COVER OF BOOK. The artist, who graduated from NYU in 2012 and lives in Philadelphia, tells me about the process of doing the cover in close cooperation with the author.
Hi Dan!
Thanks for reaching out. I'm so grateful for this opportunity and am very happy that my artwork will be used for the book cover! Thanks for including the copyright message with my name on the inside cover, too.
As for my background:
From early childhood I did a lot of drawing, painting and making things. I did a few side illustration jobs throughout middle and high school, and continued to make art whenever I could as an extracurricular activity. I graduated from New York University, where I started out as a Studio Art major but ended up studying Environmental Studies and Latin American Studies. I did not plan on having a career as an artist or illustrator; my goal was and is to find a career that combines my artistic ability with my passion for environmental and social issues.
Given that combination, you can imagine that I was thrilled to be working on this novel in particular. The concept of my illustration came mainly from my conversations with the writer. I did not want to create an image that was too melodramatic, but I thought it was important to create an image of a world that no human would ever want to inhabit. I think that in this illustration, the colors do that work for us, particularly the yellow sky and red sun.
I have known the author of this novel for a long time from being friends with his daughter, and I earlier illustrated the cover of one of his nonfiction books about technology issues. I think that is why he chose me again to do the cover for his first novel. He knew my earlier work and he liked what I did for his nonfiction book two years ago.
YOUR SHORT, OR LONG, REVIEW -- 200 words to 800 words -- should be accompanied on any blog or website with these words: "I received a free copy from the author in exchange for an honest review."
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FREE REVIEW COPIES BY PDF OR PRINT PAPERBACK are available for any reader who wantto READ and REVIEW the novel in an honest way, and give their honest opinion and feedback for the novel. The review will then be posted on the book's Amazon site and on Goodreads site and on your own blog or this blog. And you can keep the book!
IF INTERESTED, shoot an email expressing your interest to READ and REVIEW this new novel and we will make arrangement to ship it to you by post office mail or email pdf.
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As soon as we have a final cover and publication date, we will put the book on our website and have the website designer start generating interest -- and hopefully traffic. We've already given them a head-up about this, so they're ready to go.
The ideal time for the book release will be the week of September 21 when the author will be back in the USA after a well-deserved European vacation and ready to devote a lot of time to the book. That's the week Pope Francis will be in the U.S., so climate change will be receiving a lot of attention. Also, the presidential race will be in full swing, which will also focus attention on climate change.
A book reviewer tells this blog: "This is cli fi novel that shows what climate change will do to the United States. It is intended as a warning. Many Americans are willing to deny the reality of climate change because they think that it will only affect tropical countries and oceanic islands that are far away from us. The novel depicts a United States that with its coastal cities flooded and its remaining land sweltering under debilitating heat. It has broken into smaller units that are in conflict with each other and it is dominated by more northerly nations, such as Canada, that now have temperate climates.''
She adds: ''There are already a number of "cli-fi" novels that deal with global warming. But most of these belong within the category of post-apocalyptic speculative fiction. They use a disaster -- a nuclear war, an epidemic or an ecological disaster -- to wipe away the complexities of modern civilization and tell an adventure story. This novel is different. It shows an imaginable future, not very distant from the present, when there are still modern houses, cars, governments, schools and political conflicts. The purpose is to bring home to Americans the devastating effects that climate change might have on our nation.''
And adds: "This book is a real story -- relatively short, filled with action and written in simple, easy to read prose. It does not preach and it does not try to advance scientific arguments. Its goal is to make the consequences of climate change real and immediate. It is intended to motivate people who believe that climate change is occurring to take action, and to induce those who deny climate change to re-think their position."
For environmental websites and magazines and groups, we want to offer a REVIEW COPY AS WELL:
First early READER REVIEW is here and will later be posted on Amazon reviews, too:
This is 'cli fi' novel that shows what climate change will do to the United States. It is intended as a warning. Many Americans are willing to deny the reality of climate change because they think that it will only affect tropical countries and oceanic islands that are far away from us. The novel depicts a United States that with its coastal cities flooded and its remaining land sweltering under debilitating heat. It has broken into smaller units that are in conflict with each other and it is dominated by more northerly nations, such as Canada, that now have temperate climates.
While there are already a number of "cli-fi" novels that deal with global warming. But most of these belong within the category of post-apocalyptic speculative fiction. They use a disaster -- a nuclear war, an epidemic or an ecological disaster -- to wipe away the complexities of modern civilization and tell an adventure story. This novel is different. It shows an imaginable future, not very distant from the present, when there are still modern houses, cars, governments, schools and political conflicts. The purpose is to bring home to Americans the devastating effects that climate change might have on North America.
What I liked best about this debut novel is that it does not preach and it's a real story -- relatively short, filled with action and written in simple, easy to read prose. As I said, it does not preach and it does not try to advance scientific arguments. Its goal seems merely to tell a goo story while also making the consequences of climate change real and immediate. I think it is intended to motivate people who believe that climate change is occurring to take action, and to induce those who deny climate change to re-think their position.
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