Blog Tour: FANNY FITZPATRICK AND THE SIRENS

FANNY FITZPATRICK AND THE SIRENS

Dana Hammer

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GENRE:  MiddleGrade Fiction

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BLURB:

It’s the end of the school year. For most kids, it’s time to relax and get ready for summer. For Fanny, there’s work. She has a brand-new baby brother, and she’s been hired by Zeus to look after his “injured” son. And she still has her and her friends’ cheesemaking business! Fanny is overwhelmed.

But then she meets three sirens who want Fanny to join them on Feather Island for a summer of singing, instrument playing, and fun at the beach. The program is totally free and could start an amazing musical career-the thing that Fanny has always wanted the most.

Athena and Gemma are dead set against it. Athena says that the sirens are bad news; that their whole purpose in life is to lure men to their deaths with their beautiful singing. Gemma says that Feather Island is part of a network of unmappable islands, the type of place where criminals and sketchy organizations hoard their wealth and do their crimes.

Surely, the sirens don’t do that anymore, right? All that stuff was a long time ago. If the sirens want to keep their island paradise a secret, well, that’s not so weird, is it? Fanny has talked to them, and she just knows that they aren’t as evil as everyone says. They are perfectly nice ladies.

Right?

Follow Fanny Fitzpatrick as she navigates big sisterhood, friends who disapprove of her life choices, burning ambitions, and a bunch of sirens luring her away to their private island.

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Excerpt One:

The thing with funerals is, you have to be sad. Or at least, you have to act sad, because it’s ghoulish and weird to be happy at a funeral, even if you really, really didn’t like the person who died. But when someone dies, you can’t say you didn’t like them. You have to pretend that whoever died was a nice person, who you will miss very much.

That’s the situation I’m in today. I’m at a funeral for my cousin, Ava May. And it IS sad that she’s dead. OBVIOUSLY. My aunt and uncle are devastated, and my mom has been crying all morning, and even my dad got a little teary, and I don’t think he liked Ava May either, but of course he can never say that, because she’s dead.

The thing with Ava May is, she was never nice to me. Ever. She was always saying terrible things about my family because we don’t have as much money as hers. My aunt is an oceanographer and a college professor, and my uncle is an investment banker, and together I think they make a lot more money than us, but that doesn’t mean my family is trash or whatever. My family is fine. But Ava May was always like, “Oh my god, who doesn’t have a pool in this day and age? Don’t you get hot in the summer?” And “I can’t believe you’ve never been to France. You’re so provincial.”

But now Ava May is dead, and I can’t be mad at her anymore, because A) it would be petty and B) it wouldn’t do any good.

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Interview:

Where are you from? Tell us a little about yourself!

I’m originally from Grays Harbor, in Washington State.  Think Twilight, not Seattle. But I’ve lived in Orange County, California since 2006, and I feel like I’m very much a California girl now, who just happens to know a lot about wild berries and cooking salmon. I make an incredible lemon beurre blanc for salmon, by the way. At least I think it’s incredible. No one else agrees, but they are wrong.


Tell us about your book? How did it get started?

My book is Fanny Fitzpatrick and the Sirens, and it’s the third book in the Fanny Fitzpatrick series. I love sirens as a mythological concept, and really wanted to incorporate them into the Fanny-verse. Also, I wanted to tempt Fanny with her own shot at superpowers, to see how she would react.


How do you create your characters?

I try to give them traits that I find interesting, and fun to write. I like quirky. I like different. I like special. I like funny.

Where do you write? Is there something you need in order to write (music, drinks?)

I usually write at my desk, which is in the kitchen of my house. It’s a little roll-top desk I got on Craigslist for $40, and I love it. I always have a beverage when I write. Typically tea, but lately I’ve learned to make a mocktail called a “no-jito” and those give writing a festive feel. If I’m writing a dark or sad scene, I like to light incense and candles.

What do you like to read?

I read widely, in basically every genre. Right now I’m reading A Well-Trained Wife, which is a memoir about a woman who escaped a high-control religious sect. It’s pretty heavy stuff, and I think I’ll need to read something light-hearted after this.

What would your advice to be for authors or aspiring in regards to writing?
If at all possible, be independently wealthy, or marry someone who is. I’m 90% kidding.

Anything else you’d like to share?

I hope you enjoy my book!

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AUTHOR Bio and Links:

Dana Hammer is a novelist, screenwriter and playwright. She has won over forty awards and honors for her writing, few of which generated income, all of which were deeply appreciated. She is not a cannibal, but she is the author of A Cannibals Guide to Fasting. Dana is also the author of middle grade fantasy My Best Friend Athena which was inspired by a desire to write something her 9 year old daughter could read.  

Website: https://www.danahammer.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/danahammerwriterofthings

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Fanny-Fitzpatrick-Sirens-Dana-Hammer/dp/1962308243/ref=sr_1_1

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GIVEAWAY INFORMATION

Dana Hammer will be awarding a $10 Amazon/BN gift certificate to a randomly drawn winner.

a Rafflecopter giveaway