Kids in Love by Nikki Godwin

Title: Kids in Love (Saturn #1.5)
Author: Nikki Godwin
Date of Publication: September 7, 2014
Purchase at: Amazon; Smashwords

As one of the original Saturnites, Darby McMillon has been a longtime face of the fandom. From the days when the boys were just a YouTube band trying to gain fans up through their recent lockdown, Darby's channel - Darby's Daily Dose of Drama - was the "go to" spot for all things Spaceships Around Saturn.
Until now, she's been trusted by most and envied by few, but her meet up with SAS girlfriend Chloe Branson shakes Darby's world. She learns quickly that when you're with the band, everything isn't always red carpets and music videos.
And the closer she gets to her SAS crush Tate Kingsley, the closer she comes to losing her Saturnite status forever.

Excerpt:

Tate walks over to the trampoline and climbs up. Then he reaches a hand out to me. I haven’t been on this thing in a long time. I grab his hand anyway and let him pull me up. He falls back onto the bouncy material and eventually comes to a halt, staring up at the clouds.

“Sometimes, late at night, I wish I really did have a spaceship to take around Saturn,” he says, his eyes lost somewhere among the stars. “I just want to see firsthand, up close, that there are things much bigger than this, you know? Like bigger than this band and the fame and the fandom.”

I lie back next to him and watch as the milky strands whisper across the night, leaving their words across the black backdrop.

“Honestly? I kind of like the view from down here,” I say.

“Yeah, but I mean…” He pauses. “I don’t know. Sometimes it’s just too much. Don’t you feel like you can’t breathe sometimes? Like everyone has expectations and you can’t meet them all? Or is the fandom totally different on that level?”

The fandom is definitely different. We don’t have the pressure on us that we put on the guys of SAS. Sure, people expect daily videos from me – or at least every other day – but I do those for fun anyway.

If I fell off the planet tomorrow, a few people would notice, and eventually there would be some other girl who made videos and everyone would follow her. That’s a depressing thought now that it’s in my brain.

“Fandoms are different. People come and go,” I tell him. “You guys are the sun. We just orbit around you.”

He sighs. “It’s tough being the sun.” Then he turns on his side and faces me. “If you could wish for one thing, on one star, which star would you pick and what would you wish for?”

“Right now?” I’m completely caught off guard. I can’t tell him that I wish he’d drop to one knee with a diamond and propose. “Umm…”

I look away from him and glance around the stars for a bright one. “That one,” I say, pointing to the twinkling speck in the sky, slightly to the right of my house’s rooftop.

“So you go for the bright ones?” Tate asks, craning his neck to see my star.

“Well, yeah,” I say. “That way I can always see it.”

suddenly feel like this was the wrong answer or maybe not what he was looking for. It makes me feel snobby, like the way small accounts look at big accounts online. It’s like we’re the bright stars that everyone can see, and everyone else is a peasant star – a measly little light that tries so hard to shine amongst the rest of us and our giant glows. Oh gosh, I should’ve picked a dim star. Can I go back and pick a dim star? I’ll totally be a peasant.

Hmm,” Tate says. He rests back on the trampoline. “I guess that makes sense. I’d pick this one over here. It’s kind of hard to see.”

He motions his index finger toward a dim star. I trace the stars around it and wonder if it’s part of a constellation. If this set of stars is meant to be something special, I hope I’m seeing it incorrectly because it looks like a seagull. Tate’s star is at the tip of its beak.

“Why that one?” I ask, hoping he doesn’t give me some beautifully poetic answer.

Title: American Girl on Saturn (Saturn #1)

Author: Nikki Godwin

Date of Publication: August 29, 2013

Purchase at: Amazon; Barnes & Noble; Smashwords

The summer after graduation is supposed to be that first real taste of freedom - but not for eighteen-year-old Chloe Branson. Just as that breeze of freedom is making its way into her galaxy, her secret-service-agent dad drops a meteor-sized bomb of bad news on her and her sisters. An attempt has been made on the lives of Canadian boyband, Spaceships Around Saturn, during their USA tour, and the guys have to go into hiding ASAP. The only problem? In the midst of the crisis and media frenzy, their dad volunteered to hide the guys...in their house.

Six-year-old Emery is as ecstatic as any self-proclaimed Saturnite would be, but Chloe and her seventeen-year-old sister Aralie watch their summer plans crash and burn like a falling star. The SAS guys aren't happy with the situation, either. Bad boy Jules picks fights with Aralie about everything from his Twitter followers to his laundry, and heart-throb Benji can't escape Emery's fangirlisms for more than three minutes.

But after the super-cute Milo kisses Chloe during a game of hide-and-seek, she finally understands what Emery means when she talks about SAS being "out of this world." If this is what Saturn feels like, Chloe doesn't want to come back to Earth.

About The Author:

Nikki Godwin is a YA/NA/LGBT author. She can't live without Mountain Dew, black eyeliner, and music by Hawthorne Heights. When not writing, she internet-stalks her favorite bands and keeps tabs on surf competitions. Her life goal is to meet David Desrosiers of Simple Plan. Her favorite pro surfers are Jeremy Flores, Gabriel Medina, and John John Florence.