Hey, lovelies!! It gives me great pleasure today to host Dana Hammer and her new book, “My Best Friend Athena,” here on FAB!! For other stops on her Goddess Fish Promotions Book Tour, please click on the banner above or any of the images in this post.
Be sure to make it to the end of this post to enter to win a $10 Amazon OR Barnes and Noble Gift Card!! Also, come back daily to interact with Dana and to increase your chances of winning!!
Thanks for stopping by!! Wishing you all lots of good luck in this fabulous giveaway!!
My Best Friend Athena
by Dana Hammer
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GENRE: Middle Grade Fantasy
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BOOK BLURB:
Fanny Fitzpatrick has the coolest best friend ever. Athena is smart, and pretty, and brave, and kind. Fanny loves her friend, but sometimes, she feels a little jealous of how perfect Athena is.
But even “perfect” girls make mistakes, and Athena makes a big one when she accidentally turns the school bully into a cockroach. He was picking on their friend Gemma and Athena lost her temper and her magic powers just slipped out right in front of Fanny.
Now Fanny knows that Athena isn’t an ordinary girl – she’s the reincarnation of a Greek goddess, powers and all – and now she needs Fanny and Gemma’s help to hunt down the bully-turned-cockroach and turn him back into a human boy.
Fanny doesn’t want to spend all her time looking for a cockroach. She’s got the Junior Miss Super Pretty Pageant to prepare for, if she can get over her stage fright. Besides, Athena’s Dad, Zeus, has forbidden the girls from meddling with any more cockroaches or magic, and Zeus is a god you don’t want to mess with.
Fanny has to make a choice. Should she pursue her pageant dreams, or risk Zeus’ wrath to find the cockroach-boy? What’s the right thing to do? And how do you hunt down a cockroach anyway?
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EXCERPT TWO:
By the time I get home, everyone in town knows about Daniel’s disappearance, including my mom, which explains why she grabs me as soon as I walk in the door, like I’ve just returned from war or something. She hugs me so tightly I’m pretty sure it damages my intestines. “Honey, I’m so glad you’re home. Where were you?”
“Athena’s. Remember? I told you where I was gonna be.”
“A boy’s gone missing! I had no idea where you were! I was terrified.”
This is what happens when a kid goes missing. Your mom completely forgets about any conversations you had earlier in the day, because all she can think about is the fact that a kid is missing, and it scrambles her brains.
“I’m sorry you were worried, Mom. But...um...a boy’s gone missing, you say?”
I’m such a bad actress.
“Yes! It’s all over the news. I got an amber alert just a few minutes ago. His name was Daniel Doyle. I think they said he went to your school. Do you know this boy?”
I panic inside. What am I supposed to say? “Yeah, I know him, and he’s a total douche-nozzle, and Athena turned him into a cockroach, but it’s ok. We’re working on it.”
No. I can not say that to my mom. Instead, I will deny everything.
“No.”
“Really?”
I can tell that my mom doesn’t believe me. She has that skeptical look on her face that she gets when I lie. Probably because I’m a terrible liar. I can’t look her in the eyes, and my face turns bright red. It’s the worst.
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GUEST POST:
On Daniel, the Bully
Do you remember the villains in 1980s movies? The bullies were always one-dimensional, stupid, and utterly hateable. Why is he picking on the kid with glasses? Because he feels like it. Why is he randomly beating people up? Just ‘cause. I remember one of my favorite movies as a kid was Roxanne, with Steve Martin. In it, some random bullies try to beat Steve Martin up…because he’s on the sidewalk, and has a big nose. The bullies are cartoonish and demented, and make no sense in the real world, because bullies don’t act like that.
Think of Johnny Lawrence in the Karate Kid. He’s a horrible person who picks on the new, poor kid. Johnny is rich, and handsome, and rides a dirt bike, has lots of friends, and knows karate. He has every kind of power a teenage boy could want. Again, this is cartoonish and silly.
I’m a big fan of the show Cobra Kai — it’s one of my favorite shows of all time. In it, we see Johnny Lawrence all grown up, and we get to see his side of things. Suddenly, he’s not a cartoon. He’s a real person, who has made many mistakes, but isn’t some all-powerful force, or a maniacally evil jerk. It’s a more intelligent, nuanced depiction of a bully — one that appeals to intelligent people who can handle nuance.
In My Best Friend Athena, I needed to have a bully. I didn’t want him to be a cartoonish oaf, with no brains, or a super rich yuppie-type. I wanted him to be a real bully, someone that a kid might actually encounter. Daniel isn’t especially handsome or rich. He lives in the bad part of town, and he wears a lot of sweatpants. He does bad things — he breaks Fanny’s necklace, and he calls Gemma the “R word”. He is definitely an unlikable character, but I tried to make him unlikeable in a realistic way.
