Each week one of the members of The Indie Exchange will be showcasing one of their covers and telling us the story behind it.
This week’s featured cover is from Girl In The Glass by Zoe Brooks, designed by John L. Wilkinson.
Zoe Brooks says:
“I’m lucky to be surrounded by creative people. For starters my husband was a professional book editor before he became a full-time non-fiction writer. And then there’s our son – John. John works as a graphic artist in the film industry, which means he has to turn his hand to all sorts of graphics from transforming Glasgow’s streets for World War Z to designing Victorian theatre posters for the latest Sherlock Holmes movie to reproducing 19th century Russian banknotes for Anna Karenina,. Luckily for me he also offers a more general graphics design service, including web graphics and now ebook covers. So it was to John that I turned when I wanted a cover for Girl In The Glass.
My brief was: I wanted the cover to work as a thumbnail as well as full size, to look good in greyscale as well as in colour. I wanted a cover image that captured Anya’s longing to escape the desert. John used three pictures taken from rights-free images site and merged and adapted them in Photoshop to create the artwork. I loved it and still do: the way the sand dune forms Anya’s cheek bone and the sun on her forehead are just magical. What is Anya dreaming about behind those closed eyes?
“I will have to say it: ‘I am Anya and I am nothing’. I will look down at the floor as I say it, so that I don’t see the smile on my aunt’s face, so she won’t see the defiance in my eyes. She will get her victory. She always wins these battles. I know it, she knows it. But one day, one day she will not.”
In this Cinderella story for adults there is no fairy godmother and no handsome prince, just a girl of spirit and her strange companion.
Orphaned at the age of 10 in circumstances that she refuses to explain, Anya grows up trapped in the house of her abusive aunt where she and Eva, her Shadow, are treated as slaves. As her aunt tries to break her and the punishments become increasingly life-threatening, Anya struggles to find affection and self-esteem. When the inevitable showdown arrives, where will Anya find the strength to survive and escape? And if she does escape, what then? An arduous walk across an unforgiving desert to a city where an even worse danger lies.
Why not share your thoughts about the cover?
**Please note that guest posts and columns reflect the opinions of the individual author and not The Indie Exchange as a whole. Also note, The Indie Exchange uses affiliate links to offset the costs of hosting etc.**
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I like but I think the title should be a little bolder, more clear. I have bad eyes! :-)