The Cover Story
This is a pictorial story of how Wrong Hand Right would be portrayed visually.
The first step in creating a visual image for Wrong Hand Right was to create an icon or logo. I first searched for images of left hands and found several, including:
As I had done with three of my first novels, I then turned to my old friend, the very talented visual artist, Lorenzo Contessa, to create a left-hand logo. He had several ideas:
But a left hand alone was not enough, so I thought of combining the left-hand theme with the scales of justice to incorporate another of the book’s themes.
Lorenzo then combined these themes and created new images:
After I tried his patience asking for changes, Lorenzo produced a final version:
Next came the book cover. Through 99Designs I submitted a brief summary of the book, emphasizing the gritty New York setting, along with Lorenzo’s logo and a wide-open invitation to create. I made two mistakes. First was to exclude any use of AI, because I wanted actual human artwork at the core of the design, but forgetting that most designers would simply cut and paste stock images and add the over-sized title so common to modern novels. Second, I permitted the designers to see each other’s work. Thus, when initial designs depicted New York City through cliched images of the Brooklyn Bridge and the Statue of Liberty—along with graffiti-scarred subways—that did not really speak to the story. For example:
I wondered at first whey I was seeing so many images of the Brooklyn Bridge, which I had not mentioned in the 99Designs brief and does not appear at all in the novel. But then I realized many designers were copying each other.
Still, there were many creative submissions, such as:
I went back and forth with several of these designers trying to revise their ideas into a final cover, and in the end selected LemonLime Designs, whose cover did not use the logo that appears at the chapter headings and suggested the gritty New York City of the 1980s without relying upon stereotypical landmarks.
I’d like to thank Nora Novak at LemonLime Designs for sticking with me through numerous revisions to come up with the final design:
