Vasiliki said on 14th October:
"I didn't know what to expect when I bought this book, and I got a really pleasant surprise. It's packed full of detail with finely drawn, likeable characters and loads of intrigue. The world building/historical detail and description seem to me to be well researched and accurate (I covered a tiny bit of this era during my degree in Archaeology) but the author does not overdo it, keeping a light touch so that the story doesn't get bogged down with it. The writing is very good, and it is well edited so the reader isn't distracted by errors. Overall a very good read, that packs a lot in for the price."
All authors love to get reviews and I'm no exception. This one brightened my day and spurred me on with the writing of my next book. Here's hoping I get many more!
For a little amusement (and because I can't bare to delete them usused!) this is a cover I played around for a while before deciding to ask the very talented Dave Slaney to do a cover for me. His is so obviously better! I used to play arpund with ideas for a cover when I had reached a point in writing or editing when my eyes, or my brain, or both - had begun to glaze over. It was therapeutic but eventually frustrating because I did not have the expertise to get the effect I wanted. I see I even misspelled my own title!
Using different colours and fonts can make or break a cover, and it is an absorbing process. Some colours fade back, other leap forward. Some fonts are just too - what's the opposite of plain? Beautiful hardly seems the correct word here. Mixing fonts and colours is just a no-no and that shows up well here in my two covers.
I get the urge to go and take a class in graphic art, but then it all gets too complicated - no where local offers such things but the universities and they are so expensive that the idea just fades away.
No doubt I'll keep tinkering and trying and learning bit by bit.
I'd really like to know how to fade layers into one another to make a wonderfully sophisticated cover like Dave Slaney.
If I was starting my life over again, I might have chosen to do graphic art at university.
It's a bit late now!
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