Dia Reeves, and the big giveaway!

Well, look at that! It's December first!

This mostly means pain and suffering to me, of course: short lengths of daylight, lots of cold, shoveling to do, ages till the thaw. But it also means it's time to start the Tenners tour of the Exile!

So, without further ado, here's the first guest post, from the wonderful, funny, and talented Dia Reeves, author of Bleeding Violet, which you can pre-order from this page! Remember: the topic is "fish out of water," keeping in the spirit of the Exile. (Stay tuned after the post for some more info about the signed ARC giveaway!)

I can't really think of any fish-out-of-water stories, Steve. I'm always at home wherever I go. You know, as long as people aren't looking at me. The only things I can think of that might even be remotely fishy is, sometimes at parties people insist that I get up and dance because of that old chestnut about how all black people are great dancers. Heh. Well, usually after about ten seconds of watching me strut my stuff, I get asked to sit back down.

Or like this other time when I went trick-or-treating in college and I was so old that no one would give me the good candy--just candy corn and those nasty brown things that taste like root beer. And, like, a toothbrush I think.

And this other time, my mom and I went to the movies to watch one of the sequels to Children of the Corn (can't remember which one) and we laughed the whole way through it, especially at the parts that were making other people scream. Only three movies scare me--The Exorcist, The Return of the Living Dead, and Evil Dead. Everything else is stupid.

So that's all I got. I think my way of being different is largely internal and would require a weird-girl brain scanner or something like that to pick me out of a crowd. Otherwise I just blend in.

Thanks, Dia.

Now, as promised, more info on the giveaway. The contest* will officially begin right now, with this post. To enter, simply comment below. If you Twitter or blog link to this post, I'll give you an extra entry, just make sure to let me know. And on future Tenner posts, there will be more opportunities to enter. As a reminder, the prize is an ARC of The Absolute Value of -1, signed by every Tenner featured on the Exile (so far, that means me and Dia, but many more will follow). I'll also add other fun gifties down the road, so stay tuned.

*US and Canada residents only (sorry, Roo). Please do not enter if you are under 13.