New dragonized book cover

Posted on October 1, 2009 (Subscribe to Blog)

I finished Labyrinth of Fire (for now) and have sent out a couple of copies for proofing. One went to my brother Darren in England, who has one or two eyes for detail and is a qualified proofreader. Another went to Laura Canning, who is Irish but currently living in Australia. She's a journalist, author and proofreader. I might send out a couple more proofs shortly.

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After all my editing the book ended up just two pages shorter than Island of Fog, but with around 5000 extra words -- a fraction under 100,000.

Part of the process of uploading the files to CreateSpace and getting proof copies is preparing the artwork for the cover. Although I've had a cover design displayed on this site for a while now, it never really "worked" for me. I knew it needed a dragon on it! So I've now dragonized the cover. It's the same background image of a lava tube, but darkened. I placed the dragon on top and added some fire. I like this version much better; a story that heavily involves dragons kind of needs a dragon on the front!

For my original cover, I spent some time removing the lamps from the tunnel. I bought my picture from Big Stock Photo so I could use it without worrying about copyright issues, but it turns out that this is a common picture on the internet -- the famous Thurston Lava Tubes in Hawaii.

I also bought the dragon picture. There were a few to choose from, but this one is closest to what I had in mind for the dragons in my book. Oh, and although the dragon is breathing fire already, I added some more fire courtesy of a flamethrower, as you'll see if you look very closely. You'll see the new curly orange fire above and below the yellow fire (the same image flipped upside down).

Composite for new Labyrinth of Fire cover

Finally, you can now read the prologue and first two chapters online if you want to. The text might change slightly in a later version.

With the conclusion of this book I'm now fairly well settled on the title and plot of the third and final book in the trilogy. I need to give it some more thought just to be sure, but watch this space!

Comment by PHILIP MANNERING on Friday, October 2, 2009...

I like the new cover! It's much better than the old one. You've now hooked me to the story with an interesting prologue and first two chapters. Can't wait to see what happens next!

Will it be available in PDF as well?

Comment by KEITH ROBINSON on Friday, October 2, 2009...

Yes, definitely — same as with the first book. It may even be available earlier than the printed book. Watch this space for updates! :-)

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