Book Blitz for Things from Other Worlds by Anne E. Johnson!!

BOOK INFORMATION

TITLE – Things from Other Worlds
AUTHOR – Anne E. Johnson
GENRE – Children’s literature / science fiction
PUBLICATION DATE – October, 2015
LENGTH (Pages/# Words) - 84 pages
PUBLISHER – Anne E. Johnson
COVER ARTIST – James for GoOnWrite.com

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BOOK SYNOPSIS

Many strange things wait inside these pages. There's a fuzzy ball of kindness, camped out on a grumpy man's porch. A chewed piece of gum with a mind of its own. A smart Alec who actually stands in line twice when they're handing out brains. A girl who isn't afraid when all the plants in her neighborhood come to life.

This collection of 15 science fiction and fantasy stories for kids by award-winning author Anne E. Johnson is perfect for ages 8-12, or anyone with a child's heart.

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BUY & TBR LINKS

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EXCERPT

THE CRUSTY-HEARTED MAN (Excerpt from Story No. 15 in Things from Other Worlds)

Outside our town, a few miles from where Jimbo’s gas station used to be, an old man lived all by himself. Everybody knew he was there, but nobody actually knew him. He’d show up a few times a year to buy canned goods at Ruth & Bobby’s, but that was it. Not a soul, not even the oldest soul in town, could remember a time when that man hadn’t been around. He must have been two hundred years old. Some said more like three hundred. 

Truth was, he’d been out of touch with people for so long that nobody could remember his name. 

He couldn’t even remember his own name. Folks said that a crust had grown over his heart. 

The heart’s a funny organ, though. It’s tougher than you’d think, and can survive through pretty much anything. It’s like a tulip bulb. No matter how icy and long the winter is, that little bulb stays alive under the frozen ground until it’s time to shoot up a new sprout, green and full of life.

But for some especially frosty people, there’s rarely enough sunshine to wake up their hearts. It takes something spectacular, maybe even something from another world. I’ll tell you what happened to this old, old man, and you’ll see what I mean. 

Nobody wanted to have anything to do with him. Flies and grubs and spiders occasionally tiptoed into the walls of his house, but most were never heard from again. The younger raccoons and rabbits only touched his front stoop on a dare because their parents warned them not to. 

“Get away!” the old man would scream hoarsely while shaking a frying pan above his head. 

Every living creature, from human on down to bedbug, knew enough to keep off the old man’s property. But that knowledge had not been broadcast across space. So, when an alien landed in a clearing in the woods one late winter afternoon, it didn’t realize what it was up against. It was scared and a little woozy after a rough landing, although it wasn’t afraid. It had been brought up to assume that all beings will do right by each other when given the chance. Poor little thing. 

I bet you think an alien is a spindly sort that looks like it’s made of green plastic. Well, not this one. It was furry. Oh, so furry. Picture fur as thick as a polar bear’s and as soft as a mink’s. Now double how thick and soft it is. Now color it blue-green. This deep, soft, dark fur was all over its body, which was short and wide. The alien, standing, came up just past your knees, but was too wide to get your arms around.

It had two giant tangerine-orange toenails on each of its four feet. Its eyes, too, were the color of tangerines, but twice as big. They were very close together in its head, and surrounded by fur, giving it a very intense look. Your average human would probably describe this alien as “the cutest thing I’ve ever seen,” and make a sound that went something like “Awwww.” 

Well, this little alien was in need of shelter and food. It didn’t know the plants and animals of our planet, so it shuffled right by some perfectly edible berries and nuts. But it recognized a building when it saw one. And so it approached the old man’s house in the middle of the woods, with hope in its heart but nothing in its belly. 

“MMMnnnyonggg,” it called out from the yard. Nothing stirred in the house, but several woodchucks and foxes gathered to watch from a safe distance. The alien trundled up the front steps. Once it caught its fur on the rotting wood, but freed itself like a real trooper. Inside the house, the old man heard a nasal howl. 

“MMMnnnyonggg!” 

He assumed it was a wolf or an injured bear. “Durn thing’s up on the porch,” said the crusty-hearted man as he pulled his frying pan down from its nail. “I’ll teach ʼem whose house this is.” 

The old man shoved the front door open so hard it smacked against the rotten siding. A few shingles crumbled and fell. The woodland creatures watching the show skittered deeper into the shadows, fearing what would come next. 

But the alien didn’t move. It didn’t know it was supposed to be afraid of the sound of wood smacking wood, or the sight of a two-legged earthling holding a round metal object. It assumed this was either a way to say “hello,” or else a communication device telling the whole planet about its arrival. Those were the only options that made sense to the alien. Widening its eyes and puffing up its fur, it tried to look as friendly as possible.

For his part, the old man was so puzzled that he forgot to swing the pan. “You’re not a bear,” he accused the blue-green furry thing. “You’re sure not a wolf. What are you? Gorilla?”

