Hello Summer, Goodbye Free Time.

As we approach the official-unofficial start to summer, I was just thinking the other day how I used to look forward to this time of year more than any other. I’d be out of school (no more homework – yay), away from the bullies (duh), and could wear whatever I wanted (no dumb private school dress codes at home). Given how amazing this time of year typically is for me, I’m actually going into it this year feeling a bit stressed.

Wait no – that sounds depressing.

I don’t mean this to sound like a total downer, but there are so many different things happening this summer that I didn’t have to juggle back in my school days.

Things like…

• Freelance blogging
• Editing
• Crocheting art for my vendor shows
• Training to teach guitar
• And somehow still carving out time with my boyfriend (yep, that’s new – read this post for more on that)

They’re all good things of course – but I’ve learned that not all stress is something negative. In fact, sometimes the best things in life freak us out for totally normal, human reasons. And that’s totally okay! But these particular things are requiring a fair amount of adjusting, so I better step it up and reorganize if I ever want to make any headway on my next book.

It’s not what you do with your time so much as the habits you form.

If you’re like me and plan on nixing your habit of laying in bed until noon, that’s naturally going to free up a lot of your time. So sometimes the little changes you apply to your life make all the difference. Don’t be afraid to celebrate those! I’m learning to listen to my body. When I’m tired, I sleep. When I feel motivated to work, I work. Simple as that! Of course, sometimes there are hard deadlines that I have to hit, either for clients, or for a scheduled art show. But aside from those caveats, I let me body and mind lead the process.

Productive rest is also something I want to get a lot better about.

You know, doing something restful besides mindlessly scrolling through Instagram for the umpteenth time that day. Watch your favorite movie, cook something yummy, go out with friends. There’s so much more to life than what you can do. Instead, think about what you can be.

“Be a human being, not a human doing.”

My Quantum Energy Healer, Dr. Mark Mincolla

This particular mantra has always been the toughest for me to master. But I’d wager that’s largely due to societal pressures that make us feel worthless unless we’re actively producing something. But you’ve gotta remember that there are so many wonderful things you bring to the world just by being yourself. Don’t forget that.

Hopefully you’ll be able to have a restful and productive summer. If you have any tips for striking that perfect balance, feel free to reach out to me in the comments. I’d love to hear what you’ve managed to accomplish despite feeling burnt out like I often do!

Happy summer, everybody. Let’s roll.

P.S. – Add my books on Goodreads if you’d like. That would be pretty cool 😉

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Life Doesn’t Come with Cheat Codes.

Hello friends! I’m writing today with some VERY exciting news about my yet-to-be-published book.

Before anyone else, I’m going to let you see my book cover and cover blurb. How cool is that?

But first, a little background: So this newest book, Forgiving What I Couldn’t Change (The Rewind Duology Book 2) is the sequel to Forgetting What I Couldn’t Remember. Both books deal heavily with coming of age, struggles with bullies, and finding yourself amidst the noise. Vera Bartlet is the main character, and in book one, she has to track down her missing dad while dealing with issues like time travel, dating, and learning to adult. If you like snark and clever tagline, you’d probably like this book, and you can find it on Amazon HERE.

Here’s the blurb for book 2:

Life doesn’t come with cheat codes.

Vera Bartlet finally lands her dream job after rescuing her dad from the psychotic bullies who held him captive. Despite dealing with the recurring trauma from being bullied and the psychological struggles surrounding it, Vera’s moving in a much better direction. With time travel under her belt, happily engaged friends, and an improved relationship with her previously estranged Uncle Edgar, life is stable – until the time machine gets stolen.
Vera’s family worries that a machine immune to the limits of time and space in the wrong hands would spell disaster for more than just their family. But when she’s quite literally dragged into the epicenter of the nefarious operation, Vera gets thrown into the very same virtual reality world that imprisoned her dad for the better part of a decade.

This place isn’t like anywhere Vera’s been before. Sporadic sky patterns with a deadly acid nightfall, man-eating purple-blooded wolf creatures, and an avatar with totally unnecessary upgrades is only the beginning of what she has to deal with. Her only saving grace is the frustratingly attractive Fader, who’s been in the game longer than she has and knows a way out.

Can Vera make it out of the game alive, forgive her bullies, and level up before her whole world glitches?

AND HERE’S THE COVER…

Seriously, how cool is this?!?! I’m obsessed with this cover. My designer really nailed this one.

As of now, I’m planning far a soft-release, maybe later next month if all goes to plan. But I’m not making any formal announcements yet as I’m still in the editing process right now. Even the cover may be subject to change depending on how everything is laid out, but I’m really excited to see how it goes.

There’s just so much that goes into all this, and I’m really hoping that it’ll all go smoothly, but the key is to just keep rolling with it and not panic. But then again, that’s also just life. And lately, I’ve been really bogged down with all my freelancing work on top of it all. And getting out of burnout is really, freaking difficult. I’ll probably blog about that soon too – but today is not the day.

