The Girls Heart Books blog tour for Ride of Your Life begins!

The Girls Heart Books blog tour for Ride of Your Life has begun! Even though it's not my most recent book, I decided to do a blog tour now in honor of the 30th anniversary of the Six Flags Great Adventure Haunted Castle Fire, which inspired the novel when I was still a teenager. The book tells the story of Tracy--a seventeen-year-old girl who died in the fire--and Josh--a seventeen-year-old boy who dies in an accident in the same theme park thirty years later.

Ride of Your Life won third prize in SmartWriter's Write It Now contest in the YA category, which was judged by Alex Flinn, the author of Beastly, Cloaked, and more. I hope you'll check it out.

Carousel at dusk

I took this photo on Thursday, July 18, 2013 in Hershey Park, Pennsylvania during a heat wave. It's late in the evening and the lights are on. There's something magical about an amusement park at dusk. It reminds me of my YA ghost story romance set in an amusement park, Ride of Your Life.

Looking for a great summer read? How about a bittersweet, teen romantic ghost story?

I'm excited to announce that my latest YA novel, Ride of Your Life, is now available on Kindle and Nook and from the iBookstore! This is the story of Tracy Miller, a teenage girl who dies in a theme-park fire and meets the love of her life thirty years after her own death. This bittersweet romantic ghost story was inspired by a true event: the Great Adventure Haunted Castle fire that killed eight teenagers in 1984. I think Ride of Your Life is the most romantic ghost story since the movie Ghost, but I hope you'll download a free sample so you can decide for yourself: http://amzn.com/B0081ICVEQ

Researching my romantic YA ghost story

I'm currently editing Ride of Your Life, a romantic YA novel involving ghosts in a theme park, when I came across this website:  http://amusementsafety.org/safety_news_11.asp

I know that several deaths and injuries take place in theme parks every year, but to see just the ones that happened in 2011 compiled like that is disturbing: 24 people died and many more were badly injured. The "lucky" ones end up with broken bones, but others lost limbs. Wow. 

Ride of Your Life was inspired by what is probably the worst amusement park accident to have ever happened in the USA: the Great Adventure Haunted Castle fire that killed eight young people in 1984. 

New cover for my upcoming YA romantic ghost story--What do you think?

I couldn't open my old cover for Ride of Your Life in CorelDraw, so I ended up recreating it. So what do you think? I changed the font and added some color. 

This is the next book I'll be indie publishing. It's a romantic YA ghost story about a seventeen-year-old girl who meets the love of her life in an amusement park . . . thirty years after her own death. It was inspired by a real event, The Great Adventure Haunted Castle fire that killed eight young people in 1984. 

So do you think it works?