Blog Tour: Sybil Nelson Guest Post!!!

 Priscilla Sumner is the strong, opinionated, yet lovable main character of my Priscilla the Great series. She always has something to say and she often won’t shut up until I write down her thoughts. This is what led me to write a collection of five short stories entitled Twin Shorts from her point of view. For those of you who want to get to know her a little better before you commit to reading the entire first novel of the series, this is a great introduction. Each story takes the form of a school assignment for her English teacher Mrs. Talendy. You can buy the kindle version of Twin Shorts for only $.99 here: Twin Shorts on Amazon

---

My Life Changing Moment by Priscilla M. Sumner

Mrs. Talendy's 7th grade English class

So I'm supposed to write about a life changing moment. Well, that's kind of hard for me to do. I mean I've had lots of life changing moments. For example, when I was in third grade and I figured out that I was going to marry Spencer Callahan and that we were going to have three children and two dogs. That was a pretty important moment in my life. Not many people know exactly how their life is going to turn out when they're only eight years old. I guess I'm lucky that way.

But unfortunately, things change. The marriage and kids thing came before I had to babysit The Devil Twins. After that I decided I would definitely have to get my tubes tied before Spencer and I got married. I didn't exactly know which tubes needed to be tied, but I knew any tubes that could possibly lead to children like Charlie and Chester had to be eliminated. Hey, I'd go even further than tying them. Whatever had to be done to make sure no children came out of my tubes was fine with me.

You think I'm being mean, Mrs. Talendy? Well, you haven't had the life changing pleasure of spending an afternoon with my little brothers. (And when I say pleasure, I don't really mean pleasure. That's sarcasm. My older brother Josh taught me about that.)

So let me tell you what led to this decision. It was last summer when I was a young eleven-years-old. My mother was away on "business" and my father had to take Josh to take his driving test so that he could get his license. There was no way I was gonna interfere with that. Having a brother who could drive would definitely come in handy during the summer. But it meant that day I was stuck babysitting the almost five-year-old monsters for a whole afternoon.

I wasn't completely naive (look Mrs. Talendy, I used a vocab word. Naive. Extra credit, huh?). I knew what my little brothers were capable of. So I borrowed some shin protectors from my friend Kyle, slapped on my rain coat, and snapped my bicycle helmet on. Then I locked all the doors and sat them in front of the TV.

While they watched SpongeBob Squarepants, I stood in front of the kitchen door to make sure they didn't go in there. They were notorious for turning the kitchen into a literal land mine of eggs and dog poop.

Everything was going great for about an hour. Then Chester turned to me with his deceivingly cute blue eyes and curly blond hair and said, "Prissy, can I go to the bathroom?"

 I had to debate this for a second. I mean did he really have to go to the bathroom? Or was he trying to confuse me? If I let Chester go to the bathroom and kept Charlie on the couch, I wouldn't be able to keep an eye on both of them. My defenses would be breached. What if this was part of their plan? They were trying to divide and conquer. Well, I was too smart for them. If they wanted to go to the bathroom, they would have to go together.

"You have exactly forty-five seconds," I said as I let them in the bathroom. Then I stood outside while they took care of business.

Exactly thirty-eight seconds later, panic set in. It was too quiet in that bathroom. They weren't capable of quiet. What was I thinking? How could I let them go to the bathroom together?

I burst through the door just in time to see Charlie light some kind of string and toss something white into the toilet.

"What are you doing?" I asked, snatching the lighter away from him.

"We're lighting bombs," he answered cheerily.

"Yeah, but they don't work," Chester said with a pout. "We've almost gone through the whole box and not one explosion."

"Yeah, Tampax makes the worst bombs ever!" Charlie added.

"Tampax? What are you talking about?" I snatched the nearly empty box away from Chester. "You've been lighting my tampons!" I yelled. (Okay, Mrs. Talendy, the only reason I'm telling you this is because I really need a good grade and you're kind of a girl anyway. Please, please, please don't tell anyone else about my tampon troubles. It's sooo embarrassing.)

"We didn't know they were yours," Chester said.

"Yeah, sorry Prissy. I'll get them back." Charlie reached his arm into the toilet.

"No, don't do that. Just go. Just get out!" I screamed. I was just about ready to pull out my hair.

Chester jumped up and ran out of the bathroom, but Charlie didn't move.

"Didn't you hear me? I said get out!"

"I'm trying. I can't. I think I'm stuck!"

I rolled my eyes then grabbed him by the armpits. I pulled as hard as I could. Charlie screamed as loud as he could, but he didn't budge. His arm was stuck in the toilet.

"I'll get him out!" Chester said running back into the bathroom holding a tub of butter. Before I could stop him he started dumping the butter on Charlie's head.

"How is putting butter on his head supposed to help him get his arm out?"

Chester shrugged. "It worked on SpongeBob Squarepants."

"That's a cartoon, you moron!"

"Hey, don't call my brother names, Priscilla Gorilla!" Charlie said while splashing toilet water on me with his free hand. Good thing I was wearing the raincoat.

           

Two hours later my dad came home to find his youngest son covered in butter, chocolate syrup, honey, and bacon grease. Not to mention sopping wet and halfway down a toilet.

