The most recent Swoon Reads cover contest has me craving swoony book covers and I love this one! Earlier this month, I had the pleasure of presenting at the Rochester Writers spring conference along with several other YA authors. Melanie Hooyenga and I met for the first time, and the cover of her YA skiing novel, The Slope Rules, caught my eye right away. If you loved the winter sports and romance mash-up of The Boy Next Door, you should definitely check out The Slope Rules. Here's what Melanie has to say about what inspired her to write The Slope Rules and her own skiing experiences:

Being a Michigander, I’m no stranger to snow, so writing a skiing book isn’t that far-fetched. I first came up with the idea in the winter of 2014 while watching the winter Olympics. West Michigan was buried under 100 inches of snow and I spent a lot of time snuggled on the couch thinking about snow and watching amazing athletes do incredible things with their bodies. I’ve always skied and thought it’d be fun to write about a skier—but not just any skier, a girl who isn’t afraid of anything and can hurl herself through the air like the best of them.

I borrowed the idea of two kids meeting on vacation and cliques with silly names from the movie Grease, then I tossed in a few Mean Girls and added a brewery because my husband and I love craft beer and brew beer at home.

As for skiing, my grampa worked at a small ski place on the east side of Michigan so I first learned when I was five-years old. In junior high I joined the ski club—which means they set 200 7th and 8th graders loose on a hill once a week—but I didn’t get over my fear of going fast until I took a ski class in college. I’ve always been more about precision—the Snow Bunnies’ style is based on how I ski—but being graded forced me to get over myself. Now my husband and I regularly race down the slopes—but I’ll never do spectacular stunts like Cally.

Despite my familiarity with the sport, I did a lot of research for the terminology in THE SLOPE RULES. I spent a day riding up the chairlift on the terrain park to watch how the kids interacted on the jumps and tricks, and I critiqued my own skiing. When you’ve done something your whole life you don’t think about the technique, you just do it, so I paid attention to little things like which leg you lean on to turn and what the snow sounds like when you catch an edge.

So far the response from readers has been great, and I especially love the people who say they’ve never skied but my book made them feel like they could. That’s why I do this. To unleash readers’ imaginations and make them imagine things they never thought possible. Even if it’s just pulling a reverse 360 on snow.

You can find out more about Melanie Hooyenga and her other YA novels on her website and social media accounts:
http://www.melaniehoo.com
https://www.facebook.com/MelanieHooyenga
https://twitter.com/MelanieHoo
https://instagram.com/melaniehoo/

Here's where you can get your own copy of The Slope Rules:
Print: https://www.amazon.com/Slope-Rules-Melanie-Hooyenga/dp/1542620309
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Slope-Rules-Melanie-Hooyenga-ebook/dp/B01MUBSOLO
BN: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-slope-rules-melanie-hooyenga/1125532935
Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-slope-rules
Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/698287
iBooks: https://itunes.apple.com/author/melanie-hooyenga/id714226093

This is one of those novels that makes me wish that Goodreads let you rate books at six stars. The kind of novel that makes me wish I had a book group. The kind I want on every end aisle of every bookstore everywhere.

Sequels and companion novels are hard to pull off well. There’s all the expectations of the first book, and after Openly Straight, I had high ones. Here's just one of my favorite passages.

“I'm glad we did this,” I said, looking over at Ben. “I'm glad you came.”
            “You wish I came,” he said.
            My face flushed pink, or pinker. The silence felt like it could fill the resort for hours. “Did you just make a sex joke?” I finally managed to say.
            He grinned.
            “You're such a dick,” I said, laughing.
            “Are you trying to make me another one?” (247-248)
 
The relationship between Rafe and Ben was heartbreakingly real. I also loved the premise of Openly Straight, which made me feel so deeply about the way we label people.

As you may have guessed from my first paragraph, though, Honestly Ben did not disappoint. It went beyond the questions of labels and boxes to “are you in or out?” and “what have you bought into that maybe you shouldn’t have?” These weren’t just about sexuality, either, but about life. Are you really in life, engaged with those around you? Are you buying into “truths” that you haven’t really considered, about the way you only think things have to be?

I don’t want to give spoilers, but I’ll say this much. For my fellow romance lovers yearning for happily-ever-after, this realistic ending is satisfying. And on a completely unrelated note, the subplot about Ben’s speech is plotting genius. Go get this book, now.