Blood Bound Cover Reveal! Plus, Democracy in Action!

Hey everyone, I haven't done a real post in a while. I've been busy being sick. That's twice in less than a month. It's not as awesome as it sounds. Anyway, the great Vic Caswell has a tough decision to make regarding what cover to choose for her latest work. Check them out and vote!

From here on out, I'll leave it with Vic:

This one's a bit tricksy, because it's a two-fer!

Spencer Hill Press is having trouble deciding which cover they want, so they are giving YOU the power!!!

(MWHAHAHAAAA!!!! Can you feel it going to your head yet?) 

So! Let's hear about the book first!

Blood Bound

   Starting college a year early is hard. Starting fae college and learning to protect the world from the Unseelie is harder.
   Brielle Reed has always been an over-achiever, but this time she may have bitten off more than she can chew. Between her crash course in fae politics, struggles to control her new mind-reading ability, training sessions with the demanding Dr. Schwartz, and discoveries about the father who is still a mystery to her, Brielle finds herself longing for a chance at a normal life.
   But she may not get that chance. Or chance at a life at all, for that matter.

Title: Blood Bound

Author: Keshia Swaim

Publisher: Spencer Hill Press (www.spencerhillpress.com) Please feel free to use any images, text, links, etc. from our website.

ISBN: 978-1-937053-45-1

Release Date: September 10, 2013

Formats: Paper, e-book

Keshia is previously published, but this is her first full-length novel to be unleashed on the world.

Now, the covers:

 

Which design do you prefer, the one 
with the hand or the one with the girl on the cover?

• Hand
• Girl

Freeblogpolls

More polls: Memira

So which do you prefer? 
Does the hand make you feel like the power could be in yours? 
Or are you intrigued by what secrets the pretty lady is keeping? 
Don't forget to vote!
(you don't even have to register or listen to politicians or anything!)

Blood Fugue Cover Reveal

The great Vic Caswell and her Sketcher Girl studios have produced another great book cover. Check it out below:

Blood Fugue, Moonsongs Book 1 by E.J. Wesley Cover Reveal Party

Author E.J. Wesley is throwing a blog party to celebrate the release of his new book cover and wants you to join in the fun. Jump over to his blog to learn about how you can win some awesome prizes, including $50 toward a cover of your own and advance reader copies of Blood Fugue.

Cover work by Sketcher Girl, LLC - http://sketchergirlstudios.com/

What's the Story About? 

“Some folks treated the past like an old friend. The memories warmed them with fondness for what was, and hope for what was to come. Not me. When I thought of long ago, my insides curdled, and I was left feeling sour and wasted.”

Jenny Schmidt is a young woman with old heartaches. A small town Texas girl with big city attitude, she just doesn’t fit in. Not that she has ever tried. She wears loneliness like a comfy sweatshirt. By the age of twenty-one, she was the last living member of her immediate family. Or so she thought…

“We found my ‘grandfather’ sitting at his dining room table. An entire scorched pot of coffee dangled from his shaky hand. His skin was the ashen gray shade of thunderclouds, not the rich mocha from the photo I’d seen. There were dark blue circles under each swollen red eye. A halo of white hair skirted his bald head, a crown of tangles and mats. Corpses had more life in them.”

Suddenly, instead of burying her history with the dead, Jenny is forced to confront the past. Armed only with an ancient family journal, her rifle, and an Apache tomahawk, she must save her grandfather’s life and embrace her dangerous heritage. Or be devoured by it.

BLOOD FUGUE by E.J. Wesley, is the first of the MOONSONGS books, a series of paranormal-action novelettes. At fewer than 13k words, BLOOD FUGUE is the perfect snack for adventurous readers who aren’t afraid of stories with bite. Available wherever fine eBooks are sold September 2012. 

Join the Party!

The Open Vein, E.J.'s blog - http://the-open-vein-ejwesley.blogspot.com/

E.J. Wesley on the Twitter - https://twitter.com/EJWesley

Sketcher Girl Studios!

I met Vic Caswell during the A-Z Blogfest this April and fell in love with that girl's skills as an artist. Check out her official grand opening below. Also, I should be in the middle of our family trip deep into the heart of Texas. Nobody break into my house and steal my stuff.

GRAND OPENING!!!!

Today is the day that Sketcher Girl Studios, LLC officially opens for business!

In celebration of this momentous event, Vic Caswell (owner/operator) is hosting a give-a-way.
Using the "Contact Us" form on the site, send her the secret word from the end of this post and you'll be entered to win.

