Guess what?

On November 1st, CROSSED will be released in stores! Can you believe it? An entire year since MATCHED came out flew by so quickly… except of course for constantly wondering if Cassia will choose Ky… or if she’ll choose Xander… or how Cassia is going to save Ky… never mind, I take that back. This past year was agony!

There is also an extended MATCHED excerpt up of the first seven chapters, which will be especially nice for sharing with friends.

Do find yourself a little rusty on the details of MATCHED, like what the difference between an Anomaly and an Aberration is, or what the different pills are for? Worry not! Help is on the way in the form of MATCHED Facts. The MATCHED Facts Tumblr will be posting one Fact per day leading up to the on-sale of CROSSED. Will include important facts about the world of the Society, reminders of the information we learned in MATCHED, quotes from the book, review blurbs, trivia about MATCHED and Ally Condie and more!

And not to worry: Spoilers will be clearly marked and hidden, and there will be ABSOLUTELY NO CROSSED SPOILERS!

The first fact of MATCHED is…

And now for a contest!

In preparation for CROSSED, Penguin Teen has given us one paperback copy of MATCHED to give away to our followers! Comment below with what you are most excited for for CROSSED, and we’ll pick the winner from now until September 17. For extra entries, you can also follow our Facebook, Twitter, and retweet this tweet.

First of all, how were you approached about being on the cover of Matched and Crossed?
Theresa from Penguin emailed me about possibly doing the photography for the book cover of Matched. The dress I wore for the cover of Matched is what caught their eye initially. They spotted this photo of mine on Flickr, wearing “The Dress” and well after a short wait, I was contracted to do the photography for the book covers.

Let’s get technical for a moment, Ally said in an article that you actually took this photo of yourself. What is that process like?
It’s really a process of trial and error at first, after that it’s all fairly easy.

I’m able to take these full body photos of myself, by myself, with the use of a wireless remote. I plug the transmitter into my camera and then I have the remote in my hand, and I’m all set, I press the remote’s shutter button and then 3 seconds later my camera takes a photo. I set my camera on a 3 second timer so that I have time to ‘hide’ my remote so I can put my hands where ever they need to be in the photo.

I take a lot of trial shots to figure out all the little details that make up the photo. From where I need to position myself, how I want props positioned, how I want my outfit to look, the lighting, the crop of the photos, etc. Once I have everything figured out, I just try to slightly change something between each shot and shoot away.

Were you able to read the book beforehand or were you told what they wanted for the covers? Do you have creative control or was someone else there to assist?
I was given a small summary of the book, just so I could get a sense of the setting and feeling of Cassia. Which felt like such a tease afterward, because after doing the photos I really wanted to read the whole book.

There was already an idea of how the Matched book cover was going to look, so I was asked to just try different ways to express the ‘trapped’ emotion. So a lot of that emotion had to come from my body language since my face isn’t shown in either of the covers.

Have you had a chance to meet Ally condie?
Unfortunately I haven’t had a chance to meet her, though I’d love to. I’m hoping she comes to my area sometime so I can stop by and have [her] sign one of my copies of Matched.

Everyone is in love with that green dress! There have been a lot of fans wondering where they could get one for their prom. Recently, Ally said that it was actually a white dress that was later edited for the cover. Where did you find this beautiful dress?
I found the dress about 4 years ago, listed online by a wedding boutique. The dress is actually an ivory/light gold colored wedding dress by one of my favorite Dress Designers (Maggie Sottero). After I bought the dress, my crafty Mother-In-Law and I altered the dress so I could wear it to the Marine Corps Birthday Ball, without the long wedding train…

After the wearing the dress to the military ball, I hung onto it and began using it as an outfit for photo shoots. It has this almost princess feel to it, so it works out perfectly for the whimsical fairytale photos I try to create. If fans are really wanting to wear the dress to prom, I’ve seen the dress available at a couple online boutiques, otherwise if anyone has a super crafty relative, the could consider trying to replicate the dress. I thought the dress had a name, like most Maggie Sottero dress do however it seems it only has a dress number, #J8031.

Where do you get your inspiration from?
Inspiration comes from a lot of places. Sometimes I will be sitting at work listening to music and a lyric will catch my attention and an idea will pop into my head for a new image to create. So I’ll do a little doodle on paper of my idea so that I don’t forget it and then go later I’ll try to create the image. Other times I’ll be looking at an art magazine and I’ll see a color palette an artist used in a painting and I’ll try to figure out how to use those similar colors in an image of mine.

I’m also a big fan of whimsical, fairytale, mythical stuff…so I try to put a little whimsical almost princess like twist on my images…

What is your favorite book?
Oh, that’s a toughie. See I have this thing where when I go book shopping I sometimes just find a book that has an eye-catching cover. I’ll read the little story summary on the jacket and if it sounds interesting I’ll buy the book. So in a sense I’m going against the age old saying of “never judge a book by its cover”….its terrible, I know but its like a little surprise, cause sometimes I’ll come across a author I’ve never heard of before, and I’ll end up loving their book and then go searching for more of their books. Other times I’ll end up learning a whole lot from a book and other times I’ll be totally flabbergasted by a book.

