Bernard Jan's Blog - Posts Tagged "design"
The Face of A World Without Color
The time has come to reveal the hidden, to unveil the covered and show what I kept secret.
My first indie book is coming out soon!
Yes, it is true. Finally and at last I can publicly say that, even though I didn't decide about its release date yet. It will be anytime between end of June and beginning of August (or maybe even later or outside that period of time). However, it is time now for me to present you my official book cover.
I love it eternally! I have fallen in love with the photo of my friend cuddling his cat the very moment I saw it on his Twitter feed and I am so happy it now adorns my book. This is the perfect image for my story, my complete opening and revealing of the best and worst days of my life. My deepest emotions and hardest tribulations when I lost my favorite creature and didn't know whether I should carry on living without Marcel or stop with my life a few hours or days after our family veterinarian put him to sleep and took him away from us.
Writing A World Without Color was my way of surviving, a true story I wrote in three days while memories, scars and wounds were still fresh and burning. This story I had to tell, I had no option, I couldn't do it otherwise and bury it in me. Soon it will be in front of you should you wish to read it.
Many people worked on this with me and I will say a few words about them in my future blog posts. But since I am showing you its beautiful face here, its cover which warms my heart and gives my life a certain sense of completion of something very important and dear, I will mention two people, two names only: Zach Singh and Mario Kožar.
Zach Singh, my buddy from New York and Columbus, Ohio is a nice and talented young photographer who loves cats as much as I do - if not even more - and was so kind and ready to provide me this photo for my book cover when I came with my proposal about this project to him (I can never thank you enough, Zach!).
Mario Kožar from MKM Media is my designer who lives on the relation Rome-Zagreb and he gave my book such a sparkling and professional shine. Thank you, Mario, for having so much patience with me and understanding for all my demands for promotional ads I will be posting in days and weeks and months to come.
I only hope my readers will like at least half as much what I wrote as I like what you both did to give such a beautiful new life to my story. With this cover you gave a face to its soul.
I’d ask everyone who is reading this to please be so kind and generous and give your vote of confidence to Zach and Mario if you like their creation. Later you will judge me and my writing, but now I ask you to follow, like, retweet and share them because their talent deserves that.
Always share what you love with those who appreciate it because there is no greater joy than that.
Thank you!
Check the Photos to see the book cover or click here.
Bernard Jan
www.bernardjan.com
Join my mailing list, subscribe to blog Muse!
Bernard Jan
My first indie book is coming out soon!
Yes, it is true. Finally and at last I can publicly say that, even though I didn't decide about its release date yet. It will be anytime between end of June and beginning of August (or maybe even later or outside that period of time). However, it is time now for me to present you my official book cover.
I love it eternally! I have fallen in love with the photo of my friend cuddling his cat the very moment I saw it on his Twitter feed and I am so happy it now adorns my book. This is the perfect image for my story, my complete opening and revealing of the best and worst days of my life. My deepest emotions and hardest tribulations when I lost my favorite creature and didn't know whether I should carry on living without Marcel or stop with my life a few hours or days after our family veterinarian put him to sleep and took him away from us.
Writing A World Without Color was my way of surviving, a true story I wrote in three days while memories, scars and wounds were still fresh and burning. This story I had to tell, I had no option, I couldn't do it otherwise and bury it in me. Soon it will be in front of you should you wish to read it.
Many people worked on this with me and I will say a few words about them in my future blog posts. But since I am showing you its beautiful face here, its cover which warms my heart and gives my life a certain sense of completion of something very important and dear, I will mention two people, two names only: Zach Singh and Mario Kožar.
Zach Singh, my buddy from New York and Columbus, Ohio is a nice and talented young photographer who loves cats as much as I do - if not even more - and was so kind and ready to provide me this photo for my book cover when I came with my proposal about this project to him (I can never thank you enough, Zach!).
Mario Kožar from MKM Media is my designer who lives on the relation Rome-Zagreb and he gave my book such a sparkling and professional shine. Thank you, Mario, for having so much patience with me and understanding for all my demands for promotional ads I will be posting in days and weeks and months to come.
I only hope my readers will like at least half as much what I wrote as I like what you both did to give such a beautiful new life to my story. With this cover you gave a face to its soul.
I’d ask everyone who is reading this to please be so kind and generous and give your vote of confidence to Zach and Mario if you like their creation. Later you will judge me and my writing, but now I ask you to follow, like, retweet and share them because their talent deserves that.
Always share what you love with those who appreciate it because there is no greater joy than that.
