We’re celebrating the launch of our new beach read, The Last Resort, which is an ebook novella (a short novel), just $2.99. Readers who purchase the book will have a chance to win a humongous beach read-y package.

Summer, sisterhood and sacred answers in paradise. 

Lott’s latest brings all of her main characters together at a mojo conference for women at a luxury resort in Maui. Mojo and fitness guru, Rachel Woods, takes the women through adventures on the magic island to discover their deepest desires and fears. Readers will catch up with Ramona (Dating da Vinci), Taylor (The Stork Reality), Macy (Fixer Upper), Georgia (Life’s a Beach) and get introduced to Kelly, who gets her own novel, Something New, in Fall 2012. (Which is why we’re so tickled we found the photo of the five hula dancers on the beach!)

You’re invited to find your mojo at The Last Resort.

Summer is better with beach reads! Last year’s Life’s a Beach contest was such a hit, we’re doing it again with The Last Resort. Click over to our contest page for information on the June contest and the chance to win a package valued at nearly $300.

Where to buy THE LAST RESORT?

Amazon for Kindle or Kindle apps

Barnes & Noble for Nook

and coming soon to iBooks, Kobo and Smashwords.

For the details on the contest and how to get multiple entries, visit our Contests page.

Readers of THE LAST RESORT have a chance to win this package.

Free Prom! 

To celebrate the end of the school year, we’re gifting Prom Dates to Die For on Smashwords now through Memorial Weekend with this coupon code: CJ85E. Click here to go get your ebook edition in your favorite e-format. A fun young adult novel with bite-size paranormal stories perfect for your vacations or lazy summer afternoons! FREE! Here’s what Pages Unbound blog recently said about each of the five stories featured in Prom:

“Darkness Becomes Him” by Kelly Parra – “The concept was great … a lot of action!”

“The Bone Flower” by Heather Dearly – “This story was very nicely imagined … both beautiful and a little depressing.”

“Every Breath You Take” by Lena Brown – “the story is very well-developed and had a fascinating premise.”

“A Kiss at the Threshold” by Aaron Smith also presents a very interesting concept, and it has my favorite protagonist (also the only leading male!).” “Gripping.”

“Tonight, You’re Mine” by Jenny Peterson – “Also intriguing. It incorporates some surprises and a bit of humor, which makes it a refreshing contribution to an anthology about proms gone wrong!”

If you take advantage of our free offer, we hope you’ll let us know if you liked it with a review on Goodreads, Amazon or Barnes & Noble. Help us spread the buzz about Prom!

Prom is available as an ebook for $2.99 at Amazon and Barnes & Noble and in print for $7.99 in our Buzz Books store and Amazon.

Calling All Honeybees!

We’re looking for a romance story to fall in love with to launch our Honey romance line. Who will be our first Honeybee, our debut romance author? We’ll post the full details after Memorial Day on our Contest page, but the contest prize will include a 40% royalty, glossy bookmarks, a book trailer, being a guest on our Hive podcast, a Facebook and Goodreads ad campaign and Honey swag including a T-shirt and coffee mug. Send us some Honey by following our submission guidelines. Fun fact: According to National Geographic, “Worker honeybees are all females and are the only bees most people ever see. They forage for food and build and protect the hive, among many other societal functions.”

And our unofficial Honey song? Why, it’s the Voice’s cutie-patootie country crooner Blake Shelton’s song, Honeybee, of course!

Coming Soon! SWARM, Buzz’ Mystery/Thriller Line

The logo is in the works and so is our first contract. We’re THRILLED to “bee” adding a mystery/thriller line to the Hive. (Sorry, couldn’t help the pun.) If you know of a great mystery book shop and mystery/thriller book review sites, send us the info so we can add them to our distribution list. More soon!

#buzzchat, #littlebrand, Loyalty Club

As promised, we’ll be posting all the buzz from the week Sunday evenings at 8 p.m. using the hashtag #buzzchat on Twitter from our @buzzbooksusa account. Biggest movies, books, TV and story news plus the latest with Buzz and a nice giveaway to those who RT and participate in our chat. If you have a small biz or work in one, check out our #littlebrand feed with daily tips on branding. And last week, we mentioned a Buzz loyalty club. We’re hammering out the details to makes sure it’s extra awesome, but know that those who love to read and share the buzz will get some great opportunities for free reads and swag, so stay tuned.