In the meantime, if you want to join my review team, you can do so at this link: http://eepurl.com/df6qqf

Thank you so much for all your continued support! Angelina signing off for now, but I’m never too far away. Comment below to connect or follow me on Instagram and Tiktok.

So I Finally Caved and Got a Tik Tok Account…

I’d been putting it off for months. It’s a time-sucking, highly addictive platform that I knew would probably be more irritating to deal with than it was worth. But I did it anyway – because marketing reasons.

Yep – in any marketing endeavor, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know that you’ve got to go where your target demographic is. And for me, as a Young Adult / New Adult author, I know that my readers probably are hanging out on there. So engaging on that platform was a no-brainer, even if learning the controls was slightly clunky at first. But in many ways, it’s not really all that different from Instagram (which I’d like to think I’m pretty well-versed in).

The concept of Tik Tok is fun, because it’s pairing music with trends and ideas that bring people together. I’m not typically a huge fan of taking selfies, but I do that anyway for marketing reasons. If there’s anything I learned from my college marketing classes, it’s that people want to see the human behind the product. Even though I’m selling books, they want to relate to and see who they’re supporting. So if Tik Tok is a way for readers to catch a glimpse into my illustrious life of sitting at my desk blogging, then so be it.

If you want to give me a follow on Tik Tok, I’d surely appreciate it, but by no means do you have to, of course! I just appreciate that you’ve read this far, and care about my stories.

FOLLOW ME ON TIK TOK HERE.

I always try to limit how much of the irritating “buy my book” posts I do, but I have to tell you that my sequel is getting SO CLOSE to being finished! Well, the first draft anyway. If you want to read the first installment of my time-travel coming-of-age bully-ass-kicking snark-story, you can find a copy of Forgetting What I Couldn’t Remember HERE.

“Maybe getting older lets you finally see all sides of the dice – not just the ones that are facing up.”

Vera Bartlet is a soon-to-be college graduate with absolutely no idea how messy her life is about to become. It’s not just the job search looming on the horizon or her lack of a boyfriend that’s got her stomach in knots – rather, her dad has been missing for almost a decade, and no one knows what happened to him.

When Uncle Edgar mysteriously arrives back onto the scene, he comes armed with some interesting new ideas about what may have happened to Vera’s dad – and an even more revolutionary idea of how to find him. With nothing short of bending time and space, Edgar sends Vera back in time in the hopes that she might find the clues they need to get her dad home.

As she sifts through the mangled pieces of reality and her altered memories of middle school drama become jumbled in between truth and fantasy, Vera has to choose which elements of her past should stay in the past, and which she might like to incorporate into her future. Time travel is never simple, and there are always side effects – but in this case, it might just hold the key to finding her dad. Will Vera stay sane long enough to find her dad and make peace with the bullies who made her miserable?

Listen to my Latest Podcast Interview HERE!

This morning, I got to be a guest speaker on WNRI’s Author Hour, with my fellow Association of Rhode Island Authors Board Member Wayne Barber. I answered all kinds of questions about my writing process, as well as offering some opinions about current events and publishing in general.

It’s always fun reflecting on how far I’ve come, because I remember starting the publishing thing for no other reason than I had a story I was dabbling with. I didn’t set out to publish my first book; I swear it happened totally accidentally. And it’s for a very amusing reason, LOL.

If you’d like to take a listen to hear all about this and more, you can do so at THIS LINK HERE.

Additionally, I am so pleased to say that I’ve hit the 95k word mark on my latest book, the sequel to my time-travel coming-of-age story Forgetting What I Couldn’t Remember. The sequel will be called Forgiving What I Couldn’t Change, and I’ll have ARC’s available pretty soon, so if you want to be the first to hear about that, join my review team HERE.

This one is so important to me, because I’m finally coming to terms with the bullying I lived through from ages 5-14, and how that profoundly affected my outlook on life. But luckily, there are so many healthy ways to adapt and grow even though that was extremely difficult at the time. Writing this sequel, and the prequel before it, has helped me immensely. If you want to read book one of the Rewind Duology where Vera Bartlet time-travels back to middle school to teach the bullies a lesson, you can grab a copy of it HERE.

Life is about growth and change, after all. And I’m so grateful for the opportunities I’ve been given. Thank you for reading this far, and feel free to share a bit about yourself in the comments. Tell me something you’ve GROWN through that felt awful at the time, but now is a source of strength ❤

My Top 10 Best Reads of 2020 (Based on My Goodreads Profile)

I’m going to preface this by saying that in no way is this limited only to books published in 2020. I just thought it would be fun to chat a bit about my ten favorite books that I read this year and awarded the 5-star rating to, presented in the order I read them in.

