I am supposed to be writing a Stash post right now but you see, Thea is NOT here.

What is it that they say again? “When the cat’s away the mice will play”? I really feel like rambling about assorted things instead of writing a cohesive post about upcoming stuff. I don’t feel cohesive at all. And I blame it on Thea.

She LEFT. For 3 WEEKS. To visit family in a land far, far away and 8 hours ahead of me, which makes her pretty unavailable to talk to me and since we usually exchange thousands of emails every day talking about important stuff like books, and blogging, now I have all of this free time and I don’t know what to do with it!

“Why don’t you read any of the gazillion books that you have”, you may ask me? I DON’T KNOW. There is something wrong with me. I haven’t read a single page this week. That is unusual. I usually read at least 3 books per week. Plus I have tons of books that I HAVE to read and I can’t open a single one of them. I have been carrying around this one:

in my bag for days and I didn’t read a single line yet. To be fair, I don’t know if this is Thea’s fault or Julie James’ for writing such a good book that now everything I read afterwards pales in comparison. I think I am going with Thea’s fault since this seems to be theme of the post. HOW exactly this is her fault, I have no clue. But I am sure it is.

So instead of reading and emailing, I have been occupying my time with other stuff like wandering from room to room like a lost soul in an old manor house. Or watching weird yet addictive TV Shows like Important Things With Demetri Martin

I have yet to ascertain if the show is crap or brilliant. I will keep you posted. Or glued to the TV to know what happens next in the Jon Stewart- Jim Cramer War of Words. I don’t even live in America but hell if I don’t think Jon is awesome.

I also twitted a lot this week. Something that I don’t usually do, because let’s face it: addictive much? I found out we are close to having 500 followers! WOW. That’s a lot isn’t it? I also found that Joss Whedon and Neil Gaiman twit and immediately started following them! Another thing I found out, we got 4 “Your Blog is Fabulous” Awards from some pretty fabulous blogs out there for which I am so thankful and honoured– and although I had to squee all by myself, I am sure Thea will be super happy when she hears of this. I will soon pass the award ahead.

We also won a Premio Dardo award from Tracy. I felt super great about this, because Premio Dardo is a pretty cool award for bloggers and one that has been around everywhere. Plus, Tracy is a sweetheart!!

The award “Dardos” appreciates the merits – culturally, literary and individually- of every blogger who expresses him/herself on his/her blog

But the thing took a direction no one could have predicted. CJ from the Thrillionth Page was awarded the same prize from Tracy and she wrote a funny post about it, investigating the origins of the prize, wondering about its name etc. I always wondered about it myself you see. Because Premio and Dardo are Portuguese (my mother tongue) words (they can also be Spanish though) and they mean Prize and Dart respectively. I told CJ this, and decided to do a bit of investigating myself. I googled Premio Dardos (in Portuguese) and found this Yahoo Post column by Alexandre Inagaki who is editor of a big blog in Brazil (he won an International prize called The Bobs promoted by the German site Deutsche Welle em 2007) who wrote a piece about “Blog Prizes” back in February.

In his piece, he talks about prizes and how bloggers love to get and to give them away and how they sometimes resemble those pyramids schemes. One such prize is the Premio Dardo. According to him the fact that you need to give the prize to not less than 15 bloggers makes the prize sort of meaningless and the thing has been translated to English, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish and German. Also according to him the creator of the prize is Spanish Writer Alberto Zambade who owns the blog Leyendas de el pequeno Dardo – Dardo being his nickname. In Feb 15 2008, he published the “I Entrega de Premios Dardo 2008 Best Blog Darts thinker” …. That is an awesome bit of investigating if I may say so myself…but to know more about it , you need to go to CJ’s blog and read her second entry about our CSI: Premio Dardo.

I also found out that there are some books that I most positively need to have or DIE.

Like this one for example:

“Soulless” by Gail Carriger. US Release Date: October 2009. Alexia Tarabotti is laboring under a great many social tribulations. First, she has no soul. Second, she’s a spinster whose father is both Italian and dead. Third, she is being rudely attacked by a vampire to whom she has not been properly introduced!

Where to go from there? From bad to worse apparently, for Alexia accidentally kills the vampire, and the appalling Lord Maccon (loud, messy, gorgeous, and werewolf) is sent by Queen Victoria to investigate. With unexpected vampires appearing and expected vampires disappearing, everyone seems to believe Alexia responsible.

Can she figure out what is actually happening to London’s high society? Will her soulless ability to negate supernatural powers prove useful or just plain embarrassing? And who is the real enemy . . . and do they have treacle tart?

“Soulless” is a comedy of manners set in Victorian London full of werewolves, vampires, dirigibles, and tea-drinking…
Found on Fantasy Book Critic’s Blog.

Or this one:

Which every single Fantasy blog seems to be reviewing these days. Aidan loves it. John does too. And DarkWolf and of course, Graeme. . Needless to say: I WANT it. Now, you want to know how long Amazon.UK wants me to wait for it? 1-2 months. *gasps*

And then you have Angie obsessing about these three books and making me literally dream about them. The Thief, The Queen of Attolia and The King of Attolia.

So, this is what happens in a week when I am left to my own devices: I tend to wander, ramble, exaggerate, not to talk about the things I am supposed to (like the review of Smooth Talking Strange by Lisa Kleypas I will post this week, or the review of Forest of Hands of Teeth by Carrie Ryan that Thea will post on Thursday) and to plot about the things that I will be doing for the next two weeks.

