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@ashleyhblake

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Here's a handy dandy guide to preordering HOW TO MAKE A WISH & what you get for it! Preorders help authors so much, y'all. So if you're able to preorder my book or ANY book, THANK YOU.
In Which I Cajole You Into Preordering HOW TO MAKE A WISH With Pretty Things.
Hello, lovelies, we are a little less than 3 months out from the release of HOW TO MAKE A WISH. I am excite. Are you excite? Well, if you’re not or if you’re only a feeling a modicum of excitement, I hope some preorder incentives will help.
You can preorder the book in a few different ways and still get goodies. Here’s how:
1. Preorder from Parnassus Books. This is my local store and I work there as a bookseller, so naturally, it is my love. They ship anywhere in the US & Canada. All preorders from Parnassus can be signed/personalized. All preorders from Parnassus come with a bookmark and a button (1 of each per reader). The first 30 preorders will also get a bottle of purple-hued nail polish (also 1 per reader). All the goodies will arrive with your book upon release.
Parnassus has made it super easy to preorder and ask for personalization. Just go to this link: http://www.parnassusbooks.net/AshleyHerringBlake and preorder to your heart’s delight! Remember, only the first 30 orders get a nail polish. Also, there are shipping fees. But feast your eyes on the possibilities!
2. If you’d rather preorder from your own indie or elsewhere (I, of course, advocate for the indie buy, but I understand not everyone can go that route every time), all you have to do is email proof of purchase to aehblake at gmail dot com, include your mailing address, and I will mail you a bookmark and bookplate. This is open internationally.
And that’s it! Thank you so much for all of your support and excitement. I can’t wait for the world to meet Grace and Eva.
xoxo
No question, just wanted to tell you that your writing--the way you describe everything, especially people and kisses--is amazing and something I aspire to. I'm learning a lot from you and need to get Suffer Love on my TBR pile ASAP!
Aw, thank you so much! 💚💚💚
2016 in Books
As this garbage fire of a year comes to a close, I took at a look at my reading. What did I read? Why? Who wrote it? Anyway, without further ado, here are the stats. For the purpose of these numbers, these are for authors I know identify as I have labeled them. For example, I’ve only counted authors as LGBTQ if I know without a doubt they are out.
Total books read: 172
Total pages read: 52, 700
Books by women: 158
Books by men: 10
Books by NB authors: 4
Books by POC: 44
Books by LGBTQIAP+ authors: 33
Total #ownvoices books: 53
Young Adult: 117
Middle Grade: 28
Graphic Novel: 23
Adult: 4
ARCs for 2017 releases: 22
Speculative: 46
Historical: 11
Contemporary: 115
I obviously lean heavily toward contemporary YA. This year, I was very cognizant about who I was reading and made a point to read more books by POC, but 44, considering I read a total of 172, is still not enough. So that’s going up in 2017. My queer authors number was also surprisingly low to me considering I’m, well, queer. Increasing that number will be another 2017 goal. #OwnVoices could go up as well, and that number is lower than the total of POC and queer authors because those authors weren’t always writing about their experience/marginalization.
Let’s talk about some favorites!
Favorite Cover: I have two, one for YA...
And one for MG...
Favorite speculative read:
Favorite contemporary/realistic read:
Favorite badass girls read:
Favorite LGBTQ+ read:
Favorite #OwnVoices read:
Favorite middle grade:
Favorite graphic novel:
Favorite adult book:
Favorite 2017 release that I’ve read so far:
My actual favorite doesn’t have a cover yet, and that is Rebecca Podos’ Like Water and it is gorgeous and hella queer and just a beautiful feast of a book. But, of 2017 books that have a cover and I’ve read, I’m going to go with...
And I think that’ll wrap it up for 2016! Picking favorites is alway so hard for me, as I love so many and there are so many to love. I look forward to another great reading year and diversifying my reading even more, especially when we will need these words more than ever.
Thanks all, and happy 2017!

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SHATTERED, by Ashley Herring Blake
Usually, we dance to forget, but tonight feels different. Tonight, we move our bodies through the full moon’s light to remember. Maybe it’s because our father finally drew blood, the evidence a crimson smear across Naomi’s cheek. Maybe it’s because when Mama turned her face away while he raged, I saw the ghost of the girl she used to be and more and more lately, my body has started to feel transparent. Too light, too easily tossed aside.
