Michael Blatherwick's Blog: Snippets

It's been a simultaneously easier and yet more challenging road to get book two out, both from a personal and professional standpoint. I am so thrilled to share the second chapter of Dana Jefferson's journey with you all.

Book three, the final piece of "The Juggernaut Arc", is coming out in 2024. The title?

Photograph: New Wheeled Order

But wait, there's more! There's a teaser for ANOTHER book at the end of book two, and fear not, Dana's journey will continue in the next planned arc for the series into book four... and five.. and ... six...

I've just been staring at the proof cover of my book on Goodreads.

I have no idea how they intercepted the metadata for the author proofs I ordered, but there it is, in glorious color with an ugly band across it. I've checked and rechecked every site where I'm for sale, and they're all correct, but Goodreads, well, thanks for the shot in the foot.

On to the next do it yourself job for me....

Marketing is hard.

When I received my first book cover art, after pestering the artist for an update, I was given a piece of white hot trash that looked like it took about five minutes in photoshop.

Lesson learned: don't pay up front.

My second cover was waiting in queue with the artist, a very talented public person who I will not flame by naming him, and I finally got the "I'm working on this" message. I was ecstatic.

The art? Good. Very good. We worked through the designs a few times and he basically nailed it.

Then he went silent.

No responses. Nothing. I was working on my own self-imposed deadline so I could have the books ready for a big convention, and ... nothing.

I solicited another art source, miblart, to get a new cover ASAP.

My former artist finally wrote back that he had a massive system crash/computer issue, which is just a risk we all run in the digital age, but I wondered why/how he didn't have a backup system of some sort to at least keep me in the loop. It was slightly off-putting, but I know his work has been epic and this was just a case of him having a bad timing crisis as I was closing in on my deadline.

I followed up with miblart and we had a cover in about 3 weeks, start to finish, for the entire process.

And I published.

People loved the cover. It was exciting, it had my protagonist and setting front and center, and it relayed the action theme.

Slowly ... I fell ... out of love with it.

It will always remain important to me, like a first girlfriend, a first kiss, something special that can and will never be replicated in emotional weight. But, my second book was on the way and I needed something that grabbed me, and my readers, and was going to be modular, adaptable, and thematically congruent across the series.

So back to miblart for book cover number FOUR.

And it is spectacular.

I can't wait to show it to you all, and I have some far fetched plans for the reveal, but when you do finally see it, remember that it was born out of a series of twisting events and emotions, and I hope that it only elicits one in the final print:

Excitement.

And maybe love. Okay, that's two emotions.

Or maybe one. Excitement isn't quite an emotion, it's modifier.

Excited love.

That's what it is, and will be, forever to me.