I’ll be at the Minneapolis author event this Saturday from 12-4 at Hotel Ivy.  If you want to check it out, go here.  

If you’re here about the free pig, she’s not for sale.

If you’re here to stare at the cover for Losing Hope, just go here to look at it.  There’s still time to enter that contest to win the cover photo signed by Griffin Peterson.  I’ll be drawing winners next week.

Sunday, 12:01 a.m. EST.

Several months ago I was sitting in my office writing the first few chapters to Losing Hope.  At the time, I wasn’t even sure if I wanted it to be a book.  I knew there was a whole side to Holder we never got to see in Hopeless, but I wasn’t sure if it was best just to leave that side unseen.   I was typing this exact sentence in Losing Hope when I got the first text of many that night.

“That’s the last thing Grayson says to me.  My fist meets his jaw twice before he hits the floor.”

As soon as I finished typing that sentence, my phone received several texts all at the same time.  The first one I read was from my friend Crystal.  ”Turn it on American Idol!  There is a guy about to sing that looks JUST LIKE HOLDER!”

I was curious because, at the time, I didn’t even know what Holder looked like.  Sure, Sky describes him a little bit in Hopeless, but not much.  I tend to leave detailed physical descriptions out because when I write, I don’t necessarily see the face of the characters in my head.  I like to leave that up to the preference of the reader.

So, I go and flip on American Idol.  I had been recording it, so I skipped to the part she was talking about.  A guy named Griffin Peterson was singing and I didn’t even have to question Crystal to see if this was the guy she was talking about.  Because she was right…he looked just like how I’d imagined Holder.  I texted her back and said, “OMG!  You’re right.  He looks just like Holder.”

It was weird, because lots of people send me their thoughts on who looks like Dean Holder and Will Cooper, but no one has 100% matched up yet to the faceless Will in my head.  But this guy really did match up to Holder perfectly.   You can watch his American Idol audition here and see.  Did I mention he’s incredibly talented, too?

But that’s not the crazy part.  The crazy part came a few minutes later when I grabbed my laptop and logged onto facebook.  I lost count of how many messages I had that said something along the lines of, “There’s a guy on American Idol that looks like Holder!”  And tweets!  Oh, lord, the tweets.  I swear, almost everyone who read HOPELESS who were watching American Idol all thought the same thing.

So of course a few days later when I wrote a little more of the book and decided to go forward with it, I also realized I needed a cover for Losing Hope.
Who else could I have asked to grace it other than Griffin Peterson?  I mean, you guys pretty much declared who should be on the cover with the incredible response to him on Idol.

But just because y’all thought he resembled Holder and I agreed that he definitely would be a great cover for Losing Hope, didn’t mean that he would actually AGREE to something that INSANE.  I mean…he’s on American Freaking Idol!  And he’s good!  And he’s probably got a million better things to do than respond to a psycho email from some chick who wrote a random book and thinks he looks like a character, right?

But he DID respond.  And the best part is… he’s so NICE! And humble. And he actually took time out of his crazy, hectic recording schedule to do a photo shoot for Losing Hope!  And now, thanks to Griffin, we have this incredible cover that I’ve been DYING to share for weeks now.

Isn’t it just…perfect?

Incredible?

Yeah.

*Sigh

Here it is even bigger.

And here’s a close-up.

And an even closer close-up.

Go ahead.  Stare for a while.  :)

Here’s my only concern.  I’m afraid that everyone in America is going to need a copy of this paperback.  Or two or three.  Or one for every room of their house.  We might run out of all the ink on earth because of all the people that absolutely need a copy of this cover.

So if you think you need a paperback, go HERE to pre-order it while it’s on sale before the world runs out of ink.  And if you think you might need Losing Hope for your kindle, go HERE to pre-order it, because the cover is the same for the ebook.

And if you want to win a copy of the cover photo, signed by Griffin Peterson and myself, then just share this blog post on Facebook or Twitter and comment back here with where you shared it.  Did you hear that?  The cover photo!!  Signed by the guy on the cover!!!  The guy who is so incredibly talented (just watch the music videos on his facebook page) that he is more than likely going to become even more super duper famous the second his album releases.  And you could have his signature on a photo!  So share this link, people!

http://wp.me/p1Yxo1-Ah

And then save this picture to your screensaver and your phone and maybe even have a mural painted on your wall of it so you will have something to stare at until July 9th gets here and we can read all about Holder in Losing Hope.

