Signed, Sealed, Delivered: Meant to Be and Pivot Point

Casey at The Bookish Type has started up a new meme for highlighting recent book deals that have been announced! These are for books at the stage where they don't yet have a cover or official synopsis. I always feel like the books only really start getting attention once they have a cover, so I'm excited about this meme!

My picks this week:

Meant to Be by Lauren Morrill

From Goodreads: "Cyrano de Bergerac meets YA in a Shakespearean comedy of errors in which one mysterious romantic text message sets off a wild goose chase full of mistaken identity, misdirected chemistry, and misguided heartache."

And a slightly different description from the Publishers Weekly announcement (taken from the author's website):  

"Boston Derby Dame roller girl Lauren Morrill's debut novel, MTB, in which mystery texts and swapped cells lead to a flurry of mixed-messages and romantic entanglements on a class trip to London, to Wendy Loggia at Delacorte, in a two-book deal, via exclusive submission, by Stephen Barbara at Foundry Literary‬‪+ Media on behalf of Paper Lantern Lit."

Stats: scheduled for Nov. 13, 2012; from Delacorte.

Cyrano de Bergerac + London + mistaken identities = what's not to like? Comedy of errors can be hilarious if done well...fingers crossed for this one!

Pivot Point by Kasie West

From Goodreads: "Reminiscent of the movie Sliding Doors, Pivot Point is about a girl who has the power to Search alternate futures. When faced with a life changing decision, she lives out six weeks of two different lives (in alternating chapters), both holding the potential for love and loss, and must ultimately choose which path she is willing to live through."

And the longer version from the author's blog:

"When Addison Coleman is faced with a choice, she has the ultimate insurance plan against disaster—the ability to see both outcomes.  It may not be as flashy as Telekinesis or Telepathy, but it’s the perfect ability to maintain a suck-free life.  Or so she thought.  But after her parents ambush her with a divorce announcement and ask her who she wants to live with, she knows either road leads to Anywhere-But-Here.

With her father leaving the paranormal compound to live amongst the masses of underused brains and her mother staying with the gifted in the life she’s always known, both futures seem lacking.  It isn’t until she Searches the two possibilities that she realizes how hard the choice really is.  And it’s not just because the popular quarterback is interested in her in one life and the troubled artist in the other.  When her father, a human lie detector, is assigned as the lead investigator of a murder and her best friend, a mind eraser, becomes involved with a criminal, she learns either path holds the potential for loss.  It all comes down to which loss she’s willing to live through.

Reminiscent of the movie “Sliding Doors” the chapters alternate between the two possibilities.  The intertwining futures provide the reader with insights the main character can’t see, building tension for when the knowledge of both worlds collide."

 
Stats: scheduled for December 2012/January 2013, from HarperTeen

 

Hello, book that fills one of my "gaps" in YA lit! Parallel lives and realities have spades of potential as yet untapped in YA. Here's hoping it will spark a trend...

What recent book deals have you discovered? Join the meme on Casey's blog and share!

Signed, Sealed, Delivered: The Lost Girl and The Gathering Dark

Casey at The Bookish Type has started up a new meme for highlighting recent book deals that have been announced! These are for books at the stage where they don't yet have a cover or official synopsis. I always feel like the books only really start getting attention once they have a cover, so I'm excited about this meme!

My picks:

The Lost Girl by Sangu Mandanna

There's not a lot to go on yet, but what there is sounds awesome!

From the author's blog:

"It's a book about a girl, and a copy of that girl; it's a story about death and echoes and impossible, reckless love." 

And a FAQ giving a bit more info:

"How did you come up with the idea for THE LOST GIRL?

A mixture of Frankenstein and Tim Burton and a hot afternoon in Bangalore. The thought of making a person from scratch is both creepy and kind of appealing to me. And once the idea of stitching a human being together took hold, it wouldn't go away. A girl started taking shape in my head. Smokily, foggily, at first. Then she stopped being smoke and became real. She was a copy of somebody else. She loved the wrong people. She was angry and sad and lovely and I wanted to write about her."

From Goodreads: "A girl forced to choose between two worlds."

Stats: scheduled for 2012, from HarperCollins Children's Books in U.S. and Random House Children's Books in U.K.

I want to know more! The Franksteinian aspect sounds kind of creepy and unsettling, but at this point I'm not sure exactly what genre it's in. Just that my interest is definitely piqued!

The Gathering Dark by Christine Johnson

From Goodreads: "Christine Johnson’s THE GATHERING DARK, about a gifted pianist who discovers that she and the mysterious boy she’s falling for are part of an alternate world made from dark matter, and in a race of love against fear, she must somehow save her life without losing herself."

Stats: scheduled for Fall 2012, from Simon Pulse

And the author has provided a visual idea of the book on her blog:

I haven't read Christine Johnson's books Claire de Lune and Nocturne (I'm not big on werewolves), but The Gathering Dark definitely appeals to me more. The premise stands out among other YA reads and I'm interested to see how the physics aspect of it (an alternate world of dark matter?!) is handled, along with the connection to music.

What recent book deals have you discovered! Join the meme on Casey's blog and share!