BAFFLING BINGO MYSTERY BOOK DAY:DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS- A GIVEAWAY

WELCOME TO BOOKIN' WITH BINGO'S
"BAFFLING BINGO DAY"
I'M EXCITED TO ANNOUNCE THIS THURSDAY'S
"BAFFLING BINGO DAY"
MYSTERY BOOK CHOICE IS.....

GIVEAWAY ENDED
DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS 

BY C. J. OMOLOLU

ABOUT THE BOOK:

Everyone has secrets. Some are just bigger and dirtier than others.

For sixteen years, Lucy has kept her mother's hoarding a secret. She's had to—nobody would understand the stacks of newspapers and mounds of garbage so high they touch the ceiling and the rotting smell that she's always worried would follow her out the house. After years of keeping people at a distance, she finally has a best friend and maybe even a boyfriend if she can play it right. As long as she can make them think she's normal.

When Lucy arrives home from a sleepover to find her mother dead under a stack of National Geographics, she starts to dial 911 in a panic, but pauses before she can connect. She barely notices the filth and trash anymore, but she knows the paramedics will. First the fire trucks, and then news cameras that will surely follow. No longer will they be remembered as the nice oncology nurse with the lovely children—they'll turn into that garbage-hoarding freak family on Collier Avenue.

With a normal life finally within reach, Lucy has only minutes to make a critical decision. How far will she go to keep the family secrets safe? 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

I'm a writer living in Northern California with my husband and two sons. I grew up with the serviceable last name of Jaynes, but then married a handsome Nigerian man, which is why my other last name has so many vowels.

I was born in New Jersey, but grew up in San Diego. Being almost 6 feet tall by the time I was twelve makes it painfully easy to remember my teen years. Even though I was really tall, I didn't like sports—but I did read a lot (and I mean a lot!) of books. Still, I never thought I'd be a writer. Except for a book called How the Rabbit Got His Hop that I wrote in third grade, I didn't write anything unless I had to. Every diary I've ever had stops on or about January 21st because I get bored writing about my own life. I've found that I do, however, enjoy writing about the lives of pretend people.

I didn't do the cheerleader thing in high school I did the... other thing. After high school I went to college at UC Santa Barbara. I majored in English but that was only because they made me decide when I was a junior and I'd taken more English classes than anything else.

The best part of college was living in Scotland for a year. I was terrible at Spanish and never took French, which really narrowed down the year-abroad choices. I met some amazing people there who I still consider some of my best friends all these years later. I also learned how to travel by myself and that when you are on a crowded bus in Rome, don't wear a short skirt.

When I graduated, I kept going up the West Coast until I came to San Francisco where I lived in Haight/Ashbury for many years. Living in a big city after college gives you a lot of inspiration for stories later. I highly recommend it. I met my husband when I was working for a San Francisco weekly newspaper (in advertising, not writing).

After my kids were born, I stopped working and got to stay at home with them for a few years. One day, I was reading to my kids and I started thinking that there weren't enough books about biracial kids and maybe I should write one. How hard could it be? Turns out, it's plenty hard.

Several years and one giant learning curve later, I got an email from an editor who said she would like to buy my story When it's Six O'clock in San Francisco and it came out in July of 2009. Although I didn't have anything to do with the illustrations, I think they look great and I'm glad that my publisher chose Randy to do them.

After I'd been writing for a little while, one of my writing partners started writing novels and although it looked really hard, I thought maybe I should try it. Turns out, there are a lot of voices in my head and sometimes they have interesting things to say. I met my agent, Erin Murphy, in an elevator (really) at a writer's conference and when I finished my first novel, we signed together. My young adult novel Dirty Little Secrets came out with Walker Books in February, 2010.

PRAISE FOR DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS:

ALA Quick Pick for Reluctant Readers list

ALA Best Fiction for Young Adults nominee

An ALA Quick Pick nominee

A Borders Original Voices selection for February

"[A] disturbing appraisal of how a mother's obsessive hoarding affects her teenage daughter in this frank novel that spans a tense 24-hour period."
   —Publishers Weekly

"Shocking, tragic, desperate, and believable. Characters, situations, and settings are vivid, and dialogue rings true. As a valuable new addition to heartbreaking but honest books about teens immersed in emotionally distressed families this potent and creatively woven page-turner brings a traumatic situation front and center."
   —School Library Journal

GIVEAWAY

I HAVE ONE HARD BACK COPY

OF THIS FASCINATING BOOK

 TO GIVE AWAY MYSELF

 

--U.S. RESIDENTS ONLY
--NO P. O. BOXES
---INCLUDE YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS
IN CASE YOU WIN!
--ALL COMMENTS MUST BE SEPARATE TO
COUNT AS MORE THAN ONE!

HOW TO ENTER:

+1 ENTRY: COMMENT ON WHAT YOU READ AND LISTENED TO ABOVE AND SIMPLY TELL ME YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS IF YOU WOULD LIKE A CHANCE TO WIN THIS BOOK

+1 MORE ENTRY: BLOG OR TWEET ABOUT THIS GIVEAWAY AND COME BACK AND LEAVE A LINK THAT I CAN FOLLOW 

+1 MORE ENTRY: COMMENT ON SOMETHING YOU FIND INTERESTING WHEN VISITING C. J. OMOLOLU'S  WEBSITE HERE.

 
+1 (or +?) MORE ENTRIES: COMMENT IF YOU HAVE ENTERED ANY OF MY OTHER CURRENT GIVEAWAYS. IF YOU HAVE ENTERED MORE THAN ONE, COMMENT SEPARATELY AND GAIN AN ENTRY FOR EACH ONE YOU ENTERED AND COMMENT ON

GIVEAWAY ENDS AT

6 PM, EST, MAY 7

 GOOD LUCK!