Celebration: CompBiblio is turning TWO!

Wow. I can't believe that I have been missing posts on this blog for months for two years :)

But really. I am so happy to make this milestone and I am grateful for each and every one of you who comes here to read my thoughts on books. Books have always been a big part of my life. To be able to find an international community of readers to interact with, was a Godsend two years ago. I love being able to hear so many opinions.

Though certain times have been more reading less reviewing, this online community is always close to my thoughts.

So in celebration of two years of blogging and in general celebration of this online community, I want to throw a giveaway for ya'll.

The Prize:
An up to $15 book of choice from The Book Depository

The Rules:
Enter via Rafflecopter below! If you can't enter via the Rafflecopter, please email me at bambbles{at}gmail{dot}com or leave a comment and I'll enter for you!

Also check and make sure The Book Depository ships to you. If not and you still want to enter, or if you just prefer it, I can give an eBook from any vendor of your choice that allows gifting eBooks (I know BN and Amazon, but not sure about Kobo)

The contest ends at 12:01 EDT on June 30th.

So let's celebrate CompBiblio's birthday the hobbit way! Giveaway for all!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Giveaway: No Strings Attached Giveaway Hop

The No Strings Attached Giveaway
Hosted by I Am A Reader, Not A Writer

Welcome everyone to the No Strings Attached Giveaway! What is a no strings attached giveaway? Well, I am glad you asked! This hop is for all the people who hate jumping through hoops to enter giveaways. This is a no strings attached, no requirements to enter hop. Just one click and you are in! No requirements to following anything or tweet anything for extra entries. If you do that is completely voluntarily and of course appreciated :)

For those of you new to CompBiblio, welcome as well :) Take a look around if the fancy suits you.

The Prize
Any book of your choice from The Book Depository up to $10. Please make sure The Book Depository ships to your country.

How to Enter
Please use the Rafflecopter below to enter. If you cannot see the Rafflecopter, have troubles using it, or just do not want to use it, please email me at bambbles{at}gmail{dot}com and I will add your entry in. :)

Bloggiesta Mini Challenge: What's a Rafflecopter?

Hello everyone! Welcome to the Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge stop here at The Competitive Bibliomaniac! The topic/theme over here is...

What's a Rafflecopter? A Guide to the giveaway site, Rafflecopter

One day you are sitting around thinking to yourself "I've just got too many books!" (Okay. I am not sure any of us ever think this...) "I need some more space in my bookshelves for some new books" (Better) "Let's host a giveaway!"

But how do I host it? Have people comment to enter, but then I can't do multiple entries easily. Have people use a google form? The setup for that is kind of long and the nesting just looks horrid with my new layout.

What to do, what to do?

If you have ever been in this situation, fear no more. Rafflecopter is here! Rafflecopter is a tool bloggers can use to make crazy-simple giveaways. Rafflecopter will allow you to be as specific or as broad with your entries as you wish. It also provides a cool way of tracking who entered. Let's delve in.

The first step to creating a rafflecopter giveaway is to sign up for an account. This keeps all of your giveaways, past and present, in one convienent place.

Now let's create a giveaway. These are the basic steps:

• On your home page, your'll see a happening right now section, where it will list all your current giveaways or let you create a new one. I want to create a new giveaway so I select "Plan One Now"
• First we give it a name. Mine will be called "Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge Giveaway"
• Next add a prize. When we add a prize, it gives us the option to name it and put a total of how many are being given away. The cool thing about this section is you can update this any time throughout the giveaway and it will update the widget without changing the code! Great for when you add prizes halfway through!
• Now we have a name and a prize, but how do you enter? There are multiple options of types of ways people can enter.
• Leave a Blog Post Comment - You can even tell people in the task what you want to them to answer
• Tweet About the Giveaway - This one is super easy for end users because they have a built in tweet to tweet for an entry
• Follow a twitter user - Another easy, built in button so entrants can easy follow you
• Like a facebook page - Get more facebook followers easily and fast!
• Like this post - another easy tool to spread the word about your site
• Create your own - This task is awesome because it let's you dream a dream. What task can you think of to make? The one I most commonly see is Follow on GFC.
• Now that you've chosen any where from one to a ton of tasks, you can set some options for each. Is it manditory? Does a user get one entry or five for this task? There are so many options, and with the easy user interface, setting up a giveaway becomes a snap
• Next, let's enter a date range. Mine will run for a week.
• Finally we enter our terms and conditions and hit Get the Widget

After that it's as easy as copying the code into your entry! My favorite part is only having to do this once because it updates automatically.

One big thing to remember is that not everyone can see the Rafflecopter widget, so it is always nice to give an alternative entry for those readers, either email me or post it in a comment.

Now for your challenge.

The Mini-Challenge: The Rafflecopter experience
A Creator: Go over to Rafflecopter and play around with creating a Rafflecopter giveaway. Make some tasks, find out what you can do and not. No need for it to be real. See what the options are and if it fits your needs.

A Enterer: Enter my Rafflecopter Entry below to get the user experience. There is no need to be a blogger to enter this giveaway.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

(For those who cannot see rafflecopter please email me for a list of extra ways to enter. A free entry can be gained by leaving a comment with your email)

I will be reading comments so if there are any questions ask away!

Giveaway: 100 Followers Giveaway!

