Last Minute Contest for Giveaways

Deadline is tomorrow, December 21st, so you want to scoot over here quickly!

Tina Anne Forkner is hosting a contest with some great CDs and books for giveaway. You enter by commenting on her blog, and there are extra credit entries. Here is her description from her website, or travel directly by clicking here.

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BIG BOOK AND CHRISTMAS CD GIVEAWAY!

I am so excited that my agent has given me a whole box of amazing products to give away to one lucky person! This is a short contest, so get the word out! Leave your comments or email me atforkner@yahoo.com by Sunday, December 21st!

Update: Receive Five Extra Entries if you post about this contest on your own blog and leave the link here. *AND Just a note that you can also enter by emailing me directly or by leaving your comments on my Facebook page or my Cafe Mom page. Some of you already have! *

New Prize Expansion Update: my publisher has generously donated a box of books! See the books included, in addition to the great CDs below.

The Gift Package Includes:

GRAND PRIZE
Amy Grant CD - The Christmas Collection
Travis Cottrell CD - Ring The Bells
Travis Cottrell CD - Found
Point of Grace CD - Tennessee Christmas
Point of Grace CD - How You Live Deluxe Edition
Michael W. Smith CD - It’s a Wonderful Christmas
Tina Ann Forkner - My novel, Ruby Among Us
New Book Additions to the Grand Prize!
God Gave Us Christmas, Lisa T. Bergren
My Mother’s Wish, Jerry Camery-Hoggatt
Bon Appetit, by Sandra Byrd
Sister Chicks Go Brit!, by Robin Jones Gunn

2nd Prize
The Sweetgum Knit Lit Society, Beth Patillo
When Zeffie Got a Clue, Peggy Darty
Ruby Among Us, Tina Ann Forkner
The Busy Mom’s Devotional, by Lisa T. Bergren

3rd Prize
Cyndere’s Midnight, Jeffrey Overstreet
Boo Humbug, Rene Gutteridge
A Mile in My Flip-Flops, by Melody Carlson

Runner Up
101 Cups of Water, by c.d. baker

Here are the Rules:
(Note: If you live outside of the United States or Canada and happen to win the prize, we’ll ship to any United States address you choose.)

1) Leave a comment and be sure it links back to your email information or that you leave your email in the comment.

2) Five Extra Entries - If you have given to a charitable cause in 2008.

3) Two Extra Entries - If you buy a copy of Ruby Among Us in December. You are on the honor system here.

4) One Extra Entry - If you have ever purchased a copy of Ruby Among Us.

5) One Extra Entry - If you have purchased ANY book during the month of December.

6) One Extra Entry - If you have purchased any CD by one of the artists mentioned in this giveaway during the year 2008.

7) One Extra Entry - If you have ever checked Ruby Among Us out from the library.

One Extra Entry - If you have ever read Ruby Among Us at all.

We Have a Winner!

Everyone, thanks so much for entering the contest for my sister's writing book! (the book I was going to give to her, not the one she wrote, since she hasn't written any :-) It was great to hear from so many people.

Well, I have a winner. Let me explain the determination:

On last Monday's (12/1/08) post, I set up the rule that one comment per blog entry would be eligible for the drawing. I would enter each comment/name into a bowl, and randomly draw someone out.

When I'd tallied all of the names on my sheet of paper and put ticks next to each name for the number of comments, I found that there were a total of 40 comments. The next step was to give each comment a unique number from 1 to 40. You can see the list of names and unique numbers at the bottom of this blog entry.

The list of names goes from most recent blog entry to oldest. I started at the top of each blog entry, so the list of names isn't quite reverse-chronological, and then I counted each comment given by each name sequentially and assigned a number. Yes, if I were doing this experiment absolutely correctly I would have randomized the comments to then assign a number, but this is truly a pain, my dear readers. I figured my procedure was random enough.

Next, when it actually came down to it I didn't want to physically write 40 numbers on scraps of paper and put them in a bowl. Instead I went to a random number generator here and instructed it to pick a number between 1 and 40, inclusive. The generator gave me number 7. This is one of Sarah's numbers, so congratulations Sarah!

But wait, there's more!

I STILL have 9 extra ARCs that will deplete my stock -- but since some people indicated an interest in reading the ARC as much as the Truby writing book, I decided to award a multiple second prize. What the heck, right? Back to the random number generator. The numbers generated were 31, 14, 39, 38, 20, 13, 20, 29, 1. I had to run the generator one more time, since 20 occurred twice. This number was 4.

Therefore, the second-prize winners of these ARCs are:

Lynn (31)
Jessica (14)
Chi (39)
Dmarks (38)
Billy (20)
Inspire (13)
Avily (29)
Joanne (1)
Ruth (4)

OK, I have emails for everyone but Jessica. Jessica, I'll leave a comment on your blog, but get in touch, OK? Everyone else, I'll write you directly -- I need addys to send the books out. I'll be sending by media mail which is cheap, but very slow at this time of year.

To everyone, thanks for participating. The book will be available on amazon by February if not before, so check back!

This contest turned into a bigger deal than I thought :-) But I for one loved it. Thank you, everyone!

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Joanne (2 comments) unique numbers 1, 2

Ruth (3 comments) unique numbers 3, 4, 5

Sarah (6 comments) unique numbers 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11

Inspire (2 comments) unique numbers 12, 13

Jessica (1 comment) unique number 14

Gwen (1 comment) unique number 15

Lydia (3 comments) unique numbers 16, 17, 18

Billy (2 comments) unique numbers 19, 20

Alison (2 comments) unique numbers 21, 22

Philangelus (2 comments) unique numbers 23, 24

Rosslyn (2 comments) unique numbers 25, 26

Avily (4 comments) unique numbers 27, 28, 29, 30

Lynn (3 comments) unique numbers 31, 32, 33

Travis (1 comment) unique number 34

Brenda Susan (2 comments) unique numbers 35, 36

Julie (1 comment) unique number 37

Dmarks (1 comment) unique number 38

Chi (1 comment) unique number 39

Nancy (1 comment) unique number 40

Christmas Book Giveaway!

I am a writing book junkie, constantly searching for REALLY GOOD BOOKS to learn more about story construction or story writing. Every year I buy two or so *best of the best* that I've run across for my sister for the holidays, who is laboring to create a novel in between taking care of a husband and toddler.



One of the books I selected for her this year it turns out she already has -- so here I am with a beautiful new book, fresh from amazon, that I've found is extremely helpful! I've been reading this book while sitting at my computer, and answering the writing exercises and questions, and have discovered (internal) angles of my story I hadn't thought of before. It's certainly a good read, albeit intense.

Here's the deal:

Since it's December 1st, we'll call this a Christmas contest. I don't want any big deal thing, so let's do it that each comment between today (Dec 1st) and Saturday (Dec 6) becomes eligible (one comment per person per day) for the grand book drawing that I'll hold on Sunday. Winner is selected by random drawing -- I'll put all comments/names in a bowl and draw one out. Comments can be about that day's topic, current events, topics you'd like me to write about, saying hello, whatever.

But wait, there's more!

I have a few ARCs still left. For the winner of the drawing, if you would also like a copy of my own book A Lever Long Enough (either for yourself or for a holiday present) let me know and I'll autograph it and send it on. These are *limited editions*, advance reader copies, but otherwise it's the same book that will be released on January 12 on amazon. Retail price for Lever will be $15.95, so this is quite a deal! (providing you like the story, of course :-)

OK everyone, happy start of Christmas season.

~enjoy the carols, my dear friend~