The alien didn’t know what the word “gorilla” meant, but it enjoyed the sound, so it waddled a little closer to the cool-talking human.

“GGgggrrrrill,” said the alien, trying to fit in.

The old man just snorted and slammed the door, leaving the alien alone on the porch.

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AUTHOR BIO

As the author of dozens of published short stories, Anne E. Johnson has won writing prizes for both children's and adults' short fiction. Her short fiction for kids has appeared in FrostFire Worlds, Wee Tales, Jack & Jill, Young Explorer’s Adventure Guide, Rainbow Rumpus, and elsewhere. Her stories for adults can be found in Alternate Hilarities, The Future Fire, Liquid Imagination, and SpeckLit. For a complete list of her published stories, please visit AnneEJohnson.com. She also writes science fiction novels, including the humorous Webrid Chronicles series.

To give back to the writing and children’s lit community, Anne is a volunteer story judge at RateYourStory and writes a weekly column called Kid Lit Insider for EatSleepWrite.net.

Anne grew up in Wisconsin but moved to New York City over 20 years ago. She now lives in Brooklyn with her husband, playwright Ken Munch.

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AUTHOR FOLLOW LINKS

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This Event has been Organized & Hosted by:

Book Blitz for The Broken Destiny:A Broken Novel by Carlyle Labuschagne!!

Title: The Broken Destiny: A Broken Novel Book two Author: Carlyle Labuschagne 
Genre: Dystopian. Science- Fiction. YA 
Release Date: November 2014 
Publishers: Hallowed Ink Press

Blurb: "You cannot know what light is if you have not experienced darkness"  Ava and her people have been exiled to the planet Poseidon for reasons she can't fathom. Upon meeting a boy from a different sector, her life turns into a beautiful chaos. She begins to feel things she isn't allowed to, thus motivating her to find out the truth about why her kind are so different, and why the Council are so interested in her. Once her mind is freed, with it comes a terrible power that could either save her kind, or destroy them all. But Ava is not the perfect heroine. She will become what she hates to save the ones she loves, and the cost of such a burden is deadly at best.

Carlyle Labuschagne is a South African award winning author working her way into the hearts of international readers with her first two books in the Broken Trilogy. Her first young adult dystopian novel "The Broken Destiny" reached top 3 in its YA debut Category. The Sequel Evanescent won YATR literary award for best Sci-Fi book 2013. Her become a published author prgramme for students launched Feb 2014. She is not only an author, but works as a marketing manager by day. She holds a diploma in creative writing through the writing school at College SA. Carlyle loves to swim, fights for the trees, and is a food lover who is driven by her passion for life. Carlyle also writes for IU e-magazine India, an inspirational non-profit magazine that aims at inspiring the world through words. The drive behind her author career is healing through words. Carlyle is also the founder of the first annual book drive – Help Build A Library in Africa Project. And hopes to launch her very own Indie book festival in Johannesburg March 2015. “My goal as an author is to touch people’s lives, and help others love their differences and one another.”

Author Links:

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Buy Links: Amazon

Chapter OneOh, Star

I wasn’t sure why they called us ‘The Broken’, but what I did know for certain was that we were different from the other ‘human’ inhabitants of this planet. We were the third generation of our kind, with a huge―some would say, cursed―destiny. We are also the last of our kind, a dying race. I used to believe that the reason we were exiled to Planet Poseidon was because we were a lot different from the humans on Earth. They tell us at assembly every morning that we are what survived of Earth because of those differences.

 Global warming, war and evil undertakings were said to have contributed to Earth’s destruction in the late twentieth century. Greed stripped Earth of its ‘magic’ and caused the planet to turn on itself. A way of getting rid of the ‘virus’, so to speak. Did I buy into those lies anymore - No. I believed that there was a lot more to the story behind our origins and our extradition to a long forgotten sector within the Titan galaxy was no accident. I could feel it in the cold burn of my legs as I walked the hollow halls of our institutions, and I could see it on the eerie motionless faces of my peers every day. Little by little, small things started changing and I started believing in the signs my mother wrote about in her secret journals.

A haunting feeling stared back at me as I looked upon my reflection in the monitor every morning, clearly remembering as a young child my iris were a lot bluer. At first I thought it was the effect of the changeover from mirror to monitor. I used to think that maybe the mirror was the lie. That it was evil and that that was the reason it had been outlawed. But so many new laws had been put into place over the last few years, I was beginning to doubt our perfect Utopia really existed, that beneath the surface something deceivingly dark was brewing, and the nightmares my biological mother wrote about were real events the council had stripped from her memories. Keeping it on paper was the only way she could decipher real memories from the planet ones.