One thing is for certain: this place is so not the same without Thea.

It’s been fun, but our X-Files Weekend now comes to a close. And so, we look forward, onward ho!

First things first, our magical sorting hat has spoken. The winner of our Accidental Demon Slayer giveaway is…

M. of Apprentice Writer!

Congrats, M.–please drop us a comment or an email (thebooksmugglers AT hotmail DOT com) with your mailing info as soon as possible! Thanks to all for playing–and if you didn’t win, don’t worry, you’ll soon have another chance…

Coming This Week:

We have a jam-packed week filled with early reviews and another giveaway!

On Monday, Ana will review The Wild Road (Dirk & Steele book by Marjorie Liu.

Lannes Hannelore is one of a dying race born to protect mankind against demonic forces. And while those who look upon him see a beautiful man, this illusion is nothing but a prison. His existence is one of pure isolation, hiding in plain sight, with brief solace found in simple pleasures: stretching his wings on a stormy night, long late drives on empty highways, the deep soul of sad songs. But when Lannes finds a young woman covered in blood—desperate and alone, with no memory or past—he will be drawn into a mystery that makes him question all he knows. And though it goes against his nature and everything he fears, Lannes will risk his heart, his secrets, and his very soul, in order to save someone who could be the love of his life…or the end of it.

The Wild Road is available July 29, 2008.

On Tuesday, we’ll have a review of Nightwalker–the highly anticipated new release by Jocelynn Drake.

For centuries Mira has been a nightwalker—an unstoppable enforcer for a mysterious organization that manipulates earth-shaking events from the darkest shadows. But elemental mastery over fire sets her apart from others of her night-prowling breed . . . and may be all that prevents her doom.
The foe she now faces is human: the vampire hunter called Danaus, who has already destroyed so many undead. For Mira, the time has come to hunt . . . or be hunted.

Nightwalker is available July 29, 2008.

And, what’s more is on Wednesday we will have a Q&A with author Jocelynn Drake herself! Stop by to see what this new author has to share about writing and her new book–and also for a chance to win a copy of Nightwalker!

On Friday, Ana will have an early review up for Suzanne Enoch’s Before the Scandal, book 2 of The Notorious Gentlemen series.

It Was a Scandal Waiting to Happen . . .

Colonel Phineas Bromley is a legend—on the battlefield and in the bedroom. Though he’s won many wars, and even more hearts, nothing could prepare him for his new life. When Phin discovers that someone has been pushing his family toward ruin, he assumes the role of a legendary highwayman. Riding out in the middle of the night, hidden behind a mask, Phin heads straight into trouble . . . and into the arms of the ravishing girl next door.

Coming face-to-face with a masked man did not frighten Alyse Donnelly as it should have. Instead, she finds him rather dashing. But her foolish heart has led her into trouble before, and helping a fugitive may mean jeopardizing her own plans, no matter how enticing his kisses. Now, as the danger grows, Alyse must make a choice between freedom . . . and the chance for true love.

Before the Scandal is in stores on July 29, 2008.

Other News:

Stephen Hunt’s SFcrowsnest Hivemind, a new social networking site for science fiction, fantasy and horror fans, is now up and running!

Welcome to SFcrowsnest Hivemind, the social network for science fiction and fantasy fans. If you’re looking to converse and make friends with fellow science fiction & fantasy fans, then you have arrived at the right social networking service. We start at A for Asimov, move on through S for Star Wars (or possibly Star Trek, if you have odd-looking textures on your forehead), and end on Z is for Zelazny. And you can even stop off at B for Bladerunner and Battlestar, or C for Conan of Cimmeria, if you want to travel the long way round. Enjoy.

Stop by and check it out! Here’s a LINK to our profile

Annnnnd, in a final note, last week the new CAPRICA trailer went online at scifi.com!

From NBC Universal:

The people of the Twelve Colonies are at peace and living in a society not unlike our own, but where high-technology has changed the lives of virtually everyone for the better. But a startling breakthrough in robotics is about to occur, one that will bring to life the age-old dream of marrying artificial intelligence with a mechanical body to create the first living robot — a Cylon. Following the lives of two families, the Graystones and the Adamas (the family of William Adama, who will one day become the commander of the Battlestar Galactica) Caprica weaves corporate intrigue, techno-action and sexual politics into television’s first science fiction family saga.

I trust in the capable hands of the BSG creators, even if this family drama isn’t exactly what I was looking for. Still, with the final episodes of BSG looming, I’ll take whatever I can get. Plus, Eric Stoltz and Esai Morales? Niiiiice.

Also, as comic-con ends (I’m still pissy I didn’t get to go!), RWA kicks off this week! We’ll try to stay updated.

May is shaping up to be one of the best months with fabulous new books coming up: we just had the new Kresley Cole’s, Dark Needs at Night’s Edge released and we will have another one at the end of the month, Dark Desires After Dusk. The new book by JR Ward, Lover Enshrined will also be out. I haven’t read any one this series but I know most of you are addicted to it and think of this series as pure crack. Katie has got an ARC and reviewed it a few days ago over here .

But I have to say that the two I am most excited about are The Lost Duke of Wyndham by Julia Quinn and Your Scandalous Ways by Loretta Chase. Both have been reviewed by Publisher’s Weekly and this is what they have to say:

(isn’t the UK Cover cute?)