BANISH by Gretchen McNeil

• Publication Season/Year: Winter 2012
• Publisher: Balzer + Bray
• Release Date: TBD
• ISBN (hardcover): TBD
• ISBN (paperback): TBD

Fifteen-year-old Bridget Liu just wants to be left alone: by her overprotective mom, by the hunky son of the police officer who got her father killed, and by the eerie voices which she can suddenly and inexplicably hear.  Turns out the voices are demons – the Biblical kind, not the Buffy kind – and Bridget possesses the rare ability to banish them.

San Francisco’s senior exorcist and his newly assigned partner from the Vatican enlist Bridget’s help with increasingly bizarre and dangerous cases of demonic possession.  But just when she is starting to come to terms with her freakish new role, Bridget receives a startling message from one of the demons: Don’t trust the Priest.

When one of Bridget’s oldest friends turns up dead in a ritualistic sacrifice that mirrors her father’s murder, Bridget realizes she can’t trust anyone. An interview with her father’s murderer reveals a link between Bridget and the Emim: a race of part-demons intent on raising their forefathers to the earth in human form.  Now Bridget must unlock the secret to the Emim’s plan before someone else close to her winds up dead, or worse – the human vessel for a Demon King.

NEVERMORE by Kelly Creagh

• Publication Season/Year: Fall, 2010
• Publisher: Atheneum
• Release Date: August 31, 2010
• ISBN (hardcover): 978-1-442402-00-3
• ISBN (paperback): N/A

In NEVERMORE, cheerleader Isobel falls for Poe-fan Varen–but will she be able to save him from the madness taking hold of his mind?

BAD GIRLS DON’T DIE by Katie Alender

• Publication Season/Year: Spring 2009
• Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
• Release Date: April 21, 2009
• ISBN (hardcover): 978-1423108764
• ISBN (paperback): TBD

Alexis thought she led a typically dysfunctional high school existence. Dysfunctional like her parents’ marriage; her doll-crazy thirteen-year-old sister, Kasey; and even her own anti-social, anti-cheerleader attitude.

When a family fight results in some tearful sisterly bonding, Alexis realizes that her life is creeping from dysfunction into danger. Kasey is acting stranger than ever: her blue eyes go green sometimes; she uses old-fashioned language; and she even loses track of chunks of time, claiming to know nothing about her strange behavior. Their old house is changing, too. Doors open and close by themselves; water boils on the unlit stove; and an unplugged air conditioner turns the house cold enough to see their breath in.

Alexis wants to think that it’s all in her head, but soon, what she liked to think of as silly parlor tricks are becoming life-threatening-to her, her family, and to her budding relationship with the student council VP. Alexis knows she’s the only person who can stop Kasey – but what if that green-eyed girl isn’t even Kasey anymore?

Presentations and workshops

• My Life as a Writer (all ages)
• So You Want to be an Author (all ages)
• Exploring Creativity (2^nd to 8^th grade)
• Focusing Your Creativity (9^th-12^th grade)
• Fiction Writing Techniques (7^th-12^th grade)
• Creating Dynamic Characters (7^th-12^th grade)
• Applied Critique Workshops (7^th-12^th grade; up to 6 students)

THE MONSTER VARIATIONS

• Publication Season/Year: Summer, 2009
• Publisher: Delacorte Press
• Release Date: August 11, 2009
• ISBN (hardcover): 9780385737333
• ISBN (paperback): TBD

Someone is killing boys in a small town. The murder weapon is a truck, and the only protection is a curfew enacted to keep kids off the streets. But it’s summer-and that alone is worth the risk of staying out late for James, Willie, and Reggie.

Willie, who lost his arm in the first hit-and-run attack, finds it hard to keep up with his two best friends as they leave childhood behind. All of them are changing, hounded by their parents, hunted by the killer, and haunted by the “monster,” a dead thing that guards the dangerous gateway between youth and manhood. But that’s not all: shadowing the boys everywhere is Mel Herman, the mysterious and brilliant bully whose dark secrets may hold the key to their survival. As the summer burns away, these forces collide, and it will take compassion, brains, and guts for the boys to overcome their demons-and not become monsters themselves.

In this chilling and poignant debut novel, Daniel Kraus deftly explores the choices boys grapple with and the revelations that occur as they become men.

ADVANCE PRAISE:

“Beneath the terror and the thrills, there is *truth* in this haunting tale. It pierced my heart straight through.” –Lauren Myracle, ttyl and Bliss

“Has shades of A Separate Peace, Lord of the Flies, and To Kill a Mockingbird, but is utterly unique from the very first line.” –Joshua Ferris, Then We Came to the End

YOU ARE SO UNDEAD TO ME

• Publication Season/Year: Winter 2009
• Publisher: Razorbill
• Release Date: January 22nd, 2009
• ISBN (hardcover): N/A
• ISBN (paperback): 978-1595142252                               

Q: HOW MANY ZOMBIES DOES IT TAKE TO RUIN A SOCIAL LIFE?

A: NOT MANY.

Megan Berry is a Zombie Settler by birth, which means she’s part-time shrink to a whole bunch of semi-dead people with killer issues. All Megan really wants is to go to homecoming, but when you’re trailed by a bunch of slobbering corpses whenever you leave the house, it’s kinda hard to score a date. Let’s just say Megan’s love life could use some major resuscitation.

Megan’s convinced her life can’t get any worse – until someone in school starts using black magic to turn average, angsty Undead into scary, hardcore flesh-eating Zombies. Now it’s up to Megan to stop the Zombie apocalypse. Her life – and more importantly, the homecoming dance – depends on it

BLEEDING VIOLET by Dia Reeves

• Publication Season/Year: Spring 2010
• Publisher: Simon Pulse
• Release Date: January 5, 2010
• ISBN (hardcover): 1416986189
• ISBN (paperback): TBD

BLEEDING VIOLET summary:

Sixteen-year-old Hanna Järvinen is an unusual girl with a head full of hallucinations, a medicine cabinet full of pills, and a closet full of frilly, violet dresses. Everything a girl needs–except love.  But that’s what mothers are for, and Hanna is sure she can reconcile with hers, even though she was abandoned as a baby.

Unfortunately, her mother lives in Portero, an odd East Texas town with doors that lead out of the world, flesh-eating creatures, and parasitical spirits–not an ideal environment for winning a mother’s love.

Hanna, however, refuses to let a few monsters interfere with her plans. If she has to flirt a little, lie a little, kill a little, or even bleed a little, she’ll do it. Hanna can live with monsters and mayhem, but she would rather die than live without love.