In the last month or so, I’ve been happy to welcome many new blog readers, and to celebrate, I’m inviting everyone to enter to win a free, signed copy of Into the Land of Snows. All you have to do is leave a comment below to be entered. There are a couple of rules, though. I’m only going to be able to mail to a location in the US. Comments will close midnight (MT) on Wednesday, August 15th (2012). I will conduct a random drawing at that point and notify the winner. Enter only once. Just to have a theme, I’m requesting you comment on something about the blog (mention something you liked or learned about) or something about the book (Buddhism, Tibet, Himalayas, Mt. Everest, Nepal, yeti, magic, etc.). To start us off, I’ll post a comment so no one feels awkward to be the first to post.
Thanks to everyone who entered. I enjoyed reading your comments and seeing the diversity of thoughts and experiences this group represents.
And the winner is…. fakename2. Congratulations!!! I’ve left a message on your blog. You can contact me at himalayaspencerellis@yahoo.com. I will need your mailing address.
ellisnelson 
Count me in – this book is very enticing!
LikeLike
Ellis,I finished your book yesterday and liked it very much. As I said earlier, I think it first captures the spirit of adolescence with all its confusion. Knowing a lot but failing to understand much of it, partly because you’re being “protected” by adults from the knowledge you really need to understand better, and partly because you have no yardstick to measure your knowledge against, because you don’t have enough life experience. It’s kind of a Catch-22 place to be. I can’t imagine that this book would not resonate with teens, and I applaud you for being able to recapture that. As adults, it’s easy to forget those days.
Plus, it introduced me to the life of Nepal and Buddhism that all the mountain climbing stories I’ve read about Everest and K2 have never done.
And meanwhile, as if that weren’t enough, there is the journey of discovery Blake takes with Ang. And the surprise ending! (What actually happens with the mysterious camera, and why?) It had all the elements of a great mystery and a great book. So thank you for writing it, and I’m still glad I won! .
LikeLike
Thanks! I always appreciate a few kind words on Amazon, if you have an account, and a few spare moments. Glad you liked it.
LikeLike
I do have an account on Amazon and I’ll be happy to do it.
LikeLike
Wonderful!!!
LikeLike
It’s done. I think you have a bright future, Ellis.
LikeLike
Thanks for writing such an insightful review. I really appreciate it! I know at least one reader really “got” the book.
LikeLike
You’re welcome, and thank you too. I thought the one reviewer, Kristen, sounded like she might be about Blake’s age, and she said she could relate to Blake. I thought that was high praise! Just what I imagine you were shooting for.
LikeLike
Thanks for the like on my recent blog post. It is always nice to read what other authors are doing.
LikeLike
I am happy I won! I had trouble believing it, I only ever won one thing before and that was a 3-day trip to Las Vegas a long time ago. I like this one better. I’m only on page 29, but even so, I can say that it’s well-written. I don’t quite know what happens yet, but that’s okay. The stage is set. And not in a boring way which reminds me of, as my sister and I say, The Begats in the Bible. So far I think if perfectly captures the anger,angst, and trapped feeling of an adolescent.
LikeLike
Too late for the draw and living in UK anyway, but thanks for enjoying my blog: I enjoyed the contrast between our two books: yours contemporary fiction in the snowy Himalayas, mine a memoir set in 1960’s colonial Africa; your book with a beautiful, crisp snow-blue design, mine earth-red and textured … reminding me yet again that covers are important too! All the best for the book’s success – and I admire your blog design too, I am still an amateur on that! Warm wishes
LikeLike
I’ve only just discovered your blog and unfortunately missed your contest, but I look forward to checking out your blog and following your posts. Thanks for stopping by and liking my post!
LikeLike
Hey i nominated you for Sunshine bloggers award http://allworldissues.com/2012/08/17/pay-it-forward-award-post-nominees-check-to-see-if-your-nominated/
LikeLike
Thanks for visiting my blog.
LikeLike
i wish I could read your book too. 🙂 I’m a great fan of young adult fictions. I love authors like Tolkien and Bradbury as well as L’Engle. Books are stars in dark night skies.
LikeLike
Thanks for recommending all the YA fiction and ghost stories. Very useful for a teacher or parent. I’m not US-based, but I’d like to offer my congratulations on your book anyway! It looks so intriguing!
LikeLike
I’d love to be able to get a copy of this book to review. I grew up in New Orleans, so when I first saw mountains, my breath was taken away. They’re so beautiful!
LikeLike
Your book intrigues me! I love the fact that you’re interested in Buddhism as I am as well! I can’t wait to read your book and perhaps do a review on it!
