I Wish I Could Draw

Hey guys,

I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas. Can you believe that the year is almost over? I ask myself everyday, where did the year go? Christmas is over and the New Year is right around the corner.

So my iPhone was recently stolen (let’s have a moment of silence) and on it was an app that was counting down until the release of my second book Entangled Hearts. So we have to figure this out on our own. Lol.

Today is December 26, 2014 my book will be release April 6, 2015.

It was very difficult for me to get a book cover together when I was working on my last book. I finally came up with a passable cover about a week before the release. It wasn’t the cover that I truly desired but it was doable.

I do not want to have that same problem with my second book so although I haven’t written much I am trying to get the cover done and out of the way.

I have a vision it just seems to be a problem getting it to become a reality.

I like to live in my truth and my truth is, I am an African American woman. (I wasn’t trying to hide it.) I write African American characters. However, I do not write urban hip-hop stories.

This is my truth. Don’t hate me for it.

Now that you know my truth it may be easier for you to figure out what my problem is when trying to get a cover together.

I understand that I will have to pay. I don’t love the idea but nothing is free in this world. I’m okay with paying for my book cover to be done by someone who knows what they are doing. I just don’t know where to look.

I was referred to Fiverr.com by a fellow self-published author on my Facebook page. I decided to stop by and commission someone to design my book cover.

I commissioned a young lady to design my cover in 24hrs. I let her know what I was looking for. Needless to say, I was refunded and the order was cancelled.

I am not too familiar with how things work on Fiverr.com so I was surprised that she asked me to provide an image for the cover. I mean, if I had the image I would create the cover myself, again.

So, I got on the web and looked around for images. I even looked at a ton of premade covers. I’m cool with using a premade cover because they say that it is removed once you purchase it so that no one else can use it. The thing is, I cannot find any covers featuring African American models.

Ugh. This is so frustrating. I did land on a site that features premade covers for African American writers but they were the urban hip-hop covers. Now there is nothing wrong with those covers or that genre of books. I actually like to read those. The thing is I do not write in that genre. I need a cover that is appropriate with what I am writing and what my book is about.

I realize that this is a long post and if you made it this far I want to thank you for sticking with me. Back to the title, I Wish I Could Draw.

I wish I could draw because I would use vector art for the cover of my book. I came across some really good stock photos that were vectors and I like that idea, I just couldn’t find anything that would work for my cover.

Sigh.

If anyone knows of any ideas to solve my problem with getting a great book cover please let me know. It would be greatly appreciated.

Until next time bloggers… Love, Peace and Chicken Grease.