Monday, October 11, 2010

Shooting Covers for Dying to Go Viral


Last Tuesday Dying to Go Viral sold to my favourite publisher in Norway, Sweden and Finland. Hurray!
After a few cover attempts failed for the Canadian publisher, my husband Bob shot the cover for Last Chance for Paris. Turned out to be my favourite cover of all time. This time I thought
I would try to give him first crack. My niece Kelly is the perfect age to play the 14 year old character Jade who dies in the first chapter when she "skitches" on a Mustang while riding her skateboard. Of course for the shoot, we couldn't have the Mustang driving. Then we'd be as stupid as the boy who attempts to capture this video for youtube in the story. So the car is parked and we hope for the designer to add the illusion of movement.

I like to get more creatively involved with my books. I'm an idea person so I can write good copy for back blurbs, I took scriptwriting for a year so I can envision and write scripts for booktrailers and I work at a magazine part time so I can think of how I'd like a cover to look at least conceptually. The actual colours and design, well really that's up to the visual professionals. But I also like to stretch creatively using the talents of my family. Traditionally publishers don't like authors to suggest or submit illustrations. And they may not like us submitting potential photos. But who knows maybe they will love it. For more photos of the skateboarding cover shots, see this url
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mcnicollphotography/sets/72157625009561933/show/

Last Chance for Paris--the book trailer

It occurs to me that while I posed some photos of the filming of the video, I never posted the finished product. My son did the shooting and editing. He's a talented videograper/editor who works for Emotion Pictures.

Will everyone buy a second and third copy of Last Chance for Paris? Maybe not. But my family working together creatively makes me happy. In the meantime, the autographed book is available at A Different Drummer's on Locust Street in Burlington.