Susane Colasanti - Journal

Spotted: One rad poster.

I don't know where this is or where it came from. All I know is that it's freaking awesome:



Sources say it may be located in Germany. Jack Bauer is on a mission to identify its coordinates.

Over.

Which book am I kissing this week?



The Something Like Fate galley! No way! I wasn't expecting the galleys to be printed this early, but it's so awesome that they are. It sounds like the friendly neighbors in sales and marketing are planning a lot of fun stuff for this book. I love that they're excited about getting the party started! As part of the fabulousness, the always awesome Penguin will be sending galleys to book bloggers and reviewers.

To be added to the mailing list, you can send me an email at friendly.neighbor [at] hotmail.com. Please include the following information in your email:

Your name
Your complete mailing address
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Galleys will only be sent to book reviewers in US and Canada. I'm not sure when they'll be sent out. It might not be for a few months, since the Something Like Fate pub date is May 18. But you should submit your request soon, as the offer is only good while supplies last.

The party has officially started. Woot!

Thanks to everyone who commented with warm fuzzies about the Something Like Fate cover! I am just so excited about this book. It's sort of wild talking about an upcoming book so far in advance, especially considering that Waiting for You just came out in May. But that's the world of publishing, always looking ahead. Kind of like how I am about life in general.

I was really impressed to see that several book bloggers had already picked up on the cover, like, not even a week after it was released. You guys rock. You're right about the synopsis not being posted yet. However, as many of you have guessed, the story deals with a lovers' triangle. It's amazing how much a finger touch can say. When we get closer to the pub date, I'll post pics of the cover models so you can see how cute they are. That boy is hot. He's already shown up on two other recent teen novel covers. My editor went to the photo shoot and conferenced with the models, telling them a bit about the book and their characters. I don't know how she did it, but those models totally feel like my characters, even from the back. You can check out the studio where the photo shoot took place.

The cover's not the only exciting part of the Something Like Fate book jacket. The spine has this gorgeous watercolor pattern that will totally pop on the shelves. And guess what? The When It Happens and Take Me There paperbacks have been revamped, so all of my books will now have this cool watercolor pattern in different color themes! I can't wait to see them all lined up together. But that's not all - my paperback covers have been revamped, so now they all have a uniform look. The same cover images were used for the repackaging, but now all the covers have pretty new fonts, enhanced colors, tag lines, embossing, and something called spot gloss, which I am so excited to see. When these editions are released in a few months, I'll post the covers here. I'll also be running contests for you guys to win some.

One last thing about Something Like Fate: The pub date has been finalized as May 18, 2010. This is a strict on-sale date, which is an awesome thing to have with a book. It means that all bookstores should definitely have the book out on that date. There will also be a Something Like Fate floor display, so you know what that means. Even more contest opportunities in the house! And with the strict on-sale date, all of the floor displays should be out at the same time as well. Now I just have to think up a fantastic new floor display contest...

My next book, Something Like Fate, will be released on May 13, 2010. I am beyond excited to share the cover with you:



What do you think?

I think this cover is hot. My publisher even did a photo shoot for it, which is a rare thing. And an awesome thing, because these models are my characters. Even from the back, I can tell. It's unreal. The designer (you rock, Jim!) just finished the book jacket. It is so gorgeous. I seriously cannot wait for you to see it.

I'll tell you about the photo shoot and some other fun stuff when I return from the Greek Islands. I'll be on vacay there for the next two weeks. As I'm not sure what the Internet access will be like, I don't know if I can blog before I get back. But I will try my best to post a few photos from Santorini. I've been hearing that Santorini is the most beautiful place in the world for years, so I'm psyched to immerse myself in all the beauty. The forecast is almost identical for every single day - high of 80, low of 70, low humidity, totally sunny. Yay yay freaking yay!

Enjoy these last two weeks of summer! For those of you going back to school, I hope you have an incredible year.

I still haven't absorbed last Friday's good news. How can I be on a Top Ten Bestseller list with J.K. Rowling and Neil Gaiman? They clearly have me confused with someone else.

