Servant cover art

ByJohn Brown

The cover illustration for SERVANT is finished!

(and there was much rejoicing.)

yea.

Actually, there was DANCING. Because I think the final piece rocks. The artist is Victor Minguez. Here are two of his pieces that I really enjoy.

The first is “Angel.” I love the bright contrast, the face, and the fact that there’s so much rich detail.

The next is “Champagne Havoc.” Again, a wonderful face, but also an awesome idea (a robot carrying a woman in the palm of its hand), and then the lines and chopper give the whole piece a lot of energy.

Click here to see other works in his portfolio.

So we kicked the project off by me sharing the goals I had for the cover and tons of reference on everything from color scheme to character costume. I asked Victor to develop some concepts for an ensemble of Hunger, Sugar, and Talen as well as some for the cave scene towards the end of the book. He came back with these sketches.

Servant Sketch 1 cave Servant Sketch 2 horse ensemble

Servant Sketch 3 ensemble Servant Sketch 4 cave

I liked the first because it would allow us to see the figure’s faces more clearly. And there was a lot of interesting detail with the cave. Look at the roots by the entrance. I also liked the structure. I liked the third because it included Hunger, and Victor was taking Hunger in a new direction. I also thought we could do some neat things with the energy of Sugar on the horse and that long sash. The fourth one, however, just felt right. It had so much potential energy. I was immediately drawn to the body language. And so this is the one we decided to develop.  Then one of my beta art viewers suggested moving closer and putting in more strong diagonals. It was a perfect idea. Victor agreed and came back with this.

 

Servant WIP 1

I liked the lines of her stance but wondered if she needed something stronger with her legs. Victor adjusted, but my idea just wasn’t an improvement.

Servant WIP 2

So we decided to stick with the previous version. However, this was all too dark. Way too much gray. When looking at things in thumbnail, the cover has to pop. I shared more reference images. And Victor went back and delivered this.

Servant WIP 3

Boom! That was exactly what I was looking for. Bright, dynamic. However, we needed a more neutral bit at the top for the title and author’s name. And the brightest spot had to be behind Sugar to draw the eye to her. Here was the next version.

Servant WIP 4

At this point I started to dance. This was IT! There was a lot going on here. We had the high contrast I wanted. We had the energy. The wind with the hair and leaves and sash and torch all add kinetic energy. As do all the diagonals. Notice as well the cave details–we have hints at previous habitation, runes, and some interesting contrast with the dark foreground. I had shared a number of N.C. Wyeth and Tim and Greg Hildebrandt pieces as reference, and I think this captured elements of those and gave them a new twist. Note as well the sharp projections on Sugar’s behind. Victor put them in there purely for aesthetic reasons. He had no idea what they were. I loved them. He loved them. They worked. We would just have to make them make sense.

After a few more iterations, he delivered the final.

Servant Final

I think it’s gorgeous. And will advertise the book perfectly. In a few days I will reveal the final cover with title etc. Shortly after that, SERVANT will be available again to please English readers worldwide.

 

 

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    Wolves in my backyard

    ByJohn Brown

    National Geographic ran an article in the March issue titled “Wolf Wars.” It has a great interactive map. You’ll want to read the whole article, but I want you to look at something.

    First, here’s a picture of a wolf in Yellowstone licking his or her chops over a recent elk kill.  Looks real friendly, doesn’t it. Here, poochie, poochie, poochie.

    A few facts. Wolves can grow up to six feet long (tip of nose to tip of tail) and three feet tall. They weigh on average about 80 pounds but can be as heavy as 150-190 pounds. Wolves can reach 40 mph when chasing, but the use their stamina more than speed. Regardless of how they catch you, their jaws are strong enough to crush bones. You want more facts? Go to this wiki article on canis lupis.  The point is that they are large, smart predators. At the top of the food chain. These aren’t little doggies. They’re killers. And they are mighty hard to socialize with humans (read the wiki article).

    Of course, it can be done. Not far away in Heber City, Utah lives Doug and Lynne Seus (yes, that’s the name–gotta love it!) who train wild animals for movies. The company is called Rocky Mountain Wasatch Wildlife. I know you’ve seen one of their animal “actors,” Bart the bear, in many movies. The Seuses also happen to train wolves. A friend of mine grew up in Heber with the daughter of Doug and Lynne. She visits from time to time. Last summer she went down and saw the wolves. My friend was told that she had to carry any children she might bring.

