You wrote the book.  You found a publisher. (Finally!) And now the book is making its way to market, which means to bookshelves in book stores.  To READERS!  Others will read what you spent so many years writing.  

Or will they?  

What if they walk past the place on the shelf where your book awaits?  What if they never pick it up, open the cover, and step inside the world you have created?

Whether you judge a book by its cover or not, the cover has to grab your attention.  It has to provide clues to the story that awaits. It needs to suggest, to beguile, to pick up on implicit codes of recognition.

So much depends on the cover.

It was my pleasure to work with Melissa Carrigee of Brother Mockingbird Publishing, on the cover for my novel.  With a title like The Kimono Tattoo there was potential for so many different kinds of images—some lascivious, some clichéd.  To give into romantic fantasies of kimono-clad “geisha,” while tempting for its potential market appeal, would not have represented the book.  (There must be a confederation of book designers who automatically fall back on this cliché when covering books in translation by Japanese women writers. I have stories to tell there!  I will save that for later.)

Melissa held a cover contest!  Many of you may have voted on the various social media sites.  

So, now we can announce!  We have a winner……

And here it is:

Let me know what you think!  Comment below or email me.

The Kimono Tattoo will be released in June!!!

Photo by Stefan Steinbauer on Unsplash