only get you in trouble.

Actually, scratch that. Listening to cats is one thing, but really I should never listen to my best friend Oscar. It’s completely his fault (okay, and my aspiring actress friend Melly’s too) that I got caught up in this crazy celebrity-kidnapping mess.

If you had asked me, I would have thought it would be one of my super-Talented sisters who’d get caught up in crime fighting. I definitely never thought it would be me and my Talent trying to save the day. Usually, all you get out of conversations with cats is requests for tummy rubs and tuna.

Wait . . . I go back to what I said first: Never listen to a cat. Because when the trouble starts and the kitty litter hits the fan, trust me, you don’t want to be in the middle of it.

 

Vodnik by Bryce Moore

Teacups: great for tea. Really sucky as places-to-live-out-the-rest-of-your-eternal-existence. Very little elbow room, and the internet connection is notoriously slow. Plus, they’re a real pain in the butt to get out of, especially when you’ve gone non-corporeal.

When Tomas was six, someone—something—tried to drown him. And burn him to a crisp. Tomas survived, but whatever was trying to kill him freaked out his parents enough to convince them to move from Slovakia to the United States.

Now sixteen-year-old Tomas and his family are back in Slovakia, and that something still lurks somewhere. Nearby. Ready to drown him again and imprison his soul in a teacup.

Then there’s the fire víla, the water ghost, the pitchfork-happy city folk, and Death herself who are all after him.

All this sounds a bit comical, unless the one haunted by water ghosts and fire vílas or doing time in a cramped, internet-deprived teacup is you.

If Tomas wants to survive, he’ll have to embrace the meaning behind the Slovak proverb, So smrťou ešte nik zmluvu neurobil. With Death, nobody makes a pact.

 

 

Tu launch roundup

Galaxy Games gets cross town treatment

Let’s take a look at all the things happening online for the launch of Tu’s first three books. First of all, see what our publisher Jason Low would do if we had a million dollars to promote our first three books. Too bad we’re not millionaires!

The Challengers

First up, The Challengers, book 1 of the Galaxy Games series. To celebrate, author Greg Fishbone is currently on a month-long blog tour that includes a game that readers can play along, finding puzzle pieces to fit together and win prizes. To find out more on how to play the game, go to http://galaxygam.es/tour/ and find out what puzzle piece they’re on. Note that there’s also a giveaway—poke around on the site to find more ways to enter!

You can also follow Greg on Twitter, like the Galaxy Games series on Facebook, or like Greg on Facebook for more news as it happens.

Here’s what Publishers Weekly had to say about Galaxy Games:

Complemented by Beavers’s comic book style artwork, Fishbone’s narrative is ripe with kid-friendly humor—i.e., Earth’s radio and TV transmissions are picked up by the toilets on the Mrendarian ship—and many of the plot twists could be straight from the ‘what if’ imaginings of a fourth-grade classroom. Though Fishbone clearly sets up the next book, he gives Tyler enough of a victory to leave readers satisfied. —Publishers Weekly

Wolf Mark

Joseph Bruchac, author of Wolf Mark, recently shared a video on YouTube talking about why he wrote the book, his inspiration, and other thoughts on this exciting suspense-filled paranormal thriller. Check it out!

Here’s what Publishers Weekly and Kirkus have to say about Wolf Mark, too:

 

Bruchac (Dragon Castle) delivers a fun twist on werewolf stories mixed with some mad science and espionage. . . . Bruchac adeptly incorporates characters of various heritages: Luke is Native American; his best friend/crush, Meena, is Pakistani; and the Sunglass Mafia a group of students who are more than they seem are from eastern Russia. Luke also possesses a hefty amount of cultural and political awareness to go with his combat and espionage expertise, which serve him well. . . . [T]he action and Luke’s narration carry the book nicely. —Publishers Weekly

A loner teen finds himself caught up in a paranormal paramilitary threat but he has both untapped personal resources and some unlikely allies to help him out. Ever since his mother died, his father-a sometime Special Ops-type agent who happens to be of Native American descent-has been worse than useless. Lucas just concentrates on doing well in school and mooning over the beautiful daughter of one of the Pakistani scientists working at the new Romanian-owned top-secret facility in town. He goes out of his way to avoid the Sunglass Mafia, a bunch of unusually pale Russian students. But when his father is kidnapped and gives him a coded message by telephone, Lucas discovers that his heritage is more complicated and powerful than he had thought. . . . [T]he scenes with the Sunglass Mafia both defy stereotypes and manage to be very funny, and when the action kicks in, it does so in overdrive. A solid entry into the paranormal market, with an appealingly different hero.—Kirkus Reviews

 

Tankborn

Karen Sandler, the author of Tankborn, has already had one book signing in her area of northern California. She’s also been doing a lot of interviews lately. Check out her latest on the Kirkus Reviews blog. An excerpt:

You’ve set your novel in the futuristic world of Loka. Tell us how you went about imagining that world.

The imagining of Loka happened in layers. At first, I had only a vague idea of what the planet was like. I knew it was ugly, barren of trees, except for the symbiotic junk trees, the plant life scruffy, the creatures hideous by Earth standards. As I made my way through the book, new creatures or plants would pop up, and I’d add them to the taxonomy, adding another layer.

Then in the editing process … a light bulb came on, and I decided that the bulk of Loka’s creatures were arachnid-based—creatures I’d already described were changed to fit the spider-like model. I retained a couple mammals—the drom and seycat—but everything else became eight-legged and a bit on the creepy side.

