MFT Guest: Becca Ritchie and her favorite things + a Giveaway!

Today I have the pleasure of having Becca Ritchie on the blog for My Favorite Things.  She's going to share a few of her favorites and she's giving away a copy of Wynter Chelsea: The Legacy.

Wynter Chelsea: The Legacy

Few know of the demonic beings that plague our world, threatening to destroy it. But for two families, it is a familiar battle they have fought for ages. 
The Wynters and the Chelseas live for the hunt, to kill those who prey upon the innocent. Four children, born of these two dynasties, are now in their teenage and young adult years. The three boys-Jack, the conjurer; Dustin, the telepath, and Trevor, prescient one-are all warriors, well aware that their destinies are sealed. Then there is 17-year-old Amanda, the one who has been protected and guarded all of her life-much to her great questioning and dismay. She is the special one, the empath and first girl born to the families. Burning with the fever to fight, Amanda constantly challenges the status quo, but to no avail. 
When their parents inexplicably disappear, Amanda's dream of joining the legacy wins out, and she goes to battle with her brother and her lifelong friends. But as the four follow a dangerous path across the United States, a long-buried affection surfaces between Dustin and Amanda, and each must confront their hidden emotions...and ultimate reason for their existence.

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Wynter Chelsea: The Legacy might be about supernatural hunters but the core of the story really remains between these two families, the Wynters and the Chelseas, where four young adults have to come together to find their missing parents. Throughout the book, I threw out a multitude of pop culture references, and with the quirky Trevor Wynter, my love for superheroes is shown in big bright neon letters.

In spirit of the summer superhero movies, I would normally go on a rant about how amazing X-Men are and salivate over Captain America in his uniform, but most people are probably tired of superheroes on the big screen. So I’ll stick to my favorite three things, books, movies, and television, which may inadvertently have those pesky superheroes in it… sorry it happens with me.

My Favorites

YA Book: The Hunger Games trilogy – Why? Amazing world, amazing story, brilliant cliffhangers in each chapter, it literally made me love reading again.

Non-YA Book: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce – I love character driven stories, and this book rivaled Catcher in the Rye for me, so much so that it landed as my favorite non-YA.

Comic Book: New Mutants: Fall of the New Mutants (#15-21) – I just read this and it blew my mind. My two favorite X-Men have quickly become Cypher and Magik. The New Mutant series is definitely one I would pick up if anyone is new to comics.

Movie: X-Men: First Class – I saw it at midnight and it beat X2 by just a hair. The film is storytelling at its finest. A lot of action-packed movies forget about character development, which for me is key to a great movie or even a great book. I want to fall in love with the characters and connect with them so when an explosion does happen, I care.

TV Show: The Vampire Diaries – Hands down this is the best show on television. I will fight with anyone about this (with my words) because it is so brilliantly written. I admit, I’ve never read the series, but the plots are crazy good in the TV show. The last three episodes truly amazed me.    

While these are my favorite things, not all of them are seen in Wynter Chelsea. The pop culture references in the series are usually thrown out by Trevor Wynter, and in one of my earliest drafts, Superman Returns (the bad one) was playing in their fictional movie theater. Time has certainly passed since then. But I think a lot of people forget that superheroes come in so many forms, and they don’t have to wear tights or fly or even brandish a sword. All Trevor ever wanted to be was a superhero, and in his own right, he is one.

The Giveaway:

Becca is being awesome and is giving one lucky person a paperback *signed* copy of Wynter Chelsea: The Legacy (bk 1)

This is open to US only.

Must be 13 or older to enter

Ends July 5th, 2011

To Enter:

Tell us 5 of your favorite things. And don't forget contact info!

For the schedule and list of Giveaway for The Favorite Things event check out the schedule post.  And make sure you head over to My Bookish Ways to see what she has going on today as well!