Category Archives: Book cover

The Greatest Show In Town – cover redux

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Here’s the new, and final, cover for The Greatest Show In Town.

When I posted the first version of the cover the feedback was really quite positive, but a few people pointed out a couple of things that stuck in my craw. Not because they were wrong, but because they were very much right.

I felt that I could do better – much better. Hopefully these minor tweaks have brought out a major improvement.

The basic photograph is still the same as the original, but I’ve applied a few extra colour filters to it, which have given it a stronger more vibrant appearance. I also removed one of the layers, which sadly didn’t add much other than a background texture.

The major change has been to the font, which has been replaced with a stronger, bolder face. I’ve also separated the name and title blocks, which – as a previous comment pointed out – made the top of the cover look cluttered.

Oh, and for those of you who aren’t familiar with the landmark – this is a very nice shot of Teesside’s transporter bridge.

I think it’s a considerable improvement upon something I already thought was quite nice. Hopefully you all agree. Let me know your thoughts.

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The cover for The Greatest Show in Town

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The cover for my new short collection - The Greatest Show in TownHere for anybody who cares to have a look is the cover for my upcoming short story collection The Greatest Show in Town and other shorts. It features a very nice photograph of the Transporter Bridge in Middlesbrough as its main image, along with a bit of photo layering and a touch of transparency effects to get something that I feel is quite evocative of the contents within.

It has a different look to The Gamblers and The Hunters, but that was intentional. I wanted to differentiate it, draw attention to the fact that it’s a short collection. The Stanton brothers books will all have a very similar visual theme  – following the look developed in The Hunters. And even though the brothers appear in quite a few of these shorts it isn’t strictly a collection about them. I wanted the cover to reflect that.

Anyway, enough waffle from me…

Let me know what y’all think. If it’s appealing, do tell. Similarly, if you think it’s a big bag o’ crap then kindly tell me why it offends you!

The problem of having just the one bookshelf

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The problem of having only one bookshelf is you have to select from three boxes of books, three BIG boxes of books, what goes on your shelf (in this case an ornamental fireplace mantelpiece).

This is a cause of massive displeasure for somebody like me, who likes to have all his books at his disposal. You know how it is, book folks; it’s the kind of decision that can cause sleepless nights, right?

Still, I’d like to think I chose pretty wisely. But still, I can’t help but fret about the ones I left in the boxes :-\

The Hunters now has a cover…

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Here’s the cover for my novella The Hunters, which will introduce the world (a very small portion, most likely) to the Stanton brothers a pair of Teesside villains who steal only from other villains.

The cover pretty much describes what’s going to happen inside — guns, bloodshed, a general air of brutality. Or at least that’s what I hope is the case. Comments about the design (by yours truly) is most welcome. If you like it, tell me why. And if you think it’s a hideous bag o’ shite, then share you reasons for that too!

By the way, the novella is pretty bloody close to a finished first draft. A short break will ensue, for reflection and to get back to my second novel, and then it’s time for revisions and redrafts.

Mark it in your diaries: The Hunters will be unleashed on the world in December.

Another fantastic book cover

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This is for GBH by Ted Lewis, which should bloody well be in print, damn it! It deserves much better, and Lewis deserves better, than being forgotten about by the reading public. If you’re looking for British noir you really won’t do much better than this guy, or this novel.

Anyway, how many publishers in this insipid age of ours would dare to produce an image like this for the front cover of a novel. The publishers of the 70s and 80s used to produce things like this all the bloody time!