Welcome to Day 4 (sadly, the last day!) of our Blog Party honoring all the people who made 1,000,000 visits possible! The giveaways run 6/8/13, 6/9/13, 6/15/13 and 6/16/13. Be sure to visit each day separately! I’ll announce the winners on 6/22/13.
There are prize packs on each day for Young Adult readers (scroll down), and also prize packs for writers. Scroll down to see them all, and please, take the time to read about the amazing people I want to honor. There wasn’t room for everyone individually. Most importantly, none of this would be possible without the support of the authors who so generously share their books, their time, and their writing talent to bring you giveaways and guest posts every week. It wouldn’t be possible without the publishers who send us ARCS and finished copies to share with you.
I do want to give an extra shout-out to Jan Lewis, though. I mentioned her in the first post, but I can’t possibly thank her enough for all she does!
Happy reading (and writing),
Martina
Prize Pack 27: Clara’s Picks

I first met Clara Kensie at one of the first workshoppy things I did here on the blog, and she was awesome. So awesome that we have been friends and critique partners ever since. After a stint sharing the hunt for great articles for the This Week for Writer’s Posts, she took time off to focus on her wonderful book. Naturally, she nailed that the way she nails everything else. Now she’s back with us for the Sunday Question of the Week series. Yay!
Clara writes twisty mysteries and chilling thrillers, she’s juggling more things than any two people ought to have thrown at them.
Check out Clara’s Blog
Follow Clara on Twitter
What’s your favorite way to celebrate a success, Clara?
I’m not ticker-tape parade, big-crazy-party type of person (at big crazy parties, you’ll most likely find me hiding in the host’s laundry room, playing with the cat). To celebrate a big success, I like to hang out at home with my family or a small group of close friends and eat carryout while watching a movie. Is that boring? Yeah, that sounds boring. Okay, fine. I’ll tell you a secret: once I’m alone, I squee and do this. About two dozen times.
Muppet-flailing aside, writers experience many more rejections and defeats than successes. That’s why I celebrate every single good thing that happens to me. With a Sharpie, I note every success, big or small, on a cork from a wine bottle. Some of my corks say: Finished draft of X manuscript! Attended X writers’ conference! Sent first query letter! Full request from agent X! Signed with an agent, ohmygod wheeeee! I keep them on my mantle where I can see them every time I’m in the room. At first all I had was a loose handful of corks. Now my corks fill a large wine glass. Soon I will have to buy a vase to hold all my corks (that’s on my to-do list for this week, as a matter of fact). When that’s filled, I’ll get a bigger vase, and then a bigger one. My cork collection is constant inspiration and it’s how I celebrate every single success.
What do you think makes young adult books special for writers and for readers?
Being a teenager is wonderful. And horrible. Teens are discovering who they are, and they still have time to become who they want to be. Teens make mistakes. Teens hold their futures in the palms of their hands. Teens have so many choices to make. And all the firsts: first crushes, first kisses, first loves, first breakups. Emotions run deeper. Hearts break harder.
Teens have this combination of bravery, vulnerability, cynicism, ambition, rage, and hope that just isn’t found in people of any other age.
Dystopian, historical, romance, paranormal, thriller: the genre doesn’t matter. What makes YA Lit unique and special are the teen protagonists and their unique inner journeys. That’s why I read and write YA.
Clara’s Fiction Pick
Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man
by Fanny Flagg
Giveaway
Ballantine Books
In Fannie Flagg’s high-spirited first novel, we meet Daisy Fay Harper in the spring of 1952, where she’s “not doing much except sitting around waiting for the sixth grade.” When she leaves Shell Beach, Mississippi, in September 1959, she is packed up and ready for the Miss America Pageant, vowing “I won’t come back until I’m somebody.” But in our hearts she already is.
