For the second book of the Wolfskill trilogy, I have decided to use Canva. Rebecca Amiss makes beautiful covers for her books. My favorite is Summer of ’77.
I figured—get a subscription to Canva and create a cover. This couldn’t miss.
I was very happy to find a picture of a balloon airship that is steampunk-ish. In no time, I had a desert cover with an enemy airship.
Alas, the perfect airship wasn’t what I described in the book. Ruth (wife and plot maven) said, “You have to have multiple gasbags.” She was right—the entire battle depends upon the ships having multiple airbags. Grr.
First, I had to rename the airships in the book. The next step was to put a second ship with multiple airbags on the cover. All that remained was to change any text that refers to ships that are not like the cover ships.
I suppose I could hope the reader doesn’t flip back to the cover, in the middle of reading, and say, “That’s not right!” I may not be “Counting Horses” accurately in my books, but in my teaching days, I was a chief critic when illustrators of children’s books drew pictures that showed they hadn’t read the book.
So, here I am, searching and changing faulty text. The process becomes more complex because the names of the ships changed. I dread the possibility of having someone, in the heat of the final battle, stop and say, “That’s not right.”
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