Or maybe I'm hallucinating. That's the kind of thing that happens when you've been scrutinizing copyedits for days. I'm obsessed with details, so I can agonize over a word choice for way longer than I should. Or whether a certain comma interrupts the dialogue flow. One detail I'm really happy about is that smiley faces are still part of the copyediting process, even though we've shifted to a new on-screen framework. Yay for the preservation of smiley faces, even if they're not in colored pencil anymore:



Other happy things include this Running for Fiction review of Waiting for You. I recently posted links to Robby's reviews of When It Happens and Take Me There. The most I can hope for is that my readers will relate to my books and maybe even feel better about their own lives. All of your kind words mean so much to me, I cannot even tell you. I feel extremely thankful for feedback like Robby's. Most of the time it's hard for authors to know how their books are doing out in the world. To everyone who has let me know how I'm doing: You rock. And for those of you who might want to connect with me, here's where you can find me on Facebook, MySpace, or Twitter.

Dude, the loudest storm just moved in. We had such a downpour yesterday, all resonant thunder and powerful wind. The storm was so intense that my screens are totally cleaned now. Bonus! I like working while it's pouring out, the sound of the summer rain, my warm desk lamp glowing. Back to the Something Like Fate copyedits. Maybe more smiley faces are waiting to be found.

There's a new line-editing process that I'm working with for the first time. The coolest thing about it is that it saves tons of paper because no one has to print out the manuscript to work on it. Yay for saving trees! A typical line-edit works like this: The editor writes comments and makes changes directly on the manuscript, then the author uses that info to do a final revision (before copyediting and first pass pages). With this new green way, both the editor and the author use the Track Changes feature in Word to make their comments and changes. I'm loving the adventure. It's important to go with the flow. Only, I miss seeing the smiley faces my editor draws. Now her smiley faces look like this:



As much as I love paper, I love how the publishing world is taking steps to reduce their carbon footprint more. Most people hate change, but now is the time to embrace it. At first, I was concerned about missing some things on screen that I would only absorb on paper. There's something about holding a hard copy of a manuscript in paper form that allows me to work with it more effectively. But maybe I just think that because I'm so used to working that way. So I'm going to assume that I'm not missing anything on screen. Moving forward, maybe publishing houses can also require that all manuscripts be submitted by email. Then all those slush piles could become "slush files." Oh! Corny alert!

In entertainment news, my Netflix queuing/returning skills recently paid off big time. I received season three of Friday Night Lights the day it was released on DVD. I tried to resist watching all the eps right away. My plan was to spread them out. My plan was to have a modicum of restraint. Yeah, no, that didn't work. I watched the whole season in about three seconds. But it's not my fault! That show is too good! And there were only 13 eps in the whole season. That's just wrong! I've come to a realization this season. As much as I love Tim Riggins, I'm admiring Matt Saracen more. How sweet is he? I also think moving that last ep ahead five months to skip over the second semester of senior year was a bold move. I wanted to see that last semester, but I guess there are more exciting things in store for us.

Quick reminder about the NYC Teen Author Carnival. It's tomorrow, May 28, at the New York Public LIbrary at 6th Avenue and 10th Street. We'll be serving up the fun from 4:00 to 6:00. RSVP and see the deets here. Games and prizes, anyone?

I'm still smiling over my meeting with Kiefer. I think it's an awesome example of creative visualization in action. I'd been talking about meeting Kiefer and giving him a book for, like, ever. I just had this feeling that I would definitely meet him one day. Which is sort of reasonable, since he lives a few blocks from me. There's more to it than that, though. It's about putting out positive energy with your words and actions to bring the things you want to you. I think that the universe is always listening to us. This doesn't necessarily mean that all of our dreams will come true, sadly. But I believe that if you make a wish, keep it in your heart, and don't stop believing, you have a much better chance of that wish coming true.

I am happy to report that there was no Sunday Night Dread around here last weekend. There was no time. My entire weekend (and week) consisted of interacting with these objects:



Ooh, what's that? That's the revision of my fourth book, Something Like Fate. If all goes well, it should be released in May of 2010.

Now that the revision is in, I'm giving myself a few days to chill before returning to book five (I miss you, book five!). Well, chill with a To Do list about a mile long. Oh, and I'm continuing my search for the new Ben & Jerry's Obama flavor, Yes Pecan! Has anyone seen this flavor anywhere?