Sassy and irreverent from the get-go, Daisy Fay takes us on a rollicking journey through her formative years on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. There, at The End of the Road of the South, the family malt shop freezer holds unspeakable things, society maven Mrs. Dot hosts Junior Debutante meetings and shares inspired thoughts for the week (such as “sincerity is as valuable as radium”), and Daisy Fay’s Daddy hatches a quick-cash scheme that involves resurrecting his daughter from the dead in a carefully orchestrated miracle. Along the way, Daisy Fay does a lot of growing up, emerging as one of the most hilarious, appealing, and prized characters in modern fiction.
Purchase Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man at Amazon
Purchase Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man at IndieBound
View Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man on Goodreads
Clara’s Craft Pick
Save the Cat Goes to the Movies: Guide to Every Story Ever Told
by Blake Snyder
Giveaway
Michael Wiese Productions
In the long-awaited sequel to his surprise bestseller, Save the Cat!, author and screenwriter Blake Snyder returns to form in a fast-paced follow-up that proves why his is the most talked-about approach to screenwriting in years. In the perfect companion piece to his first book, Snyder delivers even more insider’s information gleaned from a 20-year track record as ?one of Hollywood’s most successful spec screenwriters, ? giving you the clues to write your movie. Designed for screenwriters, novelists, and movie fans, this book gives readers the key breakdowns of the 50 most instructional movies from the past 30 years. From M*A*S*H to Crash, from Alien to Saw, from 10 to Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Snyder reveals how screenwriters who came before you tackled the same challenges you are facing with the film you want to write ? or the one you are currently working on.
Purchase Save the Cat Goes to the Movies: Guide to Every Story Ever Told at Amazon
Purchase Save the Cat Goes to the Movies: Guide to Every Story Ever Told at IndieBound
View Save the Cat Goes to the Movies: Guide to Every Story Ever Told on Goodreads
Prize Pack 28: Cyn’s Picks
So I did. The book was TANTALIZE by New York Times and Publisher’s Weekly best-selling author Cynthia Leitich Smith, who writes both for young adults and younger children. I read it, and then I read the rest of her series, and the FERAL series, and then I read every book for young adults I could get my hands on. And I haven’t stopped reading or writing YA since. I owe that to Cyn. Corresponding with her for the first time, I lapsed into gawky fangirldom, and I still get a thrill every time. She’s my inspiration for undertaking this incredible journey that I’m on.If you haven’t met her yet, stop by her website at www.cynthialeitichsmith.com. It was named one of the top 10 Writer Sites on the Internet by Writer’s Digest and an ALA Great Website for Kids. Her Cynsations blog at cynthialeitichsmith.blogspot.com/ was listed as among the top two read by the children’s/YA publishing community in the SCBWI “To Market” column.
Visit the Cynsations Blog
Follow Cyn on Twitter
What’s your favorite way to celebrate success, Cyn?
I’m a creature of two minds. Part of me wants to throw a huge, joyful party for my friends — lots of book-themed books, music and decorations. Part of me wants to sit in a rocking chair on the front porch of a country B&B, sip an icy tea and appreciate the view, wherever I may be.
What do you think makes young adult books special for writers and for readers?
YA literature celebrates the cusp of young people turning into the heroes they’re meant to be. And I mean that literally. We’re all the heroes of our own story and the process of reaching the precipice of adulthood is as fascinating as it is inspiring.
Cyn’s Fiction Pick
Blood and Chocolate
by Annette Curtis Klause
Giveaway
Ember
Vivian Gandillon relishes the change, the sweet, fierce ache that carries her from girl to wolf. At sixteen, she is beautiful and strong, and all the young wolves are on her tail. But Vivian still grieves for her dead father; her pack remains leaderless and in disarray, and she feels lost in the suburbs of Maryland. She longs for a normal life. But what is normal for a werewolf?
Then Vivian falls in love with a human, a meat-boy. Aiden is kind and gentle, a welcome relief from the squabbling pack. He’s fascinated by magic, and Vivian longs to reveal herself to him. Surely he would understand her and delight in the wonder of her dual nature, not fear her as an ordinary human would.
