Fictional Candy: blogger on blogger interview

Showing posts with label blogger on blogger interview. Show all posts

Friday, July 11, 2014

Meet Jessica from Crossroad Reviews (Blogger On Blogger Interview)

So it's been a while since we've had a Blogger on Blogger interview. It's about due time, eh? This week we have Jessica from Crossroad Reviews!

Blogger On Blogger Interview - Esty at Boarding With Books

Hey Everyone! Welcome back to the Blogger On Blogger Interviews! It's been a while, hasn't it? Well, today we have an interview with a great young blogger named Esty from Boarding With Books. I also have a swag giveaway, which I haven't done in a while either. Now bear with me - I recently moved, and I wasn't with it enough to get an actual picture LOL. You know how it goes, right? But trust me - I give out awesome swag prizes with things from authors like Cassandra Carr, Felicity Heaton, Kallysten, CJ Ellison and wayyy more. I even have some blogger stuff from cool blogs like Herding Cats & Burning Soup, The Jeep Diva, and Riverina Romantics! So let's get on with it, eh?

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Hello Esty, nice to meet you!

Can you tell us all a little about your blog, and how it began?

I've loved to read since I can remember, and as I got older I discovered authors' websites, and through the comments, book bloggers. After the first one I saw, I was in love. (This in my opinion the only real form of love at first sight...) I mean, bookish people get to rant and rave to each other- what more could you want?? A year or two after I became a blog stalker, I decided to become one myself:)

What genres do you typically read and/or review?

Middle grade and YA- fantasy, paranormal, sci-fi, contemporary, some romance and chick-lit.

Your website says you go to boarding school, dance, and obviously, read. I’m a bit curious – do you ever sleep? :)

Hahahah as of now, I work too! Not to mention helping around with my little siblings :) . The answer? Unfortunately, no.

If you could recommend just one book to someone, which book would it be and why?

Assuming they read Harry Potter and Percy Jackson (these are the base books- everyone has to read these!) I would recommend The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. If there was ever a book to teach you about life and love, it's this one.

You also review books in Hebrew. That sounds very interesting! Can you tell us a bit about that?

I moved to Israel when I was seven and am a fluent Hebrew speaker. I figured as I read in Hebrew too, I might as well blog about it! Sadly though, a lot of Hebrew books these days are translated from English, in which case I read the original. Due to that my Hebrew blog is a little neglected... :(

Can you share a bit about a current book you are reading?

I'm currently reading The Exemus by Folami and Ebeni Morris for the Exemus book tour hosted by Candace's Big Blog:) I'm not far in yet so nothing to share but my review will be up on Sunday, August 25th- I'll tell you all about it then!

Since I'm late posting, HERE is the link! :)

What’s a day in the life of Esty like?

7:30 Roll out of bed. Slap my roommates awake. (breakfast) Go to class looking like a zombie. After school (5:00 pm) homework/read/hang/shop in the city/blog until 6:45 class activity. 7:15 dinner. After dinner, straight to dance, get back to school about 10:30-11:00, put away things, get organized, clean room, shower, heart-to-heart with a friend/call home and then my fave part- SLEEP.

So Esty, what things can we expect from Boarding with Books in the next year?

Well, I'm hoping to host my first independant giveaway when I reach the 100 follower mark;) (hint hint, people) Also debating having my friend join the blog as a vlogger. Besides that, plenty more reviews, tours, challenges and memes for you, so stay tuned!

I just love watching vlogs - and always envy the people who are brave enough to do it! :)

If you could trade places with any character in a book for one week, which one would it be?

Tessa from The Infernal Devices series by Cassandra Clare. Living in Victorian London, learning how to fight and shadowhunter lore sounds like a dream come true to me. Not to mention frolicking around with certain Misters Herondale and Carstairs...;)

And lastly, what are your favorite and least favorite things about blogging?

Favorite- getting in touch with authors and readers! (Fine. I know everyone says that. But hey, IT'S THE BEST PART. Seriously. Shoot me an email.)

Least favorite- staring at a screen. Ugh. My eyes. My back.

Thanks so much Liz! I had a great time answering your questions!!

Thank you!

