Guest Post from Dori Jones Yang, author of Daughter of Xanadu

Today, I am very happy to welcome Dori Jones Yang to the blog, the author of the newly released YA historical Daughter of Xanadu. I haven't managed to get hold of a copy yet because it's not available in the UK but it's been on my TBR list for a while now and I'm really looking forward to reading it. I hope you enjoy finding out more about Daughter of Xanadu as much as I did!

Here is the link to Daughter of Xanadu's Goodreads page.

 Welcome Dori! :

Hi, Stephanie and friends! Greetings from Seattle.

The powerful and beautiful cover!



January 11 was a big day for me, the publication, by Random House, of my YA historical novel, Daughter of Xanadu. This is a book straight from my heart, and I worked on it for almost ten years. The story-behind-the-story is one of persistence, revision, reimagining, and more persistence. I got knocked down several times, stood back up, stuck to my dreams, and this beautiful book is the happy result. Hope you'll stick to the pursuit of your dreams, too!

Daughter of Xanadu is an adventure story about a 16-year-old girl, eldest granddaughter of the Great Khubilai Khan, who is eager to become the first woman to join the Mongol Army. She gets distracted when she meets a man from a distant, backward land: Marco Polo. Because of him, she begins to see her world from a new perspective. Like many of us today, she has to juggle family expectations, personal ambition, and the desires of her heart.

This novel has an unusual setting: the Mongol Empire in the 13th century. I chose this era because of my interest in Marco Polo, who was the first European to write about China. When he got there in 1275, Khubilai Khan was ruling the largest empire in history from a magnificent palace, wearing robes made of cloth of gold and drinking mare's milk from golden goblets. In just two generations, the Mongols had risen to this lavish lifestyle from their traditional nomadic ways as herders and raiders, living in tents. We think of the Mongols as barbarians, but after they conquered much of the world, they established peace over many lands. That peace allowed Europeans, including Marco Polo, to travel all the way to China and back for the first time. What they learned in China helped prepare Europe to surge ahead.
Researching the Mongol era was fascinating for me. I read a lot of old books, including the ultimate source book, The Secret History of the Mongols. The most fun was traveling to Mongolia, where I stayed in a ger (yurt), drank fermented mare's milk, rode camels, and watched Mongolia's national games of horse racing, archery, and wrestling. I also managed to locate the ruins of Xanadu, site of Khubilai Khan's summer palace ' an off-the-beaten-track discovery.


I hope you'll enjoy Daughter of Xanadu. It's available in North America only right now, but my agent is working on getting a UK publisher. To find out more about the book, please visit me at www.dorijonesyang.com. Thanks!

P.S. I love that 2011 YA Historical Fiction Challenge. Go for it!


Thank you Dori! Daughter of Xanadu would be perfect for participants of the YA Historical Fiction Challenge. The Mongol Empire setting sounds really fascinating, it and I think the originality of the setting will really appeal to fans of historical fiction.


If you're interested in Daughter of Xanadu, be sure to visit Dori's website HERE to find out more and I also really recommend that you take a look at the book's fantastic trailer HERE!

*Apologies for some earlier spelling mistakes- now corrected!

Guest Post: For all fans of the Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead!

To celebrate the release of the last book in the Vampire Academy series, Last Sacrifice and my UK giveaway of either the first or last book, I am delighted to introduce the lovely Jess from Jess Hearts Books to tell us more about the series and why it is her favourite.  Welcome Jess!                 

The Vampire Academy books are by far my favourite vampire series and are one of my favourite paranormal series of all time. Vampire Academy is highly original- something you may not expect with the amount of vampire fiction out there at the moment- but Richelle Mead creates a brand new enticing world, with a brand new take on vampires to go with it. The Vampire Academy world has three types of vampires. Strigoi- the traditional bad ass vampires, immortal, evil, blood thirsty and ancient these vampires are feared and are the most powerful of their kind. Then you have Moroi- vampire royalty these vamps are not immortal and are I guess you would say “the good vampires” they only feed on willing human donors and are highly beautiful. Moroi vampires also inherit a power with one of the elements. Strigoi can feed off Moroi and can change them into Strigoi and the royal families are fast fading because of it, so they have Dhampires- half vampire, half humans- train to fight Strigoi and protect Moroi royals to keep the vampire race alive. There are so many layers to this world and the different vampires and I love how the Moroi’s magical connection with the elements plays a big part in the story.

The main character of Vampire Academy is our heroine Rose whose a Dhampire training to become guardian and protector to her best friend Lissa a Moroi princess. The first book in this series sees Lissa and Rose returning to St Vladimir's- a school for Moroi and Dhampires- after being on the run. Upon their return Rose gets assigned to Guardian Dimitri to help her catch up with her training as a guardian and Dimitri, oh what can I say about Dimitri? The man is smokin’ hot! He’s a hot blooded Russian, bad ass god and the only reason you wouldn’t fall for him is if you’re not a red blooded woman. Dimitri’s the ultimate bad boy with a kind sensitive soul and is one of my very favourite male characters in YA fiction to swoon over. Between Rose and Dimitri and their attraction to each other you can literally feel the sexual tension sweltering off the pages. They are one hot couple and I can think of no two characters more perfect for each other. As well as Dimitri I have a huge girl crush on Rose. She’s feisty, sassy, smart and strong and can more than hold her own against the big bad Strigoi. She’s certainly no Bella Swan, head strong and confident girls of all ages will look up to and respect her and ultimately want to be her. Lissa gets into all kinds of trouble on their return to school and Rose proves to be the perfect best friend to her with the girls having a very special, unique bond that you will learn more about if you read the books!

This series has everything, it’s original, fast paced and has one of the best plots I’ve ever come across. Having read all of the books in this series including the highly anticipated Last Sacrifice I’ve come to feel like the characters are old friends and I’m very sad to see Rose and Cos story come to an end. Reading Last Sacrifice was definitely a very bitter sweet experience for me! I have thoroughly loved and enjoyed every minute I’ve spent within these books pages and if you pick the books up I’m sure you’ll fall in love with them too. Vampire Academy is one of those series where each book is better than the last and probably more than any series I’ll ever read I would highly recommend these books to all paranormal lovers. I can’t begin to do this series justice. I love it so much and know that if you start and carry on with this series you will too. I’ve read a lot of great vampire fiction and for me Vampire Academy by far excels all of them. These books should come with a warning “read these and prepare to say goodbye to your current favourite series because this is sure to take its place!” But don’t take my word for it try them and see for yourself! ;)

For those who have read this series you may be interested in my recent review for Last Sacrifice which can be found on my blog here. Thanks for having me Stephanie!"

Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts here Jess! It has been a treat to have you. I hope other people enjoy reading them as much as I have. I'm so glad to hear that each book gets better and better. I was gripped by the first book in the series that transported me into another world and I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the series soon.
I really recommend if you are interested in the series, that you also read Jess' wonderful spoiler free review of Last Sacrifice that she mentioned. Jess is a brilliant fellow UK blogger who started blogging at the same time as me so whilst you are there, be sure to check out the rest of her blog!

Reminder: I am holding a UK giveaway of either Vampire Academy or Last Scarifice (you choose) by Richelle Mead with 3 winners  that ends on the 31st December. To find out more, visit the post here!

These are the new UK covers that have been designed to celebrate the Last Sacrifice release. I love them!

I'm also interested to know: what do you think the future for vampire fiction is?