    Why?

    Because the children are food. That’s why. And when she went out there, the wolves were tracking those children every minute with their eyes. Freaked her out. In fact, another friend got so freaked she took her kid back to the main house and didn’t come out again. Folks, these are wolves that work with humans ALL THE TIME.

    I know the nature programs often make it seem like wolves are harmless, but they’re predators. Just like grizzlies, tigers, or crocodiles. Wolves are dangerous. A pack kills up to two elk a week. That’s a lot of eating. But they’re all up in Yellowstone, right?

    Um, no.

    Exhibit 1: Documented wolf packs, i.e. two or more wolves, in 1992 (click on image to see it full size)

    Exhibit 2: packs released in 1995

     

    Exhibit 3: wolf packs as of 2008 (2 years ago)

    Holy schnitzel!

    If you didn’t read it above, they’re estimating about 1,645 wolves in 217 packs. And that’s just the ones that have been officially documented. You know there are more out there that haven’t been seen. Look at the one all the way out by Casper, WY. Those bad boys can travel. In fact, the NG article says that wolves stake out a territory of about 200 to 500 square miles (a circle of that size has a radius of 8 to 13 miles). They travel on average (AVERAGE!) 60 miles from their pack when seeking a mate or new pack. Although one was recorded traveling 500 miles.

    Okay, so given the maps and sightings above, how is the John Brown family doing down in Laketown?

    Exhibit 4: I need a gun!

    The map below marks Laketown, UT with an A. I marked over that the packs shown in NG in red and others reported in pink. I also show orange rings 20 miles apart.  

    The “unofficial” sighting just inside the 80 mile ring was by my brother-in-law. The wolves were killing a bunch of his neighbor’s ewes he was taking care of. I didn’t say “eating” because they were killing far too many to eat. Wolves looked up at brother-in-law on four-wheeler. Assessed him. No whimpering, no cowering, no doggie wagging of tails. Just a frank assessment–human, danger or lunch? Said wolves sent a herd of the willies galloping up brother-in-law’s back. Freaked him out. He high-tailed it out of there and called the Feds who found that pack and killed them about fifteen miles away. But that sighting was before 2003. The sighting just outside the 100 mile mark was by some neighbors around 2007. The sighting down by Manila, UT was reported in a  news report by KSL news in 2008, just two years ago.

    Okay, so I think it’s pretty safe to say that we probably have wolves in our backyard. And if we don’t, they’ll be here in a year or three.

    Go read “Wolf Wars” in the the National Geographic. It’s free. Then tell me how you’d feel with a few packs in your backyard. Are you all warm and comfy? Here, little doggie . . .

    So I’m thinking that when the girls or I go hiking, which we do all the time, we need to carry more than a walking stick. More than a paintball gun used to scare the deer out of our garden. I know that even with all the packs shown above, I haven’t heard about wolves attacking humans, but is it wise to assume they just freak out when they see humans and all run away–“that’s a eight-year-old human girl, she will make me wear the cone of shame. I do not like the cone of shame.”

    Or will it be, “Hum, possible lunch over there, let’s check it out. Ooh, look at the fat one. I bet he’s tasty.”

    What do you think?

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    Maya Lassiter interviews The Man

    ByJohn Brown

    Maya has one of the most quirky goat-loving blogs around. I dare you to read just one of her blogs. You can’t do it.  You’ll find yourself going back to read another. And another. Anyway, she’s been doing a series called “How Writers Do What They Do” where she interviews authors on the creative process. Mine’s the latest, but there are a lot of other interviews in the series you will want to read. Enjoy!

    http://mayalassiter.com/2011/05/how-writers-do-what-they-do-john-brown/

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  • Curse update: April 12, 2014

    ByJohn Brown

    CurseV2FinalV1I have finished the rewrite of act 3.

    In my last update, I said that I’d written almost 50k words, but Word was counting everything in the document I was working in. I really only had 36k words at that time. The material now totals 50,000 words.  A pretty hefty chunk that I’ve broken into eleven chapters.