Vivian’s divided loyalties are strained further when a brutal murder threatens to expose the pack. Moving between two worlds, she does not seem to belong in either. What is she really–human or beast? Which tastes sweeter–blood or chocolate?
From the Paperback edition.
Purchase Blood and Chocolate at Amazon
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View Blood and Chocolate on Goodreads
Cyn’s Craft Pick
What’s Your Story?
by Marion Dane Bauer
Giveaway
Sandpiper
Discusses how to write fiction, exploring point of view, dialogue, endings, and revision.
This ALA Notable Book is used by writers of all ages. It is accessible enough for young writers and insightful enough to give assistance even to experienced adult writers, especially those wanting to write for children.
Purchase What’s Your Story? at Amazon
Purchase What’s Your Story? at IndieBound
View What’s Your Story? on Goodreads
Prize Pack 29: Georgia’s Picks
What’s your favorite way to celebrate a success, Georgia?
Always with friends, lemoncello cake and wine!
What do you think makes young adult books special for writers and for readers?
YA mimics the time in one’s life when the world is alive and ripe with opportunity and when everything one feels is the best, worst or most intense emotion ever. It’s a time when anything is possible and everything is doable. We are invincible. We are YA.
Georgia’s Craft Pick One
On Writing
by Stephen King
Giveaway
Scribner; 10 Anv edition
“Long live the King” hailed “Entertainment Weekly” upon publication of Stephen King’s “On Writing.” Part memoir, part master class by one of the bestselling authors of all time, this superb volume is a revealing and practical view of the writer’s craft, comprising the basic tools of the trade every writer must have. King’s advice is grounded in his vivid memories from childhood through his emergence as a writer, from his struggling early career to his widely reported, near-fatal accident in 1999–and how the inextricable link between writing and living spurred his recovery. Brilliantly structured, friendly and inspiring, “On Writing” will empower and entertain everyone who reads it–fans, writers, and anyone who loves a great story well told.
Purchase On Writing at Amazon
Purchase On Writing at IndieBound
View On Writing on Goodreads
Georgia’s Craft Pick Two
Self-Editing for Fiction Writers: How to Edit Yourself into Print
by Renni Browne and Dave King
Giveaway
William Morrow Paperbacks; 2 Sub edition
Released 6/16/2012
Hundreds of books have been written on the art of writing. Here at last is a book by two professional editors to teach writers the techniques of the editing trade that turn promising manuscripts into published novels and short stories.
In this completely revised and updated second edition, Renni Browne and Dave King teach you, the writer, how to apply the editing techniques they have developed to your own work. Chapters on dialogue, exposition, point of view, interior monologue, and other techniques take you through the same processes an expert editor would go through to perfect your manuscript. Each point is illustrated with examples, many drawn from the hundreds of books Browne and King have edited.
Purchase Self-Editing for Fiction Writers: How to Edit Yourself into Print at Amazon
Purchase Self-Editing for Fiction Writers: How to Edit Yourself into Print at IndieBound
View Self-Editing for Fiction Writers: How to Edit Yourself into Print on Goodreads
Prize Pack 30: Lorin’s Picks
Last year, I decided I needed to make a leap forward in my writing skills to be able to pull off a tough revision. I’ve been a member of SCBWI for three years, and I was going to conferences, which are excellent. But I wanted something really immersive and transforming. A writing friend recommended the Your Best Book workshop. It was the best decision EVER. She’s an award-winning writer in her own right, and Lorin Oberweger’s students and clients have millions of books in print and have been published by imprints of HarperCollins, Random House, Penguin, Scholastic, and other mainstream and independent presses. They have also gained representation with some of the industry’s leading literary agents. She and the workshop team, including lovely Brenda Windberg, wonderful Emma Dryden, the amazing team of Josh and Tracy Adams, the incredible YA Muses, and every one of the workshop participants, were teachers, cheerleaders, and butt-kickers. I came out of that week with a whole new arsenal of writing tools.
