What’s on my iPod: “I’m Every Woman” by Whitney Houston
What I’m reading: “Once Upon a Secret: My Affair with President John F. Kennedy and Its Aftermath” by Mimi Alford
The last person I followed on Twitter: @OscarPRgirl

1. Elise Allen blurbs about Jennifer Gooch Hummer’s new novel GIRL UNMOORED

One of our favorite client’s Elise Allen took to her site to share her FIRST EVER blurb about one of our newest, freshest and most talented: Jennifer Gooch Hummer. Jennifer’s new novel GIRL UNMOORED hits bookstands soon. Here is a highlight from the blurb:

“I immediately said yes.  I’d never blurbed before, and it’s not often you get to experience a whole new verb.  It also felt like a big deal because it’s such an “established novelist” thing to do.  I was absolutely thrilled…

…and okay, a little nervous.  I remember how anxious I was when Populazzi was sent out to potential blurbers.  I had nightmares that we’d hear back nothing but a slew of, “Yeah, um… I really don’t want my name attached to this book.  Thanks, though.”  (Happily, that didn’t happen — I got great blurbs from Hilary Duff, Eileen Cook, Matthew Quick, and Deb Caletti.)

What if I didn’t like this book Crystal was sending me?  I’d have to be honest, and even though I didn’t know the author personally, I’d feel terrible passing along a bad review during those nail-biting final months before publication.

Turns out there was no need to worry at all.  Jennifer Gooch Hummer’s  Girl Unmoored had me riveted from page one.  I purposely read nothing about the book before I dove into its pages — I didn’t want any preconceived notions — but I’ll give you the official summary:”

More about Elise Allen

Elise Allen has among the most random television-writing resumes ever, with credits that run the gamut from Cosby to Dinosaur Train. She recently fulfilled one of her many life’s ambitions by writing for the Muppets. Another ambition, anytime-access to Disneyland’s Club 33, is for the moment still a pipe dream. Elise has a sick penchant for running marathons, and can’t seem to stop even though fifteen really should be enough already. She lives in L.A. with her husband, daughter, and insatiable food-hound of a dog, Riley.

2.  Speaking of Jennifer Gooch Hummer, her new novel GIRL UNMOORED is now available on NetGalley.com!

Jennifer Gooch Hummer is our first author on NetGalley! This makes it easier than ever for reviewers to receive the galley of Girl Unmoored for their e-readers. Girl Unmoored is in NetGalley’s Recent Catolog from the homepage: www.netgalley.com. Shout out to YA and women’s fiction reviewers: Request away!

More on GIRL UNMOORED

The sharp, quick-witted novel follows Apron, a young woman who has come unmoored by a sea of family drama and break-ups. But when she meets Mike, she’s met her mooring. Although Mike and his cantankerous boyfriend, Chad, don’t know what do with her first – Apron just seems to keep showing up, usually with a fat lip – they eventually offer her a job in their flower store. And then it’s smooth sailing for Apron, until she uncovers Chad’s secret. Suddenly Apron is forced to leave behind the safe harbor of childhood and navigate the stormy seas of a young adult. She knows what her real job is now, and it has nothing to do with flowers.

Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of Pictures of You, comments, “Love, loss, and the coming of age of one remarkable girl blaze through this haunting debut like a shooting star you’d wish upon. It’s tough and tender, funny and smart, and it frankly took my breath away. I loved it.”

Girl Unmoored is set to be published March 2012.

3. Joy Castro in the Daily Nebraskan 

Another great client Joy Castro – author of upcoming novel HELL OR HIGH WATER – was featured in the Daily Nebraskan. The article overviewed her upcoming novel and her life outside writing. Here is a highlight:

“I get bored easily, so I like being able to move among different kinds of work,” said Castro of her upcoming projects. “If I get stuck, I can turn to a different project for a while. I don’t beat my head against a wall when something’s not working. I don’t get writer’s block.”

“Hell or High Water,” Castro’s first novel, is a psychological thriller set in post-Katrina New Orleans, following a reporter sucked into a mystery of missing sex offenders and a world of poverty. Castro, whose husband is from New Orleans, said she was drawn to the city’s history and culture, emphasizing the importance of location in her writing.

“Place is huge,” she said. “Place shapes us. Place forms character. It’s there for writers whether we want it or not. I happen to want it and I suspect I’ll go on wanting it.”

More on HELL OR HIGH WATER

Nola Céspedes, an ambitious young reporter at the Times-Picayune, catches a break:  an assignment to write her first full-length crime feature.  While researching her story, she becomes fixated on the search for a missing tourist in New Orleans.  As Nola’s work leads her back into dangerous corners of the city, she finds herself faced with an even more compelling question:  Who is Nola Céspedes?  Vividly rendered in razor-sharp prose, this psychological thriller is a riveting journey of trust betrayed—and the courageous struggle toward recovery.

“Hell or High Water is more than just a mystery; it’s a heartfelt examination of a second America—poor but undaunted—that was swept under the rug but refuses to stay there.”  –Dennis Lehane, New York Times bestselling author of Mystic River

“In the tradition of P.D. James, Ruth Rendell, and Lucha Corpi, Joy Castro shows how mystery can be much more than the unraveling of crimes concealed.  An irresistible and compelling novel.”  –Lorraine M. López, author of Homicide Survivors Picnic and Other Stories

4. THE MAN WHO COULDN’T EAT on Memory Writers Network 

Jon Reiner‘s acclaimed memoir THE MAN WHO COULDN’T eat is still making buzz! Here is a highlight from the essay “10 Reasons to Read a Memoir about a Man Who Couldn’t Eat” on Memory Writers Network:

Jon Reiner’s intestines were riddled with the autoimmune condition called Crohn’s Disease, a cruel punishment for a man who enjoys food as much as he does. His memoir, “The Man Who Couldn’t Eat,” turned out to be a gut-wrenching journey through one of the most yin and yang dilemmas I have read in nonfiction. It is an exquisite interweaving of the intense pleasure of eating along with the intense suffering that results when his body rebels. The book is also about love and marriage, about a man’s responsibility to his family, and about a chronically ill person attempting to find meaning in life. Here are 10 things memoir lovers will appreciate in “The Man Who Couldn’t Eat.”

More on THE MAN WHO COULDN’T EAT

Imagine not being able to eat or drink a single thing.  No lobster roll on the beach in Maine; no hot dog at the ballpark; no cool drink on a hot summer day; no birthday cake; nothing. In The Man Who Couldn’t Eat (S&S/Gallery Books: September 6, 2011), Jon Reiner – a James Beard Foundation Award-winning writer –chronicles his three-month struggle to live without food. Based on Reiner’s acclaimed 2009 Esquire magazine article by the same name, the book reinvents the foodoir, telling what happens when a man obsessed with food is denied the taste of it.  A beautifully written chronicle of one man’s journey from plenty to deprivation and back again,The Man Who Couldn’t Eat  will change the way you think about more than just your next meal.

5. BookSparksPR and SparkPoint Studio now on PINTEREST! 

It was only a matter of time, but we’re officially addicted too! Check our our Pinterest account HERE and be sure to follow us for our latest book, author and simply great publicity finds!