And if you want to tell Griffin thank you for the awesome cover, or if you want to check out the EP he will be releasing soon, go stalk follow him on Twitter here.

So we did a post-taping interview, which means it didn’t air today.  Sorry about the confusion.  I’ve noticed it’s hard to pinpoint exactly when something will air, as evidenced with the Nightline taping.  But hopefully tomorrow or Friday or next week or someday we’ll see it.  It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be, but it went so fast I have no idea what I said.  But I got some cool pics.

Here’s me and Gayle. (She called me a bad-ass.  Best moment ever.)

^^^This one is me signing the signature wall, right under Shaq and Mark Cuban.  (WHAT AM I EVEN DOING HERE??????? THIS IS CRAZY!!!!!)

Update: The CBS interview has been delayed to later this morning due to breaking news.  It will more than likely be recorded and air at a later date.  I’ll update as soon as I know when.

I’m sitting in my hotel room in New York City, waiting on the big CBS interview in the morning.  Of course I can’t sleep because all I can think about is how I’m either going to

a) Puke on the host.

b) Say f*ck.

c) Puke on the host, then say f*ck.

So I’m trying not to think about it.  Instead, I’m trying to focus on all the things that have happened in the past year since that’s more than likely what I’ll be on the show to talk about. So…let’s think about it.

It occurred to me that this exact same week last year, I was in New York as well.  I flew here with Tammara Webber to meet some other author friends we had made online. Things were still very new then.  Neither of my books had hit the NYT’s bestsellers list, but Slammed had just dipped into the top 100 books on Amazon.  I remember thinking I was way out of my league being in the same room as Tracey Garvis-Graves, EL James, Tammara Webber and so many other friends I’d made. I just tried to enjoy myself because I knew it wouldn’t last.   So I did just that.  I enjoyed the weekend, then went back to work the next Monday.

Things didn’t stop there, though, like I had expected them to.  They didn’t even slow down.  They just sped up and kept going and continued to grow and every single day I still waited for it all to stop.  But then the movie rights were sold, the books were bought by a publisher and there I was in New York again in October, meeting with Simon & Schuster.

It was a great time, but then I went back home and thought, “Man!  What a ride that was.”  And I was sure it was over at that point, so I decided to finish writing Hopeless because there was no way I could stop writing.  I just knew that releasing Hopeless was a bad idea.  I was so happy with all the success I’d had with Slammed that I didn’t think I could write another book that would satisfy my readers.  But I put it out anyway, expecting the worst.

Instead, I got the best.  The best response, the best emails, the best motivation.  The reaction to that book surpassed all my expectations and I’m still, to this day, waiting for it to end.

I’m not sure why I grasp every single little thing and hold on to it like it’s the last time it’ll happen, but I’m afraid I’ll always do that.  To go from where I was a year ago to what all is happening now takes some getting used to, and apparently I’ll need more than a year to get used to it.

So tomorrow I’ll be on CBS This morning.  And while I’m super nervous about it, I’m also extremely excited.  I’m going into it thinking, “You get to be on live TV, Colleen.  When will that EVER happen again?”

Never, that’s when.

So watch CBS tomorrow from 7-9 in the morning so you can see me talk about all the things I was sure would never, ever happen.

Oh, and a quick happy book birthday to Sky and a heads up that the paperback of Hopeless was released today in Bookstores.  Take a look at this pic! It’s gawjess!

What.

A.

Week.

It began Tuesday when I arrived at the airport.  (Correct flights this time.) I was checking my baggage when the agent asked what state I was flying into.

“Kansas,”  I proclaimed confidently.  He took my bags and printed my tickets and handed them to me.  ”Have a great day, Mrs. Hoover.  And just so you’re not confused when you arrive, you’re actually heading to Missouri.”

And that was just the first five minutes.

