I love that cover. It's striking, dramatic, the Doctor looks exactly right for the story. It'll really stand out on the shelf, I think.
Now ... one thing that has changed since the olden days is that the cover is now approved by the Doctor Who production office before the author gets sight of it. Nothing terribly sinister or surprising about that, to be honest - Doctor Who is now a multi-million pound business, and all the various books and toys and DVDs and so on have to have a house style and - above all else - someone has to make sure things aren't clashing with each other. I suspect the actors involved have to approve their likenesses and so on, too.
I've always written the blurb (the words on the back cover), and I did still do that for The Eyeless. It's about a hundred words. A lot of writing is a balancing act, where the writer has two things to do and needs to negotiate between them. With the blurb, it's a balancing act between trying to tell the reader what the book is about without giving away the whole of the story.
So ... anyway, prepare to be dazzled by my amazing psychic powers.
I was wondering about the cover, and I doodled a sketch. I'd had no contact with the cover artist (Lee Binding), and presumably he worked from my synopsis - he couldn't have worked from the finished book as I hadn't delivered it at that point. Just as I finished my sketch, I got an email with the cover on it.
Here's my sketch (I've mentioned in a previous post my inability to draw):
and just to remind you:
Isn't that extraordinary? It's like when Uri Geller gets someone to put a drawing in an envelope and then uses his amazing telepathic powers to literally read the mind of the person, then draws the same thing. Which is always a house.
So I can't draw, but I am one of the Tomorrow People. Awesome.
6 comments:
But why did your cover feature Stan Laurel? All the same, I bow before your mystic powers.
Good sir, both your powers and that cover are awesome.
Even more disturbing. When I looked at the cover, before reading a word of the actual post, I thought: 'Wow. That's exactly what I thought the cover would look like.'
And then I read on. . . .
Regards the shot of DT: aren't those publicity photos, shot pre-season and approved for use across all Doctor Who merchandise?
I don't know how the publicity photos are handled, to be honest. It would be sensible to pre-approve a set, though.
Beyond that, though, they have to make sure that they use different photos, that the pictures suit the mood of the book and so on.
Even more spooky is that you are noted under 'The Tomorrow People' on my blog! Loved the cover, can't wait to read it!
And for your next trick, what's this weekend's lotto numbers?
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