Although my writing over the past several months has taken me in new directions, my thoughts have been recently drifting back to my first two novels, collectively the Cerah of Quadar series, and I’ve been dealing with the fact that I have never really been happy with the cover design.

I was talking with a friend who writes in both the fantasy and crime/thriller genre’s and when she looked up my books her first comment was “You need to redo your covers.” (You should check out her work, by the way, as she’s tearing it up on the Amazon writer rankings right now, and deservedly so. Her work is stellar. Her name is Tina Glasneck.)

I’d known already that they needed to go in a different direction, that they lacked drama and they didn’t look much like what other people in the genre were doing. They still may be a little different than the standard Berzerker with a bloody ax art that many fantasy writers use, but I feel like they reflect the feel of the books now, focusing in the two main characters, Cerah herself, and her husband Slurr.

My email newsletter readers already got to see the new covers, (and if you fill out the form that pops up when you visit this page you can be among that elite crew), but now it’s your turn.

Book #1: A Dark Clock

What you see in this cover is almost the exact image of Cerah that I’ve carried in my mind since first conceiving the character in 2009, especially as she appears in Book One. In her face you see fierce determination, an understanding of the immensity of her role in her planet’s history and future, and yet there is just a hint of innocence and uncertainty.

Book #2: Many Hidden Rooms

Here is Slurr Jacasta, described through out both books as a kind and gentle soul, pure of heart and completely devoted to Cerah, the love of his life. But in Many Hidden Rooms we see another side of him as he grows into his role. When faced with the forces of evil, Slurr is a single-minded force of destruction, a bane to any who have the misfortune of opposing him. I feel this image captures him at the instant of transformation from the gentle farm boy to the cold-blooded killer that the battle against darkness makes it necessary that he become.

While I have always believed that what is between the covers of a book is far more important than the cover itself, there is no denying that it is vital to catch the eye of the potential reader. Once you’ve done that it’s up to you to earn the attention the cover has garnered. As my friend and writing partner Craig A. Hart says, “Covers get ’em, content keeps ’em.”

I’ve uploaded these revisions and the new faces should be appearing on Amazon in the next couple of days, on the Kindle versions first, then the paperback, such as it goes. I’ll be doing a follow-up post when they’re actually available with a link for you to check them out.