My guest today is Julie Stock, who I've met a couple of times, at Phillipa Ashley's book launch, and at the Romantic Novelists' Association's Conference in July. Also, I've spoken to Julie online, via Twitter and Facebook over the past year or so. Julie has a strong social media presence, and is extremely supportive of other writers. On her blog, Julie has an Author Spotlight feature, where she says:
"I
want to be able to help other authors gain some more visibility by
featuring them on my blog in the same way that I have been lucky enough to be
featured on other authors’ blogs."
Julie also writes posts which aim to help writers, including those on how to list a Goodreads giveaway, and on book covers. The book cover for 'From here to Nashville' won a gold star in the e-Book Cover Design Awards in February 2015. And I think you'll agree, it's a lovely cover, so I've invited Julie to talk about the process of having a book cover designed.
Over to you, Julie...
Over to you, Julie...
Julie Stock on Book Covers!
Firstly, I would like to thank Anita for having me on her
blog today to talk about book cover design and how I go about sourcing it.
As an indie author and with only the one book published, I
haven't had a lot of experience of sourcing book cover designs. However, the
experience I had last year before self-publishing my debut novel From Here to Nashville was an
interesting one and as I'm on the brink of having a new cover designed for my
second book, now is a good time to review the process I went through before.
Gather your ideas
As I explained in the two blog posts I wrote on my own blog
about the process of Choosing and Working with a Book Designer (Part One and Part Two), right from the very beginning, I had a clear idea of what I wanted to
include on the book cover for my debut novel. It's a contemporary romance with
a country music theme so a guitar was a given for me and there had to be
something to suggest romance. I found a stock photo which I liked and
downloaded it to use as a provisional cover. I put this image, along with
countless others in a Word file and kept looking at them to remind me of the
sort of thing I was looking for. I haven't done a provisional cover this time
but I have been keeping relevant photos on Pinterest
for a while now on a new board. I think this is a vital first step and leaving
the ideas to percolate in your brain for a while is an important part of the
process.
Think about your
genre
This time, my story is a contemporary romance set on a
vineyard in Alsace in France. One of the villages my characters go to has a
fortified medieval church on a hillside and this image has really stayed with
me so I would like to have this as the central focus of my new cover. In most
of the pictures I have seen or taken myself on a recent holiday to the area,
there are vines in the foreground so this is perfect for my setting. The
swirling vines could also make a nice border to the cover with the occasional
heart nestled in amongst the grapes around the outside. For my first cover, the
designer added in a heart-shaped dot to the 'i' in Nashville at my request and
this worked nicely. It would have been nice to keep that idea as a theme
running through my covers, except that the current title doesn't have an 'i' in
it!
Although I want my books to look like they are romance
stories, I want to make sure that they stand out too so this time, I won't be
having any pink on the cover, I don't think because it doesn't suit the story.
One of the advantages of being an indie author is that you can make those
decisions for yourself.
Start thinking of
yourself as a marketing brand
I really like the font used on my first cover and would
definitely like to keep it or something similar for the next book. I would also
like to keep the illustrated look we went for in the final version of my debut.
I know that I don't want to use photos as the actual cover but they will come
in handy for explaining what view I would like on the new cover. When I went to
the RNA (Romantic Novelists' Association) Conference last year, I was lucky to
receive a free book in my goodie bag which had a lovely illustration on the
front of it and I noted it for future reference because I liked the style. The
book was written by Rosanna Ley and if you look her books up, you'll see that
the book covers are almost like painted versions of photos. I like that idea so
I'm hoping for something like that on my next cover, which will be different to
my first but still in keeping with what I did before.
![]() |
Received for 'From Here to Nashville' |
Research your
designer
Look at their website/Facebook page and their portfolio if
you can. If you've come to them by way of one of their cover designs, then you
should mention that in your first discussion. If you really don't know where to
start but you belong to a professional organisation, ask other members for
their recommendations.
Scheduling
Once you've decided on your designer, discuss your schedule
and how they like to communicate. Start early because it doesn't matter if it's
ready first and waiting for everything else, just as long as you're sure about
the title and the brief. Be honest about your expectations by sharing your
experiences with them from the past, it's best to tell them what went well and
what didn't. Don't be afraid to say what you want!
Communicate with
your designer
As you can see, I've already gathered plenty of ideas and
had some strong thoughts of my own about the design. My designer last time was
very thorough in asking me what I was looking for, even down to asking me to complete
a detailed questionnaire. Still, the first version of the cover was a long way
from what I'd been hoping for so it was good that I had built in plenty of time
to my schedule for the design process. This allowed us to go back and think
again. The second round of designs was so different and I found it hard to
choose between them but in the end, I was really pleased with the final design,
which later won an award from Joel Friedlander (www.thebookdesigner.com).
Do ebook and print
versions at the same time if you can
In the end, I realised that I should have gone for the ebook
and print covers at the same time mainly because it is much better value so
this time, I will definitely do that. For my debut, not having both versions delayed
the release of the paperback and yet it was so easy to do the paperback that I
know I can get both versions done together this time.
Don't be afraid to
try someone new
I explained how I'd found my designer in my blog posts last
year and in the year since, I have come across a number of other designers
whose work I admire so it will be a difficult choice this year to decide on who
to go with. In the end, it has to be someone you can work comfortably with and
who understands what you're trying to achieve.
Thanks so much for taking the time to write such an informative and generous post, Julie! I expect that your advice will be especially helpful to writers who plan to self-publish, and to traditionally published authors who plan to self-publish their backlists.
Find out more about Julie here, with links to her website, and social media accounts:
About Julie
Julie
Stock is an author of contemporary romance from around the world: novels,
novellas and short stories. She is a proud member of the Romantic Novelists’
Association’s New Writers’ Scheme and of The Alliance of Independent Authors.
She blogs
about her path to publication on her website, ‘My Writing Life’. You can
also connect with her on Twitter, on Goodreads and via
her Facebook Author Page.
When she
is not writing, she works part-time as a teacher. She is married with two
teenage daughters and lives with her family in Bedfordshire.
Read other guest posts from Sue Moorcroft, Alison Morton, Talli Roland, Jane Holland, The Romaniacs and New Romantics Press here
Read other guest posts from Sue Moorcroft, Alison Morton, Talli Roland, Jane Holland, The Romaniacs and New Romantics Press here
Wow! This looks great, Anita. Thanks so much for inviting me to write a post for your blog :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for writing such a fab post, Julie! Lovely to have you here :-)
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