Paperback Covers

Thanks

I usually write in a straight narrative, but I'm working on a novel that is turning out to be huge. And I'm working on it similarly to my comic work in that I find myself working on a scene here or there, but they may be far apart in the book. I came to this approach when I would have an idea for a scene. I'd ask myself "How do I get to there?" Then I'd start writing at a good intro point (which would probably be a new chapter). Unfortunately, I've had situations where I wrote for hours and never DID get to the scene I started to write. (My characters have a tendency to do what they feel like & don't like to hurry). Mind you, what I wrote was good, but I kept getting frustrated in not getting to what inspired me. Now, i have several scenes that (as I was doing yesterday) I find myself going back & adding to the beginning of the scene. I think of these bits as "connective tissue".

Right on! I'd add an illustration ever so often but that sounds like a great idea :)

Robert Louis Stoll

Thanks for sharing...getting a glimpse into other peoples' creative processes is always interesting! I tend to approach these from more of a narrative concept first, so hearing a graphic storyteller's perspective is enlightening!

Jenny North

Just went & looked up my original text for this. I'm pasting it below:

Usually the art will inspire the story. Then, if it's really good, there will be several scenes that play in my head as I finalized the art. Actually, I have stacks of sketches, some going back over 20 years which I have yet to come up with the story for. I'll look through them time after time, then one day-- boom! the story's there. It's like I'm waiting for the art to tell me its story.

Fun concept! Though now I'm curious. As a writer, I find my ideas tend to be more rooted in the overall concept for a story (or like here, maybe some wordplay in the title or something), rather than thinking in terms of scenes first. For me, the scenes flow from the story concept and characters. However, with graphic artists, I've noticed that they seem to more often start from a strong visual from a particular scene, but from your work I kind of get the impression that you often have a rough story in mind, and the artwork springs from that. Or is that not so much the case?

Jenny North

Agreed. And I do like the Pimp my Ride story, as it's a street pimp swapped with a hot college dean, Sandra Ride.

Ha, yeah, it can be brutal to spend a lot of time on a story, only to then have to be like, "Now to boil it down to something pithy...like maybe six or eight words. Ugh..." :) But a clever little blurb on the cover also helps signal the reader that there's some clever writing inside. Like for your "Pimp My Ride" cover, it might say, "He went from OG pimp daddy to DD-cup streetwalker!" Or for something less playful, maybe, "A cocky pimp. An ancient curse. A life he never expected." They can be fun to play with!

Jenny North

Thanks. I agree with most of your points. Of course, should I actually do one of these, I'd put more work into these, perhaps even new art. As for subtitles, I always feel I get carried away!

It's a great idea...a strong cover image definitely helps sell a book, and I know I'd be curious to read some of your prose work! I love your typography choices since it makes it feel like a cover, but I feel like the artwork is crowding the titles on a couple of these. The title should be nice and big, and the cover maybe even add a subtitle or a bit of teaser text. And definitely make your name a LOT bigger...that's a hugely important piece of branding!

Jenny North