I'm exceedingly proud to finally be able to reveal the cover for my upcoming release, They Don't Come Home Anymore: A Novella, a 32,000+ word story published by This Is Horror.
The cover art is by the exceptionally talented Candice Tripp, a UK painter and sculptor that my wife Ives Hovanessian turned me on to a few years back. Since then, I'd been waiting for the right project to coalesce that would be an ideal pairing of her artwork with a corresponding story that suited it, and thankfully my first short novel arrived from the cranial factory as the perfect vehicle. I approached Candice for the cover, and thankfully she agreed. With the art secured, that Ives designed the cover — working with Candice's phenomenal oil painting Everything Is Lovely As Long As You Never Want To Leave (which itself sounds similar to the novella in terms of title, if not theme) and solidifying the tone through font, color, and clean space — seemed incredibly fitting, considering that she's been a fan of Candice's work longer than I have, and pointed me in that direction in the first place. Everything fell perfectly into place, with wonderful results, as you can see above.
This is the first step in working toward This Is Horror's planned mid-November 2016 release of They Don't Come Home Anymore: A Novella, a story that might, at first blush, seem like a slight departure from my previous work, as it centers on a teenage girl, and is very much a tale of obsession, loneliness, and a search for meaning, acceptance, and love in a world (and sub world) that waits, cruel and threatening, just behind the facade. It's also about vampires, but not the garden variety sort you'd expect in a mass market/network television teenage vamp story, but something that cleaves closer to the natural world, and how our planet once was, and might still be in certain darkened corners. I can't really say more, other than to invite you to pick up the book when it's available, and tell me what you think it's about, underneath, beyond that first impression.
But, that's for another day, in another season, approaching faster than you might think. Watch this space for pre-order information in the coming weeks. In the meantime, check out that cover again. The devils truly are in the details.
