My Next Story

Guess what happens next month.

There are a lot of things happening next month, most of which I know nothing about. But an important one for me is a new book release. Anyone paying attention knows this will be the third Romance Arts book, The Art of Communication. Anyone really paying attention has probably guessed who’s getting together in this one. I’m not going to talk about the story inside the book because, you know, spoilers. This is the story of making the cover. I’m going to describe how I decided the kooky part and if you want to find it yourself, I suggest you do that first. Otherwise… cover spoiler! Who knew that was a thing? (Hint: The link on the title should let you see the cover, and preorder the book while you're at it.)

The “paintings” on the covers for this series are supposed to be examples of Audra’s work. They are scenes from nature with a little tweak. My post last January contained some whining about how difficult it was to get a picture that wasn’t all gray in the winter. This time I planned ahead and snapped lots of pictures of flowers during the summer. I wanted flowers on book 3 and picked out the picture to use pretty quickly.

Deciding what to tweak was not as quick. My first thought was the color of one of the flowers. I made one a darker purple, or changed it from pink to purple, depending on who you ask. The result was aesthetically pleasing. However, it didn’t have that unnatural bent I wanted. I think flowers can be different colors. I don’t actually know about this type of flower or flowers on the same plant (which wasn’t obvious in the picture anyway). But it looked perfectly normal to me.

I thought perhaps I could add a sunburst to one of the yellow centers instead, make it look almost glowing. This was either a bad idea or a great idea I was not capable of pulling off. I couldn’t get it to look natural and unnatural at the same time. It’s supposed to take the viewer a moment to notice anything is off. My sunbursts were too subtle to locate. Then they were about as subtle as the sun. Middle ground was taunting me from somewhere out of reach.

At that point, I decided the picture was the problem. I gave up and went for a walk. It was already fall so the flowers in our neighborhood were somewhat uninspiring. But while looking around, I did get the idea that I didn’t need to change the flowers at all. I could change something next to the flowers. A bee. I snapped a picture of a tiny little bee and inserted him into my cover picture. Then I made him purple instead of the flower. That’s not something you see every day, nor is it something you see the moment you look at the cover.

While celebrating this victory, I mentioned to my husband that there didn’t seem to be as many bees hanging around our backyard as in the summer. He was surprisingly shocked that the picture wasn’t something I got off the internet. He should know by now that I use my own pictures. I want everyone to know I have way more dedication than to copy a bee picture. I stood in the backyard for five whole minutes to get it. Too bad that was the easy part.

Noah Strikes Again - Part 3

    Footsteps and excited whispering in the hallway told Katie it was morning. It said her siblings were awake anyway so it was probably morning. She smiled to herself against the grogginess because it was Christmas. She pushed the covers back to sit up and not fall asleep during her morning prayers. They were somewhat rushed because it was Christmas. Then she slipped a pair of fuzzy socks onto her feet and went downstairs in her pajamas.
    “Katie’s up,” Noah said. “Now we only have to wait for Michael.” Though he was speaking to the family, he seemed to be trying to raise his voice loud enough for the only one not in the room to hear him.
    Katie claimed a comfy seat and gazed up at the lights on the tree. She was certainly looking forward to the presents, but her favorite part was all the pretty decorations.
    “All right, everyone.” Cecelia stood in front of her yawning parents and addressed her siblings with an air of impatience. “When Michael gets here, no one can start until we’re all ready. Then we have to open them one at a time so we can all see what everyone gets.”
    “That’s how we always do it,” Liz said.
    Katie nodded.
    Cecelia made a sharp inhale. Her expression showed how much she did not like to be contradicted, despite the fact that no one had done that.
    “Would you like to pass them out?” Mom asked.
    A pounding noise indicated Michael was on his way. Even rubbing the sleep from his eyes, the fifteen-year-old came down the stairs like someone who weighed three times as much. He went to the kitchen first, to the dismay of Cecelia, but came to the family room with a bowl of cereal only a minute later.
    Cecelia handed a present to Liz, who carefully peeled off each piece of tape before she opened a box with a new sweater. She smiled and said, “Thanks, Santa,” to her parents. She was one of those odd teenagers who liked getting clothes for Christmas. Katie was amused by that and the fact that her parents still labeled all the presents from Santa.
    Michael tore into his first present while holding his spoon in his mouth. It was a book. He dropped the spoon into the bowl to thank “Santa” and brag that he had guessed it was a book. There were a few sarcastic comments about the impressiveness of that deduction as Cecelia picked out a present for herself.
    She held it a moment waiting for eyes to turn to her before she ripped the paper off the small package. She displayed a silver chain with an angel pendant. “Oh, it’s perfect,” she said. “Thanks, Santa.”
    “Don’t you already have an angel necklace?” Mom asked.
    “It broke, remember?”
    Cecelia didn’t look up as she answered because she was focused on trying to undo the clasp. She didn’t notice that the people she’d just thanked were silently questioning each other as to who was responsible for the gift. The answer appeared to be neither of them.
    Noah said, “Katie’s turn,” as he shoved a gift with shiny paper into her lap before she could question the mystery. Mom smiled knowingly, which made Katie suspect the redirection was intentional. She peeled back the paper slowly as she reflected that having a little brother who liked to do things without getting caught wasn’t always a bad thing.

