This is How it Happened | Xpresso Reads

Exclusive Cover Reveal for This is How it Happened by Paula Stokes + ARC Giveaway

Posted by Rashika • 32 Comments

I know its a Monday and everyone is like UGH, weekend come back again, but today we are hosting an exclusive cover reveal for THIS IS HOW IT HAPPENED by Paula Stokes so I am actually excited about it being a Monday (*gasp*)

Not only is Stokes a wonderful human, she is also a wonderful writer and having read four of her books, I can say this with confidence. Girl Against the Universe is one of my favorite books of 2016 and Vicarious is an equally amazing action filled novel that came out this year so there are books by her out in the world that you could already be checking out and fangirling over.

Anywayy (I am quite the talker, aren’t I?) I am REALLY REALLY excited for THIS IS HOW IT HAPPENED and you guys should be too beacuse the cover is gorgeous and it sounds even better. Over to Paula!

Paula: Hiiiii 😀 I am so excited to be here on Xpresso Reads, sharing the cover of my 2017 HarperTeen contemporary novel with you. THIS IS HOW IT HAPPENED will release next July, and once again it’s quite different from all of my other novels. I’m thrilled that Rashika is revealing the cover for me, because I was lucky enough to meet her at the Anderson’s YA Lit Conference and it’s always nice to put a face and a smile with an awesome bookish person 😀

I’ve been pretty quiet about this book because I drafted it in just a few weeks after I crashed and burned on JACK OF HEARTS (Sorry Copenhagen lovers) and it wasn’t until recently that I was sure it was going to be finished in time for a 2017 release. But thankfully the ARC faeries are hard at work making the ARCs while I make the inevitable ARC fixes, and the book is basically all ready to go.

5 Fun Facts about THIS IS HOW IT HAPPENED:

1. This story takes place part in St. Louis, where I grew up, and part in Springdale, Utah, one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. (And if you know me, you know I’ve been lucky enough to visit a lot of beautiful places!)

2. This book starts with a blog post and goes on to include a lot of tweets and comments. Some of the blogger and commenter names are secret homages to personal friends and fictional characters I love. Look closely and you’ll find little references to stuff like The Crow and the TV show UnReal.

3. Main character Genevieve has divorced parents, one of whom has remarried. I know that isn’t exactly a “fun fact” but it’s meaningful to me because my own parents underwent a pretty harsh divorce when I was eighteen and this book gave me the opportunity to tap into and explore some of the pain and conflict from that time.

4. Genevieve is a runner who also becomes a bit of a hiker when she finds herself in gorgeous Zion National Park. The hike Genevieve and Elliott go on together is called Angel’s Landing and it’s a real hike that I’ve done several times. It’s also a hike where several people have died.

5. One of the first people Genevieve meets when she arrives in Springdale is Elliott, a nineteen-year-old park guide with two amazing dads, one of which is a competitor on American Ninja Warrior. Do you guys know how much I love American Ninja Warrior? Do you?? I will spare you a long speech about how good that show is and how it’s the epitome of triumph over adversity and focus over distraction and good sportsmanship and camaraderie and, well, I guess I won’t spare you the speech after all. But there’s a little bit of ANW in this book and I did so much Warped Wall research that I’m almost ready to give it a try myself 😉