{Mad About Nails+Book Giveaway} Celebrate THE ORPHAN QUEEN by Jodi Meadows with Fun Nail Art Ideas!

Follow the tour to see some really cool fan creations!

3/2 - Andi's ABCs

3/3 - Hello, Chelly

3/4 - Book Emoji

3/5 - So Obsessed With

3/6 - Tune into Books

3/9 - Ticket to Anywhere

3/10 - Disquietus Reads

3/11 - A Backwards Story

3/12 - Writer of Wrongs

3/13 - Alexa Loves Books

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I've had quite a few people comment on my nails in the past ask what I was using or wish I'd done a close-up so they could see better, etc., etc., and had a realization: Why not do a feature on nail polish? It's not book-related (Unless you're wearing HUNGER GAMES or THE GIVER-inspired lines from China Glaze...), or unless I  bookish nail art, but it's fun!

So I stressed A LOT about what to do for today's Fan Creation Blog Tour Stop to celebrate the release of Jodi Meadows' THE ORPHAN QUEEN.

It would have been so much easier to do a review because the book is so stinking good, buuuut you'll have to wait until tomorrow to see that. (And I MIGHT have added some "fan creations" of a sort to that as well in the form of .gifs, which you know I never do!)

I'll also have a write-up of last night's awesome launch for you this weekend!

Buuuut because I LOVE you, here's a teaser photo:

...And both posts will get you EXTRA ENTRIES in a giveaway to win your own copy of THE ORPHAN QUEEN! Oooooh, Ahhhh!!!!!

TITLE: The Orphan Queen

AUTHOR: Jodi Meadows

SERIES: The Orphan Queen #1

PUBLISHER: Katherine Tegen Books

PUBLICATION DATE: March 10, 2015

FIND IT: GOODREADS || AMAZON || BARNES & NOBLE || INDIEBOUND || BOOK DEPOSITORY

SYNOPSIS:

Wilhelmina has a hundred identities.She is a princess. When the Indigo Kingdom conquered her homeland, Wilhelmina and other orphaned children of nobility were taken to Skyvale, the Indigo Kingdom’s capital. Ten years later, they are the Ospreys, experts at stealth and theft. With them, Wilhelmina means to take back her throne.

She is a spy. Wil and her best friend, Melanie, infiltrate Skyvale Palace to study their foes. They assume the identities of nobles from a wraith-fallen kingdom, but enemies fill the palace, and Melanie’s behavior grows suspicious. With Osprey missions becoming increasingly dangerous and their leader more unstable, Wil can’t trust anyone.

She is a threat. Wraith is the toxic by-product of magic, and for a century using magic has been forbidden. Still the wraith pours across the continent, reshaping the land and animals into fresh horrors. Soon it will reach the Indigo Kingdom. Wilhelmina’s magic might be the key to stopping the wraith, but if the vigilante Black Knife discovers Wil’s magic, she will vanish like all the others,

Jodi Meadows introduces a vivid new fantasy full of intrigue, romance, dangerous magic, and one girl’s battle to reclaim her place in the world.

Alexa Loves Books put Jodi's THE ORPHAN QUEEN tour together in two waves. One reveals details about various characters, while the other features a mix of reviews and fan art. She asked me to do a fan art post, and...wellllllllll, I'm not an artist! STRESS STRESS STRESS Sooooo she suggested NAIL ART because she knows I love it.

PLUS, I've previously done nail art to celebrate Jodi Meadows,

complete with a wrap-up post:

So there's history here!!! It's not COMPLETELY random...

Let me tell you hard it is to do nail art for a series about mirrors. I've actually been thinking about it a LOT lately because last night, I was lucky enough to attend the official launch party for Jodi Meadows and THE ORPHAN QUEEN at Books of Wonder in NYC. I wanted really awesome nails to celebrate such a beloved author!

Seriously. I kept bugging poor Jodi on Twitter about possible designs!

And then...the time change happened Saturday night/Sunday morning. It threw me out of whack and I fell asleep early on Sunday night when I got home after being away all day when I should have been prepping my nails. So I wound up with something fun but simple.

BUT THERE WERE SO MANY OPTIONS!!!!

If you're going to an upcoming event with Jodi Meadows or just want a cool mirror-esque look to your nails as you read THE ORPHAN QUEEN, here are some cool looks:

Ultimately, I went with wearing Orly "Mirrorball" and had no extra bells and whistles. BUT the polish is so gorgeous and stunning in person that I don't care:

Alexa actually took this picture for me this morning! Thanks, Alexa! ♡

And here it is in bright daylight, where the color REALLY pops:

In January, I did a full post talking about "Mirrorball" and its quality. It's definitely one of my favorite new polishes!

I also *really* love the way it's called MIRRORball because mirrors are really important in the novel...and the second book will even be called THE MIRROR KING!

****NONE OF THE FOLLOWING IMAGES BELONG TO ME! 

The only fingers that are mine are above showing off "Mirrorball!"****

What I REALLY wanted to do was a gradient of black/white/silver:

OR

 If I didn't have three short nails ATM, I would have loved to do French tips like this:

My other favorite option was sleek and fun, but I didn't have the right type of glitter to pull it off:

If you're artsy and careful, you can also play with foil and make your nails look like mirrors in ways no polish can quite replicate:

 Here's a picture of four different ways someone attempted to make a mirror-like surface:

Foil is simple to do, but also complicated if you want to do it smoothly without blemishes!

My other big consideration was doing the water marbling technique to make something cool like this person did:

So.....YEAH. I realize that I thought WAY TOO HARD about how to do my nails to celebrate THE ORPHAN QUEEN, especially since it wound up NOT HAPPENING.

(But, again, I can't be TOO mad at myself because I love "Mirrorball" so darn much!)

If you deck out your nails to celebrate THE ORPHAN QUEEN, I'd love to see! Shoot me a picture! ^_^

But...there's no point in an awesome manicure if you don't have a book to go with it, right?

HarperCollins is graciously giving away a copy of THE ORPHAN QUEEN to one of you lucky readers!!!

US Only!

Good luck! 

a Rafflecopter giveaway

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Jodi Meadows lives and writes in the Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, with her husband, a Kippy*, and an alarming number of ferrets. She is a confessed book addict, and has wanted to be a writer ever since she decided against becoming an astronaut. She is the author of the INCARNATE Trilogy and the forthcoming ORPHAN QUEEN Duology (HarperCollins/Katherine Tegen).

*A Kippy is a cat.

FIND JODI AT: 
WEBSITE || TWITTER || GOODREADS || TUMBLR || FACEBOOK

 

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