About a week ago, I hosted my first giveaway here at CompBiblio. I didn't realize how much fun it would be! Because of the fun, I knew that one I reached 100 followers, I would have to have an awesome giveaway!

THAT TIME IS NOW!


The Prize:
Since this is a celebration of 100 people (well 102 exactly) want to follow me, the prize is your choice of any of the books I have reviewed on this site! Conveniently, here is a list!. The book must be less than $15.

One winner will be chosen!

If for some reason I reach 200 followers (I will be counting through Feedburner, which counts GFC as well as the other followers), I will add another book. The same for every 100 followers.

ETA on 3/1 I guess I dont really know how to count these things, but when I started feedburner was 101, now it 141 is and GFC was 102 and now it is 160. So somewhere in there is +100. That means two prizes will now be given away!!

I normally don't like making the Raffelcopter's too complicated, because to be quite honest, they are a pain to enter. But this time, I kind of want to promote my blog. So there is one mandatory entry and 4 additional entries. Remember, it only takes one entry to win :)

Note: If I review books between now and the end of the giveaway (if they are confines the rules below), those also count toward books you can choose. I will try to keep the list updated as much as possible.

The Rules:

1. Because this is a follower giveaway, this is one of the few times that I require the entrants to follow my blog. I have GFC and Feedburner for RFS or Emails. Chose one :)
2. The contest is international. If The Book Depository ships to you, you are golden. Here is the list of countries they ship too.
3. The maximum amount of each prize/book must be less than $15.
4. The contest will run for two weeks, until midnight EST the night of March 3rd.
5. Winners must respond to notification email within 48 hours of it being sent or new winners will be chosen.
6. Enter using the raffelcopter below. If there are any questions or concerns, please email me or leave a comment below.

a Rafflecopter giveaway


ETA
If you have issues with Raffelcopter. Here are the options, just comment or email me which ones you did and leave an email address and I'll add it to the Raffelcopter for you. :)

- be a follower. Through GFC or Feedburner rss or email. This one is required so tell me how you follow.
- follow me on twitter @bambbles (tell me your twitter handle)
- tweet about the giveaway (leave a link to the tweet )
- leave a comment on of the book reviews on the website
- leave a comment on the giveaway entry telling me what book you may want. Not a binding choice. :)

Giveaway: Romancing the Valentine Giveaway Hop

hosted by Reading Romances

The Romancing the Valentine Giveaway Hop is a hop where each participating blog hosts their own giveaway and then all hosts are linked up so our followers hop between one blog to another!

I think this may be my first giveaway on this site. What better time to do it then around St. Valentine's Day? I don't have a sweetheart this year, so one of YOU gets to take that prize :)

Here are the lovely details.

The Prize:

When Beauty Tamed the Beast
By Eloisa James
Miss Linnet Berry Thrynne is a Beauty . . . Naturally, she's betrothed to a Beast.

Piers Yelverton, Earl of Marchant, lives in a castle in Wales where, it is rumored, his bad temper flays everyone he crosses. And rumor also has it that a wound has left the earl immune to the charms of any woman.

Linnet is not just any woman.

She is more than merely lovely: her wit and charm brought a prince to his knees. She estimates the earl will fall madly in love—in just two weeks.

Yet Linnet has no idea of the danger posed to her own heart by a man who may never love her in return. If she decides to be very wicked indeed . . . what price will she pay for taming his wild heart?

This was such a fun fairy tale retelling! Eloisa James is doing quite a few fairy tale retellings as of late. Though they are the same theme they are not really a series so there is need to worry about jumping in with this book.

The characters in this book are realistically flawed and interesting! This is a great book for those who are new to romance or looking for a new twist on a historical romance!

How To Enter:
The giveaway runs from February 6through the 13th. Winners will be announced on the 14th. Please use the rafflecopter below to enter!

Waiting On Wednesday: Firelight

"Waiting On" Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted over at Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

This week's pre-publication "can't-wait-to-read" selection is:

Firelight by Sophie Jordan
Release Date: September 7th 2010

With her rare ability to breathe fire, Jacinda is special even among the draki—the descendants of dragons who can shift between human and dragon forms. But when Jacinda’s rebelliousness leads her family to flee into the human world, she struggles to adapt, even as her draki spirit fades. The one thing that revives it is Will, whose family hunts her kind. Jacinda can’t resist getting closer to him, even though she knows she’s risking not only her life but the draki’s most closely guarded secret.

Um. Yes please. Sign me up for this day one it's out, if not sooner.

Yes. I did say sooner! Today, Sophie Jordan is hosting a discussion over at her blog and if you comment you are entered for a chance to read a free signed ARC! So hurry on over there! But if you are like me and don't always look at things the instant they are posted, FEAR NOT! For I have the answer. Goodreads is giving away a copy over here. As of writing, your chances of winning are 1 in 2693 (one of whom is yours truly)!

Seriously, how can you not want to read this book.

As a fire-breather, Jacinda demonstrates attraction and desire a little more … expressively. Okay, when I say she gets all hot and bothered, I mean she really gets all HOT and bothered.

This is going to be so much win.

So check them out! This book looks rocking awesome! If I were to follow the "Book by its cover" cliché, I would highly love this book. The cover is one of the most appealing I've seen in awhile! I hope this is the exception that proves the rule, er cliché.

EDIT: Ahh!! Apparently the Goodread's one ends the first as well... drat. Well if you read this in the next 5 hours, enter!!