Penguin Teen

EXCLUSIVE COVER REVEAL: PAPER VALENTINE by Brenna Yovanoff

Brenna Yovanoff is the author of the New York Times bestselling novel THE REPLACEMENT (a 2010 Breathless Read!) and The Space Between. Paper Valentine is her new novel, and today we’re revealing the cover right here on Penguin Teen! Brenna was nice enough to answer a couple of questions about Paper Valentine for us and give us her thoughts on the cover. What are YOUR thoughts?

So Brenna: Tell us about PAPER VALENTINE! What is it about? What inspired you to write it? Does it relate to your previous novels (THE REPLACEMENT and THE SPACE BETWEEN) in any way?

Okay, so PAPER VALENTINE is a story about a pair of best friends who don’t really know how to get along without each other. Also, one of them happens to be dead. It’s a serial killer story, and a love story (in more ways than one), and has upcycled fashion and ghosts and kissing. Although the majority of the book does not take place in a photo shop, my biggest inspiration absolutely came from the fact that I worked in a color-process lab in college and one of my responsibilities was printing the crime scene photos for the local police department.

Even though the characters and the subject matter are pretty different from my previous books, I definitely think you could look at them side by side and notice common threads. Despite taking place during an outrageously hot summer, the world of PAPER VALENTINE is decidedly dark, not to mention kind of moody and surreal.

What are your thoughts on the cover? Does it do a good job of representing PAPER VALENTINE?

Oh, I love this cover so much! I think the iconic quality of it, coupled with the strangeness and the intricacy of the paper-cut design, is just very evocative and elegant, and maybe most importantly, totally creepy! Even though the actual narrative of the book takes place in the summer, so much of the story is informed by things that have happened during the winter months and I think the woods and the pale, rolling sky capture that icy undertone perfectly.

Who is your favorite character in PAPER VALENTINE?

Well, first I’d like to say that I’ve really enjoyed getting to know most of the people in this book and had an excellent time writing about them. And second, I’d like to say that I definitely, definitely have favorite characters, and those characters are Hannah’s little sister, Ariel, and Ariel’s best friend, Pinky. They don’t function as comic relief exactly, but they are just so matter-of-fact and so joyful and honest and just absolutely prepared to have fun, whatever they happen to be doing!

What are you working on now?

I’m only in the very early stages of my next book, so I can’t really talk about it in a useful, detailed way that would tell you what it’s actually like, but I can say that what I’m working on is a macabre adventure in the Southern Gothic style, filled with magic, danger, family legacies, and romance in the most, sweeping, traditional sense ofthe word.

Add PAPER VALENTINE to your Goodreads shelf.

Pre-order PAPER VALENTINE on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Indiebound.org!