Next week’s Hive report: Malena Lott’s follow up to LIFE’S A BEACH, THE LAST RESORT about six women seeking mojo in Maui, releases Memorial Weekend along with a huge “girlfriends” beach bag giveaway – a giveaway meant to be shared with your best girlfriends! So fun, we can’t wait to announce it! 

Keep calm and read on.

Lit love,

Malena

Buzz Books is pleased to announce a new deal with Oklahoma interior designer Kellie Clements, who has gained national recognition for her stint on HGTV Design Star, where viewers got to see her natural charm, charisma and creativity. Kellie owns Modern Whimsy Interiors based in Edmond, OK. We’re thrilled Kellie will be writing a Little Brand interior design book to help those who wish to launch or grow their own interior design practice. The book’s advice will be doled in Kellie’s fresh, honest and humorous voice. Good luck to Kellie as she writes the book this summer! We’re hoping to release it as a “workbook” as well as an ebook. We’re so happy to have this stylish, smart mama in the Hive!

Free Stork for Mamas

In honor of Mother’s Day, Buzz is offering a coupon code for 100% off the ebook for Malena Lott’s humorous and heartfelt mom lit novel, The Stork Reality, at Smashwords. For those of you unfamiliar with Smashwords, it’s an ebook distributor that provides the ebook is every platform, so you can download whichever option works for you and your device – or even just reading on your computer. The latest praise for the book comes from Chick Lit Plus who wrote:

” I laughed, I cried … but mostly, I cheered for Taylor as she tackled her fears and fought for what she wanted. I found the descriptions of her pregnancy journey to be spot on and often times hilarious.

Malena Lott is a phenomenal writer and she really shines with this one! I would recommend this book to anyone who is looking for a witty page turner, pregnant or not. Overall, I give it 5/5 stars. Such a wonderful read. Finally a funny and heartfelt book about pregnancy!” – Sara, Chick Lit Plus

How to get Stork for free:

Go to the Stork page on Smashwords here: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/156790

Click to purchase it and put in this coupon code: TF89D and it will change your amount due to $0.00. FREE!

The coupon code expires after Mother’s Day so please order and share the code now through the weekend.

You can also “gift” the book to loved ones. It’s available at Amazon for $2.99 through Mother’s Day. But, really, we just want you to read it and share the love! If you like the book, we encourage you to leave a review on Goodreads, Amazon or B&N.

Summer Lovin’

As the school days wane, why not get wistful about prom? Fays Books gives PROM DATES TO DIE FOR 4 stars and says: “These are five amazing stories by five equally amazing authors! You definitely don’t want to miss your chance to read ‘Prom Dates to Die For.  It’s a great collection of paranormal prom stories that are literally to die for!”  For retail links, go to our Prom page.

Who’s thinking “beach” already? Give your mind a fun escape to Mexico in the Buzz best-seller LIFE’S A BEACH, called a “perfect summer treat, with a twist” by readers. Another great gift idea for the moms in your life.

Getting Even More Social

Starting Sunday, May 20th, we’re starting a pop culture Twitter chat called #BuzzChat from 8-9 p.m. CST on Twitter. The site will be hosted by @buzzbooksusa and @bookendbabes. We’ll talk the biggest buzz in books, TV, film and stories. We’ll also share the latest happening in the Hive. Prizes each week. Tweet you later!

Stay tuned for next week’s Hive blog where we’ll be announcing our loyalty rewards club, Honeybees contest and our new mystery/thriller imprint.  

Lit love,

Malena

What if you needed to go bra shopping in a dangerous, dystopian future? Would you risk life and limb to support your “girls”? You’ll find out in Peggy Chamber’s dystopian dark comedy series in our Buzz Books Stingers line. The first in the series is tentatively titled, “Bra Wars.” Stingers are 5-10,000 words  - short on length, big on impact. I love the relationships between the characters and Peggy’s snappy dialogue and Mari (our senior editor) and I were foaming at the mouth to find out more. (Why foaming? Were we zombies? And are their any hotties left? Must. Know.) Keep your ears to the hive for more details. Congratulations on your contract, and welcome to the hive, Peggy! She hails from Enid, Oklahoma, where, we assure you, the wind really does come sweeping down the plains. Peggy will be at the OWFI conference May 4th, so give her a shout and an atta-babe.

I’ll admit I’m a little mad for mythology and I’m THRILLED that we found a writer who is taking our Mythology High young adult series by storm with three modern-day retellings of popular myths. Jammie Kern from Sand Springs, Oklahoma, will also be published in our Stingers imprint. Jammie (pronounced Jay-me) even has a writer Facebook page so pop on over and like her because I know you’re going to like her stories.