LikeLike
I read the first couple of chapters on Amazon, and it seems like a really lovely book. You really captured the emotions of a child with parents going through a divorce very well 🙂 I would love to read the rest of the book!
LikeLike
Your book sounds fascinating, I’d love to read it.
LikeLike
thanks for being the first to comment on my blog! i was flying this past december, over the alps, and had to take the photo which i selected for my ‘home’ page. my passing thoughts then were that the snow was thebestdressup for the mountains…how serendipitous that your book is ‘into the land of snows’. so eager to read your book which i have just added to my reading list. your blog is for thebestdressup!
LikeLike
Thank you visiting my blog and giving me a like. I would love to be entered into your giveaway. Your posting RE: Lewis Carroll is intriguing, and good luck with either self publishing your rendition or however you choose to proceed.
LikeLike
Even if I don’t win a copy I will put it on my to buy reading list for payday…
LikeLike
I’d like to read your book, i’ve grown near Pyrenees and I love everything related to mountains and magic legends.
LikeLike
I’ve seen first-hand what following the Buddhist path has done for my wife after she returned from studying at a monastery in Kathmandu in the ’90s. She’s since survived two battles against deadly cancer with courage and grace,
LikeLike
I long ago became fascinated by Alexandra David-Neel’s accounts of her years in Tibet, and remembered her and so many other travlers when I visited Kham and Tibet a few years ago. I will never forget the “monastery smell” of incense and rancid butter, and I still carry with me the amulet blessed at Shigatze.
LikeLike
I can’t enter officially, because I live in England, but mountains are my great love since early childhood – especially the Himalayas … Annapurna and Dhaulagiri and Nanda Devi and Kailas. So I look forward to buy and read your book very soon. Thank you for your likes on my blog – much appreciated!
LikeLike
In our culture (Native Hawaiian), we have a particular kind of reptilian water deity called moʻo. Often, the ridges of mountains are indicated as the remnants of a slain moʻo. Although I have visited over 30 countries, I have never been to Tibet, but I am fascinated with belief narratives of all peoples and love hearing stories about beings associated with mountains. Cheers! Lovely book cover, by the way.
LikeLike
Even though I live at the foot of Pikes Peak, mountains continue to take my breath away — and not just because of the elevation. Thank you for stopping by my blog. I appreciate the likes!
LikeLike
Is that You moving this castle? I like your spark!!
LikeLike
So glad to find your site, and thanks for the like you gave me on my little stop-and-go blog. I think the Himalayas and Tibetan Buddhism sound like great YA topics. I’m looking forward to reading your blog posts in depth – lots of interesting topics.
LikeLike
The book excerpt got me hooked. If I don’t win, I’ll still look for a copy to buy. (I’d really like to win, though.)
LikeLike
Thanks for visiting my blog and I’ve enjoyed your posts here. I was very interested to learn that Alice (of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland) was a real girl. I’d heard that before, but didn’t know any of the specifics until I read them in your post.
LikeLike
I have not yet read your book; however, the story line looks very interesting. I had an anthropology professor who conducted his field work in Nepal, so this should be a great read. Officially added to my reading list, and will post a review soon!
-baseballvalbooks
LikeLike
I am intrigued by the Voynich Manuscript post. I plan on doing some research into that myself. Mountain-wise, I am privileged to live near Mt Rainier. We spend a lot of time hiking, snowshoeing and skiing.
LikeLike
I first read the book on which the movie Seven Years In Tibet was based many years ago at least 35, but that’s a guess, and never forgot the strange and wonderful adventure of this German traveller and adventurer stuck in Tibet. I would love to receive a similar, unforgettable book about that magical part of the world.
Johanna van Zanten
LikeLike
I would love to read your book too. I have to confess that mountains are my least favorite places, even though I grew up in the Great Smoky Mountains and love them and have fond memories. I’ve spent a lifetime trying to work my way to warmer and warmer places, and so live in Florida now 🙂 But within the last year I read a book which I think was called Disaster on K2, which had the most profound effect, more so than others I’ve read. You also intrigued me with a response to your post “Alice was a Real Girl”. The reader said that if Alice was a real girl, then maybe Wonderland was a real place. And you said something to the effect that that is the premise of your book. I am so intrigued by that idea. So I’d like to win, but if not…I will read it anyway, maybe on Kindle.
LikeLike
Thanks for liking my posts. I’m another one who really enjoyed your post on the Voynich manuscript and am glad I found you. I find the Himalayas to be an intimidating concept; there’s a power and a beauty there that’s bigger than us mortal folk.
