Anthony Camber

You may notice there’s been a design refresh around these parts.

I’ve given the website a new template after years of long service from the old one, which has now been let loose in a grassy field to see out its days. The new template looks classier and more contemporary, I think, which means in a year it’ll look awful. Let’s see.

The other change has been to A Room Full of Elephants. It’s been given a brand new cover, and the interior design has changed too — for both ebook and paperback versions (from Amazon only, at the moment). It’s now officially the second edition, and has a new ISBN and ASIN (Amazon’s own identifier). The new editions have appeared on Goodreads and StoryGraph.

Why change the design?

Good question. In truth I’ve never been entirely happy with the ARFOE cover. In attempting to be mysterious, I think it came across as muddy and unclear, and — perhaps as a consequence — it has never sold as well as it deserves. The new cover looks a great deal better — many thanks to my design critics for their help. I love the texture of the wood, and the elephant colour(s), and the way the title glows.

I also wanted a good quote for the cover. You can’t beat a favourable comparison to Tom Sharpe and Douglas Adams — easy choice for that.

Once the new work-in-progress books are released I’m hoping ARFOE will have a new lease of life, so it made sense to give it a lick of paint now. ARFOE and the upcoming books will share the same ebook and print templates, unless something goes hilariously awry. In print, ARFOE is now 370 pages (up from 340) due to the layout changes – I haven’t added any words.

What about the other books?

I haven’t made a final decision about updating the other books. On Amazon, significant changes mean new editions, and new editions require new ISBNs (not cheap). I’d love to redo all the covers (also not cheap). The easy bit is the reformatting of the content. If I can do that without triggering Amazon’s new edition klaxon I’d like to.

Talking about the new books…

The new new book is with beta readers. Once I’ve received feedback from everyone I’ll work on a revised version. Meanwhile I’ve been exploring cover ideas. I’ll be announcing the title soon and enabling ebook preorders (Amazon doesn’t permit paperback preorders).

The new book has been a little neglected in favour of all of the above. I have a bunch of comments from an alpha reader to work through, but before I do that I want to reread it myself and make notes. Expect a release “later in the year”.

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