Hey beautiful readers! I hope you're having a wonderful day and that you're ready to get to this because I so am? I have been so ready to share with you this post the day Cake Literary asked me to host this lovely Q&A with author Karuna Riazi. I have been so excited because I love Karuna and her books and I simply wanted to share the love about this new title she has called The Battle. So let's not delay this and get to it, right?

The game begins again in this gripping follow-up to The Gauntlet that’s a futuristic Middle-Eastern Zathura meets Ready Player One! 

Four years after the events of The Gauntlet, the evil game Architect is back with a new partner-in-crime—The MasterMind—and the pair aim to get revenge on the Mirza clan. Together, they’ve rebuilt Paheli into a slick, mind-bending world with floating skyscrapers, flying rickshaws run by robots, and a digital funicular rail that doesn’t always take you exactly where you want to go.

Twelve-year-old Ahmad Mirza struggles to make friends at his new middle school, but when he’s paired with his classmate Winnie for a project, he is determined to impress her and make his very first friend. At home while they’re hard at work, a gift from big sister Farah—who is away at her first year in college—arrives. It’s a high-tech game called The Battle of Blood and Iron, a cross between a video game and board game, complete with virtual reality goggles. He thinks his sister has solved his friend problem—all kids love games. He convinces Winnie to play, but as soon as they unbox the game, time freezes all over New York City.

With time standing still and people frozen, all of humankind is at stake as Ahmad and Winnie face off with the MasterMind and the Architect, hoping to beat them at their own game before the evil plotters expand Paheli and take over the entire world.

The Book Voyagers: Hi Karuna! So happy to have you here and thank you for coming to my blog. Let’s talk about The Battle. Can you tell us a little bit more about this book? What can we expect and are there more dangers than in the first installment? 

Karuna Riazi: Hi Sil! Such a pleasure to be on the blog! The Battle picks up a few years where The Gauntlet left off, and with a different Mirza as our protagonist: Ahmad, Farah's precocious younger brother who got sucked into Paheli previously. He's now a middle schooler himself and will face down the Architect and his new ally, The MasterMind, alongside his classmate (and, he hopes, friend) Winnie. You can expect a video game twist instead of the traditional board game, more scheming from the Architect and other cool things like flying rickshaws and holographic shops!

TBV: One of the things that I found fascinating in the blurb is that this new novel is more futuristic! The evil game Architect has a new partner in crime a.k.a. The MasterMind. And they rebuild Paheli with lots of new things like robots *chef kiss* Tell me a bit more about your inspiration for this book.

KR: Well, as you know, Jumanji was part of my original inspiration for The Gauntlet. Jumanji's sequel is Zathura, which - particularly if you are considering film canon - is more futuristic than Jumanji. We decided to go for video games as the futuristic aspect instead of outer space, and I went from there! (I'm a video game fan myself so this was a lot of fun for me.)

TBV: I love board games and as you said The Gauntlet is inspired by Jumanji. Which board games are your favorite now and which were your favorite when you were a kid? And if you had the chance, would you go into the game like Ahmad and Winnie? 

KR: My favorite board games as a kid were Clue, and these two really educational ones (I was homeschooled). One was called Take Off, and it was dedicated to teaching geography, so you had a fleet of airplanes and you had to get them to a certain airport - if I recall correctly - before the opposing players' planes did. The other was Herd Your Horses - yes, I was a horse girl in middle school, down to the riding classes - and my sister and I used to carry it to our local stables for summer day camp so everyone could take a turn playing it. In terms of going into a game, I'm...a very anxious person. I think all of Alex's nerves in the first book were very autobiographical. I would spend most of my time in a game just like him: worrying, wondering if we'd made a huge mistake and freaking out over every little surprise. So I think I would honestly not want to go into a game!

TBV: Friendship is so important in your books. Can you tell me about the creation of these characters, Ahmad and Winnie, and how they form the perfect partnership? 