Noah Strikes Again - Part 2

    Katie came in and set her bag by the front door. Michael was the only one in the room, and he barely glanced up.
    “I’m home,” she said.
    “You’re always home,” he said, still paying very little attention.
    It was true that she came home from school nearly every weekend. But it would be nice if her siblings acted as though they missed her just a little during the week.
    “Hi, Katie.” Liz came around a corner.
    “Hi, Katie.” Cecelia was right behind her. “We named the ghost Muffy.”
    Katie wrinkled her eyes at her sisters. “What ghost?”
    “Noah’s ghost,” Cecelia said.
    “The one that doesn’t exist?”
    “Yeah. We named her Muffy.”
    Liz nodded but looked as though she was mostly humoring her younger sister.
    Katie was sure they still weren’t making any sense. She shrugged it off as unimportant. She was just glad the two girls were getting along again. Noah had pulled off a months long prank where he was moving stuff in their room. Liz blamed Cecelia until they started to convince themselves it was a ghost.
    “Forget Muffy,” Michael said. “Let’s play a game.” He went to grab something from the shelf. He had to grab and return several before he got enough players to agree to one.
    Katie did feel missed when they argued over who would be on her team. She enjoyed several games with various subsets of her family during the weekend. She was happy to be home and stuck around until Monday morning since her first class didn’t start until 11 am.
    She and her dad were the first ones up and sat at the table sipping orange juice when they heard the shower turn on upstairs.
    “That’ll be Liz,” he said.
    Katie nodded. “I’ll check the pancakes.” They had two big puffy pancakes in the oven. Her dad had gotten them in there before she was dressed, but she felt justified in saying they were making breakfast since she was in charge of getting them out. The sides were curling, and the scent was heavenly.
    “What smells so good?” Noah asked as he came into the kitchen.
    “Puffy pancakes,” Katie said.
    “Yummy.” Noah went to the cupboard and grabbed a stack of plates.
    Cecelia joined them as Katie was cutting slices for those plates. “I want some,” she said.
    “Dad!” Liz appeared clutching clothes and a towel to her chest. She was in pajamas. “Can I use your shower? Michael’s in my way.”
    “What’s he doing up so early?” Dad asked.
    He asked way too calmly for Liz. She added some urgency to her tone. “I’ll never get my hair dry if I have to wait for him!”
    “Go ahead,” he said. “But try not to disturb your mom.”
    Liz rushed off.
    Noah seemed entertained by the encounter. “Did you do something?” Katie asked him.
    He only smiled. The water had shut off upstairs. Michael came charging down a few moments later. His hair was dripping and his shirt darker in spots that were wet. It looked as though he’d skipped the towel. “Oh, man, I’m missing pancakes.” He grabbed a granola bar and started stuffing things into his backpack.
    “Why are you in such a hurry?” Cecelia asked.
    Michael answered somewhat angrily. “It’s called a school bus.”
    "But it won’t be here for like a half hour.”
    Noah burst out laughing.
    Michael froze. Then he looked at the clock on the wall. His confusion passed as he glared at Noah. “Someone must have changed my alarm clock to make me think I slept in.”
    “Noah strikes again,” Cecelia mumbled. He’d stopped saying it but sometimes other family members filled in the blank. The baby of the family had enough sense to run out of the room as soon as Michael figured out what had happened.
    Michael looked for a moment as though he was thinking of following before he simply rolled his eyes and returned to the kitchen to grab his share of pancake.
    Katie had finished hers already. She looked up as she heard a door opening.
    Mom came out of her bedroom squinting at the light. “Why is Liz in our shower? And why is she singing?”
    “Blame Noah.” Michael spoke around a mouthful of food so it wasn’t just the early hour that kept their mom from understanding him.
    “Liz always sings in the shower,” Cecelia said with annoyance. “And she’s already singing Christmas songs.”
    The squint deepened and Mom shook her head as though she didn’t care enough to have anyone else try to explain anything to her at the moment. She moved farther into the room and pulled down a coffee mug.
    Katie was thinking that it was almost November so it was almost not too early for Christmas songs. Cecelia wouldn’t appreciate that observation. Someone should tell Michael not to talk with his mouth full. He wouldn’t appreciate advice from his sister. And Mom certainly wouldn’t appreciate a reminder that she was the one who encouraged Noah to become a prankster. Katie quietly took another sip of her orange juice.