Eden's Escape Blog Tour (+ Giveaway!)

Edit 10/4/16: the giveaway is over and I have emailed the winner.

All right, guys, it's time for my blog tour post for Eden's Escape! I've got several goodies for you today: an excerpt from the book, a Top Ten list by M. Tara Crowl herself, a giveaway for signed copies of both Eden of the Lamp books, and (slightly less exciting, I know) my own review of Eden's Escape. Read on for the first three items I just mentioned; to read my review, click here (and here for my review of Eden's Wish). Before we get going, though, let's learn about the books themselves:

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Click to view
on Goodreads

All twelve years of Eden's life have been spent in an antique oil lamp. She lives like a princess inside her tiny, luxurious home; but to Eden, the lamp is nothing but a prison. She hates being a genie. All she wants, more than anything, is freedom.

When Eden finds a gateway to Earth within the lamp, she takes her chance and enters the world she loves. And this time, she won't be sent back after three wishes.

Posing as the new kid at a California middle school, Eden revels in all of Earth's pleasures-- but quickly learns that this world isn't as perfect as she always thought it was. Eden soon finds herself in the middle of a centuries-old conflict between powerful immortals. A ruthless organization run by a former genie will stop at nothing to acquire the lamp and its power-- even hurt Tyler and Sasha, the new mortal friends who have given Eden a home. To save her friends and protect the lamp's magic, Eden must decide once and for all where she belongs.

(272 pages)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Click to view
on Goodreads 

Eden's new life on earth begins in New York City under the guidance of her new guardian: Pepper, a petite, bubbly genie alum who's also a Broadway actress. Before she has a chance to settle in, though, Eden is whisked away for a granting-- only to find herself trapped in a laboratory. David Brightly, owner of the world's leading tech company, cares more about tapping into the lamp's power than making a wish and starts performing tests on Eden. With Brightly's plasma shield around the lamp, Eden has no way home. Left without a choice, she escapes the lab and goes on the run. After her daring exit, Eden finds herself on the streets of Paris-- home to Electra's headquarters. Left in a strange city with a price on her head (courtesy of scheming Brightly), Eden has to keep her wits about her. She dons a chic disguise and flits around Paris incognito, investigating Brightly Tech. Assisted by Pepper and her old adversary Bola, as well as some new friends, Eden embarks on a quest to retrieve the lamp and protect the secrets of the genie legacy.

(320 pages)

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About the Author:

M. Tara Crowl grew up in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. She studied Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California, then received an MA in Creative Writing at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia. She lives in New York City.

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Okay, now here's an excerpt from Eden's Escape itself. It's from Chapter 12; Eden's friend Melodie is helping her try to avoid Brightly by going incognito.

“Wow,” Eden said. “You do love clothes." 

“I told you.” Melodie started to sift through the racks. “Now, what we’ve got to do is find something that looks like the opposite of anything you’d ever wear." 

“Isn’t the point for me to go unnoticed?” In Eden’s line of sight were an orange jumpsuit that looked like a prison uniform, a shiny green skirt like a mermaid’s tail, and a feathered Native American headdress. “I don’t think I’d blend in wearing most of this stuff." 

“We’ll put you in something subtle.” 

Taking it all in, Eden wondered where exactly Melodie planned to find that. 

Though Melodie’s wardrobe seemed chaotically disorganized from an outsider’s perspective, she seemed to know precisely where everything was. After careful consideration, she pulled out a white collared shirt, a navy blazer, a pleated green-and- navy skirt, shiny black shoes, and a navy beret to top it all off. Eden put all of it on as instructed. 

“See?” Melodie said delightedly. “You’re just a regular student in Paris!”

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And now it's time for my personal favorite part of this tour: the Top Ten list by M. Tara Crowl herself!

M. Tara Crowl

My top ten places to write and/or be inspired in NYC

So much has been written, sung, and said about New York. One person can never experience everything it has to offer, and no two people will experience it in the same way. And that’s one of the things I love most about it. It’s a city so vast that you’ll never tackle it all, but you can still make it feel like your own.

August 30 marked my five-year anniversary of living in NYC. I’ve been elated, frustrated, heartbroken, and rejuvenated in this city. When I set out to write my new novel, Eden’s Escape, I knew there was nowhere else in the world that I’d want to be the first home on Earth for my protagonist, a twelve-year-old genie named Eden.

