German Cover for BLOOD REQUIEM (BLUT KRONE)

The covers continue to roll out! I have to say, the color scheme for this one is perhaps my favorite of all the covers I've had up to this point--the crimson and pale grey look gorgeous together. This cover also continues the German series aesthetic (cool-looking crowns, basically--check out the covers for the German editions of Book 1 and Book 2), which I also think is awesome.

Also, the parade of covers is likely to continue; as I understand it, books 1, 2, and 3 of the Chaos Queen Quintet will all be coming out in Poland next year, so I should start seeing covers for those books soon as well..

Anyway. Clearly I've been incredibly fortunate as far as covers are concerned, so far. If they're all even close to as good as this one, I'll be one happy writer.

Sales Cover for FEAR THE STARS

Been discussing the cover for book four with my publisher lately, and they sent me this yesterday. I'm quite happy with it. This continues the aesthetic of the series (an aesthetic I'm definitely here for, by the way; I've loved each of the covers so far, and this one is no exception), the yellow/gold really pops, and I can't say I mind the Brandon Sanderson quote either--I'm grateful he was kind enough to take the time to read my books and say some nice things about them.

So another phenomenal sales cover, one that will represent a (hopefully) phenomenal book. I can't wait to get it into everyone's hands!

For now, you can pre-order it here.

#AuthorLifeMonth Day 8 (kind of, I'm bouncing around a bit)

So I'm sort of going to kill two birds with one stone here because (a) I'm a bit behind and (b) they actually haven't changed much in the past year.

Day 5 was actually "Comp Covers," and I covered that funny story last year. Since then, each of my covers have been pretty phenomenal (seriously, I love love the Blood Requiem cover), and I'm quite happy about them.

Day 7 was "Writing Music," and that too hasn't changed much since I wrote about it last year. A couple new Audiomachine albums have been released, and they're still ruling my headphones during writing time. I've also been enjoying some music by Giles Lamb, one particular song I raved about at the end of last year.

And there you have it! I think tomorrow or soonish I'm going to post another not-so-AuthorLifeMonth related, and I'm actually looking forward to that; it's been pretty formative in my writing lately. 'Til then!

BLOOD REQUIEM Cover!

Aaaaaand it's gorgeous and I love it. I have to say, Titan has done me right when it comes to cover art. I've been very happy with what they've done so far!

Also, I fully acknowledge I've been flying under the radar for a few months, now. That's more or less been on purpose; I've been getting a lot of work done and sort of keeping my distance from the really involved social media stuff, and it's been a very positive thing for me. I'll probably be diving back into things in the next month or so, but it's been good to take some time away and focus on work.

Speaking of work, I've started Book 4 of the Chaos Queen Quintet, currently titled Fear the Stars, and it's going very well. I feel really good about the outlining and pre-writing I've done. I have to say, it's pretty strange to be moving into Book 4 of a five-book series; I'm consciously trying to wrap quite a few things up in this book to prepare for the finale in Book 5, and that's, well...just kind of crazy.

Also, Book 4 is an interesting one, because a few of the key events in this book have been swimming around in my head for a long time, and a couple of them actually inspired me to write this series to begin with. It's really interesting, fun, and actually a bit emotional to be preparing to write some of those scenes. I'll let you know how they go when I get there :-).

So: I have a great cover for Blood Requiem, I'm plodding right along through Book 4, Thanksgiving is next week, and life is generally pretty great.

#AuthorLifeMonth Day 14: Favorite of Your Covers

Well, considering I only have two covers to choose from, this choice was surprisingly difficult. But I have to go with the Duskfall cover.

I love this cover. I love the look of the trinacrya. I love the ice/crystal theme. I love the subtlety and abstractness of it all. I love the color scheme.

I'm not the only one, either. As I've toured a few locations and sold a few books, I've gotten a lot of compliments on this cover. Most of the time, if someone approaches with genuine interest, it's because they're intrigued by the cover. That's pretty cool.

So, yeah. My book covers are amazing. I really like the Dark Immolation cover as well, and I can't wait to see what we'll come up with for the rest of the covers in the series!

#AuthorLifeMonth Day 5: Comp Covers

Honestly, I had no idea what a comp cover was until I did this challenge, but as far as I can tell it's a cover design or draft that didn't make the final cut. Interestingly enough, I actually have one of those! Check out the first cover design for Duskfall:

I quite liked it, initially. That's a depiction of Knot and Winter on the cover, of course, and what I imagine to be the Sorensan Mountains in the background. It's more or less a classical fantasy novel cover. To be fair, it was the first time I'd seen my name on anything resembling an official book cover, and I think I would've been over the moon about it no matter what it looked like. After a discussion with my agent, however, we came to the conclusion that this didn't really represent the tone and brand of what we wanted the series to be, and my publisher was gracious enough to go back to the drawing board, where they came up with the official cover that we all (or at least I) know and love:

                          

And, seriously, I love that cover. But that'll actually be the subject of another ALM post, so stay tuned :-).

German cover of DUSKFALL!

Okay, have I mentioned that Duskfall is getting a publication run in Germany this fall?

Well, it totally is, by the pub house Dromer-Knaur. And they just revealed the cover:

That is a fantastic cover, amirite? I particularly love the color scheme. Anyway, if any of you folks are from Germany, check out my publisher's website here.

DUSKFALL Cover!

Long time no blog!

So, some of you may have already heard this already, but I just have to post it here. Something awesome happened:

Yeah. That's the cover of my first novel, Duskfall, coming out June 21st. Well, what do you think of this cover, Chris? some of you may be asking. Allow me to respond.

IT.

IS.

AMAZING.

Folks, this cover is gorgeous. It is everything I've ever hoped for in a cover. It is beautiful, it is detailed enough to draw me in but subtle enough to leave me with questions (or at least I think it would if I hadn't read this book a dozen times already), it totally avoids typical fantasy cover cliches, I love the title font, I love the fact that my publisher came up with "Chaos Queen Quintet" (because that sounds much cooler than the "Chaos Queen Series"). I love it all. This cover is divine. (It reminds me of a UK Joe Abercrombie cover, which are some of my favorite covers of all time.) Huge thanks to the folks at Titan for coming up with such an awesome design.

So, yeah. I'm very happy about it.

That's all for now--there's a lot of other stuff going on right now that I'm excited to blog about, so hopefully I'll be posting a bit more in the future. But, in the meantime, here's some awesome things people are saying about my book cover:

My publisher, Titan Books, revealed the cover on their blog.

Stefan over at Civilian Reader had some pretty neat things to say about it.

My agents-across-the-Atlantic featured it on their blog.

More info to come!