Yet another special snowflake has decided that “bully” means “anyone who don’t think I or my kids are wonderful and above criticism.” Worse, said snowflake thinks that some kind of moral victory has been won. Decide for yourself.

Other projects keep distracting me (which means they must be fascinating, which means you want to know all about them, which means I’ll let you know when they reach fruition, but try to stay focused here), but the long-promised CoverCritics.com — a site for the constructive critiquing of indie-publishers’ submitted covers — is finally nearing launch.

Two things I need before launch that I think some of y’all could help me procure (and would delight in doing so, even):

1) Covers! I really don’t want to put up an empty website, so I need some inaugural covers submitted for critique.  If any of you have a cover in the works for a book you’re working on, or if you have a friend in such a position, please send them here.  And yes, you may repost this in appropriate forus.

2) Designers! No, CoverCritics.com will emphatically NOT be a venue for cover designers to troll for new clients.  However, I will have a page of links to designers’ pages for self-publishers who are looking to hire it out.  Obviously, I will make no warranties as to any individual designer’s skills, pricing, or suitability for any particular project.

If you want to participate in either of these capacities, please contact me at nshumate at gmail dot com.

In response to the feedback to my post suggesting a site for commentary on indie covers BEFORE they’re published, I present to you — CoverCritics.com! Okay, there’s nothing actually there but a placeholder, but things are getting put together behind the scenes, and I’ll keep y’all informed.

And in response to several comments about the blurbs being as bad as the covers on some of these self-published books, I’ve resurrected one of my old Tumblogs, Boy, I’M Sold. Posting will be light for the near future — mostly just one post per day, until the hopper fills itself up — but there are older posts to peruse and guffaw at.

(And while I’m shoving Tumblogs at you, I’ve got another one called What I Just Listened To, which is… um… whatever album I just listened to. In case you think I’m endlessly fascinating or something.

Howdy y’all,

One thing that even the most supportive self-publisher says (or implies) of the, ahem, “service” which Lousy Book Covers provides is, “If only I had gotten all of this feedback before I published!”

With that in mind, I’ve been mulling over an crowd-critiquing site for for indie covers before they go live.  Self-publishers could post what they’ve got, and we all (that’s the “crowd” part) offer critiques and suggestions.

I haven’t figured out whether to have a curated blog, with the submitted covers posted by an admin (i.e., me), or a looser-organized bulletin board system.Thoughts?

Just in time for Halloween, Space Eldritch II: The Haunted Stars, an anthology I edited and published, is available for sale! Space opera meets Lovecraftian horror in the hands of writers like New York Times bestseller Larry Correia, #1 Amazon bestseller Michaelbrent Collings, Nebula winner Eric James Stone, multiple Hugo nominee Howard Tayler, and seven more!  Available as en ebook at Amazon and Smashwords; print coming soon!