What's In A Picture

Like most (if not all) writers out there, I have a forever growing list of To Read books. Every time I take one off the list, a handful more replace it. So there is always something I want to read, but for each visit to the bookstore, that something has to leap out and dig its claws into me and hang on for the ride.

In most cases, I've seen the books online, I know what the cover looks like, so it isn't a surprise when I physically see it. Some covers are complex and involved and detailed and your eyes dart all over trying to take in all the images. (I'm thinking something like The Mortal Instruments trilogy.) Others are simple, basic and usually at least a little bit symbolic. (The famous Twilight apple, anyone?) And then there are the other covers. Just something to grab your attention, something to make you think, wonder, want to know what is inside those pages.

Whilst walking between the shelves on a recent bookstore visit, my eyes panned over the cover of Evermore - which was a Recent Read for me. The cover is definitely a grabber. It draws the eye, but in my sister's words "it looks like a vampire book," I get that. It does. The dark background, the girl in shadows, the red tulips. Very vampiric - similar to the black/red/white themes of the Twilight Saga. It turned my sister off for a long time (though she just informed me about 15 minutes ago that she finished reading it last night and really liked it) but it was a book I kept going back to and picking up until the day it came home with me. So I think it did it's job.

But it's all in your audience, right?

Another example for me personally is Girl Overboard. I'm a snowboarder. A little absent from the mountain since I had kids, but I will go again. I swear it. Maybe next winter since Utah does have the greatest snow on Earth. I digress. Girl Overboard (another Recent Read) got me because of the cover. I kept going back to it. Partly because it was a girl with a snowboard and partly because I didn't get the title: overboard, like when you fall off a boat? But those colors, the vibrancy, the--for lack of a better word--life in this cover really pulled me in.

I am a visual thinker who, of late, has been seeking some motivation. I've started collecting images to represent each of my wips. Something akin to the character journals many others keep, I suppose, but something I have not done before. It has definitely been helpful and given me a better understanding as to why others do something similar. I've been able to figure out where I'm going in certain situations and if nothing else, at least know where I've been. The fact that they are all in anime is just a tribute to my current other obsession! :)

On that note, here is a visual representation of each of my current wips that are in various stages of completion:








Just Maybe











4 Letter Word












Grace









Okay, that's all for now! Have a great (short) week everyone!