Mari will be taking pitches at OWFI next weekend so we hope you’ll look her up and consider sharing your story with her. For more on our submissions, including our new romance line, Honey, click over to submissions.

Next week is launch week for our young adult anthology Prom Dates to Die For. Our cover model Morgan Gover will be returning to the metro on the 3rd to co-host ALL ABOUT YOU on KSBI and other media appearances will be announced shortly. The book will be available at local indies Full Circle and Best of Books. We’re getting great feedback on the book so please help spread the buzz! What authors and early readers are saying:

Early praise for #PromDates2D4

“Prom Dates to Die For is like eating pistachios. One story isn’t enough.
Dark humor and compelling story lines make this a delicious read.”
~Jordan Dane – Award-winning, Critically Acclaimed Author of THE HUNTED YA
series with Harlequin Teen

The title font is called “luncheonette” but to me it plays dark very well. My 12 year old daughter said the font reminded her of fangs without having to literally find a fang font, which might’ve been over the top. (Not that I’m against over the top when it’s needed.)

The cover and back blurb was provided by author Tina Ferraro. We’re so thrilled she liked our stories! So, what can you do to get your hands on an early copy? Simply like our Facebook page and for an extra entry, tweet, “I can’t wait to read #PromDates2D4 on 5/1. #YALit @BuzzBooksUSA” (That’s so we can see your tweet and count it.)

And equally exciting news – we’re adding a new romance imprint and will start reviewing submissions, so romance writers, send us your best stuff! We’ll update the subs page next week, but we’re looking for everything from novellas to full length manuscripts (so 20K to about 80K) in all romance genres except erotica. Our imprint: Buzz Books Honey. LOVE! Thanks to our superb senior editor Mari Farthing for naming it. We’ll unveil the new logo next week as well as the logo for Buzz Books Stingers for shorter works. Contracts are being written on TWO different Stingers series so we can’t wait to share that with you soon.

lit love,

Malena Lott

author/executive editor

Cover model winner Morgan Gover. Photo by @LeighPhotog

Buzz Books is pleased to introduce the winner of our PROM DATES TO DIE FOR cover model contest, Morgan Gover, a 17 year-old junior from Altus High School. Morgan is also Miss Altus Teen and will be participating in the Miss Oklahoma Teen competition this summer, but we didn’t know that when she applied. We held an open casting call at BodyTrends BoutiQue in Casady Square in Oklahoma City and all contestants were photographed by Leigh Thompson so we could see the models in person and judge the photos fairly. It was a tough call with many great choices, but in the end, we felt Morgan would be the right choice for our paranormal prom cover. Stay tuned for pics from the amazing couture prom dress collection at Bodytrends and the final cover model shoot this weekend. Prom Dates to Die For is Young Adult paranormal prom anthology releasing in May.

In other news, a big thank you to Kansas Writers Association for having me speak at their conference two weeks ago on The Little Brand That Could, which will be a Buzz Books Biz title later this year. Photo by friend and great photog Ken Davis.

Author and exec. editor Malena Lott at #KWA.

And in the news, this nice buzz about Buzz Books in the Edmond Sun. Gotta love local papers!

A final shout out to all the great mamas who have posted blogs over at StorkRealityBook.com. We’ve reached 3,000 views and the daily reads are growing. I love reading the personal stories each day. If you’d like to submit one, give me a shout on Twitter @MalenaLott or @BuzzBooksUSA.

If you are a book reviewer or journalist and would like to review The Stork Reality or Prom Dates to Die For, please give publicist @CyndyHoenig a holler.

