Back in 1992 I waffled around with a short story about a warrior-woman, an embroiderer, and the city they both loved. That became NEEDLE AND SWORD, which was fan-published shortly afterward.
I’ve had it on the blog for the longest time. I’m getting ready to take it down, in preparation for releasing a longer, slightly different paid version through Draft2Digital in the next month or so.
I played with several different cover ideas in Painter. I am emphatically not a cover artist. What little I know about the business is by watching professionals at the business.
The first version had a bit of the original artwork I’d done for the story in 1992.
The second was something I’d drafted up to get a ‘sweeping sunset vista’ theme, that I thought might go well. There’s a sword and a drift of pale silk cloth in there, too.
But then I thought, why not go starkly graphic? Distill the story down to its base: a woman, a city, and a banner. All half-blurred into smoke.
I like this one best, but I’ll probably incorporate a mix of other things into it, too.