Hi! My name is Cheyenne Stoddard. I’m a recently published author. I published the first book in a series I’ve been working on for nine years. This is the main blog for updates, links, questions and tf teasers! I am so excited about this series and cannot wait for the rest of the journey.
Talon Adams desperately wants to live in a world where his skin has no say in how he is viewed and how he is treated. Every day he is faced with fierce hatred and abuse at home and at school. His parents describe his birth as a curse. His teachers and classmates see him as a freak. Talon was born albino and he is demonized for it. He lives in a small Ohio village with less than 1,400 people. To them he’s evil and unnatural, even the system is against him. His twin brother, Tyler was born with “Normal” skin. He plays a big part in Talon’s mistreatment by constantly setting him up for failure. A new boy moves into town and to him Talon is the epitome of beauty. He works hard to gain Talon’s trust and affections, but he has secrets. Dark secrets that could scare Talon off. He tries his best to keep his past hidden, however certain people won’t let that happen.
But so too do many stories start when filled with wayward teenagers and boring little towns surrounded by nothing, stuck dead center in the middle of nowhere. Young things struck with boredom feel dangerously susceptible to darker events. Adrenaline comes and goes. Goes, mostly. Leaving just about any teenager hungry to chase that rush over and over again. But what makes this a distinction from other tales you may have read, other stories with feral children and the emptiness within with they live, is a single word.
Accidental.
For when two children climbed into a rusted out, smoke spewing car within their home so fondly nicknamedNowheretown, Arizona, they did not intend to end a life. There was a hunger for excitement, but not brutality in their hearts at the creeping hour of midnight. Or was it one am? Or earlier even than that, simply somewhere within the twilight hours?
it’s an every-meal sort of thing. that is to say, there’s only two and a half restaurants in town; two that are always accessible to underage and one that turns adults only when the sun goes down. thus, two and a half. a diner joint, a half fancy place that uses low lighting and the smell of spicy candles to make everything just a shade more fitting, and the bar-not-bar. sliding in and out of each of them is easy as pie for billie, but the diner gets her attention more than anyone else. not a matter of price. it’s a matter of waitstaff.
where else can she find someone like zion on such raw display? the mask that he wears is profound beyond anything, simplistically shaped to entertain the masses of their nowhere and nothing town who in return, barely tolerate the kid. watching the evolution – what zion can’t hide with a fake bubbly personality and bright smile – with wide and wary eyes. it’s chaos to them. but it’s art to billie.
when zion still went to school, alone for so long in every classroom, there was an aura of falsehood in the kid’s existence. well cultured but grating beneath any attention, every passing day. back then, zion still had hair. loose and brittle from a lack of care falling down past shoulders and the swell underneath the front of loose shirts.
back then, zion was a she with no question or hesitation in anyone’s minds. there she goes wearing a name that doesn’t suit her, there she is staring at nothing again. look at her, picking up garter snakes from the desert ground and carrying them as living knots around her fingers until the teachers make her release them into the sand again.
now a lot of them aren’t sure. things changed quickly for zion after graduation, as dismissive and dismal of a thing as it was. first a head was stripped of hair and kept that way, bare, reflecting the sunlight. then the ink appeared. not cheap and poorly done; instead an elegant brutalist sort of pattern that made no sense to anyone. poor taste, they called it. that’s the thing killing zion’s poor mother, frail thing that she is.
every job offer came out of pity. almost every person clucked in distaste as zion lashed down her, their, his chest until every shirt hung even looser on that body. what would happen, billie wondered, when sickness finally took zion’s mother away? would all those jobs be suddenly filled? the barely there kindness, would that dry up too? towns like these weren’t made for odd silhouettes wearing snakes like bracelets and haunted, gaunt expressions when no one is supposed to be looking.
she knows it’s not a question of anything but how long. and just who zion will be when the world collapses around him.
The foreshadowing… I just cried a lot I actually didn’t know that ScarJo was in this film, I’m surprised that her character will be the one I will mostly cried for in the first place. I hate it. I love her character. Very much #BEARABBIT I WILL LOVE THIS FILM FOREVER! I LOVE YOU ELSA AND JOJO
Terkel moved to Chicago to attend University of Chicago, attaining a bachelor’s of philosophy and a J.D. there, but despite being admitted to the Illinois bar after finishing law school, he never practiced law. Instead, he found work in a writer’s project funded by theWork’s Progress Administration (WPA),which allowed him to write and act for radio (often taking on the role of the villain). It was as an actor that he was dubbed Studs, from Chicago writer James T. Farrell’sStuds Lonigan trilogy, reportedly because there was another Louis in cast and the director wanted to differentiate the two. Terkel happened to be reading Farrell at the time and the name stuck.
Radio work eventually led to a television show, “Studs’ Place” (1949 - 1951), where Terkel’s strength as not only an interviewer, but a conversationalist, was recognized. However, a combination of the changing television landscape and Terkel’s outspoken leftist views in the McCarthy era meant the show was short lived. Terkel found a new home as a radio host at the newly formed WFMT, a fine-arts station more tolerant of Studs’ politics, where his show would endure for 45 years. It was through his radio program that he attracted the attention of publisher Andre Schriffin, and his literary career took off. Terkel passed away at his home in Chicago in 2008, at the age of 96.
Studs Terkel insisted that everyone has a story, and everyone deserves to be heard. He is remembered as one of the greatest oral historians of the 20th century.
I always start off my reviews of contemporary YA with the disclaimer that I don’t often read contemporary YA. Recently I’ve been reading a bit more of it, and I don’t know if I can comfortably say that anymore. I do still love fantasy more as a genre, but I’ve been reading my fair share of contemporary. Save the Dateimmediately drew me in because of its plot. I’m a fan of Katie Fforde books for…
Happy Friday, Bookworms! Here’s what the team at Simon & Schuster Canada is reading.
Jordyn, Sales Assistant: I just finished Loyalty in Death, by J.D. Robb (Nora Roberts’ pseudonym). This book is number 9 in the in Death series. I’m not even close to finishing because there are over 50 books in the series, and they’re still coming out! I love this series because each book is a murder mystery set in a futuristic mid-21st century New York City. The main character, Lieutenant Eve Dallas, had a rough childhood, but makes up for it by being a badass homicide cop who is prickly but efficient. It also helps that there’s a hunky love interest, but really, solving the murder mystery takes precedence in this series. It’s a lengthy series, but maybe one day I’ll manage to catch up!
Jacquelynne, Marketing Assistant: As you may all recall, I was reading Owl and the Japanese Circus a little while ago. I put that book down to start reading for one of our Conferences and forgot to pick it back up. Just recently I picked it up again, and I forgot how much I LOVED Owl, Rynn, Oricho, and (of course) Captain. With that in mind, I decided to pick up the second volume, Owl and the City of Angels. I am only a few chapters in, but Owl is just as feisty and funny as ever! I love how Kristi Charish has built a character I can so easily connect with, and secondary characters that really build and move the plot. The settings are always intriguing, and the mix of modern and historical elements are definitely a favourite of mine. Owl is truly a modern Indiana Jane, with a few nerdy qualities I can’t help but adore. If you’re a fan of supernatural, historical, and adventurous light reading, Kristi Charish’s Owl Series is for you. And now is the perfect time to start this series, because this May marks the third installment in the series: Owl and the Electric Samurai.
Holley, Publicity Assistant: I loved reading The Impossible Fortress by Jason Rekulak! It is a delightful story about young love between two young computer coders! The novel brings you into the 1980s in a coming of age story about friendship and young love. A great read for anyone, with the bonus of being able to play the game from the book online at http://www.jasonrekulak.com/game/
