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VORTEX is in stores today!

Synopsis: S. J. Kincaid has created a fascinating dystopian world for Insignia, her futuristic science-fiction adventure series. Earth is in the middle of WWIII, battling to determine which governments and corporations will control the resources of the solar system.

Teen Tom Raines grew up with nothing, some days without even a roof over his head. Then his exceptional gaming skills earned him a spot in the Intrasolar Forces, the country’s elite military training program, and his life completely changed.

Now in Vortex, the second book in the series, Tom discovers that the Pentagonal Spire, where he and his friends are being trained as superhuman weapons, is filled with corruption. He is asked to betray his friends—the first real friends he’s ever had—for the sake of his country.

Will he sacrifice his new life to do what he believes is right?

Hey everyone!

On May 7th, HarperTeen Impulse is releasing an INSIGNIA prequel novella focused on Wyatt Enslow! Pre-order it today!

In S. J. Kincaid’s fast-paced and humorous sci-fi Insignia trilogy, the earth is in the middle of World War III when teen gamer Tom Raines is recruited to train with other young cadets as a pivotal member of the elite combat corps, the Intrasolar Forces. At the Pentagonal Spire’s training academy, he makes the best friends of his life—fellow government weapons-in-training Wyatt Enslow, Vik Ashwan, and Yuri Sysevich.

In ALLIES, a 47-page prequel novella to the series, budding genius Wyatt Enslow—intensely loyal and hyperintelligent if occasionally, hilariously, socially awkward—takes center stage as S. J. Kincaid reveals Wyatt’s life before she found her place, and her own inner strength, among her devoted band of friends at the Spire.

Praise for Insignia: “The characters are real, funny, and memorable. You won’t be able to put this book down.”—Veronica Roth, New York Times bestselling author of Divergent

HarperTeen Impulse is a digital imprint focused on young adult short stories and novellas, with new releases the first Tuesday of every month

For more information,

Additionally, the ebook of INSIGNIA is on sale for $2.99! Please spread word!

So I just e-mailed the two people who won the VORTEX ARC. Depending on whether I get my hands on one more book, I may draw another name as the winner.

Thank you to everyone who entered!

That said�� Pitch Dark Books is now running a VORTEX giveaway, and they’re giving away TEN ARCS. So

Did you guys watch the Academy Awards? I only caught the end, but I thought Jennifer Lawrence’s acceptance speech was adorable. As was Hugh Jackman running up to help her�� then running back again when he realized she didn’t need it. Very cute. I really was rooting for him to win for Les Miserables.

Take care, and thank you to everyone who entered the contest!

First of all, in six days, FRAGMENTS will be coming out. It’s the sequel to PARTIALS by Dan Wells. Are you as excited as I am???

Second of all, I’ve been by Lynne Kelly, author of CHAINED, for the Next Big Thing Blog Hop. So here are the answers below!

1. What is the working title of your book?

It’s VORTEX, and I’m giving away two ARCs today! Please check out the bottom of the page for the giveaway!

2: Where did the idea come from for the book?

VORTEX is the second book in the INSIGNIA series. The original idea for INSIGNIA came from an article I read about futuristic drone warfare.



3: What genre does your book come under?

YA sci-fi or dystopian.

4: Which actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

The kids are pure imagination, but I definitely had images of actors for some of the adults. Vengerov is Vladimir Putin meets Daniel Craig. Dalton is Rob Lowe in Wayne’s World (or Starship Troopers�� he does a great skeezy) meets Paul Ryan meets Patrick Bateman. Blackburn, I always picture John C McGinley in his early Scrubs days.

5: What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

In VORTEX, Tom Raines has to choose between betraying someone he cares about, or facing terrible consequences at the hands of a dangerous new enemy.

6: Is your book self-published, published by an independent publisher, or represented by an agency?

It’s going to be published by Katherine Tegen Books. It’s out July 2nd.

7: How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

A while. I threw away a 90k draft and started over.