The same desperate fire lifts Elisa’s arms over her head, her face still tear-damp and her feet bare. Naomi’s fingers fly over the church’s old piano, delicate and elegant but fierce, like she’s pulling her own marrow from the keys and placing it back in her bones.
Naomi’s the youngest, but of the three of us, she’s the one who stands the tallest, her shoulders always rolled back and ready for a fight. Elisa, the eldest, is quiet and thoughtful, her mind always full of strategy, a way out that never comes.
I’m the girl in the middle, the one who spends months squirreling away granola bars and little cups of applesauce and bottles of water under our bed for when our father locks us inside, spewing hate and corrections on the other side of the door.
Good girls don’t talk back to their fathers, Naomi, you little slut.
Good girls don’t smile at boys, Astrid, you little slut.
Good girls don’t cry when they’re being reprimanded, Elisa, you little slut.
Good girls don’t. Good girls don’t. Good girls don’t.
Those words are a constant presence in our house, a member of the family that slips into each of our beds in turn, trying to fuse with our skin. They even creep between Mama’s sheets, clinging to her nightdress and wrapping around her shoulders. She never does anything to slough them off. They drag her farther and farther down, a chain on her ankles and wrists until she barely has any words of her own anymore.
The first night she turned away while our father pointed his thick finger in my face and ripped the hem of the dress I’d spent months babysitting the Briley twins to afford, telling me Good girls don’t wear dresses that short, you little slut, that was the night I knew.
She’d given up.
But I hadn’t.
I couldn’t.
Later that night, I gripped my sisters’ hands as we climbed out the window of our tiny locked bedroom, our feet bare in the moon-silvered grass, our breaths terrified but alive in our throats.
“Where are we going?” Naomi asked.
“Another world,” I said.
This was a silly thing to say, but it made sense to us. Naomi ran faster and Elisa squeezed my fingers, the possibly of something else a solid heartbeat in our chests. We ran through the woods, the river was a rolling force next to us that seemed to spur us on.
Go. Flee. Run. Fly.
We ran and ran and I didn’t know where we were going until I saw it.
The abandoned church was about a mile from our house, tucked in between the pines and beeches like a forgotten secret. It was once a vibrant Baptist water cooler, its Sundays and Wednesdays filled with organ music and clapping and the quiet hush of prayer. At least that’s what Mama says. The pews in that church haven’t been filled in years, abandoned for flashier services, lights and drums and stages.
I pulled my sisters up the rickety front steps and by some midnight miracle, the padlock was rusty enough that it broke right off in my hands. Inside, the once-red-now-pink carpet was covered with twigs and dead leaves and raccoon poop.
But we didn’t mind. The room was alight. The full moon streamed in through the stained glass windows, spilling red and blue and green and gold over the pulpit and pews and floor. Naomi headed straight for the piano, flipping its creaky lid and laying her long, skilled fingers on the yellowing keys.
As she started to play, Elisa and I crept up to the front of the sanctuary, where the pews ended and there was a wide open space in front of the alter.
Then we danced.
It started small, just a gentle sway of our hips to the beat of Naomi’s song. Naomi had a way of playing the piano that made you move. It was impossible to stay still when her music filled the air, because it filled you too. Your heart and blood and bones. Elisa grinned at me and soon I was grinning back. The smile felt so foreign on my lips, but I liked it. I lifted my arms in the air and soon it was more than a gentle protest.
It was an anthem. Naomi pounded out the song of our rebellion, our bodies acted it out, cemented it, made it real. I felt my nightdress slide over my thighs, my arms, my breasts. My bare feet pressed into the carpet, reminding the earth I was here. I was alive. I was a girl and I was real.
We danced until the sky pinked up and grew hazy. I held my sister’s hand and we laughed and felt and moved. Naomi moved in her own way, her eyes shining, her fingers quick and determined. We made our own world, dancing underneath the colors of the moon.
Since then, we’ve sought out that little sanctuary more times than I can count. Our father locks us inside our room and then forgets us, forgets we are girls with hearts and minds and wills. We climb outside and into our secret haven and we forget all that ugliness. We remember we are beautiful.