And if that wasn’t enough, which it TOTALLY was, Lorin has offered up a phenomenal opportunity for a lucky writer to win a registration to the STORY MASTERS workshop with Donald Maass, James Scott Bell, and Christopher Vogler.
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Visit Free Expressions
Peek at Lorin’s Blog
Follow Lorin on Twitter
How do you celebrate a success, Lorin?
How do I celebrate a success? My own, or my clients’? In the case of the latter, I celebrate by spreading their good fortune far and wide and taking time to honor the faith and commitment that go into each and every moment of writing. Where my own successes are concerned, I’m pretty low-key in celebrating. (I think this is a Jewish thing about not getting too far ahead of oneself or daring the universe to come and institute a reversal of good fortune.) At best, I usually celebrate with a few triumphant phone calls, a little daydreaming, and a taking stock of all the OTHER work I have to do.
What do you think makes young adult books special for writers and for readers?
In some ways, I feel that our adolescent selves stay with us for our entire lives. Deep within, we still carry the longings, the insecurities, the desires, and also the brilliant, unfettered capacity for dreaming. We grow coping mechanisms and, one hopes, greater reserves of security and self-confidence, but that thrumming tender heart continues to beat within us all. I truly believe that.
So, young adult literature taps into that place within us, a place we’re smart to nurture. And it also offers the ability to live–or relive–so many of life’s juicy firsts: first love; first kiss (and then some); first forays into independence; first tests of ability and competence. It offers, for adult readers and authors, a place in which we can be both nostalgic and inspired at the same time.
Lorin’s Craft Pick 1
The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers
by Christopher Vogler
Giveaway
Michael Wiese Productions; 3rd edition
Released 6/16/2013
See why this book has become an international best seller and a true classic. The Writer’s Journey explores the powerful relationship between mythology and storytelling in a clear, concise style that’s made it required reading for movie executives, screenwriters, playwrights, scholars, and fans of pop culture all over the world. The updated and revised third edition provides new insights and observations from Vogler’s ongoing work on mythology’s influence on stories, movies, and man himself.
Purchase The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers at Amazon
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View The Writers Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers on Goodreads
Lorin’s Craft Pick 2
Writing 21st Century Fiction: High Impact Techniques for Exceptional Storytelling
by Donald Maass
Giveaway
Writer’s Digest Books
Released 6/15/2013
Capture the minds, hearts, and imaginations of 21st century readers!Whether you’re a commercial storyteller or a literary novelist, whether your goal is to write a best-selling novel or captivate readers with a satisfying, beautifully written story, the key to success is the same: high-impact fiction. “Writing 21st Century Fiction” will help you write a novel for today’s readers and market, filled with rich characters, compelling plots, and resonant themes. Author and literary agent Donald Maass shows you how to: Create fiction that transcends genre, conjures characters who look and feel more real” than real people, and shows readers the work around them in new ways.Infuse every page with an electric current of emotional appeal and micro-tension.Harness the power of parallels, symbols, metaphors, and more to illuminate your novel in a lasting way.Develop a personalized method of writing that works for you. With an arsenal of thought-provoking prompts and questions, plus plenty of examples from best-selling titles, “Writing 21st Century Fiction” will strip away your preconceived notions about writing in today’s world and give you the essential tools you need to create fiction that will leave both readers and critics in awe.”
Purchase Writing 21st Century Fiction: High Impact Techniques for Exceptional Storytelling at Amazon
Purchase Writing 21st Century Fiction: High Impact Techniques for Exceptional Storytelling at IndieBound
View Writing 21st Century Fiction: High Impact Techniques for Exceptional Storytelling on Goodreads
Prize Pack 31: YA Highway’s Picks for Writers
One of the first YA group blogs I discovered was YA Highway, and it has remained one of my favorite blogs. The writers on the blog come from different corners of the globe, and they epitomize what I think is a huge part of young adult literature, the ability to explore, to push boundaries, to bridge divides, to fly and soar. These women do, in their books and in their lives. They’re inspiring. And a little frightening. 🙂
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Kirsten Hubbard Kristin Halbrook Kaitlin Ward Kate Hart Stephanie Kuehn Sarah Enni Amy Lukavics |
Lee Bross Leila Austin Sumayyah Daud Veronica Roth Debra Driza Emilia Plater |
If you haven’t met them yet, go take a peek.
