I'm a writer, not an artist

Which is why i engaged Cathy Helms of Avalon Graphics to do the cover art rather than making a complete mess of it myself.

There are hundreds of graphic artists out there offering to do ebooks. Some were seriously up their own behind (my children may read this), some could Do Some Stuff, one had a site that gave my computer a nasty virus. And then there was Avalon Graphics.

I picked Avalon because i got a clear feeling that here is somebody who gives a toss about giving me what i want.  It wasn't just a job.

I've never met her, don't know what she sounds like, haven't a clue what she looks like, and she hasn't paid me, but i'm more than happy to put all her contact details at the bottom of this post because she totally gets what i was trying to do.

Having said that, i was probably clueless at the start about what i wanted. The book has two main characters. He's an ex military officer, has shaved his head and grown a goatee beard which makes him look dangerous. She has green eyes and hair in a jaw length bob. They have a spaceship. And some soldiers hang about with them. There will be action and violence. This is what i got.

There are five elements to this picture. I asked for changes to four of them. That's the danger of giving me what i asked for. Now i want more!

So, back goes an email
She's too pretty, he's not old enough and doesn't have a beard, the title isn't chunky enough
And i hate the font used for my name. It looks like somebody in the 1970s trying to do futuristic and reminded me of the set of the Goodies - apologies to anybody outside of the UK or who is younger than 35 who won't have a clue.
And where are the soldiers?

24 hours later

Soldiers - tick
Him - big tick. Scares the life out of me.
Fonts - tick
Her - striking but not pretty. That's good. There's nothing in the book that says she's pretty and the First Readers were divided on the subject.

But those lips! You could lick them and then stick her to the windscreen of your car and she'd still be there next day (you'd need to move the sat nav first, of course), dangling about like one of those Elvis figures

Other than that, i'm well pleased with the result. I think it tells the story of the book and stands out and hopefully shouts BUY ME! (on Amazon, from the 20 somethingth of February).

Theoretically that's all that matters. BUY ME! Well, no. Actually Cathy has brought my characters to life and that's tremendously exciting.

So, I'm their parent, but i think of Cathy as their Godmother. (She also fancies Clive Owen, but don't tell anybody)

Main Website: http://www.avalongraphics.org
On Live Journal: avalongraphics
On Facebook: Avalon-Graphics
On Twitter: Avalon_Graphics
Blog: http://avalon-graphics.blogspot.com/
Direct Email: cathelms@charter.net