Even though The Devil Twins claimed that I had tried to flush Charlie down the toilet for no reason at all, my dad saw through their lies. Either that or he saw the box of burned tampons and chose to believe my version of events. My dad actually had to unscrew the toilet in order to free Charlie. Personally, I would have just left him there for a couple days so he could learn a lesson.

So the moral of this story is that I will never have kids. Never, ever, ever, ever. Give me a shoelace. I'll tie my own tubes right now.

---

And there you have it. That was the first of five stories in Twin Shorts. If you enjoyed this glimpse into Priscilla’s odd little world, be sure to pick up a copy of Twin Shorts today! And don’t forget to check out the first book of the Priscilla the Great Series in paperback or ebook. Priscilla the Great on Amazon

 
----------------

I'd just like to thank Sybil for stopping by! 
And here are a couple more links that you'd might be interested in: 


Visit Priscilla's Website

Visit Sybil's Website

Show Sybil some comment love, I'm sure she'd love to hear what you guys think! :)

 Happy Reading!!!

♪♫ Ambur

Blog Tour - Review: Priscilla the Great by Sybil Nelson

(Click this link to go to Priscilla the Great's Goodreads page.)

Sybil contacted me about her blog tour a while ago, and I jumped at the chance. Priscilla the Great sounded hilarious. I knew it would totally make me nostalgic for junior high and all that 'lovely' drama (yes, that was sarcasm, although sadly some of it was actually nostalgic :P). Here's the blurb:

"Meet Priscilla Sumner, an ordinary seventh grader with extraordinary gifts. As if middle school isn’t hard enough, not only does Priscilla have to fight pimples and bullies, but genetically enhanced assassins trying to kill her and her family. Armed with wit, strength, and a genius best friend, Priscilla must defeat the Selliwood Institute, an organization dead set on turning children into killing machines.

Add an older brother annoyingly obsessed with Christina Aguilera, mischievous baby twin brothers who could scare the sin off of Satan, and parents more puzzling than a Rubik’s cube in the Bermuda triangle and expect a smoking page-turner!"

See how I couldn't resist it?!

I thought, 'If the blurb is this funny, the book will be hilarious!' and boy was I right! 

Priscilla was an awesome narrator and a pretty fierce superhero too! I loved her jokes, and her whole inner monologue, which was also packed with jokes. I was laughing throughout this book, and when I wasn't laughing I was thinking about being twelve, almost thirteen, and how awesome it would have been to have superpowers...which was another thing that I totally predicted would happen while I read this book, and I was so right. I mean it would've been scary too, not knowing why it was happening or how to control it, but it would've been beyond cool! Yup, she's even got me talking like I'm in grade 7 again. :P 

The characters in this book were described simply and we got to know each of them through their interactions with Priscilla. I absolutely loved her friends, Tai and Kyle, and her Christina Aguilera-loving brother was pretty awesome too. I don't want to spoil anything, so I'll just talk about her parents a little bit. Her dad was described as a body-building secret service agent at one point...and he was trying to get jiggy with it. Oh how I miss using words like jiggy, I think my friends would look at me weird if I said jiggy, but I'd still do it anyways. Her mom's name is Quindolyn, which I think is such a cool name...totally long and a little crazy, but I still love it.

This book is middle grade, so it's not too complicated and it's easy to follow. It's also not too long, but it packs a huge punch. The paperback copy that I have has 271 pages, and in those pages it was probably one of the most exciting books I've read in a while. I forgot how dramatic being a pre-teen/early teen is, and how exciting everything feels. Reading this book helped me remember all that, and I was as caught up in it as Priscilla was herself. I would've loved to have read this when I was younger because I loved the story now, as a girl a few months shy of 20, but I would have loved it even more if I were Priscilla's age. That being said, I think this book is versatile for many ages. Sybil did an amazing job at making this book applicable to more than just those in the middle grade age group, she uses vocab and Priscilla's thoughts to help put you in Priscilla's shoes. I'm gonna be honest too, I really miss reading books where the writing it a nice font, it's easy to read, doesn't hurt my eyes, and it looks pretty. So many adult or YA books have tiny writing on big pages, so it was a relief to read a book that had really clear font, and that looked amazing too. I loved the texts that were used...I'm a sucker for aesthetics inside and outside of a book. :P

Priscilla the Great was an adorable and funny story. I'd recommend it to anyone, from the target middle grade age group, to fledgling adults like myself, to parents, or anyone looking for a fun story, which will make them remember their own childhood...and be slightly envious that they didn't have superpowers, or an ice cream machine in their school. :)

Here's the official trailer for Priscilla the Great if you wanna take a look:

And here are some links that you might wanna check out:

Buy Priscilla the Great

Visit Priscilla's Website

Visit Sybil's Website

*I was provided with a copy of Priscilla the Great by the author, Sybil Nelson, for an honest review, I was not required to right a positive review, and all the opinions are my own. 

I'd just like to thank Sybil for asking me to participate in her blog tour, and for sending me a copy of her book. I'm so glad to have gotten to read it. :)

So, am I the only one who would've loved superpowers in grade 7 or would you want them too? What powers would you have liked to have? I would've loved to have had telekinesis, I still wish I had it, then I would've have to get up just to grab things...yup, now you know how lazy I am sometimes. :P

Happy Reading!!!

♪♫ Ambur