This is less of a deeply informative post than a quick observation, really. I’m off for Southern France–I’ve always wanted to say that!–for two weeks and things are hectic here.
Thanks to a KDP Select “free” bump, I’ve sold almost 600 copies of A Reason to Live since August 6. Besides making me giddy and a little delirious, it’s also demonstrated some interesting things about that little-known self-pubbed writer’s friend, the Amazon sub-list.
This is the second part in a three part series about book cover design. The intended audience is the self-publishing writer with little design experience. The guidelines I set forth are from my experience working with my own self-published titles, with graphic designers, and about twelve years of web design experience (which is no substitute for experience in print design).
In the first part of this series, I talked about the importance of typography in setting both your title and author line apart from the fonts of workaday web pages, white papers, and emails that have desensitized many readers to the impact and beauty of the most popular fonts.
In this stage, I’ll get away from typography for a second and talk about what I consider the second important attribute of a winning cover: a single, stunning professional picture.
I’m really excited to be sitting next to Stephen King right now.
Get your make-believe wallets out, because my debut crime fiction novel, A Reason to Live, is FREE through Monday, August 6th on Amazon!
The sale is partially because of ARTL’s departure from the KDP Select program, but also because the sequel, Blueblood, should be hitting the streets in 2-3 weeks. There wouldn’t be a better time to grab a copy of the first book for that beach vacation, morning commute, or evening arm-chair routine with a glass of wine by your side.
I’m excited to announce I’ve just wrapped up a sinister novella project that’s been tickling my brain for years. Inspired by Stephen Dobyns’s masterful Church of Dead Girls, I take a frightening peek–not at the unknown–but the very well known.
Do you have neighbors? Did you ever wonder what goes on behind their doors? Then this should be your next read…
Synopsis
No one likes Jack. His wife is gone and his neighbors avoid him. He’s a recluse and a creep and that’s just the way he wants it.
But when ten-year old Emma goes missing in the nearby woods, the eyes of his neighbors turn on him in fear and accusation, escalating as the days pass. The answers they–and the reader–get, however, are the last that anyone would suspect…
Finding Emma is a disturbing novella of literary horror totalling 17,500 words or about 70 paperback pages.
You can nab Finding Emma at Amazon and Kobo for just $1.99.