I am thrilled to be hosting a spot
on the THE MIND GAME by M.G. Harris Blog Tour hosted by Rockstar Book Tours. Check out
my post and make sure to enter the giveaway!
About The Book:
Author: M.G. Harris
Pub. Date: April 4, 2024
Publisher: Darkwater Books
Formats: Hardcover, Paperback, eBook
Pages: 298
Find it: Goodreads, https://books2read.com/THE-MIND-GAME
Read for FREE with a Kindle Unlimited membership.
Years have passed since her childhood
friend disappeared, but Roni remains consumed by the mystery. Can she uncover
what happened to Maxim Santiago?
Podcast fame thrusts 17-year-old Roni into a perilous quest to find her missing
friend, who disappeared from Dulles Airport, Washington D.C. She teams up with
tech-savvy Kenzie to crack cryptic messages and unearth a dark secret about
trafficked kids. Dodging shadowy agents of the ruthless Russian dictator waging
a global ‘Mind Game’ on his enemies, they end up in a sweltering Mexican town,
a nexus for refugees.
They shared childhood memories, but Maxim has changed. He’s older, wiser,
perhaps even dangerous. Now he seeks their help to rescue enslaved children
guarding a world-shaking secret, but time’s running out. Roni and Kenzie dive
into Maxim’s risky mission, testing their friendship amid a struggle for
control of a key project that could win the ‘Mind Game.’
It's a journey that brings Roni an astonishing self-discovery. Can she trust
in herself to help the rescue succeed?
From “sci-fi author M.G. Harris, creator of the best-selling Joshua Files” (Radio
Times Magazine, 5th September 2013) comes an espionage mystery thriller for
teens and young adults, set in a world of geopolitical conflicts that sits
rather closely to our own post-pandemic world.
Praise for M. G. Harris:
- "MG
Harris proves she has a deft touch and a real skill for writing
heart-stopping adventure" Vanessa Curtis, 16 February 2008,
The Glasgow Herald
- “M.G.
Harris is a very skilled storyteller” Ed Fortune, Starburst
Magazine, 2014
- “Harris
keeps the tension high throughout the action sequences” Paul
Simpson, Sci-Fi Bulletin, 2015
- “Harris’s
prose is nice and breezy” Michael Cook, Geek Vibes Nation, 2023
Book Trailer:
Interview Questions
For the readers: can
you tell us a little bit about your book and the characters?
‘The Mind Game’ is the first in a series of YA spy
thrillers, set in a reality geopolitically similar to ours, but with a
sci-fi/fantasy tweak.
I have planned a series of trilogies, the first of which
sets up the origin story of 17-year-old, soon-to-be D.C. International High
school graduate, Roni Padilla. She investigates the mystery of Maxim Santiago,
a school friend who went missing five years prior. When she and her
bestie/adoptive brother, Kenzie, track down Maxim to Chiapas, Mexico, they’re
drawn into helping him complete a mission to liberate other kids like him from
a camp in Cuba.
As in our own reality, there’s a worldwide struggle to hold
onto freedoms against an axis of autocratic powers that are using all kinds of
chicanery to destabilize democratic nations. Whoever gets access to Maxim and
other kids like him could win the edge in this global mind game.
For Roni, her unique relationship to Maxim makes her a
target for recruitment by intelligence services. That’s the direction the
series takes. Actions she takes in book 1, relationships she makes and things
she learns about herself, they all contribute to a decision she makes in book
3.
What are you working
on now?
I’ve just finished the first draft of book 3, which takes
Roni to South Korea. Now I’m moving onto the fourth book, a prequel centering
Maxim and two other side characters who show up in ‘False Flag,’ book 2. Their
backstory is referred to quite a bit in the first trilogy, so I felt it’d be
the right time for a pause in Roni’s story and to find out more about them.
Were any of the
characters in the book inspired by people from your real life?
In ‘The Mind Game’ Roni is living with the family of Kenzie,
her best friend from school. He has two moms, and I did base these characters
on two close friends, a lesbian couple who have two kids. Originally I used
their real names until I realized I needed my characters to do things and make
decisions that my friends might not, so I changed the names. It’s surprisingly
challenging to make fictional characters inspired by real people depart from
what you think those real people would actually do! And similarly difficult for
those people to read it, so all round it was better to change their names.
Who was your favorite
character to write? What about your least favorite?
I usually write from the point of view of a single character
only, the exception being my EMANCIPATED series for Harper Teen, authored as
M.G. Reyes. The narrator is always my favorite to write because I get the most
experience doing it.
In ‘The Mind Game’ it’s Roni Padilla. For the first time in
my writing career I’m writing a narrator who is consciously addressing an
audience, which is a new challenge, very fun. Precisely who Roni’s audience is, that’s tbd. Of all the characters I’ve ever
written, she is the one perhaps most similar to me, which makes her a little
easier to write. At least until she starts doing crazy difficult stuff that I
would probably run a mile from!
My least favorite character is usually the one who features
least, because I know them less well than the others. My books usually have a
lot of plot and action going on, and only enough space to focus on the main
character and their closest relationships. Side characters don’t get a lot of
focus. But that’s the advantage of writing a series, I can feature different
characters more in future.
What is your favorite
passage/scene in your book?
Without giving too much away, there are a couple scenes
where Roni gets the first inklings of abilities she didn’t know she had. In
book 1, she doesn’t yet understand the implications of her experience in those
scenes. There are scenes where the payoff is in book 2, ‘False Flag’ (out in
hardback at the end of October!), which makes them mysterious, maybe a little
spooky. I love writing things like that.
What kind of research
did you have to do for the story?
