Bonnie Dee‘s Bone Deep is getting a buzz on readers’ and reviewers’ blogs lately, so I thought it would be nice to show how I did the cover for it. As always, the cover began with a cover art request form, and this time it came with a sketch, as displayed here.

Bonnie already had a pretty good concept in mind, and her sketch was merely a guide for the artist, a means in which to communicate her vision. She also wrote:

I have attached a mock-up for what I’d like: Full body tattooed naked man against dark background with white script spilling across the page.

I checked out many tattoo websites with photos of men with full body tattoos, thinking perhaps it would be possible to arrange some type of agreement to cross-promote; eg. we use one of their photo models for cover and provide a link to their site in the synopsis of the book or something. I was going to provide you links but there was nothing really clear and appropriate out there (especially involving a hot guy). Here are some sites: lukered.com, eviltattoo.com, or put in a search for Japanese full body tattoos and see what’s out there. Evidently it’s an ancient Yakuzi tradition to have the full body done.

Anyway, I’ve revised my thinking and perhaps non-photographic artwork would be easier to create.

I didn’t bother with the sites she listed. I didn’t even look. If we did it her way, involving another party, it could end up being a lot of time, effort, and money, none of which I had for a single cover, really. And besides, I already had a pretty good idea how I would achieve the look she wanted, and there were two ways to go about it.

If I wanted the easy way out, I could have assigned it to a Poser artist who could perhaps create a tattoo texture and put it on a Poser model in the exact pose she wanted. But I couldn’t be assured that it would look good. The tattoo itself would require some painting, and most Poser artists can’t actually draw or paint.

So I chose the hard way and took the challenge on myself. And I decided to try for the photographic look without having to ask some tattooed man to pose or share a picture.

I was going to paint the tattoo on some beefcake shot myself, that’s what. So I needed a good canvas, and I found myself this stock photo. It was the right angle, the right lighting, the right pose. It fit the description Bonnie provided:

A bold, dramatic figure against the dark background should be eye-catching. The man’s head and shoulders bowed in resignation.

The only drawback was that the man’s head is supposed to be shaved, and he’s supposed to be completely naked.

If you want any more input about tattoo placement on the character’s body, let me know (for example the Adam and Eve motif that goes around the leg and groin area — if you were to decide to go with a different body placement than what I have drawn.) Also, his head is shaved and the tattoos cover scalp as well.

And to be honest, I wasn’t quite confident enough at that time to make those minor changes. I did this cover last year, and since then I’ve tackled more difficult projects and learned a few new tricks through trial and error. So shaving this guy’s head and removing his jeans would probably not be much of a problem now. In fact, I’d probably do this cover a little differently these days.

But I digress.

She wanted tattoos. No problem. I hadn’t read the book, so I relied on the descriptions she provided. She included this passage from the book:

Above the large ship that sailed between his shoulder blades there was a starry sky. In the water below were fishes, mermaids and sea monsters. On his lower back, beneath the ocean floor, the flames of hell crackled and demons danced.

Easy enough, I thought. I gathered about 10 or 11 stock photos and pieced them together to create this:

And I fitted the tattoo on the man canvas like so:

But when I sent this first draft to Bonnie, that’s when I found out that the tattoos are supposed to be everywhere—and I mean everywhere. An angel on one arm, a sun and a heart on another … he was also supposed to have tatoos on his scalp and neck, more sea monsters on his back, and blue swirls all over. I had to stop and think how to continue because I couldn’t figure out how to put all those extra tattoos on him without making him look like a freak. What I didn’t realize at the time was that he was supposed to look like a freak.

Anyway, I added the heart, the angel, the blue swirls, and eventually we ended up with this for a cover:

It wasn’t until after the print book was out, months and months after its first e-book release, that I actually read the book. I mean, unless the author sends me a copy of the manuscript with the cover art request form, I don’t actually get to read the book until after the cover’s been done and the book’s been released—which is actually just as well in most cases, since I hardly have time for reading the books anyway. Hell, I can barely read an issue of Newsweek from cover to cover in two or three weeks. I’m always at least two issues behind.

In this case, however, now that I’ve read Bone Deep, I wish I had read it before I did the cover. I might have gotten over my insecurities and really tried for the little changes, and there are little things I would change about the art—more blue swirls, more detail in the tattoo, more tattoos on his face. I’m okay with the hair because he eventually grows his hair in the book, but I’d probably try for the bald scalp anyway.

The point of it all is … the cover, as good as people think it is, really and totally does not do the book justification. It’s a great story. Truly unique. A historical romance in the post WWII era, an awesome time period if you’re into HBO’s Carnivale, which I am. And the hero’s tattoos are even more lifelike and vivid in the story than they are in the cover.

But anyway, this is how the cover was done.

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