Today’s feature cover is a design for a self-help book. If you want to see your name and title where the place holder names are now, go grab this cover before someone else does. Happy Writing!

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The Sword will be available summer 2013.

The Sword

(The Box Series; Book Two)

A shoulder slams into mine. By the time I’ve spun around to face my attacker, I’ve already called enough magic to knock someone unconscious with a single touch. When I realise the person who hit me is a girl not much older than myself, I freeze in place. She mouths the word ‘sorry’ over the deafening music before bouncing off to rejoin her friends.

Only once she’s gone am I able to relax enough to release the spell. I have no idea how I managed to get so tense so quickly. Up until the moment she’d hit me, I’d been having fun. The music decent and I haven’t danced so much in way too long. Now I can’t even shuffle my feet.

Sin picks her way through the crowd, pausing to wiggle her fingers at a few people before stopping in front of me and handing me the bottle of water she’s carrying. In her other hand is a large mug of beer which she takes a gulp of.

“Isn’t this place the best?” She has to shout for me to hear her over the club’s noise.

She’s too consumed by the music to notice I don’t answer. She spins in a circle as the song changes without so much as a pause, and she throw one hand in the air, bouncing it up and down, matching the rhythm. Her chin length navy blue hair falls over her eyes, giving me a chance to take some deep breaths to calm down without her noticing.

It doesn’t help.

The crowd’s energy, fun only minutes ago is suddenly overwhelming. I glance down at my hand and the bottle I hold. The water swishes inside the container as my hand shakes from the burst of adrenaline still racing through me. The room seems to be shrinking and all of the dancers are moving in way too close. The lack of space is suffocating. I need to get out.

My attempt to show Sin I’m getting too hot by fanning myself goes unnoticed. A group of school friends she introduced me to earlier have grabbed her attention and her attention is fully on whatever is causing them all to laugh. They’d been friendly enough with me earlier, but now that I’ve stopped dancing, they don’t seem to remember I exist.

When the song shifts once more, the group gets really excited. They drag Sin in the direction of one of the speakers, leaving me to fend for myself. I watch them for a moment, debating whether or not I should follow. I wish I could shake whatever has gotten into me so I can go back to dancing. Instead, I turn around and head for the exit.

The room is packed with people. More shiny dresses and tight pants than I thought I’d see in my lifetime, all stuffed into the small space. And I know there are a ton more people in similar party wear outside, hoping to get in. I’m barely able to pick my way through the crowd. I’m concentrating so hard on where I want to go, I don’t notice him at first. As I squeeze between a group of girls dancing in a tight circle and a bunch of guys working up the nerve to approach them, my eyes drift across the room to him.

He meets my gaze for a second and then disappears behind the crowd. It was only a glimpse and yet there’s no doubt in my mind about who I’d seen.

Al.

Suddenly the uneasy feeling I’ve been dealing with makes sense. It’s been so long since I’ve felt the magic of a wizard, I hadn’t recognised the sensation.

I shift directions in order to follow him, and this time I’m less polite as I shove my way through the crowd. By the time I make it to the other side of the room, he’s nowhere to been found. There is, however, an ‘employee’s only’ door. When I check the handle, I notice not only is it not locked, but it’s also been tampered with by magic.

He’s gone this way.

I take a glance back to where Sin is still dancing with her friends. She hasn’t noticed I’m gone. And no one else has noticed me by the door. I slip out of the club’s main room and into an empty corridor. A glass emergency door leads out to a large black garbage bin. I can see the shadowy figure of a couple of people smoking, but they aren’t paying any attention to me. The only other exit is a wooden door at the far end of the hall with a graffiti covered ‘roof access’ sign next to it.

Now that I understand what I’m sensing, it’s easy to tell Al’s gone up the stairs. The trail of magic he left behind might as well have been arrows pointing the way.

Going after him is my only option. It’s been over a year since I last saw him and even now my entire body hums after only glimpse. And yet, I have no idea what to expect when I find him. He’s obviously running away from me for a reason. He could be trying to protect me by keeping a distance between us, or this could be his way of leading me into a trap.

I use my finger like a knife to cut the air next to my hip. A hole opens, allowing me access into a magic pocket I’d created a while ago. I find the hilt of my sword and draw it from the space.

