Mundie Moms

Monday, June 16, 2014

END TIMES by Anna Schumacher, Blog Tour: Q&A and a Giveaway!


Hello & Welcome to today's END TIMES blog tour stop, hosted by Penguin Teen. I'm thrilled to have Anna on the blog today to talk about her inspiration for End Times. First, here's a little bit about END TIMES. 


By: Anna Schumacher
Published by: Razor Bill / Penguin Teen
Released on: May 20, 2014
Purchase it from: Amazon | B&N
Add it to Goodreads

When life gets too tough to bear in Detroit, Daphne flees to her Uncle Floyd’s home, where she believes she’ll find solace in the silent hills of her childhood summers. But Daphne’s Greyhound bus pulls over in downtown Carbon County and it’s not silence that welcomes her. It’s the sound of trumpets.

Daphne’s desire to start again in simple country comfort is instantly dashed as the townsfolk declare that the End Times are here. And incredible occurrences soon support their belief. Daphne does all she can to keep her head down and ignore the signs. She works a job at the local oil rig, helps around the house, hangs out with her pregnant cousin Janie and gets to know Owen, a mysterious motocross racer and fellow roustabout at the rig. But soon a startling discovery shatters her resolve and calls into question all her doubts and fears.
Today's tour question is:

What was your the inspiration for END TIMES?

Like all respectable YA authors, I read a TON of YA. I’m a huge fan of dystopian, but whenever I read a dystopian novel or series I want to really understand how the world got that way. There’s almost always a backstory, and it’s almost never enough, and I always find myself wishing for a novella or something that puts me in the center of the action when the world as we know it is destroyed.

For END TIMES, I wanted to write an apocalyptic series that begins well before the apocalypse, with character arcs that span the before, during, and after. When I read this NYTimes article about oil boomtowns in North Dakota, it all just catalyzed for me and I knew that an oil boomtown was the perfect setting for the rapture story I’d always wanted to tell.

About Anna
Anna Schumacher received an MFA in fiction writing from The New School. Born and raised in the tiny town of Guilford, VT (no traffic lights, no post office, one store), she now lives in Brooklyn, NY with her husband and two cats. END TIMES is her first novel.
Find Anna via: Twitter | Tumblr | Goodreads

The Giveaway
Thank you to Penguin Teen I've got a copy of END TIMES to giveaway to 1 lucky reader! To enter, please fill out the form below. *US residents only
a Rafflecopter giveaway

GOOD LUCK!
* Tour stop Q&A and giveaway hosted and supplied by Penguin Teen

Mundane Monday #214- Church


Happy Mundane Monday!



Finally! Church gets his own TMI Flower Project card! haha 
Yesterday Cassie shared this picture that artist Cassandra Jean created, here.
Here's what Cassie said:

Church gets his own flower card. Because he is that awesome. Thank you Cassandra Jean!
(I shut down my ask box temporarily because I was overwhelmed with questions about CoHf but I also wanted to give people time to read it before doing all the answers. I’m thinking about opening it back up again for questions about writing and publishing if that’s something people would be interested in.)

Aww... Church. He looks so cute and cuddly. *snickers*

And just because, here's one of Cassandra Jean's latest ones of Magnus


Though when do we ever need an excuse to post a picture of Magnus. ;)


Cassandra Clare's Recent Q&As via Tumblr


HAPPY MUNDANE MONDAY!

Just in case you've missed some of Cassie's recent's posts answering fan questions regarding CoHF and the TMI series, I've posted a few of her recent Q&A posts below. You can keep up with all her latest posts via her Tumblr page here. I've included all the links to her posts via the title of each of her Q&A's.


Hi Cassie! I’m going to start out saying that your books are my all time favorite. I just finished City of Heavenly Fire today and I was wondering about Ty. Helen had said that he was special and i have seen the way he acts in CoHF and I was just wondering if he is autistic? It would make sense — my brother is autistic and as soon as I started to get to know Ty, I started to have that question. Will this be answered in later books or are these just small traits that you added to his personality? I have to say, so far he is my favorite of the Blackthorns :) I can’t wait to start reading your next book when it comes out next year! — 2be-still
I’ve been getting a ton of questions about Ty since CoHF came out, so I thought I would reblog this. I just wanted to add that absolutely TDA does address the issues of the Clave’s poor relationship with neuroatypicality — they don’t believe there is such a thing among Nephilim — and that is an issue for and regarding Ty — though so are many other things, like his personal relationships, both romantic and familial, and also his desire to be a detective, that are important, too.
After reading the COHF prologue excerpt, I have the sense that Ty has Asperger’s Syndrome. Can you confirm this? I think that would be really cool because I’ve also dealt with Asperger’s in my life (it being the worst when I was about Ty’s age) so seeing you create a character also going through that is really assuring, for lack of a better word. Thanks so much if you can answer! ➰ — malec-chat
Hi Cassie, I love your books and I cannot wait for COHF. You are an amazingly talented author on and I have fallen deeply in love with your writing. Unfortunately I shall have to wait a while for the book, but in the mean time I have been satisfying my shadowhunting needs with #TMItuesday. I have just read the new snippet from the prologue and was wondering if Ty was autistic. I have family who work with autistic children and in the snippet and noticed Ty was showing a few autistic traits, so I was wondering whether or not he was autistic? — letmeliveinbooks
Yes, Ty places on the autistic spectrum. I’m glad that that was picked up as it is a part of his character. My stepbrother is autistic (I know there is debate within the neuroatypical community as to whether to say “autistic” or “person with autism” so I try to go with what people want to call themselves) and it is partly through that relationship that I decided that I would like to write a neuroatypical hero. Ty has a loving and supportive family but certainly lives within a society that is intolerant of difference, and which has a specific poor relationship with neuroatypicality among its members. Ty is a favorite of mine and a big part of TDA. I wanted to make it clear that he was just as intelligent and skilled, and just as worthy and capable of love, respect and admiration as his neurotypical peers, when he is struggling and when he is not, and I hope you will like him.

CoHF was very cleverly written without spoiling anything from TID, but won’t it be hard writing TDA without spoiling anything from the other two series?
And  questions about the TID characters in CoHF, what to expect from TDA, and more below the spoiler cut.

Hi! first off I love your books. I just have a question(s) for you, if someone ascends and becomes a shadow hunter, what last name do they have/take? If they are not a female with the intention of getting married like Sophie Collins what would they do?
When people ascend and become Shadowhunters, they pick from a list of existing names that have become defunct, because the families have died off, etc.* That’s the case no matter what — Sophie doesn’t take the name Lightwood. She gets a different name: 
“You are Nephilim now,” she said. “I name you Sophia Ashdown, of the blood of Jonathan Shadowhunter.”
and takes Lightwood when she marries Gideon, but she has to be a Shadowhunter first, to marry him. 
They can also submit a new name for approval.
and also what becomes
spoiler under cut
I found Simon’s evaluation of Alec in CoHF very contradictory; he considers him to be the “most conservative of the Lightwoods”, and the one that looks down upon Downworlders the most. Throughout the entire series, at least in comparison to Jace, Isabelle, and his parents, he has seemed the most accepting of Downworlders in general. The Bane Chronicles also cemented this part of Alec’s character, in my opinion. Is this just a case of Simon not knowing Alec well and making false judgements?
Hello! CoHF spoilers under cut.

*click on the link to read the Q&A* spoilers


*These have all been taken from Cassie's Tumblr page, and each topic has been linked back to the specific post. Many of Cassie's answer were hidden due to COHF spoilers, and I left those hidden the same way Cassie did. To read them, please click the Read More link. 

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