Cover Design, Blurb, & Bio
The elements of the cover design are the Cover Artwork, Story Blurb, and Author’s Biography.
These must be formatted to the tight specification of Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing specification and uploaded to them in a file format they require.
None of this can or should be done without your input because:
- You already have an image of what you’d like the cover to look like, even if you haven’t thought it through in detail.
- You know the story best. What was your hook in writing the first few pages?
- You know you best. How would you like to be known to your audience?
Cover Art
We begin with your vision.
- Depending on your needs, we may use A.I. artwork or commercially available royalty free artwork. Often several images are merged to create an effective presentation.
- Three proposed cover images are presented from which you choose.
Blurb
The best way to write a good blurb is to read a good blurb. Find commercially successful books in your genre using Amazon’s advanced search capability described in How to Produce a Novel. Use them as comparables when querying an agent as well as to read successful cover-blurbs for you to emulate.
We ask that you write out about 100 words, but not more than 200 words describing the “Hook” to the story. In the blurb, you do NOT reveal the who-done-it aspect of the tale. You want to entice the reader who picks up the book in a bookstore–or reads the blurb on the Amazon sales page–to buy it.
You know the story and the motivation of the characters best. We take what you write and massage it for content and presentation.
Author Biography
The author bio, often placed inside the cover flap of a hard-cover book, does not need to be placed on the cover of a novel as it is for non-fiction work. It can be moved inside, before or after the text.
Still, a brief bio is preferable to no bio at all. This may be your first novel and you may not have writing credentials to offer. But you’ve had a life. Describe your passions that inspired you to write the novel, and perhaps how your life and profession have prepared you with insight into the development of the story.
If you have published before, fiction or non-fiction, cite the titles, even if they didn’t sell. Try to keep it at 100 words. Include a photograph.