But all was better when I turned around and Tammara Webber was standing beside me.  She was my roomie for the week and she’s quite the lovely roomie if I must say.  I mean, how often is it that you can bark around orders to a New York Times bestselling author of one of your favorite books?  Tammara would say, “Let’s go have lunch, Colleen.”  And I would laugh heartily and reply, “Tammara Webber, no food for you until I get another chapter of that book!  Work, woman!  Work!”  And so I would lock her inside the room and she would work and I would go eat for the both of us.  It was a blast!

When we arrived on Tuesday, Abbi Glines and I discovered that people have a hard time telling us apart.  We don’t look anything alike, but when people tell me they loved Never Too Far or Twisted Perfection or they would tell Abbi they loved Hopeless, we just learned to smile and say, “That was a great book!  I loved it, too!”  But I’m honestly flattered that people confuse me with Abbi, because she’s so damn cute.  But here I am posing next to Abbi’s sign, just to confuse Abbi.

On Wednesday, the rest of our friends arrived so we joined together and traded gifts.  Tina Reber and I were slacking in the buy-your-friends-gifts department, so we went to the gift shop and bought them out of stuffed unicorns.  You would be surprised to know that hotel gift shops have an endless supply of stuffed unicorns.  An odd item to keep in stock, since diet pepsi was nowhere to be found.   (Until I whined about it enough that our gift shop employee friend ordered some and saved my life.)

But if I thought I had an addiction to diet pepsi, I quickly learned that it was nothing compared to Abbi’s addiction to crunchies.  Apparently it’s an item found in the UK, and Abbi talked about it constantly.  I would try to have a normal conversation with her about writing or the state of the economy and she would just turn and look at me and say, “Crunchiiieeeesssss.”

So luckily, when EL James arrived on Wednesday, she saved the day.  She walked in with a bag and dumped it on the table and said, “Here’s all y’all some crunchies.”  (Yes, EL James has a heavy southern accent.  I was shocked, too.)   Abbi was elated to finally have her chocolates, and I have to say, they’re pretty darn good.  Not as good as diet pepsi, but the two together make a deadly combination.  Here’s a pic of Abbi with her crack.  Crunchies.

That would be a Tina Reber and Jamie McGuire photo bomb.

We had dinner a few places, but I can’t remember the names of any of them.  I just know that we would go in such large groups that dinner took hours, so by Saturday night when someone would say, “Wanna go grab some dinner?”  I knew what they really meant was, “Wanna leave on the shuttle with me and 15 other people and not come back for six hours?”

I always said yes.  Mostly because I was hungry, but also because I couldn’t believe this was my life.  I would sit back in my seat on the shuttle and stare at all the amazing, talented women surrounding me and think, “I’m a part of this?  Is this really my life?  These awesome people are really my friends?”

But as soon as I would stop relishing in the moment and open my mouth, something awkward would come out that would always end up on Twitter.  Things like, “I wonder what sound unicorns make?” Or “I hate root beer and ice cream.  Why did I order this rootbeer float?”

And OMG!  Speaking of that rootbeer float that was never touched…this was THE. COOLEST. RESTAURANT!

Me, Abbi Glines, Steph Campbell, Elizabeth Reyes, EL James, Killian McRay,Tina Reber and my editor, Johanna Castillo all went to this restaurant where, I kid you not, a train track runs around the ceiling and carries food from table to table.  They load a basket up in the kitchen and put it on the train track and then it comes to your table and drops down with all your food in it.

I was honored to be on a panel with Abbi Glines and Sylvia Day, moderated by Mark Coker of Smashwords. Abbi and Sylvia are super-smart women, and while I was part of their panel, I felt like I learned more than I spoke.  Here’s a pic with Tracey Garvis-Graves and Sylvia Day.  And below that is a pic of the most awesome moment ever, where these two readers were wearing the coolest shirts ever!