LikeLike
I would be honoured to win your book
LikeLike
Thanks for the like. Wishing you success with the book. Sounds intriguing…are you on Kindle? Thanks again for stopping by my blog too 🙂
LikeLike
Yes, a Kindle version is available through Amazon. Follow the links on the books page.
LikeLike
there it is…missed it before. Thanks!
LikeLike
Into the Land of the Snows – A story, it seems, with all the right stuff…the challenges of survival in one of nature’s most remote and volatile mountain regions combined with the challenges of mending family bonds that have been severed. Continued success!
LikeLike
I have seen the Himalayas from the Nepal Side, some 25 years ago. I do remember the feeling I had, the first time I put my eye on those powerfu and majestic. Some holiness was arising within me.I felt like being home. Sometime I hope I can go back there, but this time will be Tibet. Looking forward reading your book. Thank you for sharing your writing
LikeLike
I would love to take this journey to the Himalayas with Blake. Only, I’ll do it in my comfy socks, under a warm blanket, sipping hot coffee.
I’m really looking forward to reading your work.
LikeLike
I’m delighted to discover your blog (thanks for the like on my own blog!) because my son read Into Thin Air this summer and I think he would find your book very interesting. I’m looking forward to exploring your blog at greater length, too.
LikeLike
Your blog is very informative. Being from Canada i’m unable to enter your contest but I still have to comment…. Chat soon.
LikeLike
Hi Matt,
My son’s at Simon Fraser in Vancouver so I have a fondness for all things Canadian.
LikeLike
This is my first time seeing your blog, but I’ll check it out some more and let you know what I think. 🙂
LikeLike
A colleague of mine vacationed in the Himalayas a couple years ago and hiked to base camp. The stories about his time there and the beauty of the land just intrigued me. I know no other love like the mountains I call home.
LikeLike
I can’t enter been over here in blighty but good luck everyone
LikeLike
I started to follow your blog after reading about the Voynich manuscript. I’m a graduate student studying Asian Cultures and Languages at UT Austin and have done a little work with scans of Sanskrit palm leaf manuscripts. I find manuscripts absolutely fascinating — from the marginalia to the typos to the copyists additions and deletions. I love it all. After following that post to your blog I was excited to see that you wrote about the Himalayas, somewhere I’ve never been, but have enjoyed studying for the past few years. I really enjoy your blog and your writing. Keep it up!
LikeLike
Well, I’ve just started to follow your blog, lead here by your gracious “likes” to my own blog posts, so thank you! I’ve definitely got a heart for Buddhism, so I’m really looking forward to reading more of what you’ve got here, Ellis!
LikeLike
Though I already commented on the post, I’ll write here how much I enjoyed your post “Alice was a real girl.” I love tracing the beginnings of tales, especially those that have been written, told or shown over and over again that generally accepted version of a tale is quite different from the original, like Disney’s “Sleeping Beauty” against the Grimms’ “Briar Rose.”
LikeLike
I think there is something so far greater of Himalayas than just housing the peak of the world. It seems to call to us, all over the world, to see, to discover and to experience. Is there a magic, a greater force of the earth that lies dormant beneath the surface but when forced to the heavens surfaces? It must, because they are calling, always calling.
LikeLike
I know something about Buddhism, but not Tibetan Buddhism specifically. I’ve raised two boys through those dreadful teen years. This should be a great book to read and to share. But I have to admit I like the mountains on your blog better than the book cover!
http://www.freethoughtandmetaphor.com
LikeLike
I’ve always been fascinated by Everest…and the folks who were compelled to climb it. I’ve read a couple accounts…including that of George Mallory. I can only imagination the pain and danger associated with climbing that…or any other…peak.
LikeLike
woo hoo I like this!!
Well, I would like to say that your concise and short “about” page inspired me to change my own novel-esque “about” page to something quicker and attention grabbing. Thank you for that! Otherwise I love checking out your stories and supporting, in my own way, you as an author.
I live in Spain, but if by some miracle I win this draw, you can always send the book to my significant other who resides permenantly in the U.S. 😉
all the best!
Kasia
LikeLike
I wander the trails of the Front Range, Collegiate Peaks, and Sangre de Cristos, and I wonder…do I need the Himalayas? The answer is yes.
LikeLike
Ive had the pleasure of visiting Tibet twice, leading high school groups through Dharansala three times and meeting HHDL as well. These experiences were amazing and I can’t wait to read yours!
LikeLike
I grew up in the Catskills, live near the Rockies, and wrote about the Himalayas.
LikeLike