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  • Writing Update: Awful Intent

    ByJohn Brown

    Folks, I just finished the first draft of my working outline for AWFUL INTENT. I’m stoked. Lots of research and lots fun and sometimes maddening work to get to this point. Here’s the current version of the summary, which will change.

    Southeastern Utah. 30,000 square miles of red-rock desert and wilderness.  One of the least populated places in the United States. The perfect place to hide just about anything.

    Frank Shaw is just passing through. He was once an elite soldier, trained to see what others want to hide. Then he made some terrible mistakes and fell from grace. Except the old skills never went away: they were only heightened during his time behind bars. Which is why Frank notices the fearful woman in the McDonalds and the killer watching her. 

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    When Frank and the strong female Sheriff from the small town a number of miles away discover the truth, they try to get back and call for help, but the rancher is on to them and sends a private army out to hunt them down in the wilderness. Frank and the Sheriff will need to use all their combined skills to survive. Because time is running out, and thousands of lives are at stake.

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  • Curse of a Dark God draft 2 finished!!!!

    ByJohn Brown

    Rejoice! Sing! The draft is done!

    Hallelujah.

    Based on my records I spent:

    • 48.5 hours on the pre-draft for this book
    • 503.5 hours to finish draft 1
    • 130 hours to finish draft 2
    • A total of 682 hours of work to this point

    If I’d been working full time on this that would be roughly 17 weeks. That’s about 4 months. I don’t think that’s so bad, considering this book clocks in at 230,000 words. Not bad at all. But no wonder just finishing a novel is the thing that filters most would-be writers out. That’s a freaking huge amount of time. I hope as things progress I get faster.

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    • Sugar’s story. It was a mess and the biggest problem with draft 1. I had to rewrite or massively revise about a dozen of her chapters. In fact, I ended up added three chapters to her story: White Tower, Withers, and Loyalties. I’m very please, however, with the result. I think it works very well.
    • The Gnolum. I had purposely left the seeding chapters for these giants out (seeding as in I can’t just have them show up at the end without laying some groundwork). I had to add 2 chapters for them to this draft.
    • Early Argoth chapters. The first two chapter of Argoth’s story needed to be totally rewritten. The second needed major revising.
    • Chapter titles. For titles in draft 1 I used the name of the main pov character in the chapter and a short summary of what was happening. It helps keep things clear. So those are now out and the chapter titles in.
    • Rough stuff. In many of the early chapters I was still feeling my way into the story. Yes, I had an outline, but I just can’t get the whole story until I begin to write. So there were many chapters with notes to myself or blanks to fill in. Some things no longer worked because of later chapters. All this I had to fix.
    • Reordering chapters in the last half of the book. About halfway through the book Talen’s story breaks off from Sugar’s and Argoth’s. So when I was originally writing them, I found it easier to just write all of Talen’s story and then all of Sugars and Argoth’s until the three met up again. Well, this created some time gaps. I fixed those. I also had long stretches of one pov. For example, I had Talen’s story running for 14  chapters without any break to the other viewpoints. All this had to be fixed.

    So I’m very pleased with this draft. Here are the first three chapters for your enjoyment: CODG draft 2 beginning for readers. Remember: feedback from my wife, agent, editors, and other early readers will change it. You’re welcome to contact me with any comments you might have about it.

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6 Comments

  1. This is AMAZING!!!!!!!! Love the colors and the emotions on the character’s faces. It has such a sense of motion too. This is a great cover. I was skeptical you’d be able to get something better than the original cover, but I think you’ve done it.

  2. So glad to hear you like it, Jared. As you can tell, I’m very pleased with it as well. Looking forward to the cover for CURSE. Give us about 4 weeks.

  3. Best wishes on your efforts. Stunning. I agree, it is lovely and eye-catching! Good work John.

  4. Wow. I am impressed. I like the original cover art, but this is great. I do not know if many independent authors could pull this off as well as you have. This may kick off a trend among indie authors since yours turned out so well.

  6. Hunger would have been fabulous. But we must never say never. If we sell gobs of the books in this series, you can be sure I will commission extra color and black and white artwork to be included in the books.

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