Find Esty Online

Website

Bloglovin

Goodreads

Twitter

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Blogger On Blogger Interview - Esty at Boarding With Books

Blogger on Blogger Interview: Proserpine Craving Books

Welcome to the Blogger On Blogger Interview!! Today is my last one for a little bit, and next week I will be starting a new weekly feature called Nobody Asked Me! So today is a bit bittersweet to me, but that could just be PMS LOL. I am SO very excited to have Proserpine from Proserpine Craving Books, and she is just one of the most awesome people I have ever met! I am sure you will have a blast getting to know her, and checking out her blog!

I also have a swag giveaway today! It is, of course, international, and it will end on Monday. Good luck to everyone with that! This one has some bookmarks, magnets, trading cards, and rack cards. There's even some signed stuff in there, too!

So let's get on with the interview!!

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Hey Proserpine!!! I am so completely excited –in a non creepy way – to have you over to Fictional Candy today! Thanks for coming by!

Oh! I'm thrilled to be here! Thanks for having me on your blog today! It's kind of weird to be the one interviewed!

First, lets tell the readers a little about your website, if you will, please?

OMG! As you may know and it's probably the case for you too, this blog is my baby for over a year and a half and it's mostly about books! Hehe... I wanted to express myself to the entire world about the books and authors that I fell in love with! Everything with romance will do, but my thing is Paranormal Romance! So my blog is mainly on these stories!

And how did you come up with the name, Proserpine Craving Books?
Ahah! This is my special secret! (With a Russian accent) Proserpina is actually the wife of Pluto in Roman mythology. They are the same God/Goddess as Persephone and Hades in Greek mythology. I'm a huge fan of Hades and Persephone myths. I always dreamed to be Persephone, in a romantic way, of course! So I picked up her name even if I knew that Proserpina wasn't known as much as Persephone, but it felt less awkward to take Proserpina and just change the ''a'' to ''e'' and make it more personal! (I know, I'm a freak!)
Now, since I’ve known you for a little bit and I’ve stalked you all over (again, in a non creepy way) I know some stuff…. First, and this is completely awesome, English isn’t your first language! Was it very difficult to learn?
Reading or watching a movie/ TV Show isn't difficult for me, it's the easy part! But writing and speaking is more complicated to someone like me who's a French Canadian! At first, it was horrible! And a lot of people think that we can translate English from French... But it’s not the case! I'm still learning and also needs to check the spelling of some words on Google but I think I'm better each time!
And your day job - I think its fascinating! Just how did you get into the field of….. I’ll let you tell us! And do you have any spooky experiences you could share?
Embalmer! Yes, I am a sexy chick, book nerd, working with corpses! I guess it's why I'm fascinated by Hades! When I was younger, I was afraid to die, afraid of death and maybe it was a way for me to come over this fear but also the fact that I was able to mix science and artistic field.
As for the spooky experiences, except the one I did by myself, like being afraid of my own shadow, or being scared by a family member while I thought I was alone in the funeral home, no spooky experiences for me and its better that way, trust me!

But you know: Funeral = Real Fun :D
And you are also a newlywed! Is your new husband understanding of your book obsession? Are you ever able to get him to read your books?
Yes! And guess what! It was a Corpse Bride theme wedding! I'm married since August 4th 2012 with my own Hades! It was a little and intimate wedding, with family and close friends. The wedding was outside at my parent's chalet and the temperature was like 40 degrees! It was HOT!!! A beautiful sunny day, but hot!
As for my obsession, my husband doesn't get it but he doesn't mind it too much! Sometimes he even bought me books!!! He likes to read, but it's not really his thing and plus, he doesn't read in English...
What is your favorite genre to read, and do you have any favorite authors?
Paranormal Romance is my favorite genre to read. Everything with vampires, werewolves, witches, supernatural beings, anything paranormal will do if it's mix with romance! I do love Historical Romance too if you give me a hot and sexy Highlander O.O And finally, recently discovered Beautiful Disaster by Jamie McGuire and now, I also crave New Adult Romance!

Favorite authors:

Karen Marie Moning with The Fever and The Highlander series

Kresley Cole with The Immortal After Dark series

Samantha Young with On Dublin Street series

Misty Evans with her Kali Sweet series

more and more!

