Post Title: YA Scavenger Hunt
Welcome to the spring YA Scavenger Hunt! This bi-annual event was first organized by author Colleen Houck as a way to give readers a chance to gain access to exclusive bonus material from their favorite authors…and a chance to win some awesome prizes! At this hunt, you not only get access to exclusive content from each author, you also get a clue for the hunt. Add up the clues, and you can enter for our prize–one lucky winner will receive one book from each author on the hunt in my team! But play fast: this contest (and all the exclusive bonus material) will only be online for 72 hours! Also, I’ll be hosting my own giveaway. To enter the drawing, answer this question in the comment box: The inspiration for my third YA novel, GIRLS ON THE VERGE (out April 9th), was the seminal (as far as I’m concerned) road trip movie Thelma and Louise, which is about two friends supporting one other to the end. What is your favorite road trip movie, song, or personal road trip memory? Three winners will be drawn randomly. Prizes are book themed, of course! Please check back here on April 7th after noon PST to see if you’re a winner. Alternatively, you can send your contact info to me at shazwriter@me.com .
Go to the YA Scavenger Hunt page to find out all about the hunt. There are FIVE contests going on simultaneously each with twenty authors, and you can enter one contest or all of them! I am a part of the RED TEAM–but there is also a blue team, a gold team, a green team, and a purple team.
If you’d like to find out more about the hunt, see links to all the authors participating, and see the full list of prizes up for grabs, go to the YA Scavenger Hunt page.
SCAVENGER HUNT PUZZLE Directions: In my post, you’ll notice that I’ve hidden my favorite number. Collect the favorite numbers of all the authors on the RED team, and then add them up (don’t worry, you can use a calculator!).
Entry Form: Once you’ve added up all the numbers, make sure you fill out the form here to officially qualify for the grand prize. Only entries that have the correct number will qualify.
Rules: Open internationally, anyone below the age of 18 should have a parent or guardian’s permission to enter. To be eligible for the grand prize, you must submit the completed entry form by Sunday, April 7th, at noon Pacific Time. Entries sent without the correct number or without contact information will not be considered.
SCAVENGER HUNT POST
Today, I am hosting Joyce Scarborough, author of AFTER ME, for the YA Scavenger Hunt! Let’s give Joyce 52 rounds of applause!
About Joyce Scarbrough
The former senior editor for Champagne Books, Joyce now does freelance editing and writes full time. She writes both adult and YA fiction and has seven published novels as well as short stories in multiple anthologies.
About AFTER ME from the Unfinished Series.
After she’s murdered by a sexual predator, 18-year-old Jada Gayle must stay among the living until she finds and stops the internet stalker who killed her. Assigned to a foster home back among the living, she assumes the identity of a homeless teen and is expected to simply fit in as she hunts down her killer.
Find out more information by heading over to Joyce’s Website or find more about the author’s book here: AFTER ME!
EXCLUSIVE CONTENT
EXCLUSIVE CONTENT
Sneak Peek of AFTER YOU
The Unfinished Series, Book Two
Chapter One
Takeoff initiated as soon as the Corvette’s tires hit the pavement. All systems were go. Flying already with not even a quarter mile gone. Making the ‘Vette fly was the only thing that helped when the explosions started up inside him again, and there was one helluva firestorm going on in there now.
Wade ran his hand lovingly over the dash. “This is it, baby. Time to give it all we got, pedal to the metal and all that shit.” He laughed and watched the speedometer needle move steadily to the right. “The old man’s counting on me to screw up again, and I sure wouldn’t wanna disappoint him one last time.”
The headlights sliced a path in the dark, the scenery flying past as indistinguishable shadows. The only break in the blackness came from an occasional streetlight on the few side roads and the North Star shining brighter than all the others around it in the cloudless autumn sky.
“He’s really pissed at me this time,” Wade said. “He’ll be hell bent on making me pay, and we both know he’s always had a talent for hitting me where it hurts the most. But I’m not gonna let him win this time, baby. No sir, he’s gonna have to go to Plan B.”
The needle hit seventy and Wade smiled. The split pine he’d always used as the point of no return was gone now—taken with the thousands of other trees felled when Hurricane Frederic hit Mobile the year before—but that was okay. Wade was sure he’d be well over his previous record when he reached the curve.
