The author says:
Genre: Memoir
The Blurb: The Thornton family started their new lives in Southern France with a lorry full of glassmaking equipment, two young children, and only naïve optimism and 500€ in their pockets. What followed was a seventeen-year rollercoaster ride of navigating the baffling French education and legal systems, setting up a business, and turning a scorpion-infested ruin into a home . . . not to mention encounters along the way with a motley collection of molesters, thieves, kidnappers and corrupt politicians. It is also a story of eccentric characters and inspiring friendships, all told with compassion and humour and a smattering of historical and cultural facts.
More info: The glassblower was kidnapped at gunpoint. We have 6 rescue cats. And the tone of the book is humourous but sometimes poignant. It is not the normal memoir, ‘we moved to France and had a great time’. It’s more, ‘We moved to France and survived against all odds’. Note this draft cover has an old name and clearly the colours are wrong for the french flag. It is a very poor mock-up which I made with prit stick and scissors to give the designers what I (think) I want. I am at a complete loss over this cover. I clearly need help!
Nathan says:
I think admitting up front that you’re “at a complete loss” is am important step. Too many people try to design their own cover without realizing that they have no idea how to design their cover.
You already said that you’re planning on working with a designer. I think the best plan is to find a designer who’ll work from your blurb and maybe a sample chapter, and let the DESIGNER figure out what will work. If your chosen designer will give you three or four mockup sketches to choose from, you’ll be able to see what works best.
Thank you.
Hey guys,
Thanks for your comments. As Hitch said, I knew my limitations and did find a designer. I now have a design I really like, the book is selling and I’m getting great feedback about the cover and awesome reviews. It has all the elements as before but holds together better. (At least I think so). Sadly, I can’t attach it here, as there’s no facility to add an image. You’ll have to look at the Amazon page if you are curious.
Thanks to everyone who bothered to leave a comment.
Rachel
Rachel: I tried 5x searches, to find your book and I never found it. I would strongly recommend that you make sure that when you talk about your book to others, you learn to include the Amazon shortlink directly to it. If it’s selling, it should have shown up in my searches, and it didn’t. Not at all. I literally got cuts of beef, in my search results, without seeing your book. I even typed the entire long title AND your name, and got NOTHING.
An Amazon shortlink will look like this:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/YourASINHERE/
Good luck with it.
Congratulations on your cover and your improved sales and feedback!
I’ve checked out your cover and it looks nice and professional, with the subject signalled clearly.
You can always include a link like this https://www.amazon.com/Blown-Out-Proportion-Misadventures-Glassblower-ebook/dp/B093WPQK5Q
As an author the easier you make it for someone to get to your book’s selling page, the better!
Thanks for the link, Kata–I repeatedly tried searches and was not able to find it.
That cover is VASTLY improved, Rachel–well done.
Well, if nothing else this is certainly the best example of the Kitchen Sink School of book cover design I have seen in a long time. That, in case anyone was wondering, is giving into the urge to put absolutely everything that might be significant or connected with the book onto the cover.
It has the family and the two kids and a gun and a glassblower (I guess) and the French flag…and even the six cats. It has, in fact, everything except a single clue as to what the book is actually about. Everything on the cover is meaningful to you…but you already know all about the book. A casual browser would not be privy to this inside information.
Your cover needs to be focused and it needs to be able to convey something significant about the theme or idea of your book in a glance. It should not try to illustrate every single thing that takes place and it should not be a kind of puzzle for the potential reader to figure out.
I think that Nathan’s suggestion is probably the best one: find a good designer and trust them to create your cover for you.
I have to agree with Nathan and with Ron. I also want to commend you, submitter, (Rachel?) for knowing what you don’t know. I hang out here, but I’m not a cover designer myself and believe me, if I ever wrote a book, the first thing I’d do fora cover would be to
throw myself on the mercy of,er, hire a cover designer. (I’m not going to pile on here, but yeah, nuke that concept drawing, seriously. Even if done well, with high-quality graphics, etc., I don’t think it would help you.)If you could afford a custom illustration–which, fear not, we know that 99% of all self-published authors cannot–I could think of some humorous cartoon-like or drawn options that might be fun–a glassblower blowing something that resembles XXX. Which might be France, or a gun, or a bad guy holding a gun, or, or, or.
I’d resist the temptation to put the cadre of cats on the cover. (This is coming from a Cat Lady!). At this moment in time, with THIS suggested cover idea, I think they suggest feral cats, rather than a happy group of rescued kitties. Not sure what else, but …not working for me. (Unless you do find a cartoonist who can do them justice and make them work in context.)
There are GREAT cover designers out there affordably, some of who do/will provide custom graphics, too. My highest and best recommendation is, don’t rush into it. Don’t hire the first cover designer you see, unless/until you’ve been through at least 10 sites and 100-200 covers to look at. Take your time. No author ever wants to hear this, but your cover is critically important; in some ways, more important even than a proofread (not really). That cover will drive your sales, period. Not your witty prose; not your wit–that cover. Be clever and witty on IT. 🙂
Good luck and I for one would love to see the end result. Or, one in further development.
By the way, I do very much like the alternate title: “Blown Out of Proportion.” It’s great!
I think you should hire a cover designer. But helpful hints- red and blue stripes would be nice like the flag in the cover. Also the glass bower image is a good image to have. I don’t think that you would need the country frame graphic if you just had the colors. A cat or two could work. Also for another twist, an up close of the glass being blown and fractured. I’d also change the title to Almost Shattered or Blown Out of Proportion. A god title makes a difference. Shattered just seems like it’s been done before and sad. Love the story idea. Seems very serious at times and at other times whimsical.
Well, there’s always Cracked. 🙂