Do you have any advice for new bloggers?
I think everyone will or would say that: stay yourself. Be true to you, work with your imagination, don’t just follow meme or post cover reveal because everyone can do that! When I started to blog, I didn't know that the book blog field was that HUGE! I was following a few blogs here and there but now I can truly see the extent of it and it's huge but awesome. So if you want to be noticed and stand out you have to be yourself and creative!
What do you think the hardest part of reviewing and blogging is?
Writing skills! LOL I don't have them while I write in French, so you can guess what it is is in English! I don't have any particular skill at writing, sometimes I feel like my review looks all the same! But the hardest part is to read something you don't like and as an honest reviewer, you have to write an honest review!
I see you have a ferret! Is he (she?) just awesome? Is that your only pet?

Yes ''she'' was (Morgan); she died a few months ago :( But I'm ok now and since I want to be a future mommy, I didn't get another pet, yet! Oh, I'm so sorry to hear that hun! :(
If you could travel anywhere in the whole universe, where would you go?

I would LOVE to go and even LIVE in Scotland or Ireland! My husband will be turned into a sexy Highlander and would have to wear a kilt... (Swoon!) It was supposed to be are Honeymoon travel but it’s too expensive for us at the moment!

And one of your questions from your reviews (that I have stolen many a time), if you were a Disney princess, which one would you be?

Not fair... I would be Megara from Hercules. She's witty, fierce, beautiful, and independent (well at some point), she rubs Hades in the wrong way and since they didn't make a Disney movie about Persephone, she's the closest thing to it! I think we kind of look alike!

Ok, I’ll let you off the hook for now! Thank you so much for coming by and talking with me :)
Always a pleasure! Thanks to you for letting me take over your blog with my creepy answers and pictures!

And now you can follow Proserpine Online too!

Website

Facebook

Pinterest

Goodreads

Twitter

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Interview/Giveaway: Kristin with Book Sniffers Anonymous

I interview a lot of authors, we all do. And it is really a lot of fun, right? But who is it behind those interviews? You!!! So now I want to interview you! This post will run every Thursday (give or take a day due to scheduling) as long as I have people who want to be interviewed! Check out the tab up there in my tab index for this feature. That's where you can check out past interviews and upcoming interviews!

Today I have Kristin from Book Sniffers Anonymous along with a $5 gift card prize! Prize is international as long as you can accept a gift card from your choice of Amazon or B&N!

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Kristinnnnnnnn, yoooooohoooooo!!! Helloooooo, come on over! How are you doing today?!

WOOOHOOO (≧∇≦)/ Thanks for having me, Liz. I'm excited to be stopping by. It's my first interview *blushes* It feels so

weird being on the other side.

So Kristin, you run Book Sniffers Anonymous. How did you come up with this incredibly awesome name?

Well it wasn't my first choice to be honest. It all started at my last base (my husband's in the Marine Corp). There was a group of us wives who decided that we would keep in touch via a book club. We were tossing around names on what we could call our book club and came up with two possibilities. Well when we all separated, the book club fell through and when I decided to start the blog, the two names were already taken, so I just combined the two and voila! I'm really happy that it worked out this way because I couldn't imaging the blog being called anything else.

You have a really elegant design on your website! Who designed it?

Thank you, I will make sure to tell my co-blogger/best friend, Marissa that you said so. I wanted something lighter and more fun than what I initially threw together when I started the blog. Initially I wanted one of those cool avatars that everyone seems to have but the blog is called "anonymous" after all. So Marissa and I put our heads together and I sent a few sample photos to Marissa with what I wanted and she came up with the logo. She even incorporated my favorite color, lime green into it. The website itself was something that I threw together. It took me maybe a week or two of messing around with it until I got it to look the way I wanted it to.

I see you also run a food blog. How incredibly fun!!! Can you tell us about that site?