Lots of lit love, keep reading and buzzing about books!  - Malena

• Love couture? We had the opportunity to check out the couture dresses at BodyTrends BoutiQue in Oklahoma City where our casting call is scheduled for the teen cover model contest on March 29th at 3 p.m. Our winner will get to pose in a gorgeous couture dress. Teens can register here. 
• On FB? We’ve also set up a book page for PROM DATES TO DIE FOR over on Facebook, so we hope you’ll check it out and let the young adult readers in your life know. Thanks to the new timeline theme, we’ll be able to show the progress of the shoot and the launch and all of the events surrounding Prom.
• Yoo-hoo, YA book reviewers: our publicist Cyndy Hoenig is booking the blog tour for Prom Dates for early May, so please send her a shout out on Twitter or e-mail her at and get on our ARC list. E-mail: Cyndy Hoenig (at) ymail (dot) com.
• Meet the Prom Committee: Joining Jenny Peterson and Heather Dearly on the author team are Aaron Smith, a pulp fiction writer from New Jersey, who wowed us with his original tale of a lonely guy who gets lured to the prom by mysterious music, the only girl who seems to notice him, and a mission only he can handle; and Kelly Parra, a published YA and women’s fiction author, who gives us a pair of teen paranormal hunters-for-hire who must deal with a dark angel hell bent on some soul sucking at prom. Her writing is engaging and fast-paced and we love the chemistry between her leads; and Lena Brown (a pen name for women’s fiction writer Malena Lott) who will launch her YA paranormal debut with a story about a twenty-year old murder mystery that takes over one girl’s prom night with her dream date and how they are both linked to the murder. Her first Goddess Sisters novel, Going Greek, will be published this summer. Rounding out the prom committee: our intrepid senior editor, Mari Farthing, whose first acquisition was Aaron Smith – yay!, publicist Cyndy Hoenig and communications manager Dani Stone. Prom would be an empty gymnasium without them. Our prom wouldn’t be glamorous without BodyTrends BoutiQue, photographer Leigh Thompson or hair and makeup stylist Sharon Tabb.

Our executive editor Malena Lott was recently interviewed by The Oklahoman about author branding and her Little Brand That Could for Writers workshop in Wichita (3/16 and 3/17) at the KWA conference. She’s also looking forward to hearing pitches in hope of finding more great stories for the Hive.

If you’re interested in marketing theory, check out Malena’s post about the two categories of marketing for small businesses and authors in THE OCTOPUS AND THE GOAT over at the Girlfriends Book Club blog. She’ll be writing a Buzz Books Stinger ebook this summer with the same name as a part of the Little Brand series.

On that note, if you’re a mama or wonder what it’s like, check out our popular StorkRealityBook blog where mamas are sharing their pregnancy and motherhood stories. The Stork Reality: Secrets from the Underbelly is now available. We’d love if you’d share your thoughts on it on Goodreads, Amazon and B&N when you’ve read it. Reviews really help.

Happy reading, lit friends.

Buzz Books USA is hosting a cover model contest for its first Young Adult book, PROM DATES TO DIE FOR. The paranormal prom anthology includes five stories by five up-and-coming authors who each put a unique spin on what could happen at prom if a paranormal event were thrown into the already magical night. When Buzz Books began brainstorming cover ideas, it hit them. “Why not give local teens a shot at landing on the cover?”

For executive editor Malena Lott, it was a win-win. “We’re all about celebrating stories and how cool is it to give a young person the opportunity to be a on a book cover?”

Buzz Books could only pull it off with the help of sponsors. Cyndy Hoenig, Buzz’ publicist and Margaret Croom, one of Buzz’ new authors, suggested just the right fit: Bodytrends Spa in Oklahoma City, which not only has a boutique featuring formalwear and jewelry, but also a photography studio in the back. Popular pageant/actor/fashion photographer Leigh Thompson agreed to shoot the casting call as well as the final cover shoot. The incredible hair and makeup artist Sharon Tabb will work her magic at the cover shoot to give the winning model the dark and moody prom look to fit the collection. The winner will be dressed in prom couture and jewelry from the Bodytrends boutique. The final selection will be made based on the model selected.

Every model who auditions will be featured on the PROM DATES TO DIE FOR Facebook page and may be included in the MAKING OF video which will be included in the iBooks edition of the book. The contestants will also get VIP invitations to attend the launch party in early May at the studio and be registered to win one of several prizes at the launch party.

The casting call will be held on Thursday, March 29th beginning at 3 p.m. The winner will be selected the following day and the cover model shoot will be Sunday, April 1st at Bodytrends located 9327 North Pennsylvania Avenue in Oklahoma City. The rules and audition form will be live on our Contest page on Monday, March 12th. The winner should look high school student age, so we assume the range might be 14-21 years of age.

Photographer Leigh Thompson

About Leigh Thompson:

Leigh Thompson specializes in pageant and actor/performer headshots, model headshots and portfolios, executive portraits, senior pictures and fashion photography.   His clients have won countless photogenic awards on the national, state and local levels. Leigh Thompson has more than a decade of experience in photography.  Leigh is the official photographer of the Miss Oklahoma pageant and the Miss Oklahoma’s Outstanding Teen pageant.  His client’s include singers, actors and several Miss Americas.  Leigh Thompson is based in Oklahoma and is available to travel nationwide.