What's in a cover? NaNoWriMo Success Planning
Did you know that many of the most successful people use visualization? It's the process of "seeing" your success before it happens. It's used by Olympic athletes and even NASA!
For some of us, the idea of writing 50,000 words in a month is the equivalent of winning a gold medal or flying to the moon. So to help boost our chances of success, why not visualize your novel as complete?
Now you could get comfy and start imagining posting the NaNoWriMo "Winner" badge (which I think is a great idea) or you can make and look at the cover of your finished novel.
How do I do that?
You do have an image of your completed novel right?
No?
Or maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about.
So let me back up and show an example. Here is the "cover" I made for my to-be-written novel:
How cool is that? Actually it isn't terribly creative or what I actually have envisioned for the final cover but it is a great symbol for the book in progress. (Sorry it's so large!)
Do you want a cover?
I thought some of my fellow November Madness writers might want a cover of their own. So if you don't have one, have the time to make one, or the skills to make one, let me help you!
All you need to do is:
- Let me know you want a cover
- Send me a picture you want to use
- Tell me what byline to put at the bottom
You can post these in the comments or send me a Discord DM with the info (ntowl#9845).
This offer is only for officially registered November Madness Writers. Not registered? Go here to see how to sign up.
We can do it!
Join the Freewrite fun today! Visit @Freewritehouse
Proud to be part of the
Please the Bananafish god by entering the Finish the Story Contest
All images are mine or licensed from Adobe except where noted. Freewritehouse and the Bananafish Tribe used with permission from their owners.
NaNoWriMo logo used courtesy of National Novel Writing Month.
Hey! I do that, too! I made up a cover for mine and I do find it very inspiring to visualize it as a finished product! (Even though at the same time, I also know this won't be the final cover, I do enjoy the graphic design side of creativity as well!)
Sometimes when I'm feeling blocked with writing, I will go work on graphics for marketing the future book as well. Regardless of what I end up with, I find it incredibly relaxing!!
This is the 'cover' I made for my NaNoWriMo story.
I wish you the best and thank you SO much for putting this challenge out there. I was feeling REALLY hesitant to try it this year for some reason, but your challenge finally got me over the hump.
Thanks for the kind words @byn! I really know nothing about graphics worth knowing, but I love to do it anyway (a graphic design course is on my bucket list one of these days).
I love your cover too. I'm terrified looking at it yet curious too...
And this is @freewritehouse's challenge. I'm just helping out. so glad you decided to join us!
I've just learned over the years of finding free programs and working my way through them. Youtube tutorials and the like. It's mostly just something that I enjoy. Much less messy than things like painting :)
Same here. I just google what I want to do and find a video. If I put it all together I might actually know something, but I usually forget if I don't do it all the time.
I find painting is very cathartic, though I don't do it. It's messy as you noted, and I'm never happy with what I do - it always look like a three year old tried to paint what I was describing. The connection between my brain and my hands is well-tuned for writing, but for painting they might as well belong to different people!
I've been painstakingly trying to figure out how to efficiently utilize graphical art. It is not easy! Not only does it take some know how, but also a keen eye for art. These two aspects do not come together easily. I can attest to this!
I'm too stubborn and strong willed (stubborn Taurus) to ask others to help me in this department, but at some point, I will likely reach out for some pointers. (First day, Aries cusp) Right now isn't a conducive time however.
I feel you have a solid combination of these dynamics happening, and I really like the cover you produced. I hope you will keep us in the loop with where to purchase a copy of your novel when it's released. I would really love to purchase one!
Nice cover. Please, I need one too. I will love to read your novel when it is completed.
Great! @amelin Just give me the title and name you want on it and the picture too. If you don’t have a picture in mind you can give me an idea of what you want and I can look for one that will work as the inspiration during nanowrimo
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God bless you techno-skilled people!! I couldn't even download an author photo, nor a book cover, nor do I know how to add a title and author name to an image to create a cover. I need to learn this stuff. Thank you for offering your time and talent to the techno-needy!
Free templates for creating book covers! Just found several online, mostly via Amazon, but nowhere do I see you're committed after you download a free template: https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/cover-templates