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GENRE: Young Adult Contemporary
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BOOK SERIES BLURB:
The Rise up trilogy is a coming-of-age story about Hashim, Alex and Maryam, three best friends on the threshold of adulthood. Before they can find their place in this world, they must come to terms with their past and learn to confide in each other as they are confronted by intolerance, ignorance, and corporate greed that threaten to rob them of their future. Inspirational, harrowing, intense and deeply moving, this trilogy presents a ray of hope amidst terrible hardship, misfortune and loss.
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BOOK BLURB - CATCH YOU IF YOU FALL - BOOK ONE:
High school best friends Hashim, Alex, and Maryam must confront real-life issues that loom for Gen-Z today, including the climate crisis, corrupt politics, and racial and gender equity.
When Hashim turns eighteen, he receives a grant from his Mosque that will send him to an Ivy League in New York. His devout Muslim family couldn’t be more proud. And to support their young son on his journey, they arrange a wife for him. There’s only one problem: Hashim is gay.
Hashim’s best friend Alex is struggling with a difficult home life, a non-present father, and financial issues that prove particularly painful when all his friends are planning to go off to college and leave him behind.
Standing confidently alongside these two boys is Maryam, a headstrong Muslim girl who bucks her traditional roots by becoming a vegan activist.
It doesn’t take long until certain evil forces start to draw these three even closer, as their futures and the wellbeing of their community and the world is threatened. They are called to act.
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BOOK BLURB - MERRY FARM - BOOK TWO:
In the second installment of the Rise Up Trilogy, best friends Hashi, Alex, and Maryam stumble upon a huge government coverup. When more people get sicker and sicker, and nothing about the outbreak makes news, it becomes clear the corruption goes up high.
As the three attempt to expose and stop a tragedy that could kill thousands, they end up framed as the bioterrorists responsible for this exact crime, and a team of hitmen is dispatched to hunt them down. As they grapple with their own growing pains, Hashi, Alex, and Maryam hurry to outrun the disaster, prove that they are innocent, and do what they feel is right.
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BOOK BLURB - COLLUSION - BOOK THREE:
Now a well-known activist, Maryam, along with her two best friends Hashim and Alex, is chosen by the President of the United States to draw up a proposal to help fight climate change, mere weeks before superstorm Roxanne makes landfall in the Northeast.
After the President’s Future Rescue Advisory Board hears their climate proposal to set heavy taxes on meat, dairy and carbon emissions, and someone leaks it to the press, chaos spreads across party lines. A few months since they stopped a deadly virus in its tracks, the three uncover a conspiracy on the highest level of the legislative branch.
While the deadly hurricane wreaks havoc along the eastern seaboard, destroying the U.S. Naval Command in Norfolk, Virginia, and hitting New York City with devastating force, Maryam, Hashim, and Alex grapple with forces beyond their control in the government.
How will their stories unravel? What do their futures hold as they mature into adults in a world that may not accept them? Find out in this last book in the Rise Up Trilogy.
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EXCERPT THREE:
From Collusion - Book Three:
“Yes, let’s talk about protecting the American way,” Maryam responded to the reporter. “Let’s talk about the Norfolk Naval Station in his home state of Virginia. We were there only a few days ago. All it takes is some rain and high tide, and a large part of the base goes underwater. And many of the piers were out of operation for that reason. Like Norfolk, many other U.S. navy bases have been built on lowlands by the water, and most of them are literally sinking into the sea as we speak.”
Hashim bit down a smile from the sidelines. Maryam was going head on. She had seen how well it worked with the President when Alex did it.
“But Senator Stevenson and his colleagues refuse to talk about the biggest national security risk of our time, because it’s caused by climate change. Senator Stevenson with his fellow climate change deniers in the Senate are blocking all the attempts to fund any initiatives to address the issue. So I truly wonder what or who is the real threat to the American way?”
