Blog Tour: Thunderstone by Barbara Pietron @GCReading

Thunderstone by Barbara Pietron
Genre: YA paranormal romance
Published: November 12, 2013

Sneaking out at night, driving without a license, and falling for a guy weren’t things fifteen-year-old Jeni expected to do while visiting Lake Itasca, Minnesota.  Then she meets Ice, the local medicine man's apprentice.  Suddenly, her simple family gathering becomes an exciting – and terrifying – week of self-discovery.  At first Jeni doesn't believe Ice's claim that she can touch the spirit world and has somehow released a mythical underwater monster. However, she's forced to reconsider when a teen swears a monster killed his father while fishing on the lake. Just as she comes to accept truth, Jeni finds she is the only one who can imprison the monster, making her the creature's next target.  She'll need immense faith in her newfound ability to put herself in harm's way and face down the monster.  And even if she succeeds in delivering the local population – and Ice – from the creature's wrath, there is no guarantee Jeni will escape with her own life.

Purchase:

Amazon | Barnes & Noble

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The Prequel:

Heart of Ice by Barbara Pietron

Currently FREE! Visit Heart of Ice on Scribe-Publishing.com to download!

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Interview with Ice - Ice is in both Thunderstone and Heart of Ice so I thought I'd interview him.

B: Tell us a little bit about growing up.

Ice: As long as I can remember, it's always been just my mom and me. I was an infant when my dad took off. We live in a subdivision of small ranch-style homes on the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe's reservation. I'm half Ojibwe. When I was about ten or eleven, I was chosen to apprentice our tribe's medicine man. I've been home-schooled ever since, to make time for training.

B: How do you like being home-schooled?

Ice: It's okay, I get to go at my own pace, so I don't have those random periods of boredom. I'm actually now a year ahead of the kids I was in fourth grade with. Sometimes I feel a little isolated, but I played hockey in middle school and I play for the high school now, so I have some contact with other guys and hear about what's going on.

B: When you became an apprentice medicine man, did you ever think you'd be battling monsters?

Ice: Heck no! (laughs) I expected ceremonies, medicine, storytelling…much tamer stuff.

B: What's your favorite part about being a medicine man?

Ice: The stories. Our lore teaches so many life lessons. I think it's important to keep it alive.

B: What do you like to do in your spare time?

Ice: If the weather's good I like to get outside, go hiking—there are a ton of trails in the Chippewa Forest. Fishing, of course. Land of 10,000 lakes, right? When it's cold I like to play hockey or stay in and play video games, listen to music, or read.

B: How do you measure success?

Ice: By integrity. All the money or power in the world is meaningless if you haven't achieved it honorably.

B: What do you want to show the world?

Ice: That I've earned the right to be a medicine man. That I'm not my father.

B: Okay, just for fun, what's your favorite movie?

Ice: Shawshank Redemption

B: Book?

Ice: Hoot, by Carl Hiaasen. I did a report on it in middle school.

B: Ice cream?

Ice: Rocky Road            

About the Author

After years in the corporate world, Barbara found herself with a second chance to decide what she wanted to be when she grew up.  Her lifetime love of books and the written word returned one answer: writer.  Drawing from her experience with technical writing, she began by writing non-fiction magazine pieces and achieved both regional and national publication.  Her success encouraged her to complete a novel.  She learned much from her first manuscript, critiques, books, contests, and blogs.  In 2012, her novel Thunderstone, was a quarterfinalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award contest and won a critique by Publisher's Weekly.  A few months later, she was offered publication by Scribe Publishing Company.

 Barbara has a few other novels in the works, including a Thunderstone sequel. If she's not reading or writing, Barbara likes to walk, garden, and sew.  She works in a library and lives in Royal Oak, Michigan with her husband, daughter, and their cat – who often acts like a dog.

Find Barbara online:

Website | Facebook 

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GIVEAWAY

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Win a new young adult novel!

(Before it's in stores!)

Barbara Pietron, author of Thunderstone, is running a contest to title her next novel.

If your title idea is chosen as one of the top four suggestions, you will win the book!

Here's how it works:

Based on the cover summary below, you think of an amazing title. You know, the kind of title that compels a potential reader to take the book off the shelf.

Then go to www.barbarapietron.com and click on the News/Events page. You can make your suggestion in the comment section of the post about the contest, or click on the link which will take you to the Scribe Publishing website suggestion form. Your email will be added to Barbara's list so she can keep you in the loop about the contest and the book.

If your suggestion is chosen as a top four, you will win the new novel! Those top four entries will be posted for readers to vote on their favorite. If your suggestion becomes the book title, you'll be mentioned in the book!

Summary:

Sixteen-year-old Jack Ironwood knew exactly what he wanted. Until he got it.

Jack was content to stay unnoticed by pretty and popular track-star, Natalie Segetich, until her best friend Emma disappears. Natalie swears something took Emma, and though most people write Natalie off as traumatized and confused, Jack is a soulshifter and he knows the human-stealing Enuuki—hell's messengers—are real.

As a soulshifter, Jack can cross into the underworld so he sees Emma's rescue as an opportunity to prove himself a valuable member of his transcendental sect—and a way to secure a future otherwise out of his reach. Although he needs Natalie's help to prepare for the mission, Jack intends to go to the underworld alone. But as a viable plan takes shape, it's clear the best chance of success means Natalie must accompany him.

On the eve of the quest, when Jack is promised the hand of a respected elder's daughter—a dream come true—he realizes he's no longer sure what he wants. But it's too late to back out, not with the sect and Natalie counting on him. Pursued by the dark lord's henchmen and ghastly mutant creatures, Jack and Natalie struggle to come out ahead in a battle and barter for souls. In the end, Jack will have to decide his own fate, because nothing short of a deal with the devil will get all three of them out of hell alive.

Part one of the contest will run through January 31^st, 2015 and the voting will take place in February.