I don’t know about you, but I have zero skill at creating a decent book cover for my books. Less than zero, actually. So I am constantly on the lookout for great covers at a decent price.

I met Ellie Douglas on Twitter, and fell in love with the cover for her book, Hounded. Okay, let’s be real. I love zombies and this is a zombie book. I probably would have loved the cover had it been nothing more than some blood-dripping stick figures. But, as you can see below, this is a pretty awesome cover!

While retweeting Ellie, I saw pictures of the covers that she has created, and I was quite impressed. So much so that I decided to do this blog post and introduce her to those of you who might be looking for a cover designer..

She has stock covers available at a reasonable price, and…

If you’re like me, you’ve probably tried one book promotional program after another. I don’t know how it has all turned out for you, but 98% of them have done absolutely nothing for me.

I met Mark Schultz, @wordrefiner, on Twitter, and was intrigued by what he offered. I went ahead and booked a promotional package for Shadow of the Drill, paid his incredibly reasonable fee, then sat back and waited for more…nothing.

Surprisingly, that’s not what I got. I’m not going to say that dozens of copies were downloaded, because they weren’t, and I’m not going to exaggerate the results. However, I will say that working with Mark yielded more book sales then any other marketing program I’ve tried. In fact, even though  this happened almost a year ago, I am still hearing from readers that they became aware of my book through Mark’s website and then added it…

No, this isn’t an article about ancient prostitution. Get your mind out of the gutter.

I’ve written before about my love for ancient maps. This time, I want to present you with a collection of some great resources for 3D modelling of ancient Rome, which you can experience today and see for yourself how it might have felt to walk down the streets of Ancient Rome (and therefore, to an extent, Egretia).

Shabbat Shalom to all the artists

ahead of his or her time.

I was invited to download a review pdf copy of this guide by the author and I was most certainly glad I did.  The book cover is usually the first feature to draw a potential reader’s attention.  It is therefore essential to make it as appealing as possible to the eye while at the same time capturing the essence of what the book is about.  It is one of the hardest ingredients of the book to get right.

Mainstream writers will probably employ a professional designer but for the self publisher this investment will mostly prove too expensive.  Some are lucky in that they may know of a student going through Art College who will produce an acceptable cover at a low fee, or even for free, for a chance to include it in their CV.  Others might know of a family member or friend who is willing to do…

It is interesting to report that the staggering listing of $615.72 on amazon.com and the outrageous listing of £2,431.99 on amazon.co.uk for the Peatmore Press book, Cogrill’s Mill, have now disappeared from its book pages since I posted my blog on 23 July.  I am glad to see that someone has been paying attention to my posts.

Keith Jahans

Listings for the paperback versions of Peatmore Press novels have disappeared from amazon.com and amazon.co.uk with one exception; the exception being my first novel, “Cogrill’s Mill,” on amazon.com.  This novel is still listed as being available from my Company, “Peatmore Press,” as an independent trader at $10.00 plus postage and packing which is about right.  The listings of the company’s other novels have been removed from amazon.com and there are no listings for any paperback book from Peatmore Press as an independent trader on amazon.co.uk.

Peatmore Press’s status as an independent trader was removed from amazon.co.uk about a year or so ago, presumably because we did not sell enough books through the Amazon web page.  That is understandable because as a retailer Amazon has a perfect right not to sell any books it does not deem profitable.  But there is another exception which is quite staggering as one independent seller…