Eden has the rare privilege of being shown around the city by someone who’s lived there for hundreds of years: her new guardian, a genie alum named Pepper. In Eden’s Escape, they explore some of these locations together. Others, she’ll have to discover later. But here they are: my top ten places in NYC to write and/or be inspired.

1.     Central Park. It’s world-famous, and for good reason. I live downtown, but I try to take a trip up here at least once a season. It’s beautiful any time of year, but it’s downright magical in the snow.

2.     New York Public Library. This big, gorgeous library is right in the center of town, at Fifth Avenue and 42^nd Street. In a city where everything aims to wow, it stands out as majestic and timeless.

3.     MoMA (The Museum of Modern Art). NYC is known for its many museums, but this is probably my favorite. Thought-provoking art, and a beautiful courtyard to sit and ponder it.

4.     Top of the Empire State Building. When Eden arrives in New York City, she’s instructed to go here to meet her new guardian. When she overlooks the city from the top, she feels like its queen. When I’m here, that’s how I feel too.

5.     The Village Vanguard. This iconic West Village jazz club opened in 1935. Miles Davis, Thelonius Monk, and John Coltrane have played here, along with so many other jazz greats. You go downstairs, sit at a table, and soak in the music—no talking or phones allowed. When you’re here, it could be 2016 or 1967. The one thing you’re sure of is that you’re in New York—and when you’re here, that’s all that matters.

6.     Raoul’s. Another classic NYC establishment that transports me to another era. This Soho bistro opened in 1975. It has a colorful history and delicious food.

7.     Books of Wonder. A mecca of children’s books! Not only is this store chock full of children’s, MG, and YA treasures; its owners, huge supporters and champions of authors, host tons of amazing events. (I met Ann M. Martin here!)

8.     Nitehawk Cinema. I love going to the movies, and this is my favorite theater. Located in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, it’s small and hospitable, with comfy seats, indie movies, and table service. During the movie, you write your order on a slip of paper with a little pencil, and—voila!—a server appears with your order. For me, it doesn’t get much better.

9.     Two Hands Restaurant & Bar. I’m biased on this one. My husband owns this restaurant, and my “day job” is as the office manager. But the food and coffee(!) are sublime, and the bright, airy interior and friendly staff make it a dreamy place to think and write.

10.  My living room. Ideas flow when I wander the city, but when it’s time to get real writing done, I have to hole up in silence and get to work. There’s nowhere I’m more productive than in my apartment, by myself. Books don’t write themselves!

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I've only visited New York once, but now I'm itching to go back and explore the places on M. Tara Crowl's list–they all sound amazing. Especially Books of Wonder, which honestly sounds like my dream bookstore.

Anyway, it's time to move on to the final part of today's post. I'm sure many of you avid fans of the Eden of the Lamp series are simply dying to get your hands on signed copies of both books. If so, you're in luck, because that's what I get to give away today! Enter in the Rafflecopter form below (US and Canada only), and once the giveaway's over at the end of the month I'll announce the winner on here and send their contact info to M. Tara Crowl. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

And that's all I have for today. Have you read either Eden of the Lamp book? If you have, share your thoughts in the comments section below!

Disclaimer: I received complimentary copies of both books so I could participate in this blog tour; I'm also being entered into a $50 giftcard giveaway as a thank you for posting this tour post in the month of September.

Eden's Escape by M. Tara Crowl, 2016 (+ Giveaway!)

This is my review of the second Eden of the Lamp book. Don't read on unless you've read Eden's Wish (my review–which includes a giveaway for both books).

Click to view
on Goodreads 

Eden's new life on earth begins in New York City under the guidance of her new guardian: Pepper, a petite, bubbly genie alum who's also a Broadway actress. Before she has a chance to settle in, though, Eden is whisked away for a granting--only to find herself trapped in a laboratory. David Brightly, owner of the world's leading tech company, cares more about tapping into the lamp's power than making a wish and starts performing tests on Eden. With Brightly's plasma shield around the lamp, Eden has no way home. Left without a choice, she escapes the lab and goes on the run. After her daring exit, Eden finds herself on the streets of Paris--home to Electra's headquarters. Left in a strange city with a price on her head (courtesy of scheming Brightly), Eden has to keep her wits about her. She dons a chic disguise and flits around Paris incognito, investigating Brightly Tech. Assisted by Pepper and her old adversary Bola, as well as some new friends, Eden embarks on a quest to retrieve the lamp and protect the secrets of the genie legacy.

