Today we have a guest blog post by Jennifer Hudock. She is an author, podcaster and freelance editor from Pennsylvania. Her first full-length, dark fantasy novel, The Goblin Market, is currently available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Smashwords for just $.99. For more information about Jennifer Hudock, including updates on upcoming fiction, visit her official website: The Inner Bean.

Enjoy!

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They say you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but the truth is one of the first things to lure me in when I’m checking out a book. It doesn’t matter if I’m browsing the local bookstore, or clicking through Amazon and Smashwords for books to load onto my Kindle. If it’s got a sweet cover, chances are I’ll click the sample.

As an indie author, having control over my own cover art is amazing because who knows what’s inside a book better than the author? Up until this point, I’ve worked on all my own eBook covers, tinkering around in Photoshop with stock images from Dreamstime. I’ve had a few less-than-inspiring covers, but with The Goblin Market (Into the Green Book 1) I was really proud. Not only was I lucky enough to find imagery and colors that I felt represented what lingered within the pages, it’s gotten a few compliments from readers over the last two months as well.

I’m standing on the threshold of the dreaded sequel release. As I plot and plan the June release of Jack in the Green (Into the Green Book 2), the perfect cover eludes me. I know exactly what I want. I can see the cover whenever I close my eyes, and while I’ve found a few artists who could very well capture the imagery I see inside my head, coming to a decision isn’t easy.

So much rides on a book’s cover, whether we want to believe that, or not. It’s part of the first impression your book makes on the world, right up there with the description and sample potential readers will see every time they arrive on the pages your book is sold.
Your cover also becomes one of your top marketing tools, as you blog and share details about your book all over the web, at conventions and book signings, in the grocery store when you run into people who knew you back when…

That old cliché we’ve all heard a billion times: A picture’s worth a thousand words? When it comes to your book cover, that picture’s got to be worth more than just a thousand. It’s got to capture the very essence of every page inside the cover.

As we rush to keep up with the racing competition that’s become indie publishing, we can’t just grab the first thing that comes along and hope it’s good enough. We need to take our time and get it right the first time, because just as it goes with your novel description, you will never get a second chance to make a first impression.