The Touched by Jennifer Weiser
Published by: Limitless Publishing
Publication date: September 29th 2015
Genres: Dystopia, Paranormal, Young Adult
The first sixteen years of Arabella Penthallow’s life have been a lie…
In a world where deception is the key to survival, Ara has kept up the charade of being a perfect Legion Leader’s daughter. But a darkness stirs, and she discovers she is Touched, a mortal gifted by the Gods. The Touched are as rare as they are feared, and Ara is forced to leave Union City for neighboring Midnight City to protect herself and those she loves, leaving Tove Thorn, the boy who has always known her heart, behind.
Carter Decker has vowed to burn Union City to the ground…
Midnight City’s cocky, infamous bad boy always gets what he wants, and he wants Union City to pay for burning his mother alive because she was Touched. When Carter meets Ara, she is everything he’s been taught to hate. Then he learns she is Touched—just like him—he isn’t sure who he hates more…the Touched girl whose father killed his mother, or himself for being tempted by someone he’s sworn to kill.
They are told they’re fated to be soul mates…and they each wish the other never existed.
When Midnight City is attacked by Union City, Carter and Arabella will do the unthinkable…even if it means falling for the enemy. The truth lies in Arabella’s home nation, and Tove is waiting. Soul mates or not, he has an advantage Carter doesn’t, fated souls be damned.
War is coming…and Ara is the prize.
Jennifer Weiser is here with a special treat. I love tens lists from authors. And Jennifer is giving us three top tens lists. Read on, and I hope you enjoy the posts as much as I did. 🙂 Thank you so much for visiting Brooke Blogs, Jennifer!
Top Ten Favorite Authors
1. Wendy Higgins—hands down, makes the top of my list! I first fell in love with her writing with the Sweet Series. If you haven’t meant Kai & Anna, you need to. 🙂 I’m anxiously awaiting her newest YA novel, The Great Hunt, due out next March. I squeal every and anytime she likes my post or comment on FB. I hope to meet her one day soon.
2. Victoria Scott—amazingly awesome. Dante Walker and Guy Chambers stole my heart, and I haven’t quite been the same since I met them. Victoria’s books are not only witty, their humorous and wildly entertaining. Being apart of her VMafia and getting to know her through her books and posts, is truly awesome. She is on my list of hopeful meets one day.
3. Rachel Harris—One of the sweetest authors I’ve ever met, Rachel not only inspires me to be a better writer, she invests time to get to know her fans on a personal level. I first met her through her street team, The Flirt Squad. She’s a fantastic author and person with a huge heart.
4. Kiera Cass—I first read The Selection the winter of 2012, right before Christmas. That Christmas had been a little rough, but upon reading her book, falling in love with her characters America and Maxon, I found something inside me that awoke with her writing. The Selection is a book that I hold very close to my heart because of that.
5. Sarah Maas—her writing, her characters are just so fierce. I love the world that she has created in the Throne of Glass series and as well in A Court Of Thorns and Roses. Truly, her writing is beyond amazing.
6. J.K. Rowling—I’ve yet to meet an author who hasn’t been affected by Harry Potter and J.K. Rowling. It was her personal story of how she became a writer that truly inspired me to follow my dreams and write. The magic within Harry Potter will forever be inside all of us. And because of that, she’s an icon to writers everywhere.
7. Cassandra Clare—The Mortal Instruments and The Infernal Devices, I think make every YA fan’s list. The things that go bump in the night and the people sworn to protect us mundanes, truly makes these books and Cassandra Clare a favorite.
8. Suzanne Collins—I had truly never read anything like The Hunger Games, until the Hunger Games. I was instantly entranced with the world that Suzanne Collins created. Katniss is unlike any character that I had ever read. Her bravery, her fierce protectiveness, her need to survive—really made The Hungers Games unique. No book nerds experience is complete without reading this series.
9. Jennifer Armentrout— her books…whether J.Lynn or Jennifer—they always affect me. They give me the best book hangovers and I just devour them. I have yet to come across a book written by her that I don’t love.
10. CJ Redwine—is such a dedicated and amazing author who also helps and teaches inspiring authors and writers how to really hone in on their craft and become better. She and her books phenomenal, and I hope to one day meet her in person.
