Welcome to YA Scavenger Hunt!

This bi-annual event was first organized by author Colleen Houck as a way to give readers a chance to gain access to exclusive bonus material from their favorite authors…and a chance to win some awesome prizes!

On this hunt, you not only get access to exclusive content from each author, but you also get a clue for the hunt.

Add up the clues, and you can enter for our prize–one lucky winner will receive one book from each author on the hunt in my team! But play fast: this contest (and all the exclusive bonus material) will only be online for 120 hours!

Running from 12 noon PST (11 am my time!) October 2, it will end on Oct 7, noon PST and a GRAND PRIZE WINNER will be chosen on October 8th.

Go to the YA Scavenger Hunt page to find out all about the hunt. There are SIX contests going on simultaneously, and you can enter one or all!
I am a part of the GREEN TEAM–there is also a red team, a gold team, a blue team, a purple team, and a pink team for a chance to win a whole different set of books!

If you’d like to find out more about the hunt, see links to all the authors participating and check out the full list of prizes up for grabs, go to the YA Scavenger Hunt main page.

SCAVENGER HUNT PUZZLE

Directions: Below, you’ll notice that I’ve listed my favorite number. Collect the favorite numbers of all the authors on the green team, and then add them up (don’t worry, you can use a calculator!).

Entry Form: Once you’ve added up all the numbers, make sure you fill out the form here to officially qualify for the grand prize.
Only entries that have the correct number will qualify!

Rules: Open internationally, anyone below the age of 18 should have a parent or guardian’s permission to enter. To be eligible for the grand prize, you must submit the completed entry form by DATE, at noon Pacific Time. Entries sent without the correct number or without contact information will not be considered.

SCAVENGER HUNT POST

Today, I am hosting Natasha Sinel on my site for the YA Scavenger Hunt!

Natasha Sinel’s debut young adult novel, THE FIX, received the Gold Medal for YA Fiction in the 2016 Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPYs).
Her second YA novel SOULSTRUCK released June 2018.

She graduated from Yale University and University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business and was a director of business development at Showtime Networks.

Born and raised in Washington, D.C., she now lives in Westchester, NY with her husband and three sons.

http://www.natashasinel.com
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100006454480932&ref=bookmarks
https://www.instagram.com/natashasinel/

EXCLUSIVE CONTENT

SOULSTRUCK

http://www.natashasinel.com/uploads/6/4/5/5/64556621/soulstruck-jacket_1_orig.jpg

Seventeen-year-old Rachel tries to get struck by lightning, hoping it will lead to finding her soul mate as it did for her mother.
But when she discovers a devastating secret from her mother’s past, Rachel questions everything and quits chasing lightning.
Now her best friend has ditched her, her mom’s angry with her, and the evolving relationship with her friend Jay starts to unravel.
The impulse to get struck by lightning resurfaces and there’s a thunderstorm coming.

Enjoy this special, deleted scene that is exclusive to the YA dash!!!
(And now, a word from our author 😉

In this scene from SOULSTRUCK, Rachel and Jay are just getting to know each other. In later drafts, I decided that I wanted them to have known each other and been friends for a few years already by the time the actual story happens, so I deleted this scene.

Mom slid her phone into the back pocket of her jeans which made me realize she was wearing jeans and a light sweater, not the pencil skirt and blouse she normally wears to the bank. I wanted to ask her why she was home, but I was worried about the answer and I didn’t want to have an argument in front of Jay. If she’d lost this job at the bank, we were screwed.
“Hi,” she said, holding her hand out for Jay to shake. “You can call me Naomi.”
“This is Jay,” I said.
Jay shook Mom’s hand and cleared his throat.
Mom tried to catch his eye, but he was focused on a point just to the right of her.
“Jay’s been driving me home,” I said. “The bus takes forever.”
“You want to do some homework?” I said to Jay. We hadn’t really done that together, we’d mostly just hung out and talked or looked at house renovation stuff. But he looked uncomfortable, so it seemed like a good thing to say in front of Mom to save him.
When we got to my room, Jay whispered, “I don’t have any homework.”
“You don’t?”
“I take a few online college classes for credit, pre-med stuff. And, well . . .”
“Holy crap, pre-med?”
He shrugged.
I sat on the floor with my back against the bed and patted the floor for him to sit, too.
“Your mom’s cool,” he said. “I think you’d like my mom, too. You should come to my house.”
“Definitely. I will,” I said.
The corner of the box I’d found in the basement was peeking out from under the bed, so I pushed it back in with my foot.
“Did you look at any of it?” he asked. He must’ve noticed it was there even before I pushed it in. He was observant, that was for sure.
“Um . . . not yet,” I said. “I feel weird.”
“Why don’t you just give it to your mom? It’s all addressed to her, right?”
I knew it was wrong to keep the box from her and I knew it was borderline evil to open the letters that were addressed to her. But I wasn’t quite ready to tell her about them. I had a feeling that whatever was in this box was going to change our lives somehow, and probably not for the better. I needed more time to think about potential consequences.
Jay’s phone buzzed. I caught a glimpse of it as he pulled it out of his pocket. It was his alarm.
“I actually have to go,” he said, standing.
Wow, okay. That was abrupt.
I followed him out of my room to the front door. We stood in the doorway for a second looking at each other, almost staring. Eye to eye. Finally, he looked down at his shoes.
“Um,” he said. “Aren’t you coming?”
“Huh?”
“I thought you wanted to come to my house.”
“Oh, now?” I laughed. This was Jay, as I was learning. Literal to the core.
“I . . . I got that wrong,” he said, half-smiling but I could see the hurt in his eyes. “You meant sometime, not today.”
“I did,” I said. “But…let me just get my bag. I know you don’t have any homework, but I do.”
I grabbed my bag from my room, then went to tell Mom I was leaving. Her bedroom door was closed, so I knocked.
“Come in,” she said.
She was sitting on her bed, back against the headboard. She had her iPad on her lap and was clicking quickly.
“I’m going over to Jay’s, is that okay?” I asked.
She looked up at me.
“I think so,” she said. “Are you comfortable with that?”
I nodded. “He’s a really great person.” It seemed like such a stupid thing to say. When we had more time, I’d tell her about him. How different he was in so many ways that made me see things in a new way. How he took everything so literally, and sometimes it was cute and sometimes it could be troublesome. How brilliant he was, how much he remembered. But there wasn’t time now.
“Not too long, though, okay?” she said. “I need to talk to you about something.”
Her voice didn’t seem overly serious, but I knew that it was. She was going to tell me about losing her job, and she knew I’d freak out.
I nodded.
I went back to the front door where Jay was waiting.
“All set,” I said. I tried to smile but it didn’t happen.
“You sure?” he asked, looking closely at my face. I nodded.
I moved past Jay and got into his car. He followed. Just before he started the car, he looked at me again.
“Your mom thinks I’m weird,” he said. “You had to convince her to let you come over.”
“No, no,” I said, shaking my head. “Nothing like that. She likes you. She just . . . she said she needs to talk to me and I don’t have a good feeling about it. It’s complicated. I just want to go now, can we go?”
He didn’t answer. He just turned the key and started to drive.

NOW DON’T FORGET!!!

I loved that short story so much that I read it 14 WHOLE TIMES.
That’s right, 14!!!

Remember, you want to enter the contest for a chance to win a ton of books by me, Natasha Sinel, and many more amazing authors!

Add up all the favorite numbers of the authors on the green team and you’ll have all the secret code to enter for the grand prize!

CONTINUE THE HUNT
To keep going on your quest for the hunt, you need to check out the next author,
The Amazing Alice Reed! You can find her at her place,

https://www.alicereeds.com/