Since it was a pretty slow year for everyone, and my in-person events were temporarily suspended, I found myself reading a lot more. As I’m a YA/NA writer primarily, I consider this to be critical research for my stories as well. Fair warning: that means I read predominantly romcoms, so skip ahead unless you’re into those too.

If you want to peruse my entire Goodreads page, and take a gander at the books I’ve written, you can find that HERE.

But without further ado, let’s go!

#1: 100 Days of Sunlight (Abbie Emmons)

This one is a great riff off of John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars in the sense that there’s acquired (not genetic) blindness, and the characters have an interesting romantic relationship that develops over time. You’ll just have to read it yourself, because it’s incredibly sweet and poignant.

#2: What are Friends For? (Sarah Sutton)

Another cute story of childhood besties-turned-lovers. It’s a tale that is equal parts creative and mystifying in its teenaged-frustrations, but it ends on such a good note. Bonus points for a very satisfying closet-make out scene.

#3: The Loneliest Girl in the Universe (Lauren James)

Ah okay, this one got mixed reviews from other readers but I was absolutely in love with this chilling coming-of-age narrative set in a futuristic, dystopian setting. It takes a really rapid turn toward the end that left me shaking, but I loved it and thought the concept was super clever and well-executed. The psychological elements were confusing and terrifying in the best way. Read this, I promise you won’t be disappointed.

#4: Aix Marks the Spot (S.E. Anderson)

And… back to the romcoms. This story is a lovely jaunt into the southern French countryside, where Jamie meets a cute local boy who takes her breath away. It’s culturally rich and beautifully depicted, and I loved being able to escape somewhere refreshing when I read it this past April.

#5: The Rose Gate: A Retelling of Beauty and the Beast (Hanna Sandvig)

Here’s a fantasy for a change of pace now – a modern retelling of the classic. A cursed prince, who’s actually quite young, adorable, and in my mind, looked a lot like a young Luke Hemmings. But like, in a castle in a different realm, with an ever-shrinking portal that holds everyone there captive. Such a fun twist!

#6: As Much as I Ever Could (Brandy Woods Snow)

This one was probably the hottest of all the books I’ve read this year. Seriously, Jett is a locally-famous racer driver, and his casual friendship with CJ slowly but surely, turns into something else. CJ struggles from traumas involving an accident she was in years ago, and a summer with Memaw is just what the doctor ordered to get her out of her funk and embracing her reality, however bleak it may seem. In my head, I pictured Jett as a very blonde Patty Walters (from the band As It Is – what, I have a thing for guys in bands, don’t judge me).

#7: The Law of Tall Girls (Joanne Macgregor)

I really enjoyed this story about high school plays, following your dreams, and being honest with yourself and your friends. It also portrayed mental health especially well, given how difficult that topic can often be. With a sprinkling of incredibly embarrassing moments, and honest real-ness, this book is not one to miss. Also, love the body-positivity around Peyton’s relative discomfort with her height (even though she eventually learns to love it, and meets a tall guy who really loves it too).

#8: Joy’s Summer Love Playlist (Piper Bee)

Watermelons, bands, and summertime romance. What more could you want? With Jin’s good looks straight out of a K-pop band, compiled with Joy’s increasingly less-subtle crush, and friends Lena and Cale added to the mix, it’s a full-ride any YA reader would love. Be sure to check out the companion book as well, B-Sides.

#9: Alex, Approximately (Jennifer Bennett)

This book had my heart from start to finish! I adored the concept of Bailey’s online friend being the object of her affections, except for one major twist (that’s provided on the back cover so it’s not a spoiler, I promise) – she doesn’t tell him when she moves to his hometown. Then it turns out that she works at a museum alongside – you guessed it – Porter (who is actually Alex, the very same guy she met online but neither of them have any idea of it). So for the entire book, you just watch them fall in loathe, then fall in love, and neither of them have any real clue about it for a while. Jennifer Bennett is fantastically good at storytelling, and I’ve since checked out more of her work and loved those too.

Bonus: I was reading this shortly before I met my very own online friend after almost four years of talking, and it was nothing short of amazing. You can read about that experience on my blog HERE.

#10: Things We Know By Heart (Jessi Kirby)

This novel had a heart-wrenching plot (literally). The protagonist literally falls for the guy who received her dead boyfriend’s heart after he passed away. I know that sounds pretty dark for a YA novel, but it was handled with such care and taste that I honestly really enjoyed it. Totally worth the spontaneous book splurge at Barnes and Noble. Another story in the John Green vein of love-loss-growth, it’s a book any hopeless romantics like me would heartily enjoy.

There you have it! These are my favorite books that carried me through this crap-sandwich of a year. Here’s to a better and brighter 2021 – I’m hopeful that it’s going to be great ❤

Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year!