Excerpt 3

My mother has me in some kind of arranged marriage, to the chief’s idiotic son of all people. I don’t want that. But it’s my duty. I have to. ” She said staring into the ground.

 “You don’t have to anything!” I shouted defensively. “No one can force you into a life you don’t want.”

My heart was racing, as my feet hit the wooden platform of the bridge. But the look on Maya’s face made me calm my anger and consider my words carefully, because the truth was that people did make me do things I didn’t want to.

Maya didn’t speak for a moment. From her facial expressions, I could tell she was having a fascinating debate in her own head. My eyes fell on the small stream. Only, the stream was no longer gentle.

“What do you suppose this means, then?” I asked Maya as I stopped to look over the edge of the bridge, my hands grasping the rail firmly as I peered all the way down the shallow canyon. By the look on her face, I knew I wasn’t imagining things and that she was concerned, not excited to have the planet alive again. Surely this would mean the cycle of autumn is finally over? She stood motionless on the overpass. We were both looking down on what used to be the tiny stream that snaked through the pebbles and disappeared over the ridge among the rocks and into the valley.

Maya grabbed my right arm tightly and tugged me away with such force that I almost fell over my own feet. Our footfalls clattered loudly over the bridge, as it slowly swayed beneath us.  

“Slow down, will you?” I yelled at her in frustration. “What’s going on, Maya?” The urgency in my voice momentarily startled us both.

“The prophecy,” she said distantly, keeping her eyes straight ahead.

“What?” I snapped.

But all she would say over and over again was: “It’s too soon! Too soon. Something’s wrong.”

I heard a loud thud. The bridge suddenly swayed dramatically and I looked down, trying to figure out what could have caused the sudden erratic motion. I noticed Maya extracting a sharp object from her boot. She was crouching down, baring her teeth like a wild cat. I tried to turn, but a sharp sting shot through my thigh. I looked down to see a long, red splinter protruding from my skin.

Maya shrieked and came at me, a thin dagger gripped tightly in her hand. She came hard and fast. I stood frozen in shock. What is she doing?My vision blurred and I started feeling dizzy. Maya yelled for me to get down, but I was frozen with fear. Suddenly, she ran around me and up on to the railing. She came crashing down―not on me as I had expected, but on something behind me. I staggered and fell on my hands and knees, barely feeling the hard wood as it pressed against my trembling palms and bony knees.

There was shouting. The bridge continued to sway beneath me, making it hard for me to clear my head…to get away. I managed to turn my neck just in time to see two dark figures climbing over the railing, reaching for me. Four powerful, dark hands clamped down on my arms and legs and lifted me off my feet. I heard Maya scream my name, but I was limp and couldn’t move.

As I was hurled away, unable to struggle, I could make out Maya’s form standing over the body of one of our attackers. She struck out at the two remaining assailants who were dragging me away. Another sudden shudder shook the bridge. I could hear the sound of weapons and fists flying around me. I dropped to the floor, suddenly free. By now I was completely numb. I didn’t feel the thud. It should have hit me full on. Instead, I tasted dust and then copper; blood.

Maya stood over me and yelled for someone called Enoch. I looked up at her as my vision faintly perceived two Zulu warriors grabbing her. I shouted for her safety, but the words got stuck in my throat, and I was lifted to my feet once more as they tore her off me. Maya screamed and fought her way out of our attackers’ claws. I heard an object slice through the air, passing over my head with a soft whistle. A dull thump and a soft growl followed, before the hands let me go.

This time I didn’t hit the ground. I kept on falling. I could barely hear the water over the shouting and after what felt like an immense force, I was underwater being overpowered by the cold.

Crystal blue eyes floated towards me like shooting stars, and I allowed myself to surrender to the darkness.

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Cover Reveal for After Day One by Benjamin Levi Seims!!

 

After Day One by Benjamin Levi Seims

Publisher: Booktrope

Expected Publication: December 9, 2014

Genre: Dystopian, Science Fiction, Action & Adventure

2083, John Howe a genetic, and cybernetic, enhanced cyber operations solider who came home After Day One only to find the country he fought for broken, and his wife and son murdered. By 2096 he rebuilt his home and was trying to live a comfortable life on the outskirts of the Free Territories, the Pacific North West. That was before Sierra and Quinn. The twin thirteen year old orphans he was saddled with the minute he saved them from a fat, greasy, gypsy couple holding them. Now he’s a man who is just trying to get rid of them before they all end up dead. As fate would have it, a super soldier and two kids with abilities that could save the country, and maybe earth, are going to be hard to separate. The world is fragmented and looking for a hero. Some heroes come in rough packaging. 

    

About the Author I live in Wenatchee, WA with my wife and our three teenage boys. I work full time as a Cardiac Nurse and I am currently an Officer in the Washington Army National Guard. After Day One is my first full length Novel and is the first book in a planned trilogy.