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GUEST POST:
Five Ways to Deal with Rejection as a Writer
For most of the writers, not writing is not an option. For me, it’s a very intensive process, first energizing, and then after an hour, I’m exhausted and famished. The key question here is how you can do it without becoming an alcoholic, recluse or just generally cynical and bitter person in life. Unlike in the times past, nowadays successful writers share one trait and that’s discipline. You need routines to keep yourself in line and this is how I learned it.
When I was a kid, I loved books about faraway countries. Since I was ten years old, my father would stack books on my desk to read. He knew I loved reading, and I was very curious about the world. Then at the age of twelve I stumbled upon Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. If I must name one book that inspired me most in my life, this is the one.
The story takes place about two thousand five hundred years ago during the time of Siddhartha Gautama, aka Buddha, the namesake of the protagonist. There are a lot of similarities between this fictional character and Buddha, at least enough to ignite a fascination with Buddhism. I craved deeper meaning as my philosopher father had done at the same age. I wasn’t a prince like Siddhartha but I lived in a homogenous comfortable bubble surrounded by a big, affluent family and went to a school my parents had founded. However, I didn’t have to flee to the night like Siddhartha did. I just had to convince my parents to let me leave to go to school in more multi-cultural environment, which they did. Through Siddhartha, I became aware of the spiritual world and the need to explore it further. And to do that, I needed to train my self-discipline, which I began by quitting candy and chocolate for a year, and this training has continued till this day.
Reading Siddhartha by Herman Hesse was a paradigm shift for me. It inspired me to change the way I perceived the world and the people in it. I realized that it’s not important how different I am from the other people, but what I have in common with them. This new-born curiosity made me delve into different cultures, politics and religions ever since, and all the understanding I gained over the years through people I met pushed me to become a writer.
As we have now covered the importance of discipline and curiosity, we come to the third technique. You must write about something you’re passionate about. When you do that, you evolve, not only as a writer but as a human being. I like to put my characters in situations where they are challenged in all levels, not only in their inner but also in the interpersonal and extra-personal life. Throw in challenges that you’re struggling with and see what happens. You might find solutions to your own troubles. I think people are by nature attracted to authenticity, and more genuine you are in your writing, more universal it becomes. We are all struggling with same problems. They are just tinted by our different cultural, ethnic, religious, age-, gender-, and sexuality-related influences. And if in your writing you’re able to gain real insight, you have provided to your readers a path to reach that same conclusion, and that’s something to be really passionate about.
The fourth one is exercise and nutrition. I start every day with an hour of Ashtanga yoga and follow it up with clear set of routines. Then once I’m done with the writing, I do a half an hour cardio or intensive kettle bell training. If we feed our body with healthy (vegan) food and exercise, we’re better equipped to face any challenges that life throws at us. For me, physical exercise is very important way to release all the inner tension that writing brings on. Without it, I would be stuck in my fantasy world and unable to cope with reality.
And finally, don’t be a recluse! Go out and see your friends. I know it’s sometimes hard. I’m a part-time hermit, but on weekends, I put in an extra effort to meet up with friends, even if I don’t always feel like it, because without friends, you wither and die.
There are no shortcuts, tricks or chemicals that will make it easier to deal with the pain of rejection. Only way to handle it is by being mentally strong, and here I have presented five ways to accomplish that. And the time you spend honing these skills won’t go to waste. They could very well also take your craft to a totally new level.
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AUTHOR BIO:
Henrik Wilenius is the author of the Rise Up Trilogy, a young adult coming-of-age story about Hashim, Alex and Maryam confronting real-life issues like climate change, corrupt politics, animal cruelty and racial and gender equity.
The Rise Up Trilogy is now available also as an audiobook and a weekly serialized audiobook podcast on all the major platforms.
Previously, Henrik as published two books (an autobiographical coming of age book and a YA novel) by a major publisher (WSOY) in Finland before switching to English and self-publishing. The Rise Up Trilogy was inspired by his fifteen-year stint as a volunteer in a Red Cross Youth Shelter and by his vegan activism.
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CONNECT WITH HENRIK:
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GIVEAWAY:
Henrik will award the winner's choice of an audiobook set via Spotify or a digital book set of The Rise Up Trilogy via Rafflecopter during the tour.
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