Thank you!
Check the Photos to see the book cover or click here.
Bernard Jan
www.bernardjan.com
Join my mailing list, subscribe to blog Muse!
Bernard Jan
Gold!
After winning the 2nd place in AllAuthor contest Cover of the month August and the 3rd place in Author Shout one-week contest Cover Wars, A World Without Color cover won the 1st place as the cover of the year in a Literary Fiction category of AUTHORSdb contest!
Getting this gold is overwhelming: a great honor, a reward, thrill, happiness, joy, elation, confusion, disbelief, gratitude, humbleness!
I am grateful beyond words to my book cover designer Mario Kožar from MKM Media and the photographer and owner of the awesome selfie with his cat Oswald, Zach Singh, and to all of you who voted for my book cover! My thanks and respect because your votes are this victory too!
As much winning the gold in the AUTHORSdb book cover contest is fantastic and a great honor, there is not plenty of time to celebrate. My novella A World Without Color is still nominated in the TCK Publishing 2017 Readers Choice Awards contest! If you want to cast a vote for it as your choice of the book of the year, please go to page 6/16 to the category Memoir by following this link and click a vote for A World Without Color. Thank you!
My true story is more than just a pretty face (or cover!) so do a little something for you and give yourself a tnice and inexpensive pre-holiday gif. Or read it for free on Kindle Unlimited if you prefer that. Great feedback and many positive reviews speak in favor of it. So why wouldn't you be one of its readers and fans as well who wrote their honest reviews on Amazon and Goodreads? That'd be cool, don't you agree?
Once more my appreciation and gratitude for your love and kind support! This is huge for a first-time indie author of another native tongue like me who pushes his limits to produce and deliver you a book you will love, cherish, feel, read and reread, and remember.
Thank you for sharing what you love with those who appreciate it. You have my love and devotion!
BJ
www.bernardjan.com
Join my mailing list, subscribe to blog Muse!
Bernard Jan
Getting this gold is overwhelming: a great honor, a reward, thrill, happiness, joy, elation, confusion, disbelief, gratitude, humbleness!
I am grateful beyond words to my book cover designer Mario Kožar from MKM Media and the photographer and owner of the awesome selfie with his cat Oswald, Zach Singh, and to all of you who voted for my book cover! My thanks and respect because your votes are this victory too!
As much winning the gold in the AUTHORSdb book cover contest is fantastic and a great honor, there is not plenty of time to celebrate. My novella A World Without Color is still nominated in the TCK Publishing 2017 Readers Choice Awards contest! If you want to cast a vote for it as your choice of the book of the year, please go to page 6/16 to the category Memoir by following this link and click a vote for A World Without Color. Thank you!
My true story is more than just a pretty face (or cover!) so do a little something for you and give yourself a tnice and inexpensive pre-holiday gif. Or read it for free on Kindle Unlimited if you prefer that. Great feedback and many positive reviews speak in favor of it. So why wouldn't you be one of its readers and fans as well who wrote their honest reviews on Amazon and Goodreads? That'd be cool, don't you agree?
Once more my appreciation and gratitude for your love and kind support! This is huge for a first-time indie author of another native tongue like me who pushes his limits to produce and deliver you a book you will love, cherish, feel, read and reread, and remember.
Thank you for sharing what you love with those who appreciate it. You have my love and devotion!
BJ
www.bernardjan.com
Join my mailing list, subscribe to blog Muse!
Bernard Jan
Your Votes and My Smiles
Don’t believe an author who tells you they don’t like their books. It’s a pure lie. If we didn’t like the books we wrote, we wouldn’t publish them and share them with you! That is the real truth.
Since we already did that—wrote them, invest a bigger or smaller amount of time, money and enthusiasm to publish them and bring the final product in front of you to enjoy, love or hate it (heaven forbid the last one happens!)—we also hope and count on your support and kindness to help our books reach others and continue their life through your purchased copies, word-of-mouth recommendations, honest reviews or votes in various contests.
As it was the case with my first novella A World Without Color, I have also entered my second novella Look for Me Under the Rainbow to a few contests. This moving story of the adorable seal pup Danny and the Rainbow Warriors activist Helen who is trying to save him from the plight caused by greedy humans already went through two contests.
In The Book Designer’s e-Book Cover Design Contest for April it was reviewed by the guest judge Kit Foster, an award-winning graphic designer who specializes in book cover design. He has designed the covers for over 1500 published works for publishers worldwide, including Pulitzer Prize winners, several New York Times best-selling authors, and countless Amazon bestsellers.
