I love my publisher, Gryphonwood Press. Why? I’ll damn well tell you why. Firstly, they’ve had new wraparound artwork commissioned for my dark fantasy thriller duology, RealmShift and MageSign. The books are contemporary dark fantasy thrillers, verging on horror, and there’s a distinct vibe to that kind of book developing. If you look at book covers from people like Jim Butcher, Jon F Merz and Lev Grossman (to name just a few) you’ll see what I mean. So Gryphonwood got fantastic artist Fiona Hsieh on the case. Gryphonwood and Fiona worked very closely with me on what kind of imagery we wanted and I think Fiona absolutely nailed it.
Here are the new covers:
Pretty freaking sweet, I reckon.
Click on the images below if you want to see higher res versions of the full wraparound covers that will now grace the print editions of the books.
What do you think? I’m very interested to hear what people think of the new art, so even if you don’t like it, please leave a comment and tell me why. Amazon are being a pain and not updating the pages for the print editions, even though the Kindle editions, Books In Print and every other fucker on the planet has updated the images. But I’m sure they’ll get there in the end. Gryphonwood are on the case.
The other news that has me Snoopy dancing around the place is that Gryphonwood have negotiated audio rights to both books, and the audiobook edition of both will be available soon. RealmShift is slated to be ready in time for Xmas, with MageSign close behind. This is awesome news, as it marks a new stage in the life of these stories. And these are stories which really mean a lot to me.
The audiobooks will be read by Matt “Bentley” Allegre, a well versed voice actor who has done narration, character voices and impressions for radio, video and websites for the last ten years. I’ve heard samples and the opening pages of chapter one and I’m very excited. This guy has a great voice, with a really dark edge that suits the books perfectly. He’s American, which may bother my Australian and UK readers, but we’re all used to American accents anyway, right? It’s also worth remembering that Gryphonwood are an American publisher and the big market for books in any format is really the US. Regardless, Matt has a brilliant voice that suits the books perfectly. I can’t wait to hear the finished products.
So that’s my news, and I’m right bloody chuffed about it. I’ll let you know when the audiobooks are available.
.
Great covers. Now the covers on my copies look old and boring. Damn you Alan!
Sorry about that.
Great covers and the wrap-around gives them a nice finish. I have to say I prefer the old ones, purely because the new covers give an image of Isiah and I prefer that image to be created in my head by your words, not an illustration. In fairness, I only feel this way because I’ve already read them and who knows, my original print run copies may be worth womething in a few years!
Here’s hoping!
I was very dubious about representing Isiah, and made a point of insisting most of his face is shadowed quite heavily. I think we struck a decent balance in the end. And hopefully, regardless of what people see on the cover, my words will convey the strongest image for readers.
*squeals with delight*
Thanks Dianne!
Congrats on getting the audiobooks.
Thanks!
Nice covers, man. I like these way more than the skulls before. Especially the powers radiating from the character on Magesign…these are really enticing.
Excellent – that’s good to hear!