Christopher Moore's Blog

Miscellany from the Author Guy

Christopher Moore's Blog header image 2
←

Evolution of a Book Cover

March 24th, 2025 · 4 Comments

I’ve been very fortunate to have some really great cover art on the covers of my books, and I appreciate the compliments from you readers, although I really have very little to do with how they turn out, but I thought you might want to get a sense of the process from my point of view. (I really should talk to a book cover designer for this post, but I don’t actually know any, as they are kept in witness protection by the publisher.)

I finished the manuscript for my next novel, Anima Rising, in the Fall of 2024, but we were discussing cover art months before that. The plot involves the Viennese painter, Gustav Klimt, who finds a woman floating the the Danube Canal early one morning on his way home from an all-nighter. The woman, drowned and naked, reminds him of his own paintings, and he’s fascinated with drawing her on the spot. It goes on from there.

What drew me to Klimt as a character in the first place were his beautiful paintings, so I thought it would be great if we could use either an image of them, or use them as inspiration. Here are the Klimt images I sent to my editor as taking off points.

Watersnakes, by Klimt. The woman in water immediately brings this and some other paintings to mind so I sent this to my editor as a taking off point.
Judith (with the head of Holofernes) is an iconic Klimt image. He will eventually call
the woman he finds “Judith” as she can’t remember her name.
This painting, Philosophy 1900 commissioned by the Univerisity of Vienna to be displayed on the ceiling, was enormous, and has wide spaces that could be used for print. The original was destroyed by the Nazis in World War II, as the Russian army closed on them, so no color version exists. I thought the designers might have fun applying color to the black and white photo.
Color sketches for Medicine have survived, so we at least have some idea of what Klimt wanted them to look like.

So here is the 1st round of composite sketches, the designer, Will Staehle, who has done a lot of my covers, delivered, adding elements from the plot, as well as from his own knowledge of Klimt’s art.

The results are really stunning, I think, and any of them would have made a good cover.

Here will uses the look of gold leaf, that Klimt used extensively in his paintings, as well as floral mosaics
and color patterns often found in Klimt’s landscape work. I love that Will incorporated a cat into the design.
Gustav Klimt with a kitty. Klimt kept many cats at his studio, which was a free-standing home
with a walled garden, and they figure in the story in Anima Rising.
At one point in the novel, Judith is treated by both Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, and much of her story
is revealed through hypnotic regression. Will shows the surreal dreamscape of one of these sessions, with Klimtian motifs.
Down, down, down, in the dark water, into the subconscious. All of these designs use a font that looks
very much like one that Klimt designed himself, and used in much of has graphic work.
Here we have the therapy session with the blue background. Really striking.
Klimt was the only fine art painter I know of, who worked in the Art Nouveau style.
Other artist working in the style were printmakers and illustrators.
Here’s a whole different motif, the face drawn from Klimt’s painting, The Maiden (below) a woman asleep in a dogpile of color and sensuality. Will puts the sleeping maiden in a dream of horror and croissants, which is appropriate to Anima Rising.
The Maiden, Gustave Klimt, 1913

And finally, we settled on this one:

We picked the blue and gold motif, because the contrast was so striking, and used one of the “shrink” sessions, because it teases part of the story (Freud and Jung are mentioned in the subtitle). I went with the face from the first composite, because she seems mischievous, and that’s important for the character, even though the blond with flowing hair is closer to Judith’s physical description.

I need to acknowledge here, that I’ve been very, very lucky to have input on my covers. I wasn’t even asked on some of the early books, and some really dreadful covers resulted, or at least covers I don’t like. (The hardcover of Bloodsucking Fiends is borderline ugly.) I’m continually amazed at the flexibility and openness that graphic artists, illustrators, and designers bring to their work. Sometimes a suggestion might take the cover down a wrong direction and it might need to be abandoned, sending the artist back to the drawing board, so to speak, yet they always comeback quickly and professionally with great new designs. Considering what a whiny little bitch I can be when someone asks me to make a change to my work, I very much admire the flexibility and speed with which these professionals work.

I probably should have asked to interview Will Staehle for this post, but for now, enjoy his work, and if the opportunity comes up, I’ll get him to chime in on this. At least, for now, you get to see some of his gorgeous designs.

Tags: Uncategorized

4 responses so far ↓

  • 1 KINCAID JONES // Mar 24, 2025 at 12:03 pm

    I’m so happy to read this, thank you. In a recent publishing conference event I asked about the cover art of the book they were discussing called The Divorcees and the team (writer, agent, and editor) were thrilled to talk about it and I found it fascinating. Thanks for this insight and best of luck with your book. Sounds great!

  • 2 Gary McCormick // Mar 24, 2025 at 1:41 pm

    Thank you for the insights into the process of arriving at book cover art; Will Staehle came up with some wonderful options to choose from. I am eagerly anticipating the arrival of my pre-ordered copy of “Anima Rising”!

    (By the way, I agree with you about the cover of the hardback edition of “Bloodsucking Fiends”. I recently added a pristine first edition copy to my collection of your work, and while I am happy to have it, the cover art is really quite gruesome.)

  • 3 Russ Harvey // Mar 24, 2025 at 8:01 pm

    I’ve always thought your covers have done you well, for the most part. Kept the pages clean, anyway. Just a shame Big Advertising stole that one. Just a fluke, I’m sure.

  • 4 Dave Brandt // Mar 25, 2025 at 6:53 am

    Thank you for sharing. I love seeing the process.

Leave a Comment