Long ago and far away, in a land called "Clueless Newbie Indie Author," I paid someone who charged only $40 per book cover to create the book covers for my "Texas Hearts" series.
In case you don't know, no pro book cover designer charges that little to create book covers. And, I got what I paid for.
They weren't terrible, but...
Looking back, I now know that she didn't understand the nuances of book cover design. First, a series should have a thematic look to it; for example, the same fonts used for the title, the same or similar backgrounds, and so on. One reason for this thematic look is that book-selling websites will group novels in a series together on a page, and it's a lot more appealing when the books all resemble each other.
Second, covers should reflect the genre. While it's eye-catching, her cover for the first book in the series, The Envelope, looks more like a cover for a YA fantasy or action-adventure novel.
Third, floating heads look strange. The covers for Going Home and Benita's Dream both have floating heads.
I've broken the rule...
There's a piece of advice running around the self-published author community, and that is, unless you've actually taken classes to learn how to be a profession designer, you should pay someone to design your book covers.
I've never taken any such classes. I don't even consider myself artistic. But it's been years since I paid someone to design my book covers for me. And, if I do say so myself, the covers have turned out well.
How is this possible? Three things.
**1. Studying other book covers in my genre.
**2. My husband's willingness to learn basic skills in GIMP (free, open source image manipulation software).
**3. My learning my way around Canva.
All of that has led to...
New book covers for my oldest series.
Here they are, in order. I've linked each cover, too, so if you haven't read the series, you can check them out in the Amazon store.