But tonight is different. Tonight, Naomi’s fingers fall heavy on the keys. Tonight, Elisa doesn’t smile while she dances. She cries. She rages. She throws her body about the room, every action a demand for more, for freedom, for respite. Tonight, I my legs move underneath me, but my mind is with Mama, with the note I left in her vanity, the one our father never ever touches because it’s full of those womanly graces he despises so much.
Him or us.
That’s what I wrote to her. And I meant it. I glance over at Naomi’s face, so wise for her thirteen years. I look at Elisa with her effortless beauty, the smiles she can’t help pull out of everyone who meets her. I think about Helena, the girl who lives down the road and who doesn’t think I notice how she watches my sister, the longing in her eyes so clear, it makes my heart hurt.
Elisa doesn’t think I notice how she watches Helena back, a shy smile curving her pretty mouth.
I look down at my own arms, my own feet, my skin and my desires trapped beneath an ugly man’s hate, a sad man’s inability to understand.
Well, I’m done with imprisonment. I’m done with weakness. I’m done with blood trickling out of my little sister’s nose. I’m done with that quick flash of shame I feel whenever I hide wrapped in the quilt on my bed and slip my hands under the sheets to figure out my own needs and meet them.
They are mine. I am mine. Elisa is hers and Naomi is her own and tonight feels different.
Tonight is different.
We dance. We dance and Naomi plays and the room grows hotter and hotter. The colors steaming in through the windows seem to move with us, undulating in my vision. They twist and curl as our bodies twist and curl and I know they’re on our side. They’re with us, the colors. They’ve watched us all this time and now they know it’s time.
They know it’s time to break free, to be reborn.
The sound starts low, a tickle in my ear. I keep dancing, my heart thrumming in my chest so loudly that at first, I think that’s it. My blood is coursing through me so fast, so violently, it’s audible, a tangible force in this tiny room.
But then it gets louder and a little pucker forms between Elisa’s eyes. Naomi turns her head toward us, a question on her brow. Still, we keep dancing. It’s almost otherworldly, this understanding between us, how we just know that we need to keep moving, keep shouting to the universe.
The sound grows, a crackling, like ice thawing on the pond in March. My fingers splay above my head, a dark silhouette against the colored glass and looking up, just to see my hands in motion and life, that’s when I see it.
A crack splintering across the center stained glass window. The fissure grows and widens, zig-zagging across the glass like a living thing. Soon, there are more of them, more jagged lines over the glass, kaleidoscoping the color through the room.
I grab Elisa’s hand and we run over to the piano so that we’re next to the piano. I press my fingers into Naomi’s shoulder, but she doesn’t stop playing. Her music goes on and on and I can’t stand still. Even though a fear bites at my heart, I have to move.
I catch Elisa’s eye and she smiles. The breaking has softened now, like it’s in tune with our bodies. I arch my arms in the air and lift up on my toes. Immediately, the noises increase, the glass splits and groans and the more we move, the more it breaks, our little world coming apart all around us.
Pieces of glass fall from the windows, sloughing off all the old, letting in the cool night air and the pure, unadulterated moon. It envelops us, the colors bursting into silver over our skin.
We laugh, the windows shattering around us, our feet brushing with the glass but untouched. It’s wild and impossible, beauty unleashed.
It is us.
We dance until the air shifts, the breeze through the empty windows stilling, the quiet clear and stark even against Naomi’s music.
All at once, we stop. All at once, my hand finds Elisa’s and Naomi’s hand finds mine. All at once, we see her.
Mama.
She stands in the doorway, jeans on under her own nightdress, her hair braided messily and her wool peacoat buttoned up to her chin. A duffel bag hangs from her already stooped shoulders, the straps of two more gripped in her hands.
She’s breathing heavy, like she’s been running.
Or maybe, like she’s been dancing.
My sisters and I stare at her. Behind her, I see our father’s old pickup truck. Well, actually, it’s Mama’s old pickup truck, passed down to her from her older brother, Vance, when he moved to the city. Its engine is running and I peel my eyes for my father’s head, for his piercing, impatient eyes locked on me, yelling at me silently to hurry up, you little slut.
But he’s not there. The truck is empty, the driver’s side door yawning wide open, waiting for us.
Us.
“It’s time to go,” Mama says.
