Legends of Windemere: Family of the Tri-Rune Cover Reveal!

Cover Art by Jason Pedersen

[FROM NAVIGATOR: I’m helping spread the word of Charles Yallowtiz’s exciting new book. I’ll look exactly like the hero in the cover art once The Nameless One is finished subjecting me to the Dukan Diet. Enjoy.]

Legends of Windemere: Family of the Tri-Rune is set to debut on Sunday, March 16th!!!

The magical adventure continues after Luke Callindor and his friends recover from their battles in Haven.

Nyx still has nightmares about casting the genocide spell in Hero’s Gate. Every night her heart is gripped by the sensation of hundreds of goblins dying by her magic. By the request of Lord Highrider and Duke Solomon, she is returning to fix the damage she caused. With Luke Callindor and Sari by her side, Nyx is ready to face the vengeful goblins and opportunistic thieves that plague Hero’s Gate. Yet, there is a darker threat that was born from her violated magic: The Krypters.

It is another action-packed, character driven story that will reveal one of our heroes has been lied to for their entire life.

About the Author:

Charles Yallowitz was born and raised on Long Island, NY, but he has spent most of his life wandering his own imagination in a blissful haze. Occasionally, he would return from this world for the necessities such as food, showers, and Saturday morning cartoons. One day he returned from his imagination and decided he would share his stories with the world. After his wife decided that she was tired of hearing the same stories repeatedly, she convinced him that it would make more sense to follow his dream of being a fantasy author. So, locked within the house under orders to shut up and get to work, Charles brings you Legends of Windemere. He looks forward to sharing all of his stories with you and his wife is happy he finally has someone else to play with.

Blog: Legends of Windemere
Twitter: @cyallowitz
Facebook: Charles Yallowitz

We’re still taking volunteers for the April blog tour. So fill out the form HERE!

Read the Previous Volumes of Legends of Windemere!!!

Cover Art by Jason Pedersen

Cover Art by Jason Pedersen

Cover by Jason Pedersen

Judging a book by its [not] cover

The cover I didn’t choose, (c) 2014 All Rights Reserved

It is, perhaps, a standard joke for writers that the saying “you can’t judge a book by its cover” doesn’t seem to apply to books when it comes to buyers.

I know when I am in a book store, a book’s title is probably the first thing that attracts my attention, followed closely by the cover design. If intrigued, I’ll look at the back cover and possibly the inner covers. If further interested, I might look at the table of contents or perhaps a sample of the writing. The cover design certainly plays an important part in attracting a reader’s interest.

My FriesenPress.com “All Inclusive” package came with two cover designs. This one above was the more conventional of the two. It is clean, straightforward, attractive, and professional looking. Perhaps it is a bit boring, perhaps not.

I do like the reflection of the title into the back cover, as I think this is a clever visual device.

The other option was based on some suggestions for symbolism that I forwarded for the cover designer to consider. I am not going to show this just yet. It is more intriguing, more symbolic, and sinister. Like a haunted house, it seems to mysteriously beacon to the reader to enter it.

In my unscientific poll of the statistically too small sample size of four people, it was a 50-50 split between the two cover designs. I had thought about doing a post where the readers might vote as to which design they preferred, but my gut strongly said to go with the other design.

So, for those interested, here are three easy questions:

1. What are your thoughts on the above pictured cover design that I decided against?

2. When is the “right time” to do a cover reveal in the publishing process?

3. Is there interest in a post with both cover designs, where commenters could vote and comment as to which they liked better and why?

*Please note that I will be out of town from 28-30 January*

Judging a book by its cover

Source: friesenpress.com

There is a saying that we should not judge a book by its cover. As I’ve learned in my journey to self-publish my first book (non-fiction), this saying apparently does not apply to books, paradoxically. Witness this TED talk. Or this article from the delightful Midwest Book Review site.

Barring some minor disaster, I’ll be submitting the approved edited manuscript for my forthcoming book to my self publisher FriesenPress early next week. My “all inclusive” package includes the premium cover design.

Here’s the question: what are your thoughts on what my cover design or art might look like?

The book’s title is The Mirror, Book One: Welcome to the Evil Sisterhood. There is a strong narcissism theme throughout it, and hence the title. Mirroring is an accepted behavioural trait of narcissists. It’s like the evil queen’s magic mirror in Snow White: the mirror has to show and tell the narcissistic evil queen what she wants to be true about herself, as otherwise she’ll fly into a rage and get quite ugly.

At the risk of sounding dramatic, there is a degree of horror in the story as well, not surprisingly.

Narcissists need to see reflected in their environment, especially in the words, beliefs, and attitudes of others, something they want to be ‘true’ about themselves.  Beauty, power, wealth, victim, hero, or other.

If you were the one who had to try and convey your vision for this book’s cover to your cover designer, what would you say?  What is going to really grab someone”s attention and reflect (pun intended) the nature of the book?