Going Off Script Blog Tour: Excerpt + Giveaway

 

Going Off Script
Author: Jen Wilde
Genre: YA Romance
Publication Date: May 21, 2019
Publisher: Swoon Reads


Description:

A TV writer’s room intern must join forces with her crush to keep her boss from ruining a lesbian character in this diverse contemporary YA romance from the author of Queens of Geek.

Seventeen-year-old Bex is thrilled when she gets an internship on her favorite tv show, Silver Falls. Unfortunately, the internship isn’t quite what she expected… instead of sitting in a crowded writer’s room volleying ideas back and forth, Production Interns are stuck picking up the coffee.

Determined to prove her worth as a writer, Bex drafts her own script and shares it with the head writer―who promptly reworks it and passes it off as his own! Bex is understandably furious, yet…maybe this is just how the industry works? But when they rewrite her proudly lesbian character as straight, that’s the last straw! It’s time for Bex and her crush to fight back.

Jen Wilde’s newest novel is both a fun, diverse love story and a very relevant, modern take on the portrayal of LGBT characters in media.

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The door of the bus hisses as it folds open, and a burst of warm air swirls around me. I heave my suitcase down the steps and squint through the glare bouncing off the sidewalk.


I’m here.

I’m actually in Los Angeles. After spending years daydreaming about this moment, it’s happening. And it’s even better than I imagined, because this is real. The sun is burning my pale skin, the smell of freshly brewed coffee and exhaust fumes fill the air, and I’m kicking myself for thinking my fave plaid shirt was a smart outfit choice in this weather. But it’s all okay, because I made it….

All I want to do is dump my suitcase and start exploring this town. The air is filled with limitless possibility that gives me a buzz when I breathe it in. This is where people who love creating fictional worlds as much as I do all gather to make magic. The world’s most iconic stars have been born here. My heroes have walked these streets.

Emotion swells in my chest, and I squeeze my eyes shut. I can’t believe I actually made it. Finally, I can stop dreaming and start doing. No more long, rainy nights standing behind a deep fryer, feeling a thousand miles away from where I wanted to be. No more days spent hiding in the back of classrooms, counting down the days on the calendar until I could be free.

Jen Wilde is a writer, geek and fangirl with a penchant for coffee, books and pugs. She writes YA stories about zombies (AS THEY RISE), witches (ECHO OF THE WITCH) and fangirls (QUEENS OF GEEK). Her debut series reached over three million reads online and became an Amazon bestseller. Her next book, THE BRIGHTSIDERS, comes out May 2018, and GOING OFF-SCRIPT releases Summer 2019.

When she’s not writing, Jen loves binge-watching her favorite shows on Netflix, eating pizza, traveling to far away places and going to conventions in Marty McFly cosplay.

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The Brightsiders Blog Tour: Excerpt + Giveaway

 

The Brightsiders
Author: Jen Wilde
Genre: YA Contemporary/LGBTQ+
Publication Date: May 22, 2018
Publisher: Swoon Reads

Description:

A teen rockstar has to navigate family, love, coming out, and life in the spotlight after being labeled the latest celebrity trainwreck in Jen Wilde’s quirky and utterly relatable novel.
As a rock star drummer in the hit band The Brightsiders, Emmy King’s life should be perfect. But there’s nothing the paparazzi love more than watching a celebrity crash and burn. When a night of partying lands Emmy in hospital and her girlfriend in jail, she’s branded the latest tabloid train wreck.

Luckily, Emmy has her friends and bandmates, including the super-swoonworthy Alfie, to help her pick up the pieces of her life. She knows hooking up with a band member is exactly the kind of trouble she should be avoiding, and yet Emmy and Alfie Just. Keep. Kissing.

Will the inevitable fallout turn her into a clickbait scandal (again)? Or will she find the strength to stand on her own?

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When we pull up to the building, photographers and TV cameras are waiting. Chloe untwists the lid of their plum brown lipstick and slides it over their bottom lip. I must have seen them wear it a hundred times, but it always looks amazing. It compliments the green hues in their eyes and their dark brown skin perfectly. One of the many things we have in common is that we both wear make-up like knights wear suits of armor. I hope mine protects me from the arrows coming my way today.

The driver steps out of the car first, doubling as our bodyguard. Paparazzi rap their knuckles on the window. TMZ, Entertainment Now, and a host of other celeb gossip reporters are here, their lenses pointed right at me.

"Oh, God," I groan.

"Neutral," Chloe says. I nod.

I dab a fresh layer of powder over my nose, ease my sunglasses over my eyes and step out of the car. I keep my head down as our bodyguard pushes through the crowd. I don't cry. I don't smile. Not even when the barrage of questions start.

"How are you, today, Emmy?"