YA Highway’s Fiction Pick
Charm & Strange
by Stephanie Kuehn
Giveaway
St. Martin’s Griffin
Released 6/12/2013
When you’ve been kept caged in the dark, it’s impossible to see the forest for the trees. It’s impossible to see anything, really. Not without bars . . .
Andrew Winston Winters is at war with himself.
He’s part Win, the lonely teenager exiled to a remote Vermont boarding school in the wake of a family tragedy. The guy who shuts all his classmates out, no matter the cost.
He’s part Drew, the angry young boy with violent impulses that control him. The boy who spent a fateful, long-ago summer with his brother and teenage cousins, only to endure a secret so monstrous it led three children to do the unthinkable.
Over the course of one night, while stuck at a party deep in the New England woods, Andrew battles both the pain of his past and the isolation of his present.
Before the sun rises, he’ll either surrender his sanity to the wild darkness inside his mind or make peace with the most elemental of truths—that choosing to live can mean so much more than not dying.
Purchase Charm & Strange at Amazon
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View Charm & Strange on Goodreads
YA Highway’s Craft Pick
Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life
by Anne Lamott
Giveaway
Anchor; 1 edition
Released 6/15/2013
“Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he’d had three months to write. [It] was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother’s shoulder, and said. ‘Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.'”
With this basic instruction always in mind, Anne Lamott returns to offer us a new gift: a step-by-step guide on how to write and on how to manage the writer’s life. From “Getting Started,’ with “Short Assignments,” through “Shitty First Drafts,” “Character,” “Plot,” “Dialogue.” all the way from “False Starts” to “How Do You Know When You’re Done?” Lamott encourages, instructs, and inspires. She discusses “Writers Block,” “Writing Groups,” and “Publication.” Bracingly honest, she is also one of the funniest people alive.
If you have ever wondered what it takes to be a writer, what it means to be a writer, what the contents of your school lunches said about what your parents were really like, this book is for you. From faith, love, and grace to pain, jealousy, and fear, Lamott insists that you keep your eyes open, and then shows you how to survive. And always, from the life of the artist she turns to the art of life.
Purchase Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life at Amazon
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View Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life on Goodreads
Prize Pack 32: Bonus Pack for Readers
Mountains Beyond Mountains (Adapted for Young People): The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would
by Tracy Kidder and Michael French
Hardcover Giveaway
Delacorte Books for Young Readers; Reprint edition
Released 4/9/2013
Meet Dr. Paul Farmer, a Harvard-educated doctor with a self-proclaimed mission to transform healthcare on a global scale. Tracy Kidder follows Farmer’s quest as he focuses his attention on some of the world’s most impoverished people and uses unconventional ways in which to provide healthcare, to achieve real results and save lives.
Purchase Mountains Beyond Mountains (Adapted for Young People): The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would at Amazon
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View Mountains Beyond Mountains (Adapted for Young People): The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would on Goodreads
The Language Inside
by Holly Thompson
Hardcover Giveaway
Delacorte Books for Young Readers
Released 5/14/2013
A nuanced novel in verse that explores identity in a multicultural world.
Emma Karas was raised in Japan; it’s the country she calls home. But when her mother is diagnosed with breast cancer, Emma’s family moves to a town outside Lowell, Massachusetts, to stay with Emma’s grandmother while her mom undergoes treatment.
Emma feels out of place in the United States.She begins to have migraines, and longs to be back in Japan. At her grandmother’s urging, she volunteers in a long-term care center to help Zena, a patient with locked-in syndrome, write down her poems. There, Emma meets Samnang, another volunteer, who assists elderly Cambodian refugees. Weekly visits to the care center, Zena’s poems, dance, and noodle soup bring Emma and Samnang closer, until Emma must make a painful choice: stay in Massachusetts, or return home early to Japan.
