A Tale of Three Covers-The Covers for FIGHTING TO SURVIVE

After I initially self-published THE FIRST DAYS, the first book in the AS THE WORLD DIES TRILOGY, the excitement wore off and I realized it was time to do all the hard work again on the second book in the series.

FIGHTING TO SURVIVE was the slimmest tome of the three (at that time) and was the most disjointed in its original online form. It would take months to flesh out the plot to make it a more dynamic book (little did I know the Tor version would end up with even more material!). In the meantime, Detra sent me a painting of a broken down car on a lonely country road with dawn breaking over the trees and wondered if it would work as a cover.

I stared at the amazingly beautiful painting and told him that it would not. The first cover in the series had been very successful because the fans liked seeing Katie and Jenni. I asked that both of the women be armed with weapons. So, he added Jenni and Katie to the second cover and threw two menacing zombies on the back. I loved it!

So this was the first cover for FIGHTING TO SURVIVE.


Flash forward to 2011-I had just finished the massive revision on FIGHTING TO SURVIVE when my email dinged. It was the cover art for the new book. I was pleased with the cover for many reasons. I loved that the two women were on the cover again, I loved the menacing zombies, and I loved that the artist used the ballroom of one of the derelict luxury hotels in the Texas Hill Country. The colors really popped for me and I loved the fragility of Jenni's crossed arms.



Then it hit me. The two women were unarmed and merely gazing at the zombies.

Wait a sec!

I sat back in my chair, staring as I came to the realization that Jenni wouldn't be fragile in that moment and Katie wouldn't be standing with her hands on her hips.

Wasn't the strength of the women the one thing fans loved? The fact they didn't wait around to be rescued, but fought to survive?

Nervously, I emailed the editor with my impression. She thought it was a valid point, though she loved the first cover. A few days later a second cover pinged into my email.

I opened it up and was immediately conflicted.

I loved that Katie and Jenni now had weapons to defend themselves. I loved that we could see Jenni in "loca zombie killer mode." Yet, somehow, the Katie in the first cover felt more like the character. I stared at the covers side by side. I called my husband over to look at them. I emailed the covers to friends for their opinion.

At last, I went on the AS THE WORLD DIES and my personal facebook pages and asked:

I have a question for y'all. Do you like seeing Jenni & Katie holding guns on the cover or with empty hands?

The responses were pretty unanimous.

I'm all for seeing our bad a$$ chicks with guns. :)

Definitely guns!

I even received a few emails voting for the weapons. I forwarded the information to Tor, but knew that in the end it would probably be marketing that made the choice on the cover. I still really like both covers, but I do believe the second one really captures the mood of the entire book. I think it's Jenni's face that really sells it.

Though I have heard horror stories about authors hating their covers, I have to say so far I really love the Tor covers. They are truly beautiful and are good solid representations of the stories inside the cover. I have also been flattered that Tor has listened to my opinion on the covers.

I was hoping to share both covers with you, but wasn't sure if I should or not. Now that the Tor Fall catalog is online and features the first cover, I wanted to share with you the stories behind the three covers for FIGHTING TO SURVIVE.


Remember to pre-order THE FIRST DAYS today!

The End of an Era

As of a few days ago, I pulled the plug on the As The World Dies series self published editions. I'm not sure how long it will take for the books to come down, but already a lot of the ebooks and the Kindle editions are no longer available.

I noticed Friday that Amazon changed the status to "In stock, but make take 1 to 2 days to process." I translate this as "Rhiannon, are you crazy? Put these back on sale. You got a few days, chump, then its ovah!"

Update: Now Amazon.com is listing the books as "2 in stock" "1 in stock" with the added verbiage of "order soon."

I recognize that this is a very different experience from most writers that are in the process of being published by a major publisher. Their manuscript has most likely never been seen outside a few select friends and family members. They have never had to deal with book cover design, interior formatting, publishing headaches, and sales tracking like I have. They don't know what it feels like to click on a button to "unpublish" the work they poured their heart and soul into.

I won't lie, I got teary eyed.

This is the end of this era of my great adventure. There have actually been several eras: the original posting of the story online, pulling it down to revise and submit it to publishers, deciding to self publish and working hard to make it happen, and the time period from August 2008 to August 2010 when the books were self published and my sole responsibility.

Now the books are firmly in the hands of Tor and I know they will treat my little darlings very well. Without a doubt, this is the best next step for me as a writer and for the series. From editing to the cover to marketing and promoting, Tor is going to do an AMAZING job. My zombie epic will get polished up so it can reach out to an even wider audience.

Just today I received the edits from my editor at Tor. I'm thrilled to be able to dive back in and revise the novel. I truly want this novel to be the best it can possibly be. Growing up, I was used to my mother always taking a red pen to my writing and I embrace the editing process as one to learn from.

Already, I have seen where having one massive tome divided up into three screwed with the story a bit. For example, in the later books, the history of Juan and Travis' friendship is explained, but not in the first one. So at one point, it seems like Travis magically knows something about Juan. I never would have caught this since I wrote the story and I know all that information. But my editor caught it. And that is why I love editing!