"Hey Chloe! Are you on babysitting duty today?"

"Have you been drinking this morning, Em?"

“Where’s Jessie this morning? Still in jail?”

"Are you an alcoholic, Emmy?"

"Emmy! How does it feel to hit rock bottom?"

Security ushers us into the foyer and we hurry to the elevators, desperate to get out of sight.

“You’ve got this,” Chloe says when we reach the top floor.

Jen Wilde is a writer, geek and fangirl with a penchant for coffee, books and pugs. She writes YA stories about zombies (AS THEY RISE), witches (ECHO OF THE WITCH) and fangirls (QUEENS OF GEEK). Her debut series reached over three million reads online and became an Amazon bestseller. Her next book, THE BRIGHTSIDERS, comes out May 2018, and GOING OFF-SCRIPT releases Summer 2019.

When she’s not writing, Jen loves binge-watching her favorite shows on Netflix, eating pizza, traveling to far away places and going to conventions in Marty McFly cosplay.

Website / Goodreads / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Twitter

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Queens of Geek Blog Tour: Excerpt + Giveaway

 

Queens of Geek
Author: Jen Wilde
Genre: YA Contemporary/LGBTQ+
Publication date: March 14, 2017
Publisher: Swoon Reads

Publisher:

Three friends. Two love stories. One convention.

Charlie likes to stand out. She’s a vlogger and actress promoting her first movie at SupaCon, and this is her chance to show fans she’s over her public breakup with co-star Reese Ryan. When internet-famous cool-girl actress Alyssa Huntington arrives as a surprise guest, it seems Charlie’s long-time crush on her isn’t as one-sided as she thought.

Taylor likes to blend in. Her brain is wired differently, making her fear change. And there’s one thing in her life she knows will never change: her friendship with her best guy friend Jamie—no matter how much she may secretly want it to. But when she hears about a fan contest for her favorite fandom, she starts to rethink her rules on playing it safe.

Queens of Geek, an empowering young adult novel by Jen Wilde, is all about fandom, friendship, and finding the courage to be yourself.

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Everything is out of place. I’m imploding, warping like steel under a searing flame. Tightening. Shrinking. Collapsing in on myself. Choking on tears and words I want to say but can’t.

Most people think of anxiety as panic attacks. That’s not entirely accurate.

I haven’t had a panic attack in years. I started to recognize the signs and learned what I needed to do to stop it spiraling. I learned how to internalize it to avoid public embarrassment. Anxiety isn’t an attack that explodes out of me; it’s not a volcano that lies dormant until it’s triggered by an earth-shattering event. It’s a constant companion. Like a blow fly that gets into the house in the middle of summer, flying around and around. You can hear it buzzing, but you can’t see it, can’t capture it, can’t let it out. My anxiety is invisible to others, but often it’s the focal point of my mind. Everything that happens on a day-to-day basis is filtered through a lens colored by anxiety. That nervousness that makes your palms sweat and your heart race before you get up and make a speech in front of an audience?

That’s what I feel in a normal conversation at a dinner table.

Or just thinking about having a conversation at a dinner table.

The fear that other people feel on rare occasions, reserved only for when they jump out of a plane or hear a strange noise in the middle of the night—that’s my normal.

That’s what I feel when the phone rings.

When someone knocks on my door.

When I go outside.

When I’m alone.

When I’m in line at a store.

Everything feels like I’m on a stage, spotlight on me, all eyes on me, watching, judging. Like I’m one second away from total disaster. It’s invisible, it’s irrational, it’s never-ending. I could be standing there, smiling and chatting like everything is totally fine, while secretly wanting to scream and cry and run away. No one would ever know. In my mind, no one can hear me scream. I hide it because I know it’s not understood or acceptable—because I’m not understood or acceptable.

So here I am, hiding it. Standing in a toilet stall, trying to remember how to breathe.

I find my phone and headphones in my pocket and plug them in, turning up the Queen Firestone soundtrack and closing my eyes.

Breathe in. One . . . two . . . three . . . four . . . five. Breathe out.

I close the lid on the toilet and sit down, rubbing my palms over my gray denim-clad thighs as I focus on the music.

Breathe in.

Jen Wilde is a writer, geek and fangirl with a penchant for coffee, books and pugs. She writes YA stories about zombies (AS THEY RISE), witches (ECHO OF THE WITCH) and fangirls (QUEENS OF GEEK). Her debut series reached over three million reads online and became an Amazon bestseller.

When she’s not writing, Jen loves binge-watching her favorite shows on Netflix, eating pizza, traveling to far away places and going to conventions in Marty McFly cosplay.

Jen lives in a sunny beachside town in Australia with her husband and their cheeky pug, aptly named Heisenberg.

Website / Goodreads / Facebook / Twitter

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