(320 pages)

Okay, well it's time for my review of Eden's Escape. It just came out earlier this month, and I got copies of both books from the author so I could participate in the blog tour. I'm posting my tour stop with all its goodies today too, so click here to check it out–I've got an excerpt from Eden's Escape on there, plus an exclusive Top Ten list written by Ms. Crowl herself just for Read Till Dawn.

Now for the review itself. I wasn't sure exactly what to expect after the ending of Eden's Wish with the announcement that Eden would be going to live on earth. I thought Eden would probably be struggling to fit in, going to school, making friends, doing all the things she did in the first book but on a much grander scale. Instead, Eden spends most of the book in hiding after a granting goes horribly wrong: a scientist named David Brightly has tracked her lamp down and rubbed it, for the express purpose of performing experiments on Edem until he can figure out how to get unlimited wishes. She makes a desperate escape, but has to leave the lamp behind; the rest of the book covers Eden's attempts to avoid being found by Brightly (a feat made a thousand times harder by the fact that his company made all the phones, and he's not at all shy about tapping phones to get the information he needs), find allies, get the lamp back, and generally set everything to rights. It seems like a pretty hopeless mess at some points, and it was interesting to watch the magic of the lamp collide with all the advantages of cutting-edge technology.

It was also fun watching Eden try to interact with modern technology for the very first time. Xavier completely neglected to teach her anything about it, because he thought it was a waste of time, so she's stuck figuring things out on her own. One of my favorite scenes is when she sits down at a computer to get on the internet. She stares at the screen for a minute, clicks the Word icon on the bottom because she thinks the "w" stands for "web," and then proceeds to type in what she needs and wait for the results to pop up. It was funny, and really realistic! It may have been slightly less realistic to see how quickly she caught on to the internet after that–I've spent some solid time teaching my grandmother how to navigate the web, and it definitely wasn't as intuitive for her. I guess being a genie makes Eden better at figuring things out than my human grandmother, though. That's one of the perks of being, you know, a magical immortal being with supernatural powers.

I don't want to talk too much about the story itself, for fear of spoilers. I would like to just touch on the interpersonal relationships, though, because I think they're both the main weakness and the greatest strength of Eden's Escape.

My only real complaint is Eden's relationship with Pepper. Now, don't get me wrong: I love Pepper. She seems like a fascinating character, and a very kind one. I would happily spend a whole book just learning about her backstory or watching her move forward in the present. My trouble, though, is that she and Eden develop a strong bond too quickly. They're together in New York for just two weeks, yet when they're separated and then reunited both act as though they were in a legitimate mother-daughter relationship. I love that Eden adores Pepper–because I do, too–but I was just a little turned off by the way she saw her as a mother figure so soon after leaving Xavier and Goldie (the couple who actually raised her, and who she recognized as her true family in Eden's Wish). You'd think there'd be a little more homesickness for her masters, but Eden barely thinks of them throughout the novel except in relation to her attempts to rescue the lamp.

The relationships are also a huge strength to the book, though, simply because they're so compelling. Whether it's Eden's relationships with the main characters from Eden's Wish, or with her new friend Melodie, or even with some of the members of Electra, there's always an interesting dynamic to watch. This goes to the character-building, too: Crowl builds dynamic characters, so that–for the most part, anyway–there are no stock characters. This is a huge plus, and it really makes the entire novel for me.

Overall, I'd say that Eden's Escape is a very strong MG fantasy novel (that's perhaps not quite as strong as its prequel). I really enjoyed reading both books, and I look forward to finding out whether there will be a third installment in the series. There's certainly room for one!

And now it's time for the giveaway. Enter below in the Rafflecopter form (the same one that's on the main blog tour post). Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Disclaimer: I received complimentary copies of both Eden of the Lamp books so I could participate in the blog tour for Eden's Escape. I'm also being entered into a random $50 giftcard giveaway for posting my review and the blog tour stop during the month of September.

