IWSG - February - Cover Art

The awesome co-hosts for the February 1 posting of the IWSG are Jacqui Murray, Ronel Janse van Vuuren, Pat Garcia, and Gwen Gardner!

February 1 question - If you are an Indie author, do you make your own covers or purchase them? If you publish trad, how much input do you have about what goes on your cover?

Well, since I only have one work published in a book, this is a tricky question. I did not have any say in the cover of the book, but it was an anthology and short story authors would seldom have input.

I am currently working on a side project for the AtoZ challenge involving an artist (my aunt by marriage). I will be using her paintings to inspire a collection of short stories. Now that I have said that here, I better actually do it!! I imagine if I use her paintings to one day make a hard published work, I would get her help to create the cover.

And just for fun, here is a cover I designed when I wrote my first-ever manuscript (in 2016 I think? Goodness that isn't that long ago, and I have come sooooo far--as an author and a person.) While I used a few elements from this manuscript in my current WIP, it is a totally different (and much-improved) story. And of course, there is a new title. But I really like this aesthetic. It's simple and spacey.

Credit goes to my husband for creating the starry backdrop. He does 3D animation and some sort of VR magic and has a bunch of textures and images he makes at home as a hobby. I think that backdrop was for a game he wanted to create. He says one day when I'm a famous author, he will hire me to do the story writing for his future game design company. Isn't he sweet...

Also, I'm glad I shortened my author name. That's so many letters! What do you think?

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