Bryony's Journal

OTOLI has been entered in 'The London Book Festival 2011' book prize competition

2012-01-09T19:53:00.000Z

Here's some quick New Year news with regard to my Young Adult novel 'OTOLI'. I've been notified by my publisher that the book has been entered to compete for a book prize in 'The London Book Festival 2011'. Submissions closed for the competition on 15th Dec 2011. Apparently judging is underway so of course I'm really hoping that the book can reach the shortlist in the Teenage/Young Adult Fiction category for which it has been entered. Of course there is always a huge amount of competition in anything like this but I think it can only be a good thing for the book whatever the outcome since there will hopefully have already been several sets of new literary eyes upon the book (namely the panel of judges). Announcements shouldn't be too far away as the gala ceremony is to be held this month at a venue somewhere in London. So fingers crossed for a nice surprise in the first couple of weeks of the New Year. I'm allowed to dream aren't I? I'll be sure to let you know if it makes it, or not!

Merry Christmas to all my readers

2011-12-27T20:50:00.000Z

Here's to wishing all my followers and readers on Goodreads, Twitter and Facebook a Happy Christmas and a prosperous New Year. I hope you all have a relaxing break. I've been busy writing some further teenage books and have also started work on another adult mystery book. It's been an interesting year with regards to writing and my books are continuing to do well considering I'm with a smaller publisher in Pneuma Springs. OTOLI in particular has received some really great reviews so long may it continue. The book has been entered by the publisher in to the London Book Festival book prize competition and judging will be completed in January 2012. I'll post as soon as I know if the book has been shortlisted or not. I'll also keep everyone updated with progress regarding publication of the new work. Once again Merry Christmas and my thanks go out to all who have bought, read and earmarked my books to read. I look forward to sharing more of my work with you all in 2012.

Best regards, Bryony

Latest review now out for OTOLI

2011-11-18T09:15:00.001Z

OTOLI has received another fantastic review at the lovely Book Angel Booktopia review site. Emma the blog owner actually posted the review from one of her guest reviewers as she is swamped with workload. The poignant thing about this review is that it just happens to coincide with some of the efforts being done for #Antibullyingweek 2011 on her blog, a perfect match considering the theme for the book. Check out the review here: OTOLI latest review. Huge thanks go out to Emma and her guest reviewer Beth.

Bullying UK competition now running to win a signed copy of OTOLI

2011-11-14T16:10:00.000Z

There's yet another chance to win a copy of OTOLI during ant-bullying week via the Bullying UK web site. This competition will actually run until 1st December in order to give enough time for entries to make it through. Check out the link for details, all you need to enter is an email address. If you don't happen to win, please do buy your copy in eBook or paperback. If you do get lucky enough to win a copy of the book, a review would very much be appreciated if you can. Remember, 5% of all books sales go to the Bullying UK charity (an absolutely amazing cause). Good luck!

OTOLI giveaway during UK Anti-bullying week

2011-11-04T20:40:00.002Z

It's getting close to the week in the UK yearly calender when we can again throw some light on an issue which seems to persist as part of growing up and indeed sometimes after that as an adult, yep you guessed it, it's bullying. It's something I have unfortunately had to be around for most of my life. I've seen it all, from growing up myself, to my own kids, to the kids I teach. This year I'm involved as an author since I bound some of my experiences to all this (albeit thankfully as a fictional story) in my Young Adult novel 'OTOLI' which was released back at the end of April this year and so far the reviews for the book have been really great, just what an author wants! To bring some focus on anti-bullying week from my perspective as an writer and author I'm running a giveaway to win a signed copy of the book along with a promotional postcard and bookmark.

Please do enter the giveaway at the link above (you'll need to sign up to Goodreads if you are not already a member, but hey that's no bad thing!). The book addresses many of the issues faced by teenagers today but not everything is all it seems, it's fiction after all! You'll need to read it to find out more and you can find reading samples for the first 3 chapters in a few places, this blog, my website or Goodreads itself. If you don't end up winning the copy please do check out reviews for the book to compel you to grab your copy (Kindle e-book is available too). 5% from all sales of the book are being donated by the publisher and myself to the UK charity Bullying UK (part of FamilyLives) who are an outstanding organisation who give help and support to suffers, parents and schools. Look out for a further review of the book coming soon at Book Angel Booktopia review site during anti-bullying week as part of a UK blog tour. Good luck if you enter the giveaway too! :)

Author Interview with TRE on Monday 17th October 2.10pm (BST)

2011-10-16T18:44:00.001+01:00

I'll be appearing as a guest on the Hannah Murray show at Talk Radio Europe on Monday 17th October (yep tomorrow) to discuss my young adult book OTOLI as well as upcoming UK anti-bullying week 14th - 18th November. Feel free to tune in and listen if you have 15 minutes spare.