This is his comment for my book cover designed by Mario Kožar MKM Media: “I like the imagery in this one, The adorable seal pup, the crisp white snow, which beautifully contrasts the figure in red and the rainbow above. I think the text, however, could be a lot stronger. The title font, especially, could do to be re-thought. This is a tricky one, since the title contains six words, all of different lengths – it’s a lot to fit in and maintain a balanced design. I’m unsure what the reason for making the word ‘Me’ a different size to the rest of the words on the same line was, too.” Not a bad comment at all, coming from such a reputable graphic designer. I am pleased!
In the second book cover contest to which I submitted, Look for Me Under the Rainbow entered the finals of AllAuthor cover contest for May and it ended up ranked #6! This is a good result considering that due to the error the book entered the contest with one day and 140 votes delay!
This contest is over for my story of Danny and we cannot do anything about it anymore. But my book is running and competing in two other contests and I hope and wish for your votes there.
Look for Me Under the Rainbow has been approved in YA and Middle-Grade Book Category of the TCK Publishing 2018 Reader’s Choice Awards so please follow this link and browse to page 12 where you can cast your vote for it in this book of the year contest! If you have read my book and loved it, please don’t forget to vote for it.
You can also vote in AUTHORSdb: Author Database, Books and Top Charts Cover Contest 2018 for the cover of the year in Literary / Young Adult category. I hope you like my book cover enough to click here and cast your precious vote for it!
Book and book cover contests are fun and often excited, and it is not the end of the world if your book doesn’t win. Only one book per category wins and sometimes it is a question of good marketing and promotion and a bit of luck to win the title. What counts is sharing this experience with other books, authors and readers who vote for their favorites and the extra exposure your book gets while taking part in such contests. That exposure will help it find a way to another grateful reader and fan who will appreciate the power of your imagination and writing skills enough to share it with others who will bring a smile to your face and love it too.
Thank you for reading this and thank you for your votes!
BJ
www.bernardjan.com
Bernard Jan
Since we already did that—wrote them, invest a bigger or smaller amount of time, money and enthusiasm to publish them and bring the final product in front of you to enjoy, love or hate it (heaven forbid the last one happens!)—we also hope and count on your support and kindness to help our books reach others and continue their life through your purchased copies, word-of-mouth recommendations, honest reviews or votes in various contests.
As it was the case with my first novella A World Without Color, I have also entered my second novella Look for Me Under the Rainbow to a few contests. This moving story of the adorable seal pup Danny and the Rainbow Warriors activist Helen who is trying to save him from the plight caused by greedy humans already went through two contests.
In The Book Designer’s e-Book Cover Design Contest for April it was reviewed by the guest judge Kit Foster, an award-winning graphic designer who specializes in book cover design. He has designed the covers for over 1500 published works for publishers worldwide, including Pulitzer Prize winners, several New York Times best-selling authors, and countless Amazon bestsellers.
This is his comment for my book cover designed by Mario Kožar MKM Media: “I like the imagery in this one, The adorable seal pup, the crisp white snow, which beautifully contrasts the figure in red and the rainbow above. I think the text, however, could be a lot stronger. The title font, especially, could do to be re-thought. This is a tricky one, since the title contains six words, all of different lengths – it’s a lot to fit in and maintain a balanced design. I’m unsure what the reason for making the word ‘Me’ a different size to the rest of the words on the same line was, too.” Not a bad comment at all, coming from such a reputable graphic designer. I am pleased!
In the second book cover contest to which I submitted, Look for Me Under the Rainbow entered the finals of AllAuthor cover contest for May and it ended up ranked #6! This is a good result considering that due to the error the book entered the contest with one day and 140 votes delay!
This contest is over for my story of Danny and we cannot do anything about it anymore. But my book is running and competing in two other contests and I hope and wish for your votes there.
Look for Me Under the Rainbow has been approved in YA and Middle-Grade Book Category of the TCK Publishing 2018 Reader’s Choice Awards so please follow this link and browse to page 12 where you can cast your vote for it in this book of the year contest! If you have read my book and loved it, please don’t forget to vote for it.
You can also vote in AUTHORSdb: Author Database, Books and Top Charts Cover Contest 2018 for the cover of the year in Literary / Young Adult category. I hope you like my book cover enough to click here and cast your precious vote for it!
