English
Cette oeuvre fictive fût écrite en collaboration avec huit auteurs québécois reconnus. Le journaliste, Michel O’Toole, disparaît mystérieusement, sans laisser de trace, lors d’un voyage en moto sur la route 389 aux confins du Québec. Je voulais en premier lieu des segments de route qui disparaissaient au loin pour chaque partie écrite par les auteurs.

En fin de compte, j’ai choisi un personnage sur une moto, en vue d’oeil d’oiseaux. Je voulais que le motocycliste lui-même reste indéfini. L’ombre sur la route nous aide à comprendre de quoi il s’agit.



Finalement, nous avons choisi un papier texturé pour la route en faisant ressortir la moto.


C’est devenu un peu plus compliqué car l’éditeur voulait absolument avoir les noms des auteurs sur la couverture et en évidence. J’ai modifié l’arrière-plan pour que ça puisse ressembler à une carte routière repliée et ça a fonctionné. J’avais aussi besoin d’un vrai modèle de motocycliste. Mon ami Ben et son ami George se sont généreusement prêtés au jeu en venant chez moi et j’ai pu prendre des photos à partir de la fenêtre du haut de ma grange.






Brute Souls, Happy Beasts and Evolution

Rod Preece

Critical Models

Theodor Adorno

Broccoli and Other Tales of Food and Love

Lara Vapnyar

Just received the printed cover for this one. I have a joke with one of my clients about whether a particular cover is a front seater or a back seater. When I go into Montreal to pick up a printed cover I have an hour and a half drive home. If I am happy with how everything came together I put the book in the front passenger seat so I can look at it all the way home. This one is a front seater. Some covers are the result of a real collaborative process. Jonathan Sainsbury, the creative director at Pantheon, steered this one along and made some great suggestions like dropping the word broccoli from the title and oversaw a problem with the initial printing. I tend to focus too much on just the cover design and neglect things like cloth color. His choice of the light green cloth adds a really nice detail and makes the whole thing complete.

36 Cornelian Avenue

Christopher Wiseman

This book of poems deals with the poet's wartime experience as a child in England.Wiseman explores how the Second World War affected his neighbours, turning some into curmudgeons, others into compassionate heroes. The cover shows an imminent encounter with the former.

The Empire’s Missing Links

Walid Bitar

For this poetry book cover the poet recommended using an image of ancient accounting tokens. I found that by rotating image 90 degrees it resembled vertebrae which added an interesting dimension to image.

Sympathy for the Couriers

Peter Richardson

The editor asked for a classical approach for this poetry book cover. I did the illustration based on a grecian urn.

God and Gold

Walter Russell Mead

Silent Victims

Hate Crimes Against Native Americans
Barbara Perry

Up the Thames Without a Paddle

Gordon Cope
Approval pending

This is a book about a Canadian travel writer who spends a year in England.

The Grail

Brian Doyle

The author spends a year tracking down the world’s finest Pinot Noir. I got a bottle as a thank-you for doing cover and it was fine indeed.

Revivalists

Kevin Kee

For the Pope’s visit. Another 2 colour cover. The original photo showed the preacher in his pulpit. I cropped in really close for maximum effect.

Canadian Water Politics

Edited by Mark Sproule-Jones

April 9

This will be my third time at bat for a book cover dealing with this issue.
Approval pending



Politics in the Parish

Gregory Allen Smith

Penny Dreadful

Shannon Stewart

March 31
Penny Dreadfuls were popular, cheaply produced 19th century magazines filled with brutal and sensationalist tales. At the center of this book of poetry is the story of accused serial killer Robert Pickton who murdered women from Vancouver’s East Side.

The Telephone Gambit

Seth Shulman

It turns out Alexander Graham Bell may not have been the true discoverer of the telephone. Elisha Gray may have beat him to it but missed out on the lucrative patent. I really liked this idea of showing the discovery as a race with Gray actually winning.


In the end we went with showing the original device Bell used to call Watson with a shadow reflected in it. Who the shadow is will be left up to the reader.