KR: Of course, readers will be familiar with Ahmad from The Gauntlet - but, in the way authors often do with hindsight after the book is released, I realized that Ahmad was not given as much of a chance to show his inner spirit and character as his sister was. A lot of readers described him as bratty or difficult for no reason. So, in this book, once I knew he was going to be the protagonist, I wanted to show another side to him: the boy who wants what his sister has, good friends, but is not sure of how to do that or where to even begin. I wanted Ahmad to have a friend he deserved, even if he didn't know it: someone fun, and smart, and loyal, and also another kid of color who believes strongly in sticking together and facing the world together. I think Winnie is all that and more and I love her and hope that I've been able to do her justice and make her spirit shine as strongly as his. (I will also note that, even if he doesn't realize it yet, Ahmad has all those same characteristics, but he's less confident in them than Winnie is, which is why she's the perfect partner to draw it out of him!)

TBV: As a last question, I would love to know which books would you recommend reading for fans of your books! 



KR: Hmm, this is a very good question. As a kid, I loved The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin and I still want to write a book with as much depth and mystery as that book - so readers, if you haven't, get on that! If you want to understand me as a person in general, read Ella Enchanted and Howl's Moving Castle because those titles are the reasons I write. In general within middle grade, I love my Cake sister Anna Meriano's Love Sugar Magic titles, Anne Ursu's middle grades (like, every single one of them) and anything by Mike Jung. I'm sure I'm forgetting people!

Karuna Riazi is a born and raised New Yorker, with a loving, large extended family and the rather trying experience of being the eldest sibling in her particular clan. She holds a BA in English Literature from Hofstra University, and is an online diversity advocate, blogger, and educator. She is a 2017 honoree on NBC Asian America's Redefining A-Z list, featuring up and coming talent within the Asian-American and Pacific Islander community, and her work has been featured on Entertainment Weekly, Amy Poehler's Smart Girls, Book Riot and Teen Vogue, among others.

Karuna is fond of tea, Korean dramas, writing about tough girls forging their own paths toward their destinies, and baking new delectable treats for friends and family to relish. The Gauntlet (S&S/Salaam Reads, March 28, 2017) is her middle grade debut, with a forthcoming companion, The Battle.

Hi lovely people! Good morning to you all and happy Friday.

When I was approached for this, I was over the moon. Firstly because wow. I totally didn't expect it and I was so happy I could cry. And secondly because it was for a book that I was already excited about so it made things ten thousand times better to be honest? I had added this book on various lists and I'm so happy I get to show you all the perfect cover of 500 Words or Less by Juleah del Rosario. It's a book you want to TBR and keep on your sight when it releases. 

You can also check out the exclusive interview we had with author Juleah del Rosario.


The Book Voyagers: Can you tell us the process of how the final cover came together?
Juleah del Rosario: Sarah Creech a designer at Simon Pulse worked with illustrator Cannaday Chapman to create this striking cover after reading an early draft of the novel. My editor presented me with this design about a month after we finished the final edits. This was actually the second cover designed, and I loved it when I first saw it. What I love about this cover is that there are so many different details that I notice each time I see the cover, which is kind of like the experience of reading a verse novel. I really wanted to create a story that works on different levels, allowing readers to have different experiences with the story. I think this cover reflects the layers that exist in novels written in verse, but particularly in 500 WORDS OR LESS.

The Book Voyagers: Tell us a bit about the novel. What can we expect from the insides of this book? Or are we up to some surprises *grin* 
Juleah: 500 WORDS OR LESS is about a high school senior, Nic Chen, who has been branded as the girl who cheated on her charismatic and lovable boyfriend. She seeks to redefine her reputation by writing her Ivy League-obsessed classmates college admissions essays.

But the more essays Nic writes for other people, the less sure she becomes of herself, the kind of person she is, and whether her moral compass even points north anymore.

In writing 500 WORDS OR LESS, I really wanted to explore the type of people who can be extremely driven and accomplished on the outside, and yet deeply flawed on the inside. Without the accolades and GPAs and laundry list of extra- curriculars that we write on our college applications, do we know who are we?

I also explore the concept of identity throughout. How is one’s identity as a person of color shaped by living in a predominately white community? Who are we if our identity is performative, if we are always performing a version of our self? What does it mean to be a daughter when one’s relationship with one’s mother is fraught? These are the questions that I wanted Nic, and the characters in 500 WORDS OR LESS to grapple with.