Ten Top Reasons I wanted to become an author:
To be truthful, I didn’t actually start out writing to become an author. The thought was far from my mind…but the more I wrote, the more the stories fought to come out—they became really hard to ignore.
1. I love books. To be more specific, I love the young adult genre. I love everything about it. The readers, the authors, the excitement, everything about YA is exciting and new.
2. Like most of today’s YA authors, I was truly affected by Twilight. Lol, I don’t know a YA author who hasn’t confessed such truths. With Twilight, YA reopened up for a lot of emerging authors and aspiring alike. Stephanie Meyers created such an amazing word, readers couldn’t get enough of it. In the first years of Twilight, I fell back in love with reading. Thus inspiring me to write more.
3. Therapy is too expensive. *Winks*
4. I’ve always admired the creativity that comes alive within an author. I love that aspect of writing.
5. One of the things I love so desperately about reading YA, is how easy it is to become lost in another world entirely for hours. There’s nothing better then a good book hangover. I wanted to be able to create that for someone else. Even if only one person ever read it, I wanted to be able to give someone else a chance to escape into another place.
6. For the revenge…how else was I able to write villains and somehow incorporate traits from the first jerk who broke my heart?
7. With writing, there’s not one way to write. The sky’s the limit. It’s a job that you can fall in love with over and over again.
8. Where else can I wear yoga pants and t-shirt’s and a sloppy bun all day, besides a yoga studio?
9. For the revenge…how else was I able to write villains and somehow incorporate traits from the first jerk who broke my heart?
10. “Dreams are a wish your heart makes.” When I had my daughter, I wanted her to grow up knowing that if she dreamt it, it could happen. My dream was to always write a book—I wanted her to see that my dreams—besides having her, could come true.
Ten Top Struggles I faced while writing The Touched
1. Sometimes, Ara and Carter were stubborn and didn’t feel like talking.
2. Like most seventeen year old guys, Carter can be a little difficult and believes he is always right.
3. Tove and Carter fought most days, which made it hard to concentrate.
4. Listening to three character points of view all day, every day can become a bit…stressful. Each want to be heard and tell their side, but sometimes—3am to be more specific, I wasn’t always willing to listen.
5. Some days, the writing just wasn’t there. Call it writers block or even procrastination, but somedays the plot line was there…other days…not so much.
6. Arabella was the hardest character to write. She wasn’t always forthcoming with her feelings…and still isn’t.
7. Love triangles can be tricky—and sometimes they have a mind of their own.
8. Word count. When publishing, word count begins to matter. Sometimes, the words tend to runaway with me when I write…in turn adding more unnecessary words then needed.
9. I had the hardest time figuring out which scenes to cut and which were essential to keep—this ties in with my word count—in order to keep the plot and the development of the story running smoothly—I had take out a few things here and there.
10. Writing the concluding scene—I wanted a scene that not only put the reader at the edge of their seat, but also one that left mystery…I hope that I achieved just that. 🙂
About the Author
Jennifer Weiser is a young adult author who has always been a book nerd and a bit chocolate obsessed. Writing has always been a favorite escape, but quickly became a passion not long after the birth of her daughter. When she isn’t combing the shelves of her local book stores or blogging about newest book obsessions, you can find her nestled in her nook creating worlds she hopes that one day will inspire her daughter, who not only has given her the courage to follow her dreams–but offers the inspirations that help color their worlds together.
Author links:
http://www.jenniferweiser.com/
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14179690.Jennifer_Weiser
https://www.facebook.com/authorjenniferweiser?fref=ts
https://twitter.com/jenniferweiser
Thanks for hosting today, Brooke! 🙂
The cover really pulls me in, and the books sounds amazing!
This was great, thank you for the chance, and your blog…
love the giveaway…thx u so much 🙂
I love these lists!! Especially the favorite authors one, because I’ve read many of those authors work.
Touched sounds like a great read and the cover is gorgeous.
Thank you for hosting today, Brooke! I love your site and had a blast with the tens list! xo-Jenn
This book sounds like it be a great read
Sounds like an interesting read. Thanks for the giveaway.
This sounds like the beginning of a great series, I’m looking forward to reading it.
Another great read for curling in front of the fireplace with.