I have a very exciting cover reveal for you today. Not for a new release, but for an older book that needs a pick-me-up. But first, here’s what led to the cover change.
The concept of “branding” has always been elusive for me. Those of you who’ve stuck with me from the beginning have seen this blog undergo three major transformations in design alone. Then there have been my attempts to find blogging content suited to my brand. It’s hard.
Another area of branding I’ve been sorely inept at is image, particularly for my book covers. Until recently, I bounced around various cover artists (for multiple reasons). For my earlier books, I had no idea what I was doing in terms of branding; my only focus was I needed a cover. Recently I’ve started getting a better understanding on the importance of image recognition, especially in a series. The three main Dreamwalker novels have been done by the same graphic designer (I know you haven’t seen the last cover yet, muaha). Composition style and typeface give those books an immediate visual connection. (Yeah, the two novellas don’t match, but I said I’m still learning.)
We do judge books by their cover. I’ve been guilty of this with even my own books. Though I know the story of Elemental Magic, the poor cover choice lowered my opinion of the book so much that the past few months I wanted to sweep it under the rug as if I never wrote it. Which is sad because new readers are discovering and enjoying the story (despite its lousy image). So what I decided to do was change the cover. And in the spirit of branding, I contacted the artist who did Earth Tones. I have to say, Fantasia Frog Designs has reignited my excitement for this book just with image alone! I’ll need to redo Dry Spell at some point, but one step at a time.
So here is the wickedly awesome new cover!
Though in the case of these two books, typeface is not identical, each book has similar elements that connect them, such as the placement of the models and secondary creature images. Plus, it’s just plain gorgeous.
Branding is more important than I’d ever realized before. That isn’t to say I have it down yet, but I’m learning, and that’s all I can do.
Pick up a copy of Elemental Magic at Amazon, B&N, and Kobo.
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Angela Wallace, Author 