It was a great week with very little drama, despite the fact that Twitter seemed to want drama to exist.   I can’t wait for RT14. Oh, and for the record.  I had several people tell me that I wasn’t what they expected.  After talking with me for a while, people would say, “Colleen, you aren’t anything like I expected.  You’re so cheerful and bubbly on your blog!”  I’m not sure if that’s a compliment or not, because in essence they were saying, “Colleen, you’re so…not cheerful and bubbly.”  So, I think perhaps I’ve misrepresented myself?  Because I’m not cheerful and bubbly.  Quite the opposite, actually, if you can be opposite of cheerful and bubbly without being mean. I’ve said before that I have no emotions, and I was being honest when I said that.  But I do love a good exclamation point, so maybe that’s where it went wrong?  ;)

Oh!  And Saturday was my thirteen year anniversary.  I was sitting in the lobby, preparing to leave with a lot of people to go to a forty-hour long dinner and I saw some beautiful roses sitting at the concierge desk.  I jokingly said, “Those better be for me!” not really thinking they would be, because that would mean my husband would have had to have thought of something as clever as sending flowers to my hotel states away.  Well, to my surprise, they actually had my name on them!

I’m sorry, husband.  I underestimated your undying devotion to me.

Okay, then.  I just got home from the airport.  I’m going to go play with my children for an hour, then go to bed because I’ve got another flight in the morning to New York City!  (See?  That was an exclamation point that misrepresented my sentence, because that would not have been inflected had I said it in person.)

Stay tuned on Thursday for a recap of my appearance on the CBS morning show this coming Wednesday. That blog post should be…interesting.

So I owe a few of these blog posts some winners, so let’s have at it, shall we? But FIRST, this video of a bunch of not-so-convincing fibbers.

Will the REAL Colleen Hoover please stand up?

And second, I’ve been invited to be on the CBS morning show this Wednesday, so I’ll be headed to NYC as soon as I get back from Kansas. Missouri.  While I’m there, Atria Books will be filming a short interview with me next week!  What questions would you like me to answer?  Comment with a question and I’ll pick five.

I still have the questions compiled for the vlog I promised last month, I’m still working on that one.  <3

And don’t forget, HOPELESS comes out in paperback Tuesday.  Order it now so you can mail it to me to have signed before I shut down the PO Box again.  Just check the signed books page at the top up there. ^^^

Okay, now winners below.  If you win, email me at colleenhoover@live.com

<3

Totally Booked Blog (3 winners for the Slammed series):

I’ve been saving these for a very special occasion.  And considering the final book in the SLAMMED series, THIS GIRL releases tonight, it’s the perfect day to go retro.

(Available for pre-order right now by clicking here.  Goes live at Midnight!)

Now for the retro giveaway. I’ve got a set of the original, self-published versions of Slammed and Point of Retreat.  I only have a couple of copies left of these books, since they’ve been out of print for a year now.

But that’s not all.  I’ll also be throwing in one of only five self-published paperbacks left of HOPELESS.  (Atria paperback releases May 7th!  Next week, people!)  

And wait!!  It gets better!!!  I have ONE copy.  -JUST ONE copy of HERPLERS by CERLERN HERVER, since there were only a couple of these gag books printed to begin with!

That’s right.  Whether you want Herplers or not, it’s in the giveaway. lol.  I sure hope someone wins who gets the ermagherd joke. Otherwise when you open up Herplers…well…I can’t even explain it.

So, there you have it.  Four very rare books in a giveaway that can never happen again, considering they are my last copies.  <3

If you want to enter to win, just share one of the two links below on facebook or twitter and come back to comment on the post with your name.  I’ll be picking winners for all four of my current giveaways (check previous blog posts for other giveaways) later this week.

Link to share for blog post: http://colleenhoover.com/2013/04/29/nostalgic-giveaway/

Link to share for the pre-order of THIS GIRL: http://www.amazon.com/This-Girl-A-Novel-ebook/dp/B00BOVFLD0/ref=tmm_kin_title_0

Is it illegal to have TWO giveaways on a blog at one time? (Only if husband doesn’t find out.)

Addendum:  Make it THREE giveaways!  (See bottom of post)

Don’t worry, I blocked him from this post.

So, I just got one of the first few in-depth reviews on THIS GIRL which comes out Tuesday!  Don’t worry, there are no spoilers, but I couldn’t help but share this review because it means the freaking world to me!