Mostly geographical research, some travel in Mexico and
Cuba, some technical research about helicopters. Thankfully, less than in my
previous series ‘The Joshua Files’ and ‘Gemini Force 1’! As ‘The Mind Game’
series develops with plots more along the lines of espionage thrillers, I’m
finding I need to research aspects of tradecraft for the intelligence services.
Luckily one of the new authors I’ve started reading is a former MI6 operative
writing under a pseudonym and ‘he’ kindly agreed to answer my questions.
Lightning Round
Questions
What are you reading
right now? Or what do you have on your TBR that you’re dying to read?
Right now I’m reading ‘Box 88’ by Charles Cumming. The
series was recommended to me by other thriller authors. Being new to spy
fiction, I’ve some catching up to do, and I’m really enjoying the new wave of
espionage thrillers.
I’m dying to read another book by Gabrielle Zevin, or ‘The
Poppy Wars’ by RF Kuang, or ‘Demon Copperhead’ by Barbara Kingsolver.
Favorite social media
site?
YouTube. I’m a
politics nerd, so 30-90 minute
lectures or discussions about geopolitics are my jam. Also comedy bits, can’t
get enough of those, especially Sarah Cooper. A close second is Instagram for
cooking and baking videos. I engage much less than I used to on social media,
which is a conscious decision. It’s hard to find time to write, when you limit
your screen time, which I try to do for the sake of my eyes.
Favorite Superhero or
Villain?
Matt Murdock, aka Daredevil. He’s been an angsty superhero
since before it was cool. I have some classic runs in my DD comic book
collection. More recently, I’m really getting into ‘Invincible,’ which is an
adult comicbook with teenage heroes. So you get adult themes explored but also,
a coming-of-age story, which obviously as a YA author, I’m here for.
Favorite TV show?
For me, ‘Breaking Bad’ is the nadir of TV writing. But my
first TV fan involvement was for ‘Blake’s 7’ the British 70s sci-fi drama.
Writing ‘Blake’s 7’ fanfic is how I got my start writing, in fact.
Contemporary, I’m gonna say ‘Doctor Who.’ We recently
watched all of New Who straight through, an experience that I highly recommend,
if you have time. It helped me to see the Chris Chibnall era in a different
light. Now Peter Capaldi and Jodie Foster could well be my favorite Doctors of
the post 2005 ‘Doctor Who.’
Sweet or Salty?
Sweet, preferably chocolatey.
Any Phobias?
Spiders and enclosed spaces. Combination of the two is my
room 101.
Song you can’t get
enough of right now?
Tacones Rojos by Colombian reggaetón Singer, Sebastian
Yatra. It’s so ridiculously upbeat. Cannot help but dance when I hear
it!
2024 Movie you’re
most looking forward to?
‘Wicked - Part 1.’ First saw the show in London when my
daughter begged me to take her for her 16th birthday mother/daughter treat. Saw
the show again a few weeks back, with a friend that I’ve been trying to
persuade to learn one of the parts of ‘For Good’ so we can duet. Very excited
for the movie. One of the great
female friendship stories, in my book. My pal opted to learn the Elphaba part,
btw :-)
Do you play video
games? If so what are some of your favorites?
Not much, because I am a recovering gameaholic. No joke. I
had to go cold turkey a long time ago, when my first child was one year old and
I realized I was in danger of neglecting her.
Our kids are adults now, so a couple years ago I began to
ease myself back in. I really enjoyed ‘Life Is Strange’ and I’m currently
playing the sequel. Love the whole moody YA, Eastern seaboard vibe. It’s giving
Twilight-first-movie (the cool indie one).
Have also gone back to classics I missed out on when I was
abstaining, like the ‘Broken Sword’ series. You can get them for your mobile
phone! Very fun, cheesy dialogue, smart puzzles and globe-trotting archaeology
adventures.
About M.G. Harris:
M.G. Harris was born in Mexico City and raised in Manchester,
England. She studied Biochemistry at St Catherine's College Oxford and stuck
around for even more at St Cross College.
To this day she lives in Oxford. It's not an easy place to leave.
The first job M.G. Harris was ever aware of wanting to do, aged six, was to
write children’s books. Then, aged eight and inspired by Doctor Who, she tried
to make Wirrn slime with a friend’s Chemistry Set 4, discovered chemistry, and
writing went out of the window.
But in 2004, a skiing accident changed everything...
You can find out more about how MG became an author at her website.
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Giveaway Details:
5 winners
will receive a finished copy of the second edition paperback of THE MIND GAME,
US Only.
Ends October 29th, midnight EST.
Tour Schedule:
Week One:
|
10/14/2024 |
Guest Post |
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|
10/14/2024 |
Interview |
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|
10/15/2024 |
Guest Post/IG Post |
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10/15/2024 |
IG Post |
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|
10/16/2024 |
Interview/IG Post |
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10/16/2024 |
Guest Post/IG Post |
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10/17/2024 |
Guest Post |
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10/17/2024 |
Excerpt/IG Post |
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10/18/2024 |
IG Post |
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10/18/2024 |
IG Review/TikTok Post |
Week Two:
|
10/21/2024 |
IG Review |
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10/21/2024 |
Review/IG Post |
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10/22/2024 |
IG Review/LFL Drop Pic/TikTok Post |
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10/22/2024 |
Review/IG Post |
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10/23/2024 |
Review/IG Post |
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10/23/2024 |
IG Review |
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10/24/2024 |
IG Review |
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10/24/2024 |
Review/IG Post |
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10/25/2024 |
IG Review |
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|
10/25/2024 |
Review/IG Post |
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