I am starting to revamp my older novel, buy which I am now calling “Dead Dragon Cowboy”, there my first fantasy manuscript, with the current intention to self-publish it (as I’ve mentioned before, it did the agent rounds, and didn’t attract much interest). One major step for that endeavor is the cover, a step that I can obviously do myself, given my art skills, and should enjoy. So I did a charcoal sketch of one image that I had in mind for the cover, which is the featured image of this post. I’ve also showed a progression shot here, from an even earlier sketch:

I kind of like the charcoal look, even for the actual cover, but I know that many of the fantasy books are done in water-colour or ink, so I may do a second, more polished version in water-colour, see what it looks like. I want my book to come across as professional as a traditional publisher’s, and there is a line between originality and confusing reader expectations. So we’ll see what that version looks like, and if this rougher sketch still has some appeal.

To give an idea of what the actual novel is about, I’ve redone a short blurb, below:

In a world nothing like his own, a dark-spirited gunfighter must battle devils and gods to reclaim the girl who looked to him for protection. He won’t fail twice. Even if he triggers a battle that threatens to rip the world apart…

I hope that you enjoy the journey and at least some of you enjoy the book! At the moment, I’m thinking I might be done all the required steps by the end of 2015, but we’ll see how things go….