I suck in a breath, my fingers tightening on my sisters’. I look around at the bare windows, the colors strewn around our feet, the echo of Naomi’s song still whispering through the sanctuary. The whole room breathes, urging us on.
These windows can’t shield us anymore. They’ve broken and now they’re something new. A window that reveals what’s outside rather than shelters.
My mother meets my wary gaze. She doesn’t turn away. Her eyes are soft on me, but a hardness runs just underneath. A readiness, a determination to be remade.
As one, my sisters and I move toward her. We fall into arms, we fall into her tears, we fall into a new life, right there in that moment.
As one, we leave the broken little church behind and everything we’ll never forget.
Ashley Herring Blake is a reader, writer, and mom to two boisterous boys. She holds a Master’s degree in teaching and loves coffee, arranging her books by color, and watching Buffy over and over again on Netflix with her friends. Her young adult contemporary debut, Suffer Love, is out now from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Her second book, How to Make a Wish, will release in 2017.
Learn more about her: Twitter | Instagram | Tumblr
Everyone has a superpower. It can be just about anything—making complex spreadsheets, frying an egg perfectly, or understanding calculus. For me, it’s spotting Asians in media.
I can scan a 100+ book list and find the three written by Asian authors. When I’m watching movies, I always catch the lone Asian face in the crowd. And given a cast of illustrated characters, I can immediately suss out the one Asian. By the way, “but they don’t REALLY look Asian, so that doesn’t count” is bullshit and erasure.
All this to say that when I’m reading, I naturally gravitate toward the ‘mirrors’ in YA lit: the books that reflect who I am. I’m always on the lookout for LGBTQIA young adult books. Only a tiny percentage of them are by or about PoC, much less Asians.
Nevertheless, I gift you with five* YA books starring queer Asian characters.
http://bookriot.com/2016/10/11/ncod-5-queer-asian-ya-books/
Ninas, and a bonus Inej, my Six of Crows faves. Just kidding, they’re all my faves.
Crooked Kingdom is out and I’m so worried for everyone! Had to get some drawings in before starting it… just in case.
(Six of Crows and Crooked Kingdom by the wonderful Leigh Bardugo. Recommended!)
Ohhhhhhh!!!! @siminiblocker 😍😍😍😍😍😍😍
On the Paperback Cover of “Thanks”!
Dearest Friends and Enemies,
Exciting news to share! I’ve finally seen the paperback cover for “Thanks for the Trouble,” which will come out next Spring. It is loverly and I love it. Wanna see it? Well, you can’t. Just kidding. You can. Here it is.
Isn’t that the loverliest? I don’t know about you, but that’s a bridge I could really jump off right there. :)
I haven’t read this book, nor do I plan to. However, I and MANY others are severely disturbed by this caption that has been posted in several placed in reference to this bridge. Suicide is not a joke, Tommy. It’s a very serious, real thing, one that many of your teen readers have probably contemplated or know someone who has contemplated or gone through with it. It’s the ending of a life, it’s hopelessness and loneliness and clearly, you don’t give two shits because you’re joking about it. You’re joking about suicide and you’re a bestselling author for TEENS. Think about that. I really hope you can reread that last sentence I wrote and say, “Oh, shit, yeah, that was crappy of me.” That bridge has seen a lot of real suicides, Tommy. It’s not a joke. It’s not a punchline for your book that I’m now--well, let’s be honest, I was always a little wary--terrified about what damage it might do to a teen struggling with depression and thoughts of suicide. You are a successful author for kids. And kids read UP, Tommy. You’ve got readers who are probably 12 or 13, maybe even younger. You might see this as a fun moment to celebrate your cover, but that kid who lost their friend or family member or who struggles every day to believe that their life is worth living, that they are worth something, will not see it as that. They will see it as a flippant disregard for their life and just maybe as another reason to feel suicide is their only way out. So, shame on you. This is disgusting, insensitive, and I am horrified that you write for teens. Horrified. Do better or stop talking.