Web site update

2011-10-10T09:27:00.000+01:00

Hi all. My web site has been updated recently. You can take a look by going to the URL http://www.bryonyallen.co.uk . You will find free online reading samples of my books, video trailers, information, reviews and links to things that are close or important to me. Enjoy.

Another fab review for OTOLI

2011-08-28T09:28:00.000+01:00

My teenage novel OTOLI has received yet another fab review and this time it's at the teenage and young adult review site Intrevents. The nice thing about this one is that the site is geared to everything that teenagers are in to these days so to have the book listed and reviewed by the team there is great. Click the logo above to read what they said about it.

Book signing at Waterstones Bury St Edmunds

2011-08-03T18:44:00.000+01:00

I had a call from the manager of Waterstones in Bury St Edmunds yesterday asking for me to go back to do another book signing event, the last one was in June. Of course I was honoured to hear this and will be doing this next week on Wednesday 10th August between 11am and 2pm. Nothing like a quick turn around!

OTOLI is continuing to get fab reviews

2011-07-15T09:19:00.000+01:00

You can check out the latest review for OTOLI at the Books4Teens website. Thanks to Jesse for doing the review,

Another really good review for OTOLI

2011-07-09T18:41:00.000+01:00

OTOLI has received another very good review. This time it's at the 'I Want To Read That' review blog. My sincere thanks go out to self acclaimed bookaholic and bookseller Sammee for taking the time to read and review the book. There is also a short interview I did as well as a give-away competition running to win a signed copy of the book. This is open until Friday 15th July. Just click the image above to be directed to the review site. Enjoy.

Heads up for another book signing event

2011-07-05T10:21:00.002+01:00

Waterstones, Ipswich Buttermarket

I'll be doing another book signing for OTOLI and this time it will be at Waterstones Ipswich in the Buttermarket on 30th July 2011. Timings are 11am -1pm. If you are passing by and would like to ask questions about the book and my writing feel free to come and see me. :-)

OTOLI sitting proud in my local Waterstones

2011-06-23T20:45:00.005+01:00

Ahead of my signing at Waterstones in Bury St Edmunds this coming Saturday (25th June) I took a small detour in to the book store itself on a visit to the town during fathers day. A quick glance showed promotional flyer's up for my signing event behind both staff counters and a short walk around the store led me to the staff recommended area in the children's and teenage reading sections. Here I found 'OTOLI' sitting proud on the second shelf down next to 'A Monster Calls' from Walker's publishers and 'The London Eye Mystery' by David Fickling books on the third shelf. The book obviously touched the store manager and his staff to allow it such a pride of place in a store absolutely full of books from many publishers. Given that OTOLI has been published by a smaller Independent publisher I think what this does is show that if a book can evoke such a response in people that spend their working day in and out of books it really doesn't matter how big or small the publisher is. The book will have fulfilled its aim, to entertain and engage the reader. Of course, I'm really pleased about this fact and my publisher is in contact with the Waterstones chain to put forth a justification for the book being stocked in all of its national stores. With luck my observation is a good omen for the future of the book in the
Waterstones chain.

Interview on BBC Radio Suffolk

2011-06-11T16:31:00.000+01:00

I'll be a guest on the James Hazell morning show at BBC Radio Suffolk on Wednesday 15th June to discuss my debut teenage novel 'OTOLI', the topic of bullying and the UK charity Bullying UK.
Timings 10:00 - 11:00

You can listen via 95.5 FM | 104.6 FM or by the live web iPlayer and timings are 10:00 - 11:00. If you are tuning in I hope you enjoy the interview.

OTOLI Review - YA Book Reads

2011-06-08T19:50:00.001+01:00

Here's another review for OTOLI. YA Book Reads review

My recent author interview with the YA Book Reads blog

2011-06-08T19:48:00.001+01:00

Here is an author interview I did recently for YA Book Reads, just click on this link Author interview with YA Book Reads

OTOLI giveaway at YA Book Reads

2011-06-03T16:50:00.002+01:00

If you fancy winning a signed copy of my first teenage novel 'OTOLI' take a quick trip over to the YA Book Reads blog. The giveaway is open for a month from today and the winner will be announced on 3rd July so there is plenty of time to enter. A review and interview will be posted at the site too in the the next couple of days. Big thanks to Kelly and team at YA Book Reads and GOOD LUCK if you are entering the giveaway.

Another review of OTOLI

2011-06-01T18:59:00.000+01:00

Hi all, I just felt like sharing something on my blog in respect of OTOLI. Here's a link to another external review of OTOLI that has been featured and linked to at my publishers website. The review was left via the 'Published Bestsellers' blog site by Lubna Sengul who is currently a stay at home mum and a Freelance writer. I'm really glad that OTOLI is finding its way to many different people and groups in society as well as the teenage audience it was always intended for. More to follow soon.

