Anything and Everything.

For a self-published author, deciding on a cover, or what I want on it is an arduous task.  In my newest series -- The Ladies of Westside -- I knew exactly what my main characters (MC) looked like, but finding them? Impossible. When I contacted the lovely Cassy Roop of Pink Ink Designs, she sent me a very detailed form to fill out, asking about fonts I liked, colours I thought worked and in-depth character descriptions. Then she provided me the name of the site she uses for photos and sent me shopping.  I spent HOURS pouring through the photos. For Serving Up Innocence  the male MC has dreads and is Caucasian. The female MC has darker hair. Finding a photo with these two was nearly impossible, especially characters that are in their early 20s. Unable to find a couples photo, I did find two individual, and sent the stock numbers off to Cassy.  She sent back this prototype.  Concept 1 Now, there's nothing inherently wrong with this, but it's...

From WTH to Yes! Nailed It.  I was going through my older pictures when I stumbled across the original mock ups for Duly Noted . It still makes me gasp in horror.  Based on a recommendation from another author, I contacted her Fiverr book cover designer (who I just checked is no longer listed - at least not under that name.). I told him/her what I was looking for and waited for the mock up to come back. This was the first!  I can hear you gasping! I know I was mortified. Where were these amazing covers that they posted for other authors and why was I getting something that looked like my kid whipped it together (and FTR my kid can do much better work than this!). I told them no way, and gave more information, what the story was about, the theme, the genre, links to book covers covering similar topics, everything I thought they'd needed.  This was the second (and final) mock up. And there are errors throughout. Sigh.  It's a huge i...