The weight is over

The Weight of Silence is now out and flying off the shelves! It debuted at #7 on the New York Times bestseller list, moved up 2 spots this week and may be #3 or 4 by next week -- only its third week out! I am really pleased with its success, the book's cover design and that my daughter's first modelling job was for a hit. Good job Avery!

This book was shot and composed by Brian Pieters in Toronto. I am happy to say that it was an Applied Arts award for photography in this years annual.

On the shelves!

I have been off the blog of late -- a mixture of an intense work schedule coupled with learning more about blogs and reading more of them than writing them.

I am back on now to mention that some of the books that I first designed and posted to this blog very early on are now on sale! The Sherryl Woods 'Trinity Harbor' series and the Deanna Raybourne 'Silent in the Sanctuary' have just been released and are on sale at most book sellers. After many years of designing corporate work and annual reports, it is an unusual sensation to see your work deplayed prominantly in book shops -- and even my local grocery shop.

Identity work and book design -- a marriage made in heaven

I have always enjoyed identity work, so it was great fun to incorporate that within my new book series for Sherryl Woods. Titled "The Chesapeake Shores" novels, the design concept uses signs in the foreground to place the title for each book -- thus marrying type and image together seemlessly. I will post these books as they become final.

Start Me Up

Yes, this is the actual title. The story of a relationship between a young woman and a garage mechanic -- sometimes these things just design themselves.

Harbor vs. Harbour

Subtitled as "The Trinity Harbor" novels, these 3 books follow the romantic exploits of a cast of characters who reside in a small town on the Chesapeake Bay in Virginia. Editorially light and fun, these book covers deliver a sense of place and set the mood for the reader.

Now if only I could get used to spelling Harbor without a 'u' -- I feel I am leaving something out.

What do you get when you combine a beautiful summer night, a swimming pool, soft lighting, and a gorgeous model in a skin-tight red dress? If your thoughts turned salacious, I am sorry to disappoint (I am married after all!) All of these elements came together for the cover of my next book, "Death's Door". A romantic mystery set in Miami's South Beach district.

Body Moving, Body Moving

This continuing series of books combines murder, mystery and high fashion!

A beautiful sales associate for a luxury department store by day, but assistant to her corpse-transporting brother by night, the heroine runs up against "The charm killer" in these 3 installments. This serial killer places a charm in the mouth of each of his victims, so it seems appropriate to use a charm bracelet on the covers and use an unusual mix of charms for visual interest. It surprised me in doing this series that you can practically get anything as a charm -- I envisioned having to get some of these custom made, however they were all available online, including the meat cleaver!