I’d drawn the sword to help ease my nerves, but now it’s in my hand, I realise I’ve only made things worse. Practicing with a sword in protective gear is one thing. Using the weapon against a real person is something else entirely.

Every muscle in my body is tense, causing the walk up the stairs to be slow and mechanical. He’s up there, I can feel him even from this distance, or at least I think it’s him I sense. The patchwork of magic isn’t quite the same as what he stole from Stewart. It feels even more tainted, if that’s possible. The magic is fractured in so many pieces; I don’t understand how he’s able to keep it all together.

For a minute I think perhaps he hasn’t when I sense a chunk of the magic shift its position and moves away from the door. But then I understand what’s happening. There’s more than one wizard on the roof.

I’m walking into an ambush.

Ever judge whether you will buy a book based on it’s cover? Of course you have. The cover, along with the title are all an author has to convince you to pick up a book and take a closer look.

Each week I randomly choose a cover from Amazon’s new releases and I discuss what works for me, what doesn’t and why.

The Other Side of Us by Sarah Mayberry

Initial reaction…
Meh. Boring. And what’s up with that font choice?

A deeper look…
The more I look at this, the more I realise, it’s not the font that bothers me, but the fact that it feels like someone took a photo and slapped all of the other elements on top and then said, “Done!”

Could the designer at least chosen another colour other than black for the font? And maybe not had the random line between the title and the author’s name. The line isn’t even even between the two.

The only thing that looks like it was designed on this cover is the Harlequin banner. The design on the banner itself looks nice, and works well with the well designed Harlequin logo. However, once again “Super Romance” seems to have been slapped on top using a generic script.

Final thoughts…
This cover isn’t terrible, it’s just not particularly good either. I feel like the company must have given up on hiring designers for each cover and instead has some intern throw the name on in a generic serif type and size predetermined long before they know what the book is actually going to be called. They know they’re going to sell book no matter what the cover actually looks like, so why bother spending the money? Bad Harlequin. Bad.

Today’s feature cover is a design made for a romance novel. If you want to see your name and title where the place holder names are now, go grab this cover before someone else does.

Happy Writing!

Ever judge whether you will buy a book based on it’s cover? Of course you have. The cover, along with the title are all an author has to convince you to pick up a book and take a closer look.

Each week I randomly choose a cover from Amazon’s new releases and I discuss what works for me, what doesn’t and why.

Music of the Heart by Katie Ashley

Initial reaction to the cover…
Looks like a romance. Fairly standard idea of featuring the two main character in a loving embrace with a script font for the title. The darker colours in the photo make me think there’s a bit of a dark twist to this story. Not particularly inventive in the design, but it does the job of telling the reader what the story is as well as catching the eye with it’s rich colours and pretty picture.

A deeper look…
Notice the heart next to the title that looks like it’s a part of the font? Yeah, that’s a nice touch.

I’m not a fan of this particular script font. Things like the way the “S” in “Music” dips down lower than the other letters causes weight of each letter to be uneven and makes my eye think the words aren’t quite straight on the page. Also the “I” in the same word isn’t attached to the letter before it cause it to feel unfinished.

The tattoo on his arm drives me a bit nuts. I know nothing about tattoos, but even I know they are never look perfectly black like that unless they were just put on the skin. It’s too clearly photoshopped to me, though probably the average observer wouldn’t think twice about it.

Final thoughts…
I love the combination of the blue from the background and the red of the type, and I think that is what really gives this cover it’s punch. If I were the author, I’d be happy to have this cover and would trust it to catch the attention of the right readers.

Any feedback would be super helpful. I figured posting in the self publishing forum makes the most sense since I’d love feedback from all people who have already self pub’d or are thinking about it in the future. But if mods think this is more appropriate somewhere else, I apologize.

So here are my main questions (though anything more people are willing to tell me would be super awesome).

1. Age (or age range if your more comfortable with that)

2. What type of book(s) do you write? (Fiction, non fiction, genre, etc)

3. Have you ever self-published a book? If so, how many?

4. Did you purchase a cover or make one yourself? Why did you make that choice?

5. Do you know what a premade cover is? Can you explain it to me? (Please write whatever you think and do not worry about being wrong. There is no wrong. I really want to hear people’s ideas and see if mine match)

6. Have you ever purchased a premade? Would you? Why or why not?

7. Roughly how much would you or have you spent on a premade cover?

8. Do you have any other thoughts you’d like to share?

Thanks so much!