We’ve gotten a lot more reviews in for this one since my last review roundup. I’ll only share a couple here, for the sake of brevity—this post is already quite long!

I strongly feel that Tankborn is just what the genre has been waiting for. There are a lot of complaints these days about cookie cutter dystopians, and authors who can’t be bothered to consider plausibility or worldbuilding. Sandler’s writing punches those complaints in the face….As for the story, it’s solid, nicely paced, and thoughtful. Kayla and Mishalla are admirable girls, though their upbringing has (understandably) warped their perceptions of the world around them. Kayla’s growth is fascinating, particularly her struggles with religion. —Intergalactic Academy

It’s been a while since I’ve picked up a book that is mainly science fiction and enjoyed it so much. Karen Sandler introduces us to Loka, a planet that the people of Earth colonize in the future due to Earth’s climate crumbling down, and in the process introduces us to a whole new vocabulary. Names of plants, animals, inanimate objects, all strange names for strange things. It is truly a fascinating new world. Fans of dystopia and a little known movie called “Avatar” will enjoy this.—JJ iReads

The world building is very well done and definitely the highlight of this novel. It is a completely fictional, but believable, culture that is created in this book. It is interesting that even though it’s very far in the future, it isn’t the type of sci-fi where there’s robots and lasers and spaceships everywhere. In some ways, the culture felt a bit archaic, what with the strict social hierarchy and all. And I don’t know  why, but I kind of imagined their clothes was kind of traditional Indian-style, but that just be because of the clear Indian inspiration for the caste system in this book. Anyway, I liked how the culture and the story world was sort of antiquated but mixed with, obviously, futuristic stuff, like shock guns, and how GENs are kind of like computers — using a Datapod, one can upload and download information from a GEN’s annexed brain (as opposed to their bare brain, which, I gather, is their normal brain, the kind you and I have). The world is quite unique due to this mixture of the old and the new.—SkyInk.net

Check out her main site, blog, and Twitter. Like Tankborn on Facebook, too.

 

E-book update

I’m in the midst of a cold/sinus thing that has made my brain become enveloped in a big fog, so I’m afraid all my plans for incisive, witty (ha) posts here this week have been put off, reserving all my brainpower for cover copy and sell sheets and other fun things like that (perhaps a post may come of that in a week or so).Galaxy Games

Instead, you get more book promotion. But hopefully you’ll either enjoy it or put up with it, because we’re very, very excited on this end that almost two years of work—actually, more than two years, given that my friend and I started talking about starting Tu way back in June or July of 2009—are finally coming to fruition. So bear with us, and make sure to share the good news with all your friends!

Last time we talked, it looked like the Google Books versions of Tu’s books were optimized for tablets—meaning that they were NOT auto-reflowing e-pubs. This was a mistake, and this has now been corrected. The Google Books versions ARE e-pubs, which means that they can be viewed on a very large number of platforms, including tablets but also cell phone apps, e-readers, and other e-book viewers. So you’ll note on the Galaxy Games page, for example, that platforms that used to have red Xs by them are now all green checkmarks—you’re good to go!

Also, Galaxy Games is now available on iTunes! Which means that Tankborn and Wolf Mark won’t be far behind. And I’ll let you know when they’re available for Nook—it shouldn’t be too long now.

 

 

 

 

Weekend reading! Tu e-books becoming available

For those of you who prefer your books in e-book form: we have some exciting news for Kindle people. Nook and iPad people, your day is coming soon in e-pub form. I’ll let you know as soon as I know!

Here are the Kindle versions!
Galaxy Games Tankborn Wolf Mark

Read them right away! And then let me know what you think. 🙂

Milestone day!

What do you see me holding here?

ARCs

That’s right, ARCs (Advance Reader’s Copies) of Tankborn and Galaxy Games: The Challengers (book one of the Galaxy Games series). Soon we’ll be getting Wolf Mark as well, to complete the Fall 2011 ARC set of Tu Books! (And if you’re curious, yes, that’s my office behind me. I particularly like the “Come to the dark side. We have cookies.” bumper sticker I once got for being Editor GoH at LTUE. Note the ever-present stacks of manuscripts behind me.)

We have very limited supplies, so I can’t just hand them out left and right, but for those of you who chose the ARC option for our Kickstarter campaign, we’ll be getting in touch sometime in the near future to find out which one you want (don’t comment here with that—wait for an email). Copies will be going out to reviewers, of course—that’s what ARCs generally are for.

If you’re a librarian who will be at ALA in June, make sure to go to the Lee & Low booth (I’ll post the booth number when ALA is closer), where we’ll have ARCs for giving away there as well. If you’re a reviewer, librarian, parent, or teacher interested in finding out more about the books, I hope you’re on the Lee & Low email newsletter. If not, check it out HERE. By subscribing to the e-news, you will get up-to-date information on all of Lee & Low’s books (like Tu’s books!), including possible giveaways, resources for teachers and librarians, and other promotions and resources. Follow the Lee & Low blog, too, where we’ll share news as it comes up.

If you’re a reviewer or buyer who thinks you may not be on our list for review copies or catalogs, please contact me privately with your (in the case of reviewers) publication, readership, and other credentials or (in the case of buyers) store information so I can forward the information on to the right people.

And of course if you’re a young reader who thinks these books look wicked awesome (did I just date myself with that phrase?)—these books are for YOU, after all!—you can find out more about Tu on our website. And in case you missed it above, check out the preview of fall’s books HERE. And of course in the fall you’ll be able to find them in bookstores or order them online.