I mentioned a while ago that I sold a novel to WordFire Press. Since then, I’ve been going through the behind the doors stuff that happens when you sell a book – the conversations, the editing, and the cover. Oh, the cover.
To be honest with you, I can’t remember when or who said it to me, but someone at WordFire mentioned I could commission my own cover art if I wanted to. That idea burned brightly in my brain. I latched onto it and wouldn’t let it go. I spoke with my publisher, Kevin J. Anderson about it, and he said it was true, I could, but he was also wary. I don’t blame him for being so. Every WFP book published has his name on it, his brand, and being a marketing person myself, I understand how important it is to protect such things.
So, we worked together on it. I told him my plan, and he liked it and gave me the green light to see what I could do.
I immediately emailed Galen Dara.
I met Galen years ago at WorldCon. We sat in a large hallway in the convention center doodling back and forth in a notebook in-between her ‘tattooing’ someone’s arm with a pen.
The moment I heard I could commission art for my book cover, I knew it had to be Galen’s art. She has come a long way since we sat on that bench together, and I couldn’t be prouder of her. The art she has created is absolutely amazing, and the idea of having her do the art for this book made so much sense to me. I just hoped it made sense to her, too.
To my astonishment and delight, she accepted. We had a few back and forth conversations about the book and the title character, Samantha Kane. She sent me a ‘preliminary sketch’ that blew my mind. Based on that sketch, Kevin felt as excited as I did, and we proceeded.
Here’s the final art (followed below by the cover with text):
I may have ran around WorldCon showing that image off on my phone. *cough*
And here’s the book cover with titles and text:
I can’t tell you how excited I am at this moment.
Anyone ready to pre-order?
~P
That cover is gorgeous!
I like. It calls to mind some of the fantasy covers from the 70s/early 80s. Nostalgia trip FTW!
That is extraordinary–the whole layout is lovely!
Mouth…is…open…I can’t stop looking!
BEE-YOO-TEE-FULL!!!
I’ve blown away by the cover!
Awesome, Patrick! How many pages is she clocking in at?
Great back-copy too.
Thanks. 🙂
Roughly 95K words.
~P