vvb32 reads: Happy release: The Meaning of Maggie by Megan Jean Sovern (with giveaway)

Wednesday, May 14, 2014

Happy release: The Meaning of Maggie by Megan Jean Sovern (with giveaway)

The Meaning of Maggie
by Megan Jean Sovern
Just released: May 6, 2016
Amazon | Goodreads
As befits a future President of the United States of America, Maggie Mayfield has decided to write a memoir of the past year of her life. And what a banner year it’s been! During this period she’s Student of the Month on a regular basis, an official shareholder of Coca-Cola stock, and defending Science Fair champion.

Most importantly, though, this is the year Maggie has to pull up her bootstraps (the family motto) and finally learn why her cool-dude dad is in a wheelchair, no matter how scary that is.

Author Megan Jean Sovern, herself the daughter of a dad with multiple sclerosis, writes with the funny grace and assured prose of a new literary star.

A portion of the proceeds of the sale of this book will be donated to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

PeekAbook:

Guest post:

The Meaning of Clyde in The Meaning of Maggie
by Megan Jean Sovern

Even though he’s a minor character, I most love Clyde in The Meaning of Maggie. I love him because we really only get to know Maggie’s version of him. His true intentions are a mystery just like the rest of him.

He wore black and white Converse sneakers filthy with grass stains and in black marker he’d written “Neil Young” on the bottom of his right sole. Weird. Mismatched socks led to skinny legs that led to cutoff corduroy shorts that led to a skeleton T-shirt that led to hazel eyes looking right at me. Oh dear.

I wanted to give Maggie an obtainable crush. Not someone she admired from afar, but someone she could really connect with. And you always wonder if maybe he feels the same way about her. Or maybe you hope that after he grows up a little, dates the wrong hot girls, plays in a few successful bands then gives it all up to become a historical scholar, that he will look back and realize that Maggie Mayfield was probably his one and only. And Maggie hopes for the same, which is why she sticks close to her mantra: Career first. Love second.

Clyde was inspired by a number of cool dudes. A little Pony Boy from The Outsiders. A little Jordan Catalano from My So Called Life. And a lot of this cool and brooding boy named Ted who I may have married. And in many ways, his good heart was a gift from my sister Rayna. When she had her first son Ty, she said, “I just want to raise a boy who is nice to girls.” And I loved that so much. What an honorable and simple wish for a boy. And I think Clyde lives up to it. Especially in the scene where he signs Maggie’s yearbook.

As soon as he disappeared around the corner, I searched for the page he signed in my yearbook. I couldn’t find his signature anywhere. I went page by page and finally found it where I least expected it. On the same page in the same square where my picture was supposed to be, Clyde had sketched a portrait of me. And I was wearing a tricorn hat just like George Washington’s. Next to it he had written, “Stay cool Maggie Mayfield. Peace. Clyde.”

Let’s keep our fingers crossed for a Clyde spinoff novella where we get to see the great man this boy is destined to become.

--~ Giveaway ~--

WIN a copy of The Meaning of Maggie and a set of buttons.

Open to US and Canada only.

Offer ends: May 31, 2014

TO DO:

VISIT the author here.

RETURN here and tell me something you found of interest there.

AND, leave your email.

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

Contest has ended - winner is here

~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~

~*~
* guest post and giveaway courtesy of book tour - check out the other stops below for more details on this book and goodies sponsored by Chronicle Books.