STARWORLD by Audrey Coulthurst and Paula Garner Official Blog Tour | Spotlight, Excerpt & #giveaway @JeanBookNerd @audwrites @TTCBooksandmore ~ '

Hardcover: 352 pages

Publisher: Candlewick (April 16, 2019)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 0763697567

ISBN-13: 978-0763697563

Praise for STARWORLD

An unlikely friendship blossoms between two high school seniors…in the deft hands of co-authors Coulthurst (Inkmistress, 2018, etc.) and Garner (Relative Strangers, 2018, etc.), the well-realized main characters and deeply insightful descriptions of complex emotions combine into an unusually thoughtful novel…Readers seeking characters facing challenges with honesty, bravery, and kindness will appreciate this book with its reminder that our outward lives often don’t reflect who we really are. ―Kirkus Reviews

Sam Jones and Zoe Miller have one thing in common: they both want an escape from reality. Loner Sam flies under the radar at school and walks on eggshells at home to manage her mom’s obsessive-compulsive disorder, wondering how she can ever leave to pursue her dream of studying aerospace engineering. Popular, people-pleasing Zoe puts up walls so no one can see her true self: the girl who was abandoned as an infant, whose adoptive mother has cancer, and whose disabled brother is being sent away to live in a facility. When an unexpected encounter results in the girls’ exchanging phone numbers, they forge a connection through text messages that expands into a private universe they call Starworld. In Starworld, they find hilarious adventures, kindness and understanding, and the magic of being seen for who they really are. But when Sam’s feelings for Zoe turn into something more, will the universe they’ve built survive the inevitable explosion?

In a novel in two voices, a popular teen and an artistic loner forge an unlikely bond — and create an entire universe — via texts. But how long before the real world invades Starworld?

You can purchase Starworld at the following Retailers:

STARWORLD BY AUDREY COULTHURST AND PAULA GARNER EXCERPT) EXTRACTED FROM PAGES 41 - 45)

When do you need my painting? I ﬁnally text. So stupid, but it’s the only thing that might warrant a response. A couple of butterﬂies try to eject themselves from my stomach, but I talk myself down before it becomes a full-on chunderfest of the lepidopterous variety.

She answers quickly — she must have the same lunch period as me. I’m so glad you didn’t change your mind! The play opens the week after Halloween. It would be great to have it before tech week, if you’d be okay with that. Maybe the week of 10/19?

Me: *salutes* Brilliant. I’m back at a loss for real words even though our two-text conversation had all the substance of a boiled cabbage.

Zoe: *rejoices*

Despair ﬁlls me as I realize our conversation is over unless I do something to keep it going. I scroll through our previous exchanges, desperately looking for something to reference.

Me: *hopes your weekend didn’t involve any more misﬁres*

Zoe: Just the usual ﬁres J How was yours?

My heart leaps at her quick response, and at the fact that she asked about my weekend.

I write back: *hopes my next one’s better* *isn’t optimistic*

Zoe: What would make it better?

Really, a whole other world might be the only thing that ould make things better.

Me: An alternate reality.

Zoe: Ah. Is that why you paint such fantastical worlds?

She’s not wrong. Painting helps me feel like I’m somewhere else —like the places I create could may bebe real.

Zoe: It would be nice to spend a weekend in that fairy-tale castle.

Me: *books tickets*

Zoe: Who needs tickets? We have something much better than planes! *points to dragon in your painting*

Me: *gathers sparkly treasures into a pile, hoping to lure him*

Zoe: *sets off a ﬂare to draw his attention*

Me: *ducks behind nest as he careens in*

Zoe: *admires his magical shades of green*

Me: *scrambles around and puts a bow tie on him*

Zoe: SO HANDSOME! He needs a name. Sheldon? No, too mama’s boy . . . Dexter? No, too bespectacled and lab-ratty. HUMPHREY.

She has me laughing, and the exhausting weight of my entire life is temporarily lifted.

Me: *lassos a spike on Humphrey’s back and climbs up*

Zoe: *scrambles aboard, climbing up his shimmering scales* *clings to your hoodie* TO INFINITY AND BEYOND!

The notion of her wanting to come with me, of her holding on to me, is so absurd that my breath catches. How is this even happening?

Me: *pilots Humphrey toward a distant star*

Zoe: *gazes at the shrinking Earth and into the great dark beyond, wondering if there are Taco Bells in space*

Me: *hopes you don’t like beef burritos because they’re Humphrey’s favorite and he’ll ﬁght you for them*

Zoe: *buys Humphrey bunches of beef burritos to keep him fueled* *adds extra hot sauce to enhance combustion*

She’s fallen into the story with me so easily, it’s like she was always meant to tell the other half of it. My hamster heart is in its death throes now. Why is she talking to me beyond what’s required to get my painting? Why does she seem to care about this story we’re making up? Something doesn’t compute. She’s an unexpected side quest on the quacktacular odyssey that is my life.

Photo Credit for Audrey: Evrim Icoz Photography

Paula Garner spends most of her time writing, reading, or making good things to eat and drink. She is the author of YA contemporary novels Starworld, Relative Strangers, and Phantom Limbs, which was a 2017 Illinois Reads selection for grades 9-12. Follow her on Twitter at @paulajgarner.

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Audrey Coulthurst writes YA books that tend to involve magic, horses, and kissing the wrong people. When she’s not dreaming up new stories, she can usually be found painting, singing, or on the back of a horse.

Audrey has a Master’s in Writing from Portland State University and studied with Malinda Lo as a 2013 Lambda Literary Foundation Fellow. She lives in Santa Monica, California.