All About Covers + a Sneak Peek - Songbird Cafe Girls Cover

Songbird Cafe_Mollie final cover
Songbird Cafe_Mollie final cover

The first book in my new series, The Songbird Cafe Girls: Mollie Cinnamon is Not a Cupcake is out in March next year. Here's a sneak peek of the cover:

The book is about Mollie Cinnamon, who's 12 going on 13. While her tv-presenter mum films a new travel show, Mollie has to stay with her great-granny on a tiny island called Little Bird. Mollie is bored, bored, bored until she starts to make new friends in the Songbird Cafe. But disaster strikes and the Songbird is threatened with closure. Can Mollie and her new friends save the cafe?

Readers often ask how a cover is designed. And do writers have much say in the process? What happens in Walker (all publishers work slightly differently) is this: ideas for a possible cover are sent to me and my agent by the designer and we have a look at the various suggestions and feed back our thoughts. Booksellers are also asked for their opinion, people in the other departments in Walker (editorial, sales and marketing etc), and also the target market (girls age 9+). Then the designer takes all this on board and produces a cover.

The designer who worked on the Mollie Cinnamon is Not a Cupcake cover is called Maria and she's wonderful. It took her a long time to find the right girl for the cover but she's just perfect.

Maria and my editor, Annalie (who has a book out in January called Captive) also commissioned a map for the book. I love maps in books so I'm over the moon about the map of Little Bird, the island where my series is set.

The Map of Little Bird
The Map of Little Bird

The Map of Little Bird

Book covers are so important. You've heard the expression 'Never judge a book by its cover'? Readers do exactly that. Judge a book by the cover. The cover has to say so much about a novel: the age group (for children's books), the genre - is it an action/adventure book, a horror novel, or it is about friendship and family (like Mollie Cinnamon) - and it also has to set the tone for the book. It's a very hard thing to get right. But I think Maria has captured my story perfectly.

Do YOU have a favourite book cover? I'd love to know.

Yours in books,

Sarah XXX

This post first appeared on the Girls Heart Books website.