Archive for the 'critiques' Category

Zombies! Bunnies! … Zombie Bunnies!

What’s not to love about zombie bunnies? Right?
I don’t often get to do a cover that presents so many fun possibilities. Well, everything I get to do in book design is fun, with the possible exception of endnotes, or maybe the 101st revision on a cover that started out pretty neat in the first go [...]

Cover Design Trends

People often ask whether I follow trends in my book design. Well, yes and no. There are definitely trends. Definitely genre specific design “rules,” and definitely it goes in waves. I think that it’s just human nature to want to be one of the crowd. But is that the wisest choice in marketing? Apparently marketing [...]

Sara loved my book! Almost.

I made it through a week of anticipation and was rewarded with good comments from literary agent, Sara Megibow of the Nelson Agency in Denver, Colorado. She didn’t soft pedal it either. After a lively and direct presentation on the realities of the business of publishing, how to go about finding and landing an agent, [...]

Sour Apples

Okay Apple, now I am mad.I just previewed the Adobe product Flash Catalyst. I can understand now why they were so upset when you invited them to leave off developing for the iPhone and iPad. I and many thousands of other DESIGNERS (i.e. not DEVELOPERS) have been waiting patiently for a product which would allow [...]

The Pain and Pleasure of Cover Design

After a hiatus that  means I’m busy… I’m showing of some of my latest covers in the next few posts.
I love covers. I love the results, and I love the process. But I gotta tell ya, sometimes it’s painful. If you’re a writer/author I know you’ve heard (or lived through) horror stories about how “that [...]

Last but not least …

The third book in the cover contest gets posted today! Which one do you pick?

Cover winners… book two…

I’m enjoying the discussions of the covers for Breath. The interesting thing about cover design is that it’s largely subjective. What appeals to people is depends on their backgrounds, their preferred genres, their cultures, education, socio-economic level, and gender among other things. With all the variables it’s a wonder we can agree on anything! But [...]

Covers that grab me…

Apropos of absolutely nothing I just heard about these books in the YA (young adult) fantasy genre. I really, really like these covers.

Both by Carrie Jones and both currently on the NYT Bestseller List. Unfortunately I do not know who the designer is, because they don’t put that kind of info in the Amazon [...]

Cover Contest Winners! Here we go….

First let me apologize once again for how long it’s taken me to get these underway. All kinds of things just conspired against me having any time to work on them. Paying work has to come first, because, this is my job after all. Writing and holding contests are just my hobby! So here goes.
These [...]

We pause for a message from our sponsors…

OK, no sponsors. It’s just me.
I know that my three contest winners are waiting anxiously for their covers. And um… I haven’t had much time to devote to them yet. I’m at the research and “noodling” stage. Next comes “doodling,” but we mustn’t short change the noodle part. Though there’s nothing concrete to show for [...]