Book and book cover contests are fun and often excited, and it is not the end of the world if your book doesn’t win. Only one book per category wins and sometimes it is a question of good marketing and promotion and a bit of luck to win the title. What counts is sharing this experience with other books, authors and readers who vote for their favorites and the extra exposure your book gets while taking part in such contests. That exposure will help it find a way to another grateful reader and fan who will appreciate the power of your imagination and writing skills enough to share it with others who will bring a smile to your face and love it too.
Thank you for reading this and thank you for your votes!
BJ
www.bernardjan.com
Bernard Jan
Cruel Summer Cover and Blurb Reveal
With the beginning of the new year comes the moment to announce my new book launch! And I start it with its cover and blurb reveal.
I originally wrote Cruel Summer in Croatian over 20 years ago. By the end of February this year, I will release it in English. Cruel Summer is a Young Adult cross-genre novel with elements of social and family issues, teen and child abuse, extreme sports, conspiracy, mystery, murder and crime investigation, teen romance, sci-fi and dystopia.
I hope I won’t be distracted this time with earthquakes and other unpredictable situations and thus forced to postpone my release date again.
Indie author Dean Cole did a fantastic job and made me fall in love with his stunning eBook and paperback cover. Working with Dean was a genuine pleasure. He is the fastest designer I worked with and he will professionally meet and fulfill your requirements before you are aware it is over. It took him only three days to deliver me such a brutally good book cover, as one of my friends commented it. Do I need to say more?
Another indie author, also from the UK, saved me by helping me with the blurb for Cruel Summer when I was stuck with it. Jonathan Hill was my savior and magician also for the blurbs for my other two books, January River and Look for Me Under the Rainbow. This time again he did an amazing job, and I can never thank him enough for his professionalism, patience and kind help.
Cruel Summer Blurb
All he wants to do is skate. But they have other plans for him.
Michael Daniels is seventeen and dreams to enter professional skateboarding contests. But beneath New Manhattan, a city under the oppressive shadow of climate change, exists another world altogether—secret laboratories which threaten society as he knows it.
Those with power will get what they want. No price is too high, even if it means making someone special or robbing them of their dignity, freedom . . . or life.
The price is too high for Michael, though. He has endured his stepfather’s abuse and mind games for almost as long as he remembers. Until one day he takes matters into his own hands, ruining the lives of those he loves most. And his skateboarding friends, Alien and Victor, are his only hope for freedom.
When there is no hope left, friendship is what remains.
Please show some love to Dean and Jonathan by following them on their Twitter and on Goodreads where you can also find their books.
And don’t forget to look for Cruel Summer when it goes online and becomes available on my Amazon profile.
BJ
www.bernardjan.com
Follow me on Twitter.
I originally wrote Cruel Summer in Croatian over 20 years ago. By the end of February this year, I will release it in English. Cruel Summer is a Young Adult cross-genre novel with elements of social and family issues, teen and child abuse, extreme sports, conspiracy, mystery, murder and crime investigation, teen romance, sci-fi and dystopia.
I hope I won’t be distracted this time with earthquakes and other unpredictable situations and thus forced to postpone my release date again.
Indie author Dean Cole did a fantastic job and made me fall in love with his stunning eBook and paperback cover. Working with Dean was a genuine pleasure. He is the fastest designer I worked with and he will professionally meet and fulfill your requirements before you are aware it is over. It took him only three days to deliver me such a brutally good book cover, as one of my friends commented it. Do I need to say more?
Another indie author, also from the UK, saved me by helping me with the blurb for Cruel Summer when I was stuck with it. Jonathan Hill was my savior and magician also for the blurbs for my other two books, January River and Look for Me Under the Rainbow. This time again he did an amazing job, and I can never thank him enough for his professionalism, patience and kind help.
Cruel Summer Blurb
All he wants to do is skate. But they have other plans for him.
Michael Daniels is seventeen and dreams to enter professional skateboarding contests. But beneath New Manhattan, a city under the oppressive shadow of climate change, exists another world altogether—secret laboratories which threaten society as he knows it.
Those with power will get what they want. No price is too high, even if it means making someone special or robbing them of their dignity, freedom . . . or life.
The price is too high for Michael, though. He has endured his stepfather’s abuse and mind games for almost as long as he remembers. Until one day he takes matters into his own hands, ruining the lives of those he loves most. And his skateboarding friends, Alien and Victor, are his only hope for freedom.
When there is no hope left, friendship is what remains.
Please show some love to Dean and Jonathan by following them on their Twitter and on Goodreads where you can also find their books.
And don’t forget to look for Cruel Summer when it goes online and becomes available on my Amazon profile.
BJ
www.bernardjan.com
Follow me on Twitter.