The Book Voyagers: How excited are you to get this book out to the world? What are your thoughts and what are you feeling? 
Juleah: 500 WORDS OR LESS is ultimately a story about messy and flawed people, and explores complexities of life that can’t be tied into a neat little bow. There have been many moments in my teenage and adult life where I needed to read about flawed people, to feel that I wasn’t alone, to see the complexities in relationships and life that didn’t always end neatly, or even satisfyingly. I hope that this book can reach readers who might see something or feel something in this story that validates their own lived experience—in all its messy and unsatisfying complexity.

The Book Voyagers: What’s that one thing you’re anticipating so much to see/do when your book is out? 
Juleah: I’m a librarian and a complete library nerd. While seeing the book in my local public library would be amazing, what I’m most excited about is view the catalog record of my book in WorldCat. How many holdings will my book’s record have? What will be the book’s OCLC number? Which subject headings will be assigned? These are all super nerdy librarian questions.

I am also looking forward to smelling the pages of the hardcover. I love the smell of a new book.

The Book Voaygers: I was so excited (still am!) when I found out your novel is written in verse. That’s so enchanting. For you, is it easier to write from prose or harder? What drew you in? And why did you think it was a perfect way to tell this story? 
Juleah: While I am an avid reader, I’m also a slow reader. I have been drawn to reading novels written in verse because I can read and finish something that is still full of depth and meaning.

The first draft of 500 WORDS OR LESS was written in prose. But I got to the end and I felt like the emotional quality of the novel was off. Something wasn’t working. So I started to experiment with form and verse.

Now that I better understand verse novels, I think writing in verse is more reflective of the type of human experience I want to explore in my writing. Our experiences are filled with unknowns, with white space, with feelings we cannot easily explain.

The Book Voyagers: I would love to know from whom or where you draw inspiration, for example for writing. Who are your favorite authors you look up to? 
Juleah: Two of my all-time favorite authors are Jacqueline Woodson and John Green. I love the way both authors use language, and the way each word they write feels deliberate and inventive without distracting from voice and character.

In terms of verse novels, here are a few of the titles that were influential in writing 500 WORDS OR LESS

Inside Out and Back Again by Thanhha Lai
Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
One of Those Hideous Books Where the Mother Dies by Sonya Sones
Stop Pretending: What Happened When My Big Sister Went Crazy by Sonya Sones
Skyscraping by Cordelia Jensen
True Believer by Virginia Euwer Wolff

The Book Voyagers: What are your 2018 resolutions?
Juleah: I have started working on a new project, but have found that it is extremely challenging to go from finishing a novel with fully formed characters whose inner most secrets you have lived with for 4+ years, to meeting a new character who essentially has said two words to you and you attempt to create a novel out of the brief interaction thus far. But as a writer, I also know this is just an excuse to not write. So my 2018 resolution is to get over it and just sit down and keep writing until I finish this next project.

Juleah del Rosario is a librarian at a university thus fulfilling her love of books and leafy green campuses simultaneously. Author in the in between hours. Born & raised in the Seattle area. Now calls Colorado home. According to Teen Vogue out of all the Emmas, she is most like Emma Watson, and according to Seventeen, her prom dress style is classic-preppy. Both results feel spot on.

Title: The Flip Side

Author: Shawn Johnson

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers

Release date: June 7th, 2016

Pages: 320

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

Overall this was such an amazing book I didn't want  to put it down. My heart became full and my smile big. I just can't wait more book from MM, hopefully soon heh!

Morgan Matson was born in New York City and grew up there and in Greenwich, Connecticut. She attended Occidental College in Los Angeles, but halfway through a theater degree, she started working in the children’s department of Vroman’s Bookstore and fell in love with YA literature.

Following college graduation (and the proud bearer of an incredibly useful theater/English degree) she received her M.F.A. in Writing for Children from The New school and worked as an editor for YA novels. She received a second M.F.A. (for reasons that made sense at the time) in Screenwriting from the University of Southern California.

Her novels have been translated into dozens of languages, and published all over the world.