Eden's Wish by M. Tara Crowl, 2015 (+ giveaway!)

Click to view
on Goodreads 

All twelve years of Eden's life have been spent in an antique oil lamp. She lives like a princess inside her tiny, luxurious home; but to Eden, the lamp is nothing but a prison. She hates being a genie. All she wants, more than anything, is freedom.
When Eden finds a gateway to Earth within the lamp, she takes her chance and enters the world she loves. And this time, she won't be sent back after three wishes.
Posing as the new kid at a California middle school, Eden revels in all of Earth's pleasures--but quickly learns that this world isn't as perfect as she always thought it was. Eden soon finds herself in the middle of a centuries-old conflict between powerful immortals. A ruthless organization run by a former genie will stop at nothing to acquire the lamp and its power--even hurt Tyler and Sasha, the new mortal friends who have given Eden a home. To save her friends and protect the lamp's magic, Eden must decide once and for all where she belongs.
(272 pages)

I may, on the surface, be a little old for Eden's Wish. According to the information sheet I got from the author, it's targeted toward kids aged nine through twelve; I'm seventeen, five years above the highest age suggestion. But I still loved reading Eden's Wish, perhaps partly because of its target age. You see, I'm in the middle of applying to college. I've been very stressed out about grown-up questions like where to apply, what to major in, and - oh, you know, no biggie - what I want to do with the rest of my life. I loved reading Eden's Wish, because it took me back, for a few hours, to sixth grade. You see, back then I would have been swept entirely away in the breathless combination of magic and relationships that is Eden's Wish. It was nice to take a break from my applications and be transported back to that simpler time in my life by reading Eden's Wish.

Before I go any further with this discussion of Eden's Wish, I want to get the negatives out of the way. There are only two troubles I have with the book, and both of them are pretty small. The first is that it does slightly blend in with other novels in its genre simply because there are so many fractured fairytales on the market about young characters dealing with unwanted destinies. This isn't a huge problem here, since Ms. Crowl creates a pretty unique storyline and Aladdin isn't usually retold that often anyway, but it does mean that in a few years I might have trouble remember many specifics from Eden's Wish. The other trouble I have with the book is that I get a general sense it could have delved deeper into the possibilities of its plot. Perhaps this is just a side effect of its younger audience, but I personally would have liked a better explanation of how the genies are born (is there a surrogate involved? Do they grow out of the lamp's walls? Does Goldie give birth to them?). It would also be cool to learn even more about how granted wishes shaped history, and about how Xavier and Goldie made the lamp in the first place.

Those were the minuses, so now it's on to the plusses!

I really loved Eden as a character. She wants to do the right thing, but she's so desperate to escape the confines of her lamp that she unwittingly brings danger to the world. The ethical dilemma that she faces throughout the book is - when you actually stop and think about it - really fascinating. I spent the entire book unsure whether I wanted Eden to be free from the lamp (but let it fall into the wrong hands), or to go back inside it and be safe (but trapped). I can't spoil the ending, of course, but it's definitely an interesting question.

The supporting characters are also very interesting and three-dimensional. Eden's human friends Tyler and Sasha are really great, and I enjoyed reading about them, but my favorite supporting characters were actually Xander and Goldie (the creators of the lamp, who raised Eden inside it). We don't get to see too much of them throughout the book, but observing their relationships with not just Eden but also all of the ex-genies was really interesting.

This review is getting long, so I'd better bring it to a close. There's more I could talk about, but suffice it to say that Eden's Wish is a good book. I wouldn't go around crying from the rooftops that it's the best book in the entire world, but it's good as a comfortable escapist MG fantasy novel. If that's what you, or a middle schooler you know, is in the mood for, then definitely give it a try! Also, from now until the end of September you can enter to win a signed set of not just Eden's Wish but also its sequel, Eden's Escape. Enter via the Rafflecopter form below. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Oh, and also: the author's having a $50 giveaway to celebrate the release of Eden's Escape. Click here to check out my blitz post with the giveaway details!

Disclaimer: I received complimentary copies of both Eden of the Lamp books so I could participate in the blog tour for Eden's Escape. Also, I'm not responsible for sending the prizes in this giveaway: I will give the winner's information to the author, and she will mail out the books.