The New Cover For The Tale of The Vampire Bride

I'm so excited to present the new cover for THE TALE OF THE VAMPIRE BRIDE.  As I related in an earlier post, the original cover has received some pretty harsh criticism.  Though I liked the original cover immensely, when I read comments that stated people were not buying the book because of the cover, I realized it was time for a change.  Thanks to Philip Rogers, I have a beautiful new cover to show you.

And the new back cover.

Gorgeous, huh?

They say you can't judge a book by its cover, yet many people do.  Hopefully, this new cover will encourage people to not pass up the story inside.

The Complete Cover for The Tale of the Vampire Bride

The Amazingly Beautiful Cover Artwork for The Tale of the Vampire Bride

Detra has done it again.

Absolutely amazing!

Check out the Zombology Cover!!

Just a quick reminder about the upcoming Library of the Living Dead Press release of Zombology Volume 1--I'm in it!!! My short story "Stop Requested" is appearing in this new anthology of everything zombie. It's a great little tale about a seeing-eye dog trying to protect her mistress on the morning of the zombie outbreak.

Check out this AMAZING cover!

I'm not sure if you can see it, but my name is on the top of the stack on the left. How cool is that?

So you will get double your zombie pleasure in March when As The World Dies: Fighting to Survive and Zombology comes out!

Kick ass!

The Front and Back Covers of As The World Dies:Fighting to Survive

I thought it was time to share the amazing artwork of Detra and my husband's mad layout skills. For your enjoyment, the cover of As The World Dies: Fighting to Survive.

Isn't it gorgeous?

I absolutely love it from top to bottom. Katie and Jenni look amazing in the painting and the detail is just beautiful.

Since the first cover was our "night", this one is our "dawn" as a homage to George A. Romero. Yes, the last cover for As The World Dies: Siege will be "day" and its going to be amazing.

I have also included the back cover for you to take a peek at.




Don't you just love that zombie action???


A lot of readers really loved the back cover of the first book with the enormous full moon and that beautiful tree. Detra definitely surpassed himself on this back cover. I love how both covers just rawk it on all cylinders.

The proof copy arrives tomorrow. I cannot wait to hold it in my eager lil' hands. I'll be handing it over to the proof copy editor tomorrow as well. The first one that is. We are still on target for an early March release date.

Keep checking back for more details!!

As The World Dies: Fighting to Survive Cover sneak peak!

Detra posted the cover for As The World Dies: Fighting to Survive on his deviantart page. You can hop over to see his remarks on it and leave a comment.

So...what do you think?

I'm still in total shock over how well he captured Jenni and Katie's personalities. And those zombies RAWK.

Artwork For As The World Dies: Fighting To Survive is "Under Construction"

Just so you know, Detra is working on the second cover of The As The World Dies Trilogy. I'm so excited!! He is such an amazing artist and I love how he perfectly captured my girls on the cover of the first book.

He's going to take his first version of the cover and modify it so Jenni and Katie will be on the cover along with zombies!! YAY!!


One major reason I did not sign with the publishing house that made an offer on the trilogy is because I would have lost creative control and not having Detra's amazing artwork on the covers just does not sit well with me. He is freaking awesome and I just could not imagine his artwork not being on the covers.

Even if one day I were to sign with a publishing house and they would release new editions of the trilogy, I would cherish the ones with Detra's artwork. They reflect my vision for the books perfectly.

Please check out his artwork here.

Jenni and Katie Revealed!!! The As The World Dies Cover is almost done

It's almost done. The cover of As The World Dies is almost done. The cover artwork is finished, but we need to add the title, bar code, ISBN, author photo, and summary to get the whole thing done.

Want to see a snippet of the amazing work of Sean Detra, the artist?

Then here you go...



He did such an amazing job. Please check out his website here where you can see the first version of the cover (which will probably be used for one of the other two books in the trilogy or the anthology) and the original version of this cover. There have been some small tweaks since then. If you love his art, please buy something and support his artistic endeavors. He is such a great artist and he brought my girls to life with utter perfection.

I'm so stoked. So excited. So amazed.

He's fabulous.

And so is his artwork.

Creativity Overload....UGH!!!!

I think my brain is trying to kill me.

Seriously...

It is as if some sort of dam has burst somewhere in my imagination and ideas for stories and characters are flooding my every waking moment. Which is not always a good thing when I have a day job, husband, and life to attend to beyond my writing.

The funny thing about this overflow: I'm not writing.

It's too much. I'm having trouble with focus and getting my head in gear.

Ugh!

I did get some original stuff down on Friday night, but then I realized, that if I kept going, I'd be writing the beginning of a new novel. That idea scared me, so I saved and logged off. That hasn't kept the characters and scenarios from haunting my thoughts. Along with at least two other viable story plots and characters.

*grumbles*

I'm trying to sort out how to get refocused and where to direct my energies. I may have to turn out a "short" summary for the one story that seems foremost in my mind just so I can satisfy that muse and get to the ones lined up behind it.

Meanwhile, I've been cruising the blog sphere and soaking up information on the publishing world. What a confusing, conflicting, bizzarro place! I'm still watching the traditional publishing news, but I have found several good resources for Independent Authors and I've been spending lots of time there. To try and pacify the muses, I'm hoping to use The Novel Notebook that was put together by Lynn Viehl to get at least the information that's in my head down in a cohesive manner. I may not have all the answers to her notebook, but at least I can put down what I can.

The website will probably go live this weekend. We postponed it while I figured out exactly what I wanted on it. I've been swinging all over the place with some of my ideas. My husband has had to guide me toward some sort of sanity. Not always an easy thing when it comes to me.

I did split the last two novels of As The World Dies apart this weekend. The third books is the longest, which I expected, and it covers a lot of ground. As I was formatting it, I couldn't help but read a few parts and it is definitely the darkest of the three books.

The second book is "lighter" in some regards. It definitely shows the building of the new world and the work of the survivors on their fortifications. I took the time to read a bit about Katie and Travis and their relationship and I was really happy about how that turned out. Those two characters were my favorites and I loved how they evolved. I do feel I missed some opportunities in this part of the trilogy and since its the shortest of the three books so far, I am happy I now have the chance to flesh a few things out.

The As The World Dies Untold Tale of Eric was very popular with a lot of the original (and new) readers and it will be fun to integrate characters from that story into the framework of the novels. Eric is in the original novels, but he got swept to the side during the online draft.

In final news, I had to switch artists for the cover. I was disappointed that my first pick was unable to do the cover, but the artist that is coming on board is amazing. I think it will work out very well. Once the cover is done, I'll post it here.