Goings On

Faithful readers:

This will be a short post. My designer and I are working to perfect the final cover drafts; my cartographer will hopefully be finished soon; and I have been most occupied with my A-levels—they are proving remarkably fulfilling—as well as with reading the Picture of Dorian Gray.

I shall review it as soon as I am finished. If you are not aware, the novel is considered a ‘classic’; though, in this case, the title is merited: the prose is spectacular, the characters absolutely fascinating (and subject to no small mystery) while the plot is unexpected and engaging (though not thriller level).

More shall come once I am done with it. To truly do it justice, the review would have to be long; for the novel is indeed more than most: it is innately philosophical, and poses some rather difficult questions for me.

But enough with all that! Stick with me. Once the cover is finalised, everything will quickly follow.

Very well. Until next time!

Alex! What Have You Been Doing?

Dear Readers:

Apologies for the lack of blogging. I have been busy with about a million things: sorting out a bank account; getting an NI number (waiting for it to arrive!); and trying to get some ISBNs (still sorting it out). This is on top of, of course, communicating with the cover artist—there’s one more draft coming up!—and the cartographer. Maps are a tricky business, it seems.

Nor have my marketing ideas languished. I have permission to put up posters (those will be so cool), and I may get some assembly time! It’'ll be scary talking to 500 people—but boy I hope I get their attention.

I have also started sixth form. For those of you not aware, Sixth Form is the English post-16 education which gets you into university. You study only four subjects—not a dozen like I used to—and those are in much greater detail (and difficulty!) than the wishy-washy GCSE stuff. The teachers are also crazy with giving out homework; poor me will have to manage his time.

Okay, I have rambled enough. Hopefully you will have figured out that I’m going to be busy until Halloween—that’s publishing date—and so it is probably a good idea for you to entertain yourself with whatever’s here while you’re waiting. There’s a rather nice short story in wait. It’s called the Sandman. It’s about a being that can change your life forever. And it’s free; so take a look!

The Necromancer... Covers

Hello Blogosphere:

I, Alex Stargazer—writer extraordinaire and not-so-extraordinaire poet—presents to you five possible covers for my book, known as the Necromancer.

If you are unfamiliar with it, know that it is a High Fantasy novel with—surprise surprise—a Necromancer (that is, a person who raises the dead) and flying zombies, and magic, and stuff. Oh: did I mention our Necromancer is trying to take over the respective world?

Well, he is. That’s what people with 50,000 strong undead armies tend to do. Right? (Note: those 50,000 undead happen to be really fast, and strong, and fearless and all that. He’s kinda difficult to stop. That’s kinda the premise of the book, ya know?)

In any case, here are some descriptions of him:

Neshvetal permitted himself a small smile. It was not a pleasant one: it revealed teeth that were inhumanly white, and a twinkle of madness within those cold orbs of sight.

His eyes are balls of azure light, glowing with deep, unnatural power; his hair is darker than the darkest of nights, yet it reflects the scant moonlight like some fantastical lake. His form is tall – his posture, arrogant. A cruel smile lights up his long, aristocratic nose and handsome (if rather dark) features. He knows he has won.

As you can see, our Necromancer looks as scary as he is.

And without further ado, I present to you these covers. (Thanks goes to Kit Foster for providing them. Yes, I am paying him. Yes, it is still polite to thank those who enable your success.)

You can share them with whom you think may be interested. And please make sure to rate them on the comments below. After all: a good book needs a good cover to get you lot to read it.