As the book progresses, we learn that Daniel has his own troubles. His dad recently passed away, and he just started at this new school, where he has no friends. He’s dealing with some pretty major traumas, especially since he’s only eleven years old, and doesn’t have great coping mechanisms. Does this excuse his bad behavior? Of course not. But it does help to explain it.
When Daniel is turned into a cockroach, we sympathize with Gemma, who isn’t particularly sad about his transformation. He was horrible to her, and we can understand why she’s glad to be rid of him. We also sympathize with Athena, who feels guilty that she did an accidental transformation on him, and wants to find him and change him back. And we sympathize with Fanny, who is confused and stressed, and just wants to focus on regular things, like getting ready for the pageant. All of these are valid and normal feelings, when something bad happens to someone we dislike. It’s what we do with those feelings that counts, and in the end, Fanny makes the right decisions.
I hope that kids who read My Best Friend Athena come away feeling empowered to deal with the bullies in their lives. Everyone has the right to go through their lives unharrassed, and no one needs to let themselves be picked on. Fanny, Gemma and Athena all stand up for themselves, and each other, in a way that I hope is inspirational.
I also hope that my readers come way with the idea that bullies are still human beings, and even if their actions are awful, there might be more going on in that person’s life than they realize. This is especially important to remember when dealing with kids. Kids are often jerks, because they are still learning how to behave properly, and how to cope with traumas big and small. It doesn’t mean they’re bad people, just that they’re behaving badly. Do kids need to tolerate bad behavior and abuse from bullies? Obviously not. But it’s important to remember that people change all the time, especially children, and even jerks. The kid who’s bullying them today, might be a nice person some time down the road.
Daniel starts off as a typical bully, picking on someone weaker than him, acting out. But by the end of the book, he has transformed, literally and figuratively. We see a softer, more vulnerable side of him. He starts therapy. And we learn that there is hope for bullies, even when they seem irredeemable. Is he a hero? Nope. But I hope that we are rooting for him to become one, in his own story, someday.
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AUTHOR BIO:
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Dana Hammer is a novelist, screenwriter and playwright. She has won over forty awards and honors for her writing, few of which generated income, all of which were deeply appreciated. She is not a cannibal, but she is the author of A Cannibals Guide to Fasting. Dana is also the author of middle grade fantasy My Best Friend Athena which was inspired by a desire to write something her 9 year old daughter could read.
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CONNECT WITH DANA:
Website:
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/Dana-Hammer-Author-Page-1707631229449685
Goodreads Author Page:
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/10794904.Dana_Hammer
Goodreads Book Page:
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/63261475-my-best-friend-athena
Amazon Author Page:
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BOOK BUY LINKS:
Amazon US Kindle eBook:
Amazon US Paperback:
Amazon US Hardcover:
Amazon CA Kindle eBook:
https://www.amazon.ca/Best-Friend-Athena-Dana-Hammer-ebook/dp/B0BHH74MNM
Amazon CA Paperback:
https://www.amazon.ca/Best-Friend-Athena-Dana-Hammer/dp/1953971636
Amazon CA Hardcover:
https://www.amazon.ca/Best-Friend-Athena-Dana-Hammer/dp/1953971644
Barnes and Noble NOOK eBook:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/my-best-friend-athena-dana-hammer/1142466562?ean=2940165945304
Barnes and Noble Paperback:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/my-best-friend-athena-dana-hammer/1142466562?ean=9781953971630
Barnes and Noble Hardcover:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/my-best-friend-athena-dana-hammer/1142466562?ean=9781953971647
Kobo US eBook:
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/my-best-friend-athena
Kobo CA eBook:
https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/my-best-friend-athena
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GIVEAWAY INFO:
Dana will be awarding a $10 Amazon OR Barnes and Noble Gift Card (Winner’s Choice!!!) to a randomly drawn winner via Rafflecopter during the tour.**This post contains affiliate links and if clicked and a purchase is made, I may receive a small commission to help support this blog. This does not cost you anything, it just helps pay for all those fabulous community outreach projects and awesome giveaways on here**
This contest is sponsored by a third party. Fabulous and Brunette is a registered host of Goddess Fish Promotions. Prizes are given away by the sponsors and not Fabulous and Brunette. The featured author and Goddess Fish Promotions are solely responsible for the giveaway prize.
Thanks for hosting!
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like a great story. The cover looks really good.
ReplyDeleteThe story sounds really interesting.
ReplyDeleteThe book sounds very interesting. My granddaughter would love it!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the guest post.
ReplyDelete