Category: Graphic Design

Oh, look! My favorite imaginary author is back and demanding a cover for her latest venture.

This was a two-hour, design-along tutorial to create a western-themed rom-com. Could I improve it? Absolutely! Am I going to? No. (Sorry, Callie.) The idea behind these practice runs is to do the thing, make a cover, and experiment.

Also, I have no idea what a Cowboy Chaos novel is or whether there’s such a place as Chaos, Nevada. (But I kind of hope there is.)

However, I do like the title font (Canela). I was supposed to add a cowboy hat as well (just in case you couldn’t tell it was a western-themed book), but I thought it was a little heavy-handed.

Callie is far more prolific than I am, but I feel she’s a little scattered and that a dozen genres is far too many for one author. But she never listens to me.

So, a few months back, I took a field trip to the nearby Barnes and Noble just to do a bit of window shopping, so to speak. I was aimlessly wandering around the space, considering buying something to drink, when a display table with Rachel Harrison’s Cackle caught my eye. (And yes, I understand the irony of pointing you to the Amazon site as a reference.)

The cover was enough to pull me in; I didn’t bother looking at reviews. I simply bought it.

As it sat on the side table next to my reading chair, I thought: Hm. Could I replicate that cover?

Mind you, this is a deliberate exercise. I would never use this as an actual book cover. It’s far too close to the original. Which is why it has a fake title and fake author name. I even changed the fake author name I normally use for cover exercises—Callie Robb—to Callie Roberts. Apparently, Callie wanted to be shelved even closer to La Nora.

And yes, creating fake covers for fake authors who somehow have preferences is weird.

But it was fun. It was great to revisit Photoshop and discover I hadn’t completely forgotten how to use it. The central image is not mine, but one I found on Depositphotos (artist: liudmyla.mammamia). I felt it was striking enough that it didn’t need all the embellishments of the original cover.

And I’m hoping in 2023, I’ll create even more covers for Callie (and maybe a few for me).