Again, I cannot state how excited I am that As The World Dies will have a fresh new look and polished up story when the Tor editions hit next year.

I'm Officially A Tor Author!!! At Last!!!

If you're a regular reader of my blog, you know that the deal with Tor happened in early March of this year. After negotiations, my agent and Tor came to an agreement on the deal to procure the As The World Dies Trilogy. The Tor versions will be released in 2011 with the first book coming out in the spring.

Even though the deal was "done," the lawyers still needed to go over the contract and work out all the fine details. The contract manager at my literary agency, Foundry Literary + Media, and my lawyer, fought to get the best contract possible for me, while, of course, the lawyers for Tor did the same thing. Finally, I got the word on Tuesday of last week that they had come to a final version of the contract.

To say the very least, I was utterly ecstatic when I got the news.


My agent let me know when she put the copies of the contract in the mail and I waited anxiously for the weekend to arrive. I was pretty sure that the contract copies would arrive on Saturday. I was leaving to run errands with my friend Kody when I dropped by the mailbox. There was a thick, white envelope waiting for me. I pulled it out and did a crazy little dance of glee. I was so damn happy. I sat in my car in the hot Texas sun and texted my mom the news. She was thrilled. This has been a shared dream between us for a very long time. We were both so happy to finally see it come into reality.




My husband had to give me a hard time, of course, pretending to toss out the contract and all that sort of thing. By his grin I could tell he was just as happy as I was to finally have the contract in my hands. If not for him, I know I would have not reached this point. It was his push toward self publishing that put me on the path to Tor.


Sunday I decided it was time to open up the package and sign the contracts. Up until this point, I wanted to just chill out until the big moment. I felt really calm about the whole process. Since the deal was made in March, to me the signing of the contract was just a formality. At least I thought that up to the moment I pulled out my super-duper special pen that my friend had given me just for this occasion. My hand wasn't shaking, but memories of my journey to this point flooded my thoughts as I started to sign my name.


I signed the first two copies while my husband and our friend Kody snapped photos. All at once, I was overwhelmed with emotion and tears started to fall. I was shocked at the sudden swell of emotion that flooded me. My husband hugged me tight and comforted me as I let the enormity of the moment sink in.

Wiping my tears away, I finished signing my contracts and filled out my form for the IRS. Grinning, I stacked up the contracts, put a rubber band around them, and did a victory dance.


I am, ladies and gentleman, officially a Tor author.


It feels awesome!

A Whole Lot of Good Stuff

Most of my good news with all things publishing has landed firmly on Mondays. In fact this has really taken my hatred of Mondays down quite a few notches. At some point I began to look forward to Mondays.

That's just scary!

Anyway, I suppose because of the extended Fourth of July weekend Tuesday had to substitute for Monday. Almost as soon as I sat down at my desk the good news started to pour in.

And it was long awaited good news, which is just delicious.

First off, FINALLY the contract is done. It took a very long time due to Macmillan changing its contract at the beginning of the year. My literary agency's contract manager had to acquaint herself with this new contract and go through it with a fine tooth comb. Then my entertainment lawyer needed to chime in on the contract as well as my literary agent before sending all the requested changes back to the lawyers at Macmillan. Then rinse and repeat as their lawyers responded. Rinse, repeat....you get my point. So after months of back and forth, the contract is ready! By Friday or Saturday I should have it in my little hands ready to sign and fire back off to my agent.

*huge sigh of relief*

I'm not very good at waiting to begin with. My patience meter is on the low end. I'm not sure which was worse: waiting during the submission round to see if the book landed a deal, or waiting for the contract on the done book deal. I actually did quite well waiting for the contract until about two weeks ago. I hate the feeling of being stagnant. If I'm not moving forward, I start to get frustrated. Luckily, I didn't really feel we were at a standstill until that point. I had a day of utter pissiness about the deal, but happily, that is when I heard the news that we were almost done.

Frankly, I am so glad I have a literary agency and entertainment lawyer behind me. There is no way on God's green earth I would have been able to negotiate the contract. It terrifies me to think about writers signing contracts without a solid, knowledgeable team behind them and writers do it all the time.

The next big news to land yesterday was from my new editor at Tor, Melissa Singer. Tor is beginning to go full steam ahead getting ready to promote the hell out of the As The World Dies Trilogy. And, to my utter surprise, I'm going to get a say in the new covers! I'm thrilled to be included in the decision-making process, but honestly, I don't know what to tell them. The covers I wanted are on the self-pubbed versions. I do know for sure I want Katie and Jenni on the cover along with the zombies.

Believe it or not, there is MORE good news.

Tripod Entertainment has now optioned The Tale of the Vampire Bride for a possible TV cable show. I spoke at length with the producer and I'm very excited about some of his ideas about production. I am also very excited about being invited to help write the pilot episode. I am thrilled at the prospect of a TV show based on my favorite novel.

One more little thing, another production company contacted me about one of my short stories and possibly producing it as the second half of a one hour TV film. Nothing is set in stone and it might not work out, but just to be asked was really awesome!

So Tuesday was awesome.

If this keeps up, I may have to shift my hate of Mondays to Thursdays. It is such a tease sitting right before Friday.