The Writer’s Little Helper
By James V. Smith, Jr.

The Ten-Scene Tool

Point A, The Opener*
Complication
Complication
Point of No Return Complication*
Complication
Complication
Complication
Complication*
Point X, The Closer (Climax)*
Ending*

*Identify these scenes first, starting with Point A and Point X.

This is one of the most fun tools I’ve seen for writing in a while. It makes writing seem so easy. When I’m thinking about a new story, there’s always a couple of scenes that are really clear in my mind. Writing them down right away and spreading out from those main scenes makes a lot sense to me.

This is a good way to figure out the structure of your book without spending a bunch of energy writing out a detailed outline. Personally, when I write out a full outline, I lose a lot of the energy I originally had for the book. However, not having a detailed outline does make writing the first draft a lot faster, so it’s all about personal preference.

Pros
Fun, fast, simple way to figure out your novel.

Cons
Not really any cons I can think of. Even if you want to do a more detailed outline, you can start with this technique and develop it as far as you’d like. If you don’t like outlining, this honestly doesn’t take much time or energy. However, you end up with a clearer view of how strong your plot is and if you need to think through any sections a little more.

Ever judge whether you will buy a book based on it’s cover? Of course you have. The cover, along with the title are all an author has to convince you to pick up a book and take a closer look.

Each week I randomly choose a cover from Amazon’s new releases and I discuss what works for me, what doesn’t and why.

Blood Trade by Jane Hunter

Initial reaction to the cover…
Holy busy cover Batman! I don’t know if they could have thrown more elements into this cover design without it starting to make a person’s eyes explode. The saving grace is the uniforming color of the design.

A deeper look…
I’m guessing this is for a paranormal story, possibly a vampire slaying one based on what looks like stakes in the character’s hands. But what could have been a very powerful image of a strong heroine become lost in the mass of fog and background noise that overwhelms the piece for me.

Then there’s the tilted font. Maybe it’s just me, but I like my words to read in a straight line. I see no point in tilting the title, especially in this design. It doesn’t seem to help with the flow of the cover, and it only makes it more difficult for a potential reader to know the title in a glance.

The border along the left is completely pointless as far as I can tell. There is a place for borders, but not here. It feels like the designer was trying to soften the cover with this pattern to let readers know there might be a bit of romance or lightness to the otherwise dark looking story. What happened for me is that it just became another thing to look at which means I have no idea where I should be looking.

Final thoughts…
This is a case of over designing. The designer has all the skills necessary, but they took what could have worked on it’s own, a great image, and then surrounded it with too much information. It may catch reader’s eyes, but I think it will also lose people’s attention just because it takes a bit of thinking to figure out what is going on, and by then the potential reader will have moved on to something else. I’m betting this designer has done and will do much better pieces.

Words, words, words. What do they mean? And what story can be told about each one?
Each week I chose a random word out of my old (copyright 1962) Thorndike – Barnhart High School Dictionary by closing my eyes, flipping through the pages and pointing to spot on the page. Both the word and it’s meaning are copied directly from the dictionary.
What comes after is an original piece of flash fiction based entirely on the word. No idea’s have been preconceived and I start writing seconds after reading the word. No time to think. No time to stress.

Mourn – v. 1. grieve. 2. feel or show sorrow over.

There was a time when I would cry when someone died. If I knew them, the tears would flow even harder, but even if I didn’t the pain of their loss would hit me with such strong emotions, I couldn’t help but mourn them.

Since my own death, I’ve found it impossible to feel anything but envy toward those who pass. At least they get to rest. Their time in this world is over and whatever they accomplished or didn’t no longer matters as they leave this existence and go on to whatever’s next.

Me? I have to watch them go and know I’ll never experience their peace. Those that they leave behind will mourn and then eventually they will move on, continuing to live their own lives, as it should be. No one could mourn me. Because I never left. I have been here, walking among them as though nothing’s changed, though everything has.

I’ve heard of other like me. Over time, their skin becomes as cold as stone, and their eyes as red as fire. They have learned ways to control their own blood, the source of both life and death, in order to control the souls of those who have died near them.

I will find that power, and I will use every drop of my blood to bring back those who have gone. There will be no more tears and no one will mourn since no one will ever die. The world will be cursed as I have been.

And if everyone is cursed, then no one is.