Official Maria V. Snyder Blog

When I was in Australia last year a newspaper wanted to know what five books changed me.  I thought this was a very difficult question - so many books influenced me over the years, but after much thought I came up with this list: Frederick by Leo Lionni - this story is one of the first books I remember my mother reading to me. It's about a family of five field mice getting ready for the winter. Four of the mice work hard to collect enough food, but one, Fredrick doesn't help out at all. He's too busy collecting daydreams. The story taught me that a daydreamer does have a place in a family. Risk by Dick Francis - before finding this book when I was fourteen, I'd been reading Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys mysteries. While I enjoyed them, they were starting to get predictable. Risk, was an entirely different mystery. Written in first person point of view, the action didn't stop and I could never close the book at the end of the chapter. This fast-paced story te

Way back when I was an aspiring novelist, I dreamed of being published and of having a book on a shelf (yes, this was before eBooks and no, I'm not telling you how long ago ;).  And that was the dream -a  book on a shelf in a bookstore.  My daydreams did not include readers, reviewers or awards - yes, I knew they existed, but the goal was that physical book. So when Publisher's Weekly gave Poison Study a Starred Review seven years ago, I was surprised they read the book and then disappointed because on Amazon one star is bad.  My editor quickly explained one Star was an excellent rating for PW and that, yes people ARE going to read my book and it won't just sit on that shelf and gather dust.  I still wasn't convinced until... Readers started emailing me.  Yay!  I loved and still love getting reader emails - yes, even the ones "yelling" at me for various nasty plot twists ;> Here are some great Reader quotes:  Thank you so much for your writing,

This just in - the paint's a little wet so be careful not to smudge it ;>  Cover art for SCENT OF MAGIC for the UK edition.  Which will be released 18 December 2012. So?  What do you think?  I love the colors and there are some really neat elements.  But...white?  Not the uniform I imagined, but it's eye catching, which is what the cover art is supposed to do -get the book noticed. If you like to read the first chapter of SCENT OF MAGIC here's a link:  http://www.mariavsnyder.com/books/som.php   I don't have it linked to my website yet - I'm working on updating my website this weekend. Also any bloggers/reviews the ARC is up on Netgalley - you have to be approved to access it.  Please only download if you're planning to post a review - my son starts university next year ;> For my Australian readers, I now have the cover for SCENT OF MAGIC thanks to Braiden Asciak who managed to get the cover before I did *insert mini rant here* :) And her