OTOLI reviews

2011-05-16T20:52:00.002+01:00

Hi all,
Just a very quick post to say how pleased I am with some of the reviews that have been posted about OTOLI. The book has only been out a couple of weeks so I couldn't ask for a better start. More reviews are on the way soon but I'd really like to say another big thank you to Vivienne at Serendipity for the lovely review of the book, it doesn't get better than 5 stars. The Amazon reviews are trickling in too and hopefully more will continue to come once the page there shows 'In stock'. I believe the book has been received within two days by some that have purchased it via that route but I guess seeing a delivery time of 1-3 weeks listed at first glance just makes people go somewhere else or wait out. There's quite a bit happening behind the scenes so keep an eye out for the updates coming soon! Bye for now.

OTOLI now available via The Book Depository

2011-05-10T09:39:00.000+01:00

Just a quick post to let everyone know that you can order your paperback copy of OTOLI via the Book Depository with free worldwide postage. The book ships within 48hrs of purchase. While Amazon stocking status plays catch up given that the book is a new release the Book Depository may be a good way for those that just can't wait. Saying that I have had emails from readers who ordered the book on Amazon and received it pretty quickly so I'm not totally sure whats going on there. That's it for now, enjoy the sunshine if you are in the UK!

OTOLI giveaway has ended on goodreads

2011-05-06T19:35:00.001+01:00

The giveaway competition for OTOLI ended earlier today at the goodreads web site and I would firstly like to congratulate the two winning readers in Germany and Florida. The books will be sent out tomorrow and I dearly hope you enjoy the read when the books finally reach each of your respective home addresses. Second, I'd really like to send my thanks to all of the 1173 people who entered the competition for showing such interest in the book. I hope the remaining 1171 of you feel intrigued enough to reach out and obtain the book from the various outlets where it's available anyway in either paperback or Kindle e-Book format. 5% of all sales will help support the charity Bullying UK too. The book is also currently out for review and giveaway with a few YA reader blog sites so there is still an opportunity to bag a copy for free. As the reviews get posted in at these sites I'll link back here in my own blog so they can be found.

OTOLI is released

2011-04-30T21:27:00.002+01:00

Just a quick update for everyone. You can obtain OTOLI from Amazon now despite the book page saying it isn't published yet. I believe (and according to my publisher) there always seems to be a lag of a few days after the official release day before things show as in stock. (Yes I think it's a bit weird too but I won't waste valuable grey matter trying to work it out). For everyone that has marked it to read so far thank you. Go forth with confidence if Amazon is your chosen and preferred store (for both paperback and Kindle). For UK readers my publisher is also offering a 1/3 off the RRP for the book here - OTOLI Discount.

Release time is almost here!

2011-04-27T21:14:00.002+01:00

There's just a few hours to go before OTOLI is officially available around the world. I'm really excited to be fair and also immensely proud that the book was taken on by Pneuma Springs for publication in a time of real economic uncertainty as well as the fact that there is huge change happening in the publishing world too. They have given the book the chance to shine and it's my hope that the book delivers to its target readership as well as everyone else that is paying some interest in wishing to read it. The first of the official review copies have been sent out so it will be great if these can come back relatively quickly and favourably. I hope that the reviewers really enjoy reading the book as much as I enjoyed writing it. OTOLI is also now listed in quite a few places and trade catalogues and I've already seen movement for orders so that's really pleasing at this very early stage. Many libraries and schools library services have been contacted too so with luck council funding around the country won't have hit these too hard and OTOLI should reach the shelves in the very near future for many of these establishments to allow its target readership of the 12-18 year old reader easy access to the book. The facebook page for the OTOLI will be updated regularly with everything that's going on around the book so please do take a look and join up. Your more than welcome to leave messages there too. I'm really hoping the book does well and that the donation (5%) of all sales proceeds to the 'Bullying UK' charity goes some way to helping them continue the fantastic work they do. Hope you all enjoy the read!

OTOLI Book Trailer

2011-04-21T17:11:00.000+01:00

In addition to the free reading sample of OTOLI at BookBuzzr you can also view the book trailer. The trailer is also embedded on my goodreads page and linked to in a number of places such as my web site Young Adult page and the book page at the publishers web site. 'Bullying UK' should be linking to everything soon too. Hope you enjoy the trailer!

OTOLI - free reading sample

2011-04-14T17:06:00.000+01:00

You can now read the first 3 chapters of the book at http://www.freado.com/book/9650/otoli online. I've embedded the reading widget on my web site Young Adult page as well as my journal (blog). The same reading sample is also uploaded to my goodreads page as an e-book but as e-pub format so it's easy for everyone to sample in some way. (Note, the goodreads reader application appends the page headers and page numbers in the text for some reason but it's a minor thing and out of my control)

Please do enjoy these opening chapters and look out for the book video trailer coming very soon. Not long to go now until release date. Yippee!