Well Holy Cannoli Recipes started years ago when I was at my last base. Moving around a lot in the military
forces you to start over and make new friends and I will admit that I'm a really shy person in real life. So I spent a lot of time at home trying new recipes and posting them on Facebook. Marissa suggested I create a blog to post my recipes on since my friends and family were asking for the recipes. (She actually made the button and header for HCR as well) The name actually is a childhood saying of mine. I got in a lot of trouble as a kid for saying things that I probably shouldn't have. So I learned to alter the "holy crap!" into "holy cannoli!" thus saving myself a scolding and a spanking from my parents. Don't ask me what made me think of this when I was trying to think up a name but it popped in my head and I went with it.

And how in the world do you manage to run TWO blogs? Do you have a clone?

HaHa I wish! I will admit that since starting Book Sniffers Anonymous, Holy Cannoli Recipes has fallen to the wayside. I still do food/product reviews and post recipes but not nearly as often as I used to. It's kind of hard to want to spend all day in the kitchen making various recipes because not only are certain ingredients hard to find out here in the desert, so I don't really make crazy recipes anymore. Not to mention that when I come home from work, the last thing I want to do is hover over the stove, so I end up throwing something simple together like burgers or fried rice. Not anything really blog worthy. LoL

What would you do if print books ceased to exist? Could you be happy with just ebooks that don’t usually smell?

You do know that brand new e-readers have a smell too? LoL No seriously they do! When I got my new e-reader a friend of mine asked if I had sniffed it yet and being who I am *challenge accepted* I sniffed it, and it had a smell! Now of course after a day it didn't have that new plasticy smell but I suppose I could always go to Barnes & Noble and ask to sniff the new Nooks. HaHa Desperate times call for desperate measures.

Do you have a favorite candy? (ok, I’m asking this because I’m totally munching on my favorite candy – candy corn – in January)

psssst. I have a cat names Snickers. (^_-) If there is a Snickers bar in a 50ft radius, I will eat it. I love Snickers bars.

I see in your about me section that you work in a National Park. I swear, I am envying you more and more! How does a regular day go for you?

I'm kind of the front desk girl at the visitor center. I run the gift shop at headquarters (there are 3 other visitor centers for the park), so I sell merchandise but I also hand out maps for the park and give the visitors a game plan for their time out here, answer phone calls from visitors who are planning to come out and I get to harass the rangers all day. I get to not only meet a lot of people from all over the world like Germany, Scotland and Asia but I've come across a lot of people from my hometown in Syracuse, NY which is by far the coolest for me. I never thought that people from all over would flock to the desert but it's really surreal and the Joshua trees are something out of a Harry Potter book, so I totally see the appeal.

And what do you do when you aren’t blogging or parking….err, you know what I mean.

Parking... HaHa I like it! Honestly, that's kind of all I do. I'm either reading, blogging or I'm at work. I wish I could say that I do something cool on my days off but nope, you can more times than not find me reading.

If you were given a choice of Disney princesses to be, who would you choose – and why?

Image rights to Sakimichan/DeviantArt

Hm... as a kid I loved Pocahontas. I loved that movie so much as a kid that for my elementary school oral report I chose her. Little did I know that Disney had the story all wrong. I remember going all out and making a costume and preparing my speech with my grandfather. He quizzed me so that I would be prepared to answer questions and he asked "Where was Pocahontas born?" and my response was "Syracuse." My mom still doesn't let me live that one down.

Do you have any books that you constantly find yourself recommending?

I recommend books based on the person but I have recommended books to family and friends and in most cases I just buy the books for them. LoL I guess I'm pushy like that. I bought my sister The Hunger Games last year for her birthday. She had no idea what it was about going into the story but she wound up loving them and my niece wound up reading them too.

And what do you think is the best thing about blogging?

Chatting with with authors and other bloggers. The food blogging world has nothing on the book community. I've talked to more people in the year I've been book blogging than in the 4 yrs that I've had my food blog running. Never in a million years, had thought I'd talk to authors who's books I've read and own.

Ok, that’s it! Not too hard, right? Thanks for coming by, it was fun to chat with you!

Nah... it was fun *wipes sweat off forehead* HaHa Thanks so much for having me. It really was a blast.

Follow Kristin and Book Sniffers Anonymous Online!

For this post we are lucky to have TWO giveaways, so make sure you enter both!!!

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