A new year & a new cover

Happy New Year, everyone! May it be better than the last one. It’s been a long time since I was so happy to finish off a calendar and move on to the next.

I’ve been lying low with a lupus flare for the last several weeks, but I’m slowly getting better, and today I have something fun to share — the cover for my next book, THE WOMAN ALL SPIES FEAR, out in October from Random House!

The artist is Karolis Strautniekas, whose done some fabulous work in the NYT and the New Yorker, among other places. Often authors don’t have any control over covers, so I was delighted to have some input into this one, and I couldn’t be happier with the final result.

Here’s the book description:

In the summer of 1916, a young English major sets out to solve a mystery about Shakespeare. It involves a rare book, a strange millionaire, and the secret world of codes and ciphers. Within a year, she has transformed herself into one of America’s top code breakers — and that is only the beginning of her brilliant career.            

During World War I, Elizebeth Smith Friedman cracked thousands of messages and trained Army officers in cryptology. In the 1920s, she foiled the plans of mobsters and confronted them in court. By the late 1930s, she was one of the most famous code breakers in the world. In World War II, she hunted Nazi spies.

A woman of many secrets, she was later pushed into the shadows. To discover her full story, you must delve deep, the way a code breaker would, searching for the truth that lies just out of sight. This biography tells the riveting tale of an overlooked American heroine — a real-life adventure, mystery, and love story.

The book can be pre-ordered now on Amazon, and it will soon show up on bookshop.org, too. If you do pre-order it, you have my undying gratitude!

Another Pair of Eyes

I am deep in the revision trenches right now. Which may sound like a grim place to be, but it’s not, because I love to revise.

I never send off a piece of writing until it’s the best I can make it — but that doesn’t mean it can’t get better, especially with another pair of eyes. I’m lucky to have had several readers for the next Ra book, and every one of them has made some good suggestions. My editor is the latest person to have sent some wonderful notes, which have helped me to see the book from a different angle.

If you take its Latin roots literally, to “revise” means to “see again,” and that’s what I’m trying to do now: to truly re-envision parts of the book. It’s challenging work, but very satisfying.

I’m also cheered because the first Ra the Mighty book continues to get great reviews, including this one from lovely blogger Melissa at Melissa’s Mochas, Mysteries, and Meows. I’m also hugely grateful to Paula Harrison and Mo O’Hara, who wrote some wonderful words of praise for the cover.

And look at what came through my letterbox this week — my first author copy of Ra the Mighty!

The whole book is beautifully crafted. It’s hard to see from the photo, but Ra and Khepri are done in a shiny finish, so they catch the light, while the brilliant background is matte. My thanks to Sarah Horne and the design team at Holiday House Books for the fantastic art and design!

I also got my first look at the spine of the book, with Ra’s eye looming large. That means I now have TWO books with a single eye featured on the spine.

Another pair of eyes…

How many authors can say that?!

 

Ra the Mighty has a cover!

My next book, Ra the Mighty, is a funny mystery set in Ancient Egypt, where the detectives are a pampered Pharaoh’s Cat and his hard-working friend, a scarab beetle. Now it has a cover – and it’s wonderful! Huge thanks to the amazing Sarah Horne, who’s the perfect illustrator for my comic duo. She’s captured Ra and Khepri beautifully!

Inspired by Sarah’s work, we’ve got some very funny animations on the website, including a dancing Khepri. Never seen a scarab beetle dance before? This is your chance!

When Ra the Mighty comes out in September, you’ll be able to see more of Sarah’s fabulous work, as she’s done lots of drawings inside the book, too.

And here’s the full wrap-around jacket art: