eBook cover design for crime fiction series

eBook cover design | Awards finalist

Seasoned travellers and co-authors Susan Rogers and John Roosen approached me in 2021 with a cover design brief for the first book in their crime noir series – Yoga Mat Mysteries.

Dead Man’s Pose is a smart, sharply witty story set in Sydney, Australia and surrounds. Susan and John wanted a book cover that conveyed mystery and intrigue and clearly showed the Sydney Opera House – but this request came with technical constraints. The cover image needed to follow Sydney Opera House guidelines to the letter, which informed the incorporation of the geographical context of Sydney Harbour, the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Sydney’s skyline. Another key piece of the creative brief was to develop a design for book 1 that could be replicated across a series of up to 8 books, each based in a different city around Australia or New Zealand.

As a self-published release in a competitive category, the eBook required a cover that grabbed attention and revealed elements of the story to draw in a reader, event when viewed on a mobile device. Using only royalty-free imagery, I compiled landmarks from Sydney at night that speak to key scenes within the story into an original image. Highlights were added to the landscape to give the image depth and a hyperrealistic quality, inspired by Sydney’s iconic VIVID Festival, which also features in the narrative. The bright colour theme was chosen to attract the eye and further reference the ‘Sydney at night’ mystique.

While the compilation of the cover elements – typography, colour palette, and hero image – came together quickly, the primary challenge was creating the right image for ‘projection’ onto the Sydney Opera House. The authors were keen to use the projection as a clue to one of the elements of the story, without giving anything away. In the end, the theme of ‘bubbles’ – which are actually oil and water – represented several things relative to book 1 in the series, as well as book 2, Cobra Pose and book 3, Tree Pose.

Separated by the Tasman Sea and months of COVID-lockdown travel restrictions, I worked with John and Susan entirely by videoconference and email to design this eBook cover. In 2022, I was thrilled to learn that the cover design for Dead Man’s Pose was awarded a silver medal by the Next Generation Indie Book Awards as a finalist for the Best Cover Design (Fiction). This is the largest international awards program for indie authors and independent publishers in the world.

“Tess has many outstanding qualities that making working with her a pleasure. She is a good communicator -- a must for any project large or small. She is organised so you always know what to expect and the trackline you are headed. She is creative and inventive and able to quickly understand the intent of the project. We asked Tess to put together a book cover taking into consideration certain elements we wanted and a few critical requirements that were needed for compliance. This was a finely tuned balance to achieve the professional result we were after. A job well done! We are eager to work with Tess again on several future projects.”

Susan Rogers and John Roosen, Authors