However some of my favorite books have come from doing this exact process. Like The Host, by Stephenie Meyer(I read this book before I was aware she was the reason behind the Twilight craze), The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf, and one of my favorite books that I read when I was in 8th grade, Z for Zachariah by Robert C. O’Brien.

Do you have a website or other social media that fans can visit?
Right now my photography is only on Flickr. I’m working on starting my own website that showcases my photography as well as my hand-made items.

Fans are absolutely in love with the cover of both Matched and Crossed, will you also be on the cover of the third book?
I believe I’m still scheduled to do the cover for the third book. However I haven’t been given any of the juicy details as to what the direction will be for the cover.

{Site note: The cover for the the third book in the MATCHED Trilogy, REACHED, has been released and Samantha Aide is on the cover!}

Is there anything else you would like to say to all the Matched fans out there?
I just wanted to say THANK YOU to everyone from Ally, to the folks at Penguin, and to all the fans of books. I hope everyone enjoys the book covers as much as they enjoy the books!

Finally, if you have read the books, are you Team Ky or Team Xander?
I’m all about Team Ky.

Thank you so much for allowing us to interview you Samantha!

November 1 Salt Lake City, Utah
The King’s English Bookshop
1511 South 1500 East
Salt Lake City, Utah

November 2- San Francisco, CA
Books Inc.

November 4- Seattle, WA
University Book Store
4326 University Way
Seattle, WA

November 7- St. Louis, MS
Pudd’n Head Books (evening event)
37 S. Old Orchard
Webster Groves, MO 63119

November 9- Chicago, IL
Anderson’s Bookshop
Naperville, IL

November 10- Atlanta, GA
Little Shop of Stories
133 E Court Sq # A
Decatur, GA

More details will be coming soon about these dates!

Ally Condie recently posted this photo on her blog, which gives Matched fans a hint as to what the landscape will be like in Crossed.

She also listed two new songs as part of the Crossed playlist: The Climber by Neil Finn and This Hard Land by Bruce Springsteen.

What do you think?

• Comment on this entry and let us know what you love most about the Matched series so far.

Want additional chances to win? It’s easy! Complete any of the following and let us know in your comment that you did it.

• +1 entry follow us on twitter
• +1 entry retweet our tweet about the contest
• +1 entry blog about this giveaway and comment here with the link

Contest details:

Contest is open to anyone- international fans can win too! Contest closes Friday, August 5th at 11:59 PM PST. Winner will be announced Saturday, August 6th at 12:00PM PST. If we don’t hear back from the winner within 48 hours a new winner will be randomly chosen and notified.

This will be the first of many awesome giveaways leading up to the release of Crossed this November. Remember you can pre-order Crossed on Amazon, Barnes and Noble or Indie Bound.

We know you’re just as excited about the release of CROSSED as we are (which you can preorder here), and Ally’s publishers at Penguin know it as well! We’re thrilled to announce that Penguin is allowing us to give away a galley of CROSSED as well as other MATCHED goodies that will leave you breathless and wanting more.

Here is your second teaser for CROSSED:

If you haven’t already, make sure you check out The Matched Department for their teaser, and the Matched Trilogy LiveJournal Community on Friday. Make sure you enter their contests as well. You have three chances to win one amazing prize package, including….

• A signed copy of MATCHED (hardcover)

• A MATCHED/CROSSED poster

• A MATCHED bookmark

• A MATCHED button

• A galley of CROSSED (VERY IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT CROSSED: We don’t have galleys yet and we might not until sometime around June, so that portion of the prize pack will be mailed later, but one will be set aside for the winner of each contest and mailed as soon as they arrive in house.)

• US winners only

To enter, just post a comment saying who your favorite MATCHED character is and why.

We’ll pick a random winner who will be announced next Wednesday at 12 P.M. P.S.T.

We wish you optimal results!

P.S.: Check out the MATCHED Facebook App and show your support of MATCHED by adding a Twibbon to your Twitter profile picture!

In search of a future that may not exist and faced with the decision of who to share it with, Cassia journeys to the Outer Provinces in pursuit of Ky — taken by the Society to his certain death — only to find that he has escaped, leaving a series of clues in his wake. Cassia’s quest leads her to question much of what she holds dear, even as she finds glimmers of a different life across the border. But as Cassia nears resolve and certainty about her future with Ky, an invitation for rebellion, an unexpected betrayal, and a surprise visit from Xander — who may hold the key to the uprising and, still, to Cassia’s heart — change the game once again. Nothing is as expected on the edge of Society, where crosses and double crosses make the path more twisted than ever

So what do you think? Let us know in the comments!

‘Crossed’ comes in third on MTV’s 11 YA novels we can’t wait to read in 2011 list!

3. “Crossed” by Ally Condie (November 1, 2011)
Can Cassia find and save Ky—the Aberration she’s forbidden to love—before he’s killed on the frontlines of an Outer Province war? Here’s hoping we find out in the second installment of Ally’s excellent dystopian trilogy.

Are you looking forward to reading any of the books on the list?

Ally has confirmed our earlier post (located here)!

From her website:

CROSSED, the sequel to MATCHED, will be released November 1, 2011.

I was checking Amazon.com to buy UK edition of Matched, and I saw that Amazon has already listed the second book of the Matched Trilogy!

CROSSED will be released on November 1, 2011!

SOURCE: Amazon.com