8: What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

INSIGNIA. Is that lazy? Yes. I don’t care.

9: Who or what inspired you to write this book?

My three book deal and the contract I signed. They were great inspirations.



10: What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?

A few slight spoilers, how about that? Highlight to see them:

Tom loses something (or some things) quite valuable to him.

Someone is very shocked by something.

Someone has made a dreadful mistake that comes back to bite him or her.

Some people have a romantic moment while being eaten by a shark.

Want to find out more? Then enter the contests to win an ARC!

Now, I’m tagging my friends and fellow writers, , author of the upcoming 2014 release, THE BREAK-UP ARTIST, and my crit partner for several years, the amazing , agented by Kate Testerman.

Onto the Giveaway!

I am giving away two signed ARCs of VORTEX! Enter to win!

I’ve been sitting on this news, but now I get to announce it! INSIGNIA made the shortlist for the Waterstone’s Book Prize! This is a huge honor, and thanks go to my UK Publisher, Hot Key Books, and the UK booksellers who have supported the series.

Anyway, very exciting!

So one night a while ago, it happened. It was the most astounding thing! I woke up from a dream in the middle of the night with a plot in my head—a fantastic, delightful plot. My bleary brain tried to wrap around the thing, and I am sure I mumbled to myself, “It’s so brilliant!�� as I sleepily wrote this incredible new idea down on a piece of paper.

We all know the famous story of how TWILIGHT came to be. The book that changed Stephenie Meyer’s life came to her in a dream, just like the one I’d had. She wrote it down and the rest was history. And now, like her, I had just had one of those life-changing dreams.

But the thing is, I was very sleepy when I wrote this idea down, so I forgot for a few weeks that I’d even had that nighttime revelation, and then when I remembered it, I couldn’t remember what plot I’d dreamed up. I scrambled to find that piece paper and could not locate it anywhere.

Desperation gripped me. That brilliant, beautiful idea was missing. What had it been? Had I just thrown it away? If only I remembered! My career-making book had slipped out of my grasp, just like that, perhaps never to return!

And then, after months and months had passed, I did something unusual: I cleaned my apartment.

That’s when I found it.

Yes, it was the long-lost piece of paper.

Finally, the day had arrived. Finally, I could read and recall the brilliant plot my sleeping brain had devised that fateful night all those months ago. So I read the paper, my heart pounding in anticipation.

It said:

“A man begins traveling to alternate universes to kill alternate versions of himself in order to increase his power. One of his alternate selves fights back and must kill him first.��

It was a great idea.

You know, when it was a movie called THE ONE starring Jet Li. Apparently, I was very, very sleepy that night, after all.

So, I was not able to pull a Stephenie Meyer, alas. I must content myself with just writing normal, non-dream-inspired books like INSIGNIA. And at some point, I suppose, I should probably rent THE ONE.

INSIGNIA made the Wahoo! This is an incredible honor, and my book is sharing it with some amazing titles. I’m very excited about it. Anyway, that is all! See you in two weeks!

What I said above. I’m taking a short hiatus from the internet, but just as a last reminder, this is going on for another couple of weeks! Thanks to everyone who’s read/rec’ced/given it as a gift/reviewed, and whatever else.

Adios, folks!

First of all, Harper created an awesome graphic for the INSIGNIA ebook deal. It’s very lovely.

That said, I’m doing more of this origins thing for the four or five people in the world who may be interested. Just to recap, for lack of better ideas about what to post about, I’m just going to talk about various bits of INSIGNIA and how the story and characters came to be. If you haven’t read it.. It’s 2.99 right now! See above! Ahem. Anyway, if you haven’t read it, these post might not make sense. Sorry.


On Ryzerman, Vengerov, and Blackburn:

(slight spoilers for the future of the series below. Read at your own risk!)

            Who or what is a Ryzerman, you may ask?