I’m linking it here, but I’m also doing a giveaway.  Three readers are going to win all three books in the SLAMMED series.  I’ll be picking winners from the comments left on TotallyBooked’s review.  So click this link, read the review and teaser, then comment.  They are also having their own giveaway on their review of THIS GIRL, so you get double the chances!!!

And if you win, take note that the third book in the Slammed series isn’t out in paperback until August, but you’ll receive all three books as soon as I get them.

http://totallybookedblog.com/2013/04/27/this-girl-by-colleen-hoover-review-teaser-and-signed-paperback-and-ebook-giveaway/

You can click the link above to read and comment on the review, or you can click HERE. They both take you to the same place.  So does THIS link.

It doesn’t matter how you get there.  Just GET THERE.

Just got another review in from AutumnReview!!!  Go HERE to comment on her blog and I’ll have the same giveaway, picking three winners from her comments for a signed set of the Slammed series.

I went shopping today for the RT convention next week and it put me in a really bad mood since I hate shopping so much.  Then I got home and almost had a wreck with the UPS man (his body, not his truck.)  I didn’t see him walking in my driveway and I almost killed the poor man.  Luckily, Max has really good brakes.

So after he practically ran back to his truck, I opened the box and there were UK editions of SLAMMED and Point of Retreat shipped to me from the publishers.  So that made up for the bad shopping experience and near-murder.

Now I feel like I should counteract the bad Karma from always almost accidentally killing people. (Yes, it happens way more than I’m comfortable with.)

So who wants these?  Comment below with your checking account number, date of birth and credit card number to enter.  (Please don’t really do that.  Please. Your first and last name will do.)

The only kicker is, your comment has to be in a British accent.  Example:

Meh nem es Culleen Hoovah and aye wud loyke ta beh enta’d en yow dwaweeng!

Or not.

I love them!  Just a few more days before the release of THIS GIRL, which comes out April 30th.  And I just have to say that I’m super excited to have come across this post on facebook.  I hope this blogger doesn’t mind me sharing the screenshot here, but I peed a little when I read it!

And then after that, I’ve got Losing Hope being released in July.  And sometimes when I write a book, before I send it off to whoever I need to send it off too, I have two or three people whose opinions and honesty I respect SO much, that I have them read the book because of how honest they are.  One of those people is Tracey Garvis-Graves, NYT’s bestselling author of On The Island and her new one set to release soon, Covet.  Tracey is a really good friend of mine, so I’ve been on pins and needles waiting to hear what she said.  Here are portions of her email.

Okay, now that I’m caught up I’ve opened up the SIGNED BOOKS page again.

And go ahead and order your paperbacks for these three books, because if you do, I’ll sign those as well.

HOPELESS (COMES OUT MAY 8TH)

THIS GIRL

LOSING HOPE

And if you want to hurry up and get the original SLAMMED and POINT OF RETREAT paperbacks before they are gone forever, I’d do it now.  The new covers will be changing over soon.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned this past year and a half, it’s that change is inevitable. And you have to be susceptible to it, or you’ll be left behind. I don’t like to be left behind, especially at Wal-Mart.  SO!  We have a big change.

A couple of big changes, actually, but you only get one today and it has to do with  something very near and dear to my heart.  SLAMMED.

When I self-published SLAMMED, I used Amazon’s cover creator through createspace because, well…I’ll be honest.  I was making $9 an hour and living in a trailer and when I weighed the price of a good cover or feeding my children dinner, I chose my children.

So anyway, the cover for SLAMMED wasn’t something I would have picked had I had the means to hire a cover designer.  But that cover means a lot to me and it has encased the words of the book that have completely changed my life.  And I know it means a lot to a lot of you, too.

BUT!  Here’s where the change comes in.  With the addition of THIS GIRL in the SLAMMED SERIES, we thought it would be better if the covers were a little more cohesive.  And let’s be honest, SLAMMED and POR don’t really look anything alike, so it’s hard to tie a third book into that series and make the cover similar.

The covers have been changed.  Completely.  Drastically.  They’re completely different and while they’re completely different and will take a lot of us some getting used to because we’re so used to the other covers, I’m hoping it will garner a little more interest from readers and boost sales.

It’s certainly bittersweet because I will always love the old covers and am thankful I’ll always have them on my bookshelves.  And if you want the old covers, too, then hurry up and purchase them here before they change the paperback, which will happen soon.