“With beautiful language and deep sensitivity, Holly Thompson explores the courage it takes to find your own voice.” —Patricia McCormick, author of National Book Award finalist Never Fall Down
“Thompson, working in a free-verse style that becomes a seamless piece of a world imbued with poetry, weaves [the plot strands] together skillfully. The result is a touching portrait of Emma working through loss and opportunity as Lowell becomes not just “not-Japan,” but the site of new connections and a possible romance.”—
Publisher’s Weekly
Purchase The Language Inside at Amazon
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View The Language Inside on Goodreads
Prize Pack 33: Bonus Pack for Readers
The Beautiful and the Cursed
by Page Morgan
Hardcover Giveaway
Delacorte Press
Released 5/14/2013
After a bizarre accident, Ingrid Waverly is forced to leave London with her mother and younger sister, Gabby, trading a world full of fancy dresses and society events for the unfamiliar city of Paris.
In Paris there are no grand balls or glittering parties, and, disturbingly, the house Ingrid’s twin brother, Grayson, found for them isn’t a house at all. It’s an abandoned abbey, its roof lined with stone gargoyles that could almost be mistaken for living, breathing creatures.
And Grayson has gone missing.
No one seems to know of his whereabouts but Luc, a devastatingly handsome servant at their new home.
Ingrid is sure her twin isn’t dead—she can feel it deep in her soul—but she knows he’s in grave danger. It will be up to her and Gabby to navigate the twisted path to Grayson, a path that will lead Ingrid on a discovery of dark secrets and otherworldly truths. And she’ll learn that once they are uncovered, they can never again be buried.
Purchase The Beautiful and the Cursed at Amazon
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View The Beautiful and the Cursed on Goodreads
Doomed
by Tracy Deebs
Hardcover Giveaway
Walker Childrens
Released 1/8/2013
Author Question: What is your favorite thing about Doomed?
his is actually a hard question for me to answer simply because I both really love and really hate this book. Doomed was the hardest book I’ve ever written (and I’ve written 27) and I cursed it every day I was writing it– and every day for six months after it was done. But it’s also the book I am most proud of. If I have to choose one thing that I love about the book now that it’s finished, it’s my three main characters. I think Pandora is a kick-ass female heroine who is trying to do her best to undo her mistakes even as the world falls apart around her. Theo and Eli, who are my modern day take on the Titans Prometheus and Epimetheus, are also really strong in the face of continuing adversity. Both play a huge part in the Pandora myth and in Doomed. It was a challenge to capture their personalities for 2012 as depicted in the myths about them, but I’m really pleased with how they turned out (especially Theo, who I think is an awesome YA hero). I really hope my readers agree 🙂
Purchase Doomed at Amazon
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View Doomed on Goodreads
Prize Pack 34: Martina’s Picks
Tantalize
by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Giveaway
Candlewick; a edition
Released 6/16/2013
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APPLY IN PERSON BETWEEN 2:00 AND 4:00 PM.
Quincie Morris has never felt more alone. Her parents are dead, and her hybrid-werewolf first love is threatening to embark on a rite of passage that will separate them forever. Then, as she and her uncle are about to unveil their hot vampire-themed restaurant, a brutal murder leaves them scrambling for a chef. Can Quincie transform their new hire into a culinary Dark Lord before opening night? Can he wow the crowd in his fake fangs, cheap cape, and red contact lenses — or is there more to this earnest face than meets the eye? As human and preternatural forces clash, a deadly love triangle forms, and the line between predator and prey begins to blur. Who’s playing whom? And how long can Quincie play along before she loses everything? TANTALIZE marks Cynthia Leitich Smith’s delicious debut as a preeminent author of dark fantasy.
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Prize Pack 35: Martina’s Picks