            Ryzerman was the character originally playing Blackburn’s role in the story. He was there solely to be a foe, because let’s face it, the guy who gets to program all the brains? That’s some power there, and I thought it would be interesting having a third villain (in addition to Dalton and Karl) to complicate things for Tom. Like Blackburn, Ryzerman was a driven, formidable person who’d had a psychotic break due to the neural processor; he’d reprogrammed his neural processor until he regained his sanity. But unlike Blackburn, Ryzerman was supposed to be a Maximilien Robespierre type: calculating, cold-blooded and ruthless. He didn’t have much of a conscience, and he was fascinated by power.

            Oh, and he was a bit insane still. Unlike Blackburn, Ryzerman hadn’t fully fixed his neural processor issues. He also had never had a family, and there was no Roanoke.

            Anyway, something happened after INSIGNIA got picked up for publication. I had a three book deal, so I examined my plans for the next two books. I had them, but they were vague because I’d been heartbroken in the past when I planned out whole trilogies that came to nothing. Since I now had a book getting published, and two guaranteed sequels, I reevaluated my vague plans.

            The Big Bad who I originally had in mind for the series, Dalton Prestwick, had been rather humiliated in the first book. By the end, how could a reader have any respect for the guy, even as a despicable villain, when the protagonist had already so thoroughly defeated him? Not only was Dalton lacking in menace, but since he was always supposed to be a greedy, self-centered sociopath eager to suck up or do most anything to advance himself, he wasn’t particularly multifaceted or deep.
            The fact was, Dalton couldn’t carry a series. Although Ryzerman was far more menacing, and had certain layers of his own, he also wasn’t in a position (wealth, power, or job-wise) to be the big bad of the INSIGNIA world. And Karl�� ha ha ha. No.

            So I wrote Joseph Vengerov into the story.

            You’ve only seen a snippet of him so far, but I think it’s given you enough of a glimpse of what he’s like that I won’t be spoiling things here too much��

            Vengerov was icy, calculating, cold-blooded and ruthless, which basically meant he was an amplified version of Ryzerman. The problem? Two Vengerovs/Ryzermans can’t exist in the same story. The universe would implode. One had to change drastically.

            Since my awesome editor was also urging me to humanize Ryzerman, I picked him for the personality makeover. I first tried  adding a mentor dynamic with Wyatt. It was a great idea because it gave Wyatt more of a role in the story independent of Tom, but it just wasn’t working. Even toned down, Ryzerman wasn’t a character I could convincingly imagine being tender and patient with anyone. He didn’t have enough humanity to love, to care, much less to invest in the performance of some younger protégé. I tried several times adding in back story to explain him and humanize him, but it failed spectacularly with every attempt.

            So finally, I realized that I needed the entirely new perspective that could only come from taking Ryzerman out of the story and inserting a new character in his place, someone I imagined as a different person, but who could fill in for Ryzerman whenever he’d driven the action in the story (with very different motivations, of course).

            This decision, naturally, came about ten days before my line edits were due. Luckily, editor and imprint understood, so I wrote in Blackburn.
            Although most of the kid characters just exist in my head, I tend to picture some of the adult characters looks-wise as actors, or sometimes politicians. Dalton�� I envision as a cross between Rob Lowe in Wayne’s World and Paul Ryan. Vengerov�� I picture Daniel Craig meets Vladimir Putin. With Blackburn, I picture this guy:

            Although it was rather terrifying, tearing out a prominent character so late in the process and replacing him, I think it made the story a lot stronger. James Blackburn had the humanity I needed him to have, while retaining the ruthlessness I needed him to have, but his back story allowed me to set up something in future books that I could never have pulled off with Ryzerman.

            The only difficulty with doing this mostly cropped up in book one. There were times when I’d slip mentally from Blackburn to Ryzerman again, and his speech patterns would drift toward Ryzerman’s accordingly. I corrected some between the ARC and the final version, but when I reread the book now, there are definitely a few I missed. That aggravates me, but there’s nothing to do about it now.
           Thanks for reading!