The Squandering of America

Robert Kuttner

I can’t say this cover was 100% successful but I am happy that they let me get away with putting the title on the side of a bus.

The Parker Novels

March 7

The publisher wanted a hardboiled mystery look for this reissue of the famous crime novel series. They also wanted it to have a film noir sensibility with a strong sense of locale/place. It also has to have an element that ties the series together.





Canada’s Rights Revolution

Dominique Clément

March 1
I Just finished this sketch. The book is a history of social movements and social change in Canada from 1937-82. The publisher wanted a conceptual approach and I thought that a windswept tree would be an original way of expressing revolution and change. I have an entire collection of books I have done about Canada and each time I start a new one I always try to find an original way to use our national symbols. The tree used in this case is in fact a maple tree.

Push!

The Struggle for Midwifery in Ontario
Ivy Lynn Bourgeault

The author wanted to use an image of a pregnant woman. I went completely in the other direction with a type only cover with a twist. Needless to say the author hated it at first and really needed a lot of convincing.

The Politics of Postal Transformation

Robert M. Campbell

This is one of those books that could easily have a had a very straightforward cover - image of a modern postal facility with type superimposed. I included an enlargement of the stamp to show that the figure is looking from left to right. I can’t believe I got away with such small type.



The Silver Palace Restaurant

Mark Abley

This is a recent poetry book cover. The cover has matte lamination with a spot gloss varnish on the melting butter.



What’s Wrong with Children’s Rights

Martin Guggenheim

From the back cover: “He Challenges the conventional views of children’s rights advocates, arguing persuasively that children may be better off without (some kinds of) rights and that legal disputes about children’s welfare are often driven by the interests of adults.” That’s my daughter up there. The actual stilts end about 8 inches below her feet. I added the rest in photoshop.

Ghosting

Jennie Erdal

This is a story about a ghost writer. From the back cover: “... she was also secretly writing her boss’s love letters, hundreds of newspaper columns and two well reviewed novels.” The shadow of the hand forms a man’s face.

Dr. Delicious

Robert Lecker

With a title like this and the fact that the book deals with the author's lifelong love of Canadian literature this seemed like the way to go with this one. The sketch version of this is on my website but the printed cover came out much better.

Dead Man’s Float

Nicholas Maes

The Rent Collector

Glen Rotchin

This is actually my wallet which has achieved a certain degree of notoriety over the years. It was sitting beside my computer when I was working on a concept for this cover and I couldn't resist. This is an example of a cover that met with a fair degree of initial resistance and probably would have been rejected if not for the support of the publisher. The only change I had to make to the image was adding a cheque in one of the folds. I no longer have this wallet. It literally exploded one day - no one was hurt.

Nationalism from the Margins

Italians in Alberta and British Columbia
Patricia K. Wood

Learning to Look

Lesley D. Clement

In this work of literary criticism the author traces the evolution of Mavis Gallant’s visually evocative style through five decades of her short fictional works. The author contends that “Gallant envisages and renders her fictional world with the techniques analogous to those of visual artists”.

X,Y and Z

Karen Rivers

This was my first foray into young adult fiction. The mandate was to provide a new and contemporary look for this category. Each book in the series is about a young person with super human powers. X can fly, Y is invisible and Z can read thoughts.



My favorite part of doing this series is the spine treatment. When the spines of all three books are put together, XYZ can be seen in the background.

Bamboo Church

Ricardo Sternberg

A bamboo church is a birdcage. Ricardo Sternberg is a poet who was born in Brazil and now resides in Canada. “Ricardo Sternberg’s poems dance the steps of an earthy muse, traveling from south to north.” The bird on the cover is in a cage but also in a jungle. This seemed like a fitting visual metaphor for the poet’s life and also his poetry. I got so excited about using a dye cut in this way that I was even willing to forgo my cover fee which wasn't necessary in the end.





Sedaris

Kevin Kopelson

This is the printed cover. The only stipulation was that concept had to feature a cigarette prominently.



This was another option that came in a close second.