Sketcher Girl Studios is a freelance illustration company with a focus on book cover design.  Vic Caswell has produced the covers of Emily White's debut novel ELEMENTAL, as well as it's sequel FAE (release date not announced yet), and Kimberly Ann Miller's debut novel TRIANGLES (releasing June 2013).

SGStudios is passionate about books and getting them out there and into the hands of the readers who will love them.  Vic will read your book.  She will work with you to ensure that the design you end up with is something you love.  She doesn't use stock photography, so you are guaranteed an image that is original and she offers full legal usage of her cover images.  So, if you want to print it on swag, and sell that, the money goes straight to you.

Her prices are competitive- affordable for small press publishers as well as self-publishers.

She also provides other services- such as: tattoo design, logo design, header design, artistic prints, children's book illustration, and pretty much anything illustration that you can think up.

Stop by and drop the secret word: Mischief, for your chance to win one of these nifty prizes...

such as:   postcard sized prints of  her work titled PERCHED CREATURE, one of two copies of ELEMENTAL by Emily White, a ten dollar Amazon gift card, an original painting, and  free labor on a book cover (costs may be incurred for props/ models/ wardrobe) and more!

Links:
Sketcher Girl Studios
SGS on Facebook

Testimonials:

Vic Caswell is brilliant! Not only is she super easy to work with, but the things she comes up with are so amazing. She was able to take the half-coherent ideas I was kind of able to articulate and come up with exactly what I was thinking of. I loved working with her on both my books' covers and I can't wait to work with her again!- Emily White (author of ELEMENTAL from Spencer Hill Press)

"I'm loving my new logo!!! Victoria Caswell did a MARVELOUS job and was such a joy to work with. She made the process effortless and I swear she could read my mind. So, if you need some work done, please send it her way! You won't be sorry!" ♥ Nancy  Fennell (owner of Scents of Adventure)

****

Giving 110%

I'm not sure I ever understood those type of statements. Because if I'm giving 110% then I suppose I'm working on a scale of 1000. So that would mean I'm really giving 11%, which is kind of lame. But whatever, that has nothing to do with anything. I just wanted to put a number in my title.

I'm sure everyone will be happy to know that my tooth sorta took care of itself. I don't think it was an infection, but instead something stupid, like clenching my teeth really hard in my sleep.

So, after installing a mouthguard while I slept I found the teeth startedfeeling better. For a day or two, I don't think I could recall enjoying the pure pleasure of eating more after the tooth thing passed. It had been more than a week since I'd had any solid food.

I celebrated by having oatmeal for breakfast.

Well, I always have oatmeal for breakfast when I'm at work - except for the week prior when my teeth hurt too bad to have oatmeal, which is a real thing, because even though oatmeal is pretty soft, you still have to chew it, and the chewing motion was excruciating - and so I made my perfect breakfast: Piping hot oatmeal.

Oh, which I promptly spilled all over myself.

Sigh.

The next day it looked like this:

That's weird, I don't recall my arm being that hairy.

I had to go to the doc for a checkup anyway, so I asked if it was anything to be worried about. Turns out that I'll probably be okay, although there may be some scarring. A few blisters formed and all.

So, to recap. I nearly lost a finger due to a 'getting myself dressed accident', nearly lost the ability to eat due to a tooth grinding incident, and nearly lost my arm due to an oatmeal related disaster.

And that's all during the last couple of months.

Is there any question that should the apocalypse actually happen that I'd be dead within hours? I get injured in my sleep people, I'm a dead man walking.

Anyhow, I've about done all I can with that one.

Logo by Vic Caswell!

I hope everyone is aware that a new podcast is on the scene. The most excellent Vic Caswell and Emily White have started their PodPeople podcast that focuses on YA lit. The first episode is up and it was great to hear them talk books. Please check it out.

In other news, I'm rolling back the number of posts I'm going to be putting up for a while, probably for the summer at least. Time is always my enemy. It marches on without any consideration for what I want it to do. So, while I've been giving blogging my all (pathetic, I know) I'm not getting as much writing done as I should be. So, the hope is for a bit more productivity from me as a result.

I'm thinking about two posts per week right now, I'll play it by ear though and see. Maybe I can make some of them sorta interesting.

I think I had actual news today, but I got caught up in my personal drama and can't seem to recall what it was.

Happy Monday folks.