Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Cover Me

Have you ever wondered how a book cover gets designed?

Every author will have their own experience, as this varies, not only between houses but between authors. Since I'm a graphic designer by trade, the cover was very important to me and I wanted to be involved in the process. I made sure to tell my agent and my editor, and my editor was gracious enough to include me from the get go.

An illustrator was chosen and sketches were made. We made comments, suggested changes, and more sketches were made. When we got one we liked, the artist created on the final art, complete with title text.

Alas, sales nixed it.

We went back and tried a new approach. This time, the artist just did pencil sketches. I wish I could show you the sketches, but alas, that whole legality thing.

Sales nixed it again.

Then someone on the Balzer & Bray staff (I don't know who, but I'm still grateful for them) did a clip art mock up and sent it to my editor. My editor sent it to me and my agent and asked, "What do you think?"


Well, I went nuts. I just LOVED the idea and the look. The original title is used at this point, as we hadn't changed it yet. We made sure sales loved it to before we went any further. Luckily, they did. My editor changed illustrators and we started over, giving them this new concept to play with. He sent us this sketch:

We loved it, we're totally thrilled, made a few suggestions again (some involving the hands, and I wanted a more Byzantine look to the buildings), and sent it off. During this time, the title change was finally approved, so the color version reflected that.

You could have heard my excited squeal a mile away. I could NOT stop giggling over this cover. I think it totally rocks. You'll notice the "the" is missing from this version, which was added to the title after. We made a few minor tweaks (like adding some purple to the swirly stuff) and the final cover is...

And that's how I got a cover.

I'm incredibly lucky to have been included in the process, as a lot of authors have no say and don't even see their cover until it's done. That's actually how it went with the UK cover (which I'll post about soon). Nothing wrong with that, especially since those Brits like their covers differently than us Yankees do, so my design experience wouldn't have been much help. (And I did get to do one small thing, which I spill in that post). This just goes to show that even the same author and the same book can have different experiences depending on the house.

And both of mine were fabulous experiences.

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Only Four More Months

I can't believe it's getting so close! A lot of exciting things are happening now, especially with galleys going out and BEA (with the electronic galleys) this past week. People are starting to talk (yay!) and I'm seeing The Shifter pop up on blogs and other sites. It's a little scary, but in a good "roller coaster" way. I just need to resist the urge to spend all day Googling myself.

In other news...

I got my very first blog review, which is such a thrill. The folks over at A Million Words said nice things, so, thanks guys!

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Hands Across the Expo


My wonderful agent sent me this great photo of "The Shifter" displayed in bright and shiny color at Book Expo America. (Doesn't it look like a movie poster all done up like that?)

Do you think they'd let me keep that when they'd re done? Nah, me neither.