“Nope, not gonna let him take you this time, baby. Me and you gotta stick together. Can’t let him bust us up.” He pushed a cassette into the slot, and the guitar solo at the end of “Free Bird” soared out of the speakers.
The speedometer read seventy-eight.
“Gonna be airborne soon!” Wade shouted over the music. “Gonna look down on the old man and just laugh my ass off.” His hands caressed the steering wheel. “It’s always been you and me, baby. True love, just like Jeana said.”
As soon as he said her name, his smile disappeared and tears rolled down his cheeks, but he swiped them away and looked at the speedometer again. Coming up on eighty-five, the music accelerating along with the ‘Vette.
“Don’t get sidetracked, dumbass! Gotta stay focused. Can’t think about Jeana and how she looked at me tonight, or the way she told the old man off, or how it felt when she hugged me for the—”
His eyes widened and he took his foot off the accelerator at the same instant the headlights reflected off the warning signs. What the hell was wrong with him? He stomped the brake, causing the car’s rear end to fishtail just enough to put the driver’s side to the fore when the Corvette took flight into the curve.
Seconds before impact with the tenacious scrub oak that had managed to escape Frederic’s wrath, Wade had just long enough to whisper, “I’m sorry, Redhot. I didn’t mean to spoil your birthday.”
~ * ~
His eyes aren’t working and there’s something stiff around his neck. He can’t see who’s doing all the yelling, but he hears the whoop-whoop-whoopof a helicopter and feels hands rolling him onto some kind of board. That’s all he feels, and he knows he should probably be thankful for that. He wishes he could tell them all to just leave him the hell alone, but his voice isn’t working either.
Everything goes away for a while.
Then he’s awake again and doesn’t hear the helicopter anymore, but there are even more people yelling now, all of them pulling and poking at him. He hears hospital sounds too—beeps and whooshes and metal clanking. Don’t they know it’s too late? He really screwed up bad this time and there’s no coming back from it. He can’t black out again no matter how hard he tries, so he does the next best thing and goes away to the only place he’s ever been happy.
He’s ten years old and can’t stop smiling because Jeana is going swimming with him, and he’ll have her all to himself. Billy Joe is on vacation in Gulf Shores with his folks, and Jeana’s bratty sister has a cast on her arm and can’t tag along like she usually does.
They’re at the pool and he’s showing off for her with half-gainers and handstands. He challenges her to a Dead Man’s Float contest and lets her win so he can look at the way her hair gets all billowy around her when she’s in the water. She laughs and teases him about winning so he pretends to be upset, but the truth is the way she looks when she laughs is what he sees in his dreams.
A storm comes and they have to leave the pool. They take shelter at the school on the way home because she’s afraid of the lightning, and he can’t believe he has her in his arms, close enough to smell the heavenly scent of her hair that even the chlorine from the pool can’t mask. He touches one of her curls and thinks it must be what it feels like to touch strands of silk. For once his stupid brain doesn’t fail him, and he thinks of a way to keep her from being frightened. When she kisses him on the cheek before they leave and looks at him like he’s a hero or something, he knows he will love her as long as he lives . . .
“Pressure’s dropping—he’s flatlining!”
“Give him an amp of epi!”
. . . as long as he lives. . .
“Asystole. We lost him.”
. . .as long as he lives.
“Shit. Call it.”
And longer . . .
~ * ~
When he opened his eyes again, he was in some kind of pristine waiting room, sitting across from a girl wearing a long white dress. He looked down and saw that he was also clad in all white—pants, shirt and shoes. What the hell was going on?
“Hey, where are we?” he asked the girl, but she only put a finger to her lips and pointed at the wall behind him. He got up to see what she was pointing at and saw a sign lettered in gold paint.
TAKE A SEAT AND WAIT TO BE CALLED. NO TALKING.
On the door to the right of his chair was another sign.
AFTERLIFE ADMISSIONS
“You gotta be kidding me.”
AFTER YOU Releasing Summer 2019
Don’t forget to enter the contest for a chance to win a ton of books by me, Joyce Scarbrough, and more! To enter, you need to find my favorite number somewhere in this post (hint: it’s highlighted in red). Add up all the favorite numbers of the authors on the RED team and you’ll have all the secret code to enter for the grand prize!
CONTINUE THE HUNT To keep going on your quest for the hunt, you need to check out the next author! Marsha Black
GO RED TEAM!
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