Hello, my lovelies! It has been Quite A While since the last real update, and that is because life and writing has been crazy. Mostly the good sort of crazy. But yes, crazy.
Today I’m excited to officially announce my spiffy new look, brought to you in part by the wonderful Jonelle Jones. I knew that my website needed an overhaul with the approaching launch of my debut The Eleventh Trade, and I wanted to treat myself to a pro’s creative expertise. I have to admit, it was nice to put this in someone else’s hands and be the client in the freelance relationship for once.
I wanted to go with a hand-letter look because I am not-so-secretly a hipster. Over the course of a few weeks, I metaphorically thumbed through many artists’ portfolios and did quite a lot of internet research to narrow down the look I wanted in a price range that wouldn’t kill me. I sent out a few requests for quotes and chatted to a couple of great artists, but Jonelle stood out to me as super talented and very thorough.
We exchanged information, hopped on the phone for a call, and narrowed in on the sort of look I wanted. Then over the course of a month or so, we went back and forth perfecting the brand and getting everything in order. As someone who is often on the design side of these jobs, it was so much fun to give feedback and then chillax until the changes miraculously arrived in my inbox!
I am so pleased with the end result, I’ve got to share it with ya’ll.
In addition to this official style sheet, Jonelle also gave me lots of other designs to play with. You’ll notice my header isn’t actually shown on these options, for instance. I tend to experiment with designs until I find what I like, and one of the things I found I liked was the nice long header across the screen instead of a more boxy header. So, it was awesome to have the original files from Jonelle for maximum experimentation!
While Jonelle was doing the hard lifting in the design realm, I threw myself into planning the website changes. Both Roaring Brook (Macmillan) and Piccadilly Press had given the basic website guides they normally hand their authors, and my contact at Piccadilly Press even gave me some feedback on my initial organization sketches. But as always…
So I excessively researched author websites for what was normal, what was unique, what I liked, and what I disliked. I spent an embarrassing amount of time on this when I probably should have been editing. … You know, I should make all my research into a blog entry. Then it counts as work, right?
Numerous drafts and much tinkering later, and we have my entirely new set-up! I will probably continue to play with it over the next few weeks until I’m totally satisfied, but this is basically how it will stay. O! the excitement of website updates.
I’m planning a full schedule of blog entries (writing tips, publishing news, the ringer) for the second half of the year, so you’ll have ample opportunity to admire Jonelle’s work! Give her a visit and tell her I said YOU ARE AMAZING OMG THANK YOU hi.
What do you think? Did you find typos? We all know there are typos, so leave a comment and help me catch them!