Beyoncé as Dorothy Dandridge

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equal footing? equal footing.
the abyss surround us by emily skrutskie (@skrutskie)
man: has anyone ever told you you’re beautiful? me: oh no sir, today is my first day out of doors and papà forbade mirrors in the house lest we fall victim to vanity
Some novel aesthetics for HOW TO MAKE A WISH
Title: How To Make A Wish Author: Ashley Herring Blake @ashleyhblake Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 (5/5)
Review: I received an Advanced Reading Copy today and I really wasn’t expecting it but I’m incredibly thankful to Houghton Mifflin Hartcourt Publishing and Ashley Herring Blake for sending a signed copy of a book that doesn’t come out in months!
It’s my first time receiving an ARC, and I loved it. I loved the book, the characters, the writing, the easy prose that just kept me hooked from beginning to end.
Bear with me as I talk (gush) more about the book. Queer YA has recently become one of my favorite genres to read, and this beautifully cements my love for it.
Yes, these are teens, but they’re complicated, just as the rest of us are. There’s not a big deal about coming out, which is so great. It’s just normal. A girl likes another girl. *hayley kiyoko voice* Nothing new!
Diversity in the media is so important as well as representation, and having a Queer Interracial Couple be the main focus of a book just makes me ecstatic.
Loved the book and I can’t wait for everyone to read this and cry along with me and feel light and in love.
First reader review I've seen for HTMAW! Thank you, Adri!
Paint mixing videos are nice to watch when I’m stressed

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Flipping Forks
Here is a true story. In my former life, I arranged food for 40-50 people every Sunday night. Imagine a dented plastic table decorated with rogue Sharpie scribbles, two-liters, pizza, and if everyone was kind to me, Little Debbie cakes. It was about as sexy and appetizing as it sounds.
At the beginning of the line was a cutlery tray. It looked like:
Some of you see this tray and your brain screams: THE UTENSILS ARE FACING OPPOSITE DIRECTIONS.
I know this because every week my adult volunteers dutifully fixed this fork crisis, ecstasy and satisfaction on their faces until the tray looked like:
Ah! Order restored. The Earth was off-axis, but we are returning to proper position and the apocalyptic freezing or frying of humanity is abated. Whew. Close call. Thank God for fork flippers.
This is also a true story. One day I said, “STOP FLIPPING THE FORKS.” (They stopped. I rarely all-caps yell.)
Why stop these correctors of chaos?
What if I told you the 40-50 partakers of unflipped forks were mostly middle school boys? And then I asked the question: do you believe a single middle school boy cared about the direction of forks?
In 9 years of setting Sunday dinner forty-five times a year, they never did.
Here is truer story. Some of you are wasting time and emotional energy flipping forks for middle school boys. (If you’re thinking middle school boys might be a metaphor, you’re correct.)
I’ve taught fork flipping as it relates to time management and goal setting. (I’ve written about time management here.) But over the years, I applied the fork flipping theory to emotional investments too.
Here’s my best truth. People flip emotional forks for audiences that will never appreciate the effort. I’ve done it myself. Too many times to count.
Here are four things I’ve learned.
1. Audience is key.
If I’d been arranging dinner for a crowd of ladies in their twilight years (you know the ones–they drive Cadillac’s and kick ass at bridge), not only would I have flipped the forks, I’d have borrowed sterling silver. That audience cares about those details. So think about the recipient of your generous actions and ask, will this matter to them? Am I actually doing this for me? Is it emotionally efficient?
2. The problem is not your effort.
There is nothing fundamentally wrong with flipping forks. The effort can be a beautiful offering of selflessness, but don’t forget that emotional energy is finite.
3. Identify those who deserve your best emotional efforts.
There are those who deserve flipped forks. Folks who will notice your efforts and appreciate them properly, but we often burn out giving emotional energy to those who won’t appreciate us and deplete energy for those who will. I recently said to a friend, why would you punish someone who wants to help you to help someone who wants to punish you? That’s the sentiment here as well.
4. Identify those who do not deserve your best emotional efforts.
There is a very good chance you have said of someone, “I give and give and nothing ever satisfies him/her.” Perhaps…and I’m just spitballing here…you don’t owe that audience your spectacular efforts.
(It’s fine to choose another effort. My middle school boys didn’t notice forks, but when I invented a game called Blender Wars…well, that was a different story.)
*No middle school boys were injured in the writing of this post. **Some middle school boys threw up after Blender Wars.
Some novel aesthetics for GIRL MADE OF STARS.