I’m posting the new cover for SLAMMED here, but the cover for POINT OF RETREAT will have to wait until next weekend.

Also, we’ve got something seriously incredible in store for the cover of Losing Hope, which will be revealed in a couple of weeks.  So keep an eye out for that.

Without further ado, here’s our new SLAMMED.

First of all, a huge thank you to everyone who has participated in all of my blog contests. I know it’s frustrating when you enter over and over and don’t win, so I appreciate those that keep trying.  With this particular contest, I noticed I randomly drew names of a couple people who have won before, so I included 30 winners rather than 25.  If you won a signed book, email me your address and let me know which signed book you would like.  SLAMMED, POINT OF RETREAT or HOPELESS.  And note, if you choose Hopeless, I am fresh out of copies.  However, I’ll have a new shipment in once the paperbacks drop in three weeks, so give it about four weeks before your book arrives.  My email is colleenhoover@live.com.

And the winners are…

Tracy Hammond

Klarisse Bitantes

Alithle Oliva Reyes

Danielle Nicole

Gloria Landavazo

Danielle Grater

Sherry Fundin

Brandi Bradford

Karen Camp

Brook Bussell

Stephanie Brown

Mike Bolter

Kyle Magistrado

Rosarita Reader

Gemma Ang

Becca Mauldin

LiaS

Stephanie Armstrong

Jasmine Café

Dannica Alcantara

Brooke Freeman

Michelle Surtees

Natalie Tompkins

Angela B.

Sara G

Ashley Rasmussen

Angela C

Munirah Arine

Daneiva Ramirez

Jeanette Moyer

I have something for you and it’s NOT a free pig.  Although, she (was) super cute, right?

Okay.  I have this:

I am very excited to announce that I have agreed to a two-book deal with ATRIA BOOKS.  These books will be released in 2014 and will be stand alones.  To add them to your massive Goodreads to-read pile just click here and you will be directed to my Goodreads author page where you can add both books.  One will be tentatively titled MAYBE SOMEDAY and the other is tentatively titled UGLY LOVE.

I can’t really tell you a whole lot about the books yet, other than  MAYBE SOMEDAY will be a New Adult Contemporary Romance.

And UGLY LOVE? Well… let’s just say that one should be in its very own genre titled, “OH MY DEAR GOD!  COLLEEN IS GOING TO HELL FOR WRITING THIS!”

So yeah, this should be FUN!

And don’t forget about the two coming out this year.  THIS GIRL April 30th and LOSING HOPE July 9th. 

And I want to say a huge thank you to my agent, Jane Dystel and my Atria Books editor, Johanna Castillo.  Both of you have been so incredibly patient with me and I couldn’t thank you more for enabling me to do what I love to do.

HOPELESS has just hit 5,000 reviews on Amazon!  After only three months of release, that’s freaking amazing.  Thank you so much to everyone who decided to leave a review after reading that book.

It also got me to thinking about how I heard once that 1% of readers actually take the time to review books.  5,000 readers is 1% of 500,000 people!  So I checked and sure enough, Hopeless has just surpassed half a million ebooks in worldwide sales.  Half a million people have read that book!

Half.

A freaking.

Million.

People.

That’s a lot of people.  More people than I know or will ever know or will ever meet.  You would have to meet half a person a day for a million days to meet half a million people. That’s like 125,000 whole puppies cut into fourths. That’s like the population of Las Vegas.  Or Sacramento.  It’s like if you counted all the limbs of 125,000 people, assuming they still have all their limbs, you would have half a million limbs.  It’s like 499,000 more people than fans of Nickelback. It’s like a quarter of two million people, which is how many people it takes to make half a million people if a whole lot of them die.

My point is… half a million people!

That makes me feel really nervous.

I think I need to give away my very last, unreleased galley copy of HOPELESS as a big thank you to all you HALF A FREAKING MILLION PEOPLE that read this book.  Lucky for you, I don’t have half a million followers, so your chances aren’t bad. Just comment below with whatever the heck you want to comment with and you just might be the lucky winner of the last galley copy.  <3