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Book Covers and Stealing Time

So, it’s this huge misconception outside the publishing world that authors have control over their book covers. For the most part, that’s a fallacy in my experience. We see our covers slightly ahead of the rest of the world and breathe a sigh of relief that they’re good. (I’ve loved my covers thus far and had no complaints, by the way.)

The exception in this process, for me, has been Cerridwyn where I can actually help choose the path of the cover, so I’m involved in the nixing process. This is one of the differences in working with a small publisher. My publisher still is in charge and they show me potential covers, but I do have more of a voice in picking things.

Stealing Time was the hardest collaboration yet. We couldn’t find a cover that fit the mood without just being a couple stuck on the cover of the book with a huge BOOM! Check it out! Stealing Time!

Stealing Time takes place in a lodge where they’re spending the week between Christmas and New Year’s, so that was something my publisher wanted involved. There just didn’t seem to be what we wanted–exactly. We both kept sending links and comments back and forth to each other hoping to find the magic cover.

I kept going back to the couple who are on the current cover. I liked how she looked all sweet and a bit timid and he was like, “Hey, I’m kissing you!”  They were the couple I wanted on the cover. They just seemed right for Zeit and Hannah. And my publisher agreed.

 

 

StealingTimeCoverClose

There was just also the matter of how to frame them so it wasn’t just, once again, a couple stuck on the cover. I left that up to my publisher.

If you’ve read the acks in Stealing Time, you’ll see that I acknowledged I was a huge pain with this book. I was stressed with things in my personal life and so I was extra, well, let’s call it what it was…I was insane. Dudes, I was such a wreck. Half the time my publisher was getting a hold of me, I was waiting after allergy shots that I was having an adverse reaction to. But I love Cerridwyn because they put up with a crazy person like me.

So, do you want to see some of the covers/cover models that we considered?

 

CoupleBuildingSnowmansm

 

2.) This was the top contender actually. I really liked this one. And I totally plan to use this one in promotional posts because they look like Zeit and Hannah too.

 

couplecarwintersm

3.) If you’ve read Stealing Time…this couple makes no sense at all, but I LOVED THEM. *sobs* So, I used them for my site and Facebook. Hah! So there!

CoupleKissingInSnowsm

4.) Yeah, I liked this photo too. (I used it with a FB excerpt in fact.) (If you haven’t liked me on FB…that’s where I post all the mooshy, juicy excerpts.)  It created a problem with the whole horizontal vs. vertical thing…and was a bit…much. (I know, I like things a bit much.)

FeetInFrontOfFireplacesm

5.) I liked this one, but it felt…meh…in the end. I might use it for blog posts too (because I bought all these images for this blog post, by the way–I don’t mess around with copyrights.)  I like how their feet are cosying up to each other. But it just really felt too meh for the cover.

Snowboots

6.) I know, right? ADORBS!  But it’d also make me a twinner with a book out this Christmas, and it was just too cute in the end.

CoupleOnBeachWinter

7.) No, I know. There’s no beach in Stealing Time, but we liked the couple and my publisher has mad editing skills. They were going to be in front of a fire or in the snow.

So, there you go. There were some covers we considered for the son of Father Time and the mortal he’s falling for. This was the hardest cover collaboration yet, but I love the cover we decided on.

If you’ve read Stealing Time, you’re lucky…you can pick which cover model you think describes Stealing Time the best and post it in the comments. (As I said, this was a very difficult cover choice for Cerridwyn and me.)

12 Responses so far.

  1. love this post! thanks for sharing a bit of the process!
    #stealingtimegroupie #Zeitloveforever

  2. Jenn says:

    What about the beach couple?!?!?

  3. Melody May says:

    That is one of the questions a I ask authors about there covers. Some of them are lucky to get there covers that they want and others are praying to cover gods for a good cover. I can’t really tell you what I think would have worked for the story, because I haven’t read the story yet. However, I do like the cover that was selected it’s really cute.

    • It’s pretty rare that authors–well, lesser-known authors have a say in covers. I’ve seen some of the bigger name authors actually at their cover photo sessions. So, I’ve been very lucky when it comes to covers. 😀

  4. Kristy says:

    I like the one that was chosen, but I also like 2 and 4…oh and number 3 can be for the sequel!!! They leave the lodge only to get stuck in the snow…they have to wait for the tow truck…who knows how long that will take 🙂

  5. Rhianna says:

    I can’t name names but I street team with an author and her contract has a clause for requesting edits on her covers and I was so glad she had it because ALL of us had the same problem with one thing on it that was distracting our eyes from the important parts. It’s great you had some input, I really like the couple building a snowman one. 🙂

    • I doubt that people outside of publishing know how rare that is…to have something in a contract like that. It’s a good idea if you can get it, I’d suspect. I’ve been lucky with my covers…and I hope to continue getting lucky. 😉

  6. Enjoyed reading about your process and seeing the various images!

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