This month brings exciting times because MY DEBUT NOVEL COMES OUT! March 29th, mark your calendars, folks! And as if there wasn’t already enough incentive to preorder your very own copy, I’ve teamed up with the incredible artist Skillustrates to bring my world to life, and if you preorder your copy now from the Parliament House Website then you’ll get to have this beautiful art for yourself! It’s available worldwide, so go go go!
Want to see exactly what you’ll be getting? Read on!
My favourite thing about preordering books is seeing the character art and designs from the world come to life, and that’s what I wanted to do with my world. However, I have no artistic talent at all, so I reached out to someone who can visualise exactly what I’m trying to say and then bring my world to life in art so gorgeous that I want to live in it. The results are incredible. Seriously, Skillustrates is a genius (check out her links at the bottom of this page).
CHARACTER CARDS
My first priority was seeing my beautiful characters come to life, so I sent descriptions of the two protagonists of THE LIFE-GIVER to Skillustrates, asked for character cards, and watched her work her magic. Without further ado, meet Lyam and Annelie!
LYAM
The story of The Life-Giver is told through his eyes, so Lyam is key to unlocking all the secrets waiting for you between the pages of my book. As a Scribe, the majority of his life is spent bent over his desk with ink-stained fingers, holding his world together with the strength of his pen. I feel like Skillustrates really captured the mystery of his character. He’s exactly like I’ve always pictured him and I couldn’t be prouder to introduce you all to my anxiety-ridden hero.
ANNELIE
The true heroine of the tale, Annelie is a force to be reckoned with. She’s a Dreamer, one of the chosen ones who can contact the Sun God in her sleep, and though it takes a toll on her body she sees the hard truth when no one else wants to face it. Lyam is her whole world, but she isn’t afraid to push him when she needs to. Also, how cool is it to see a wheelchair in a fantasy world?!
BOOKMARK
Up next we have a gorgeous double-sided bookmark with original art from my world on both sides. This side matches the gorgeous cover of my book, designed by Shayne Leighton at Parliament House, and Skillustrates made a beautiful counterpart to it. The sun motif is a constant theme, seeing as The Life-Giver is a Sun God.
The reverse side is probably my favourite thing to come out of this whole project! It depicts the opening scene of my novel in which Lyam hears a mysterious knock at the door and must descend into the tunnels to learn of a dark force attacking the Dreamers. As you watch him climb into the depths of the earth, I think you can really feel the fear. The underground city is central to The Life-Giver’s setting, and I wanted to depict exactly how claustrophobic that feels.
SIGNED BOOKPLATE
Now onto my favourite of the designs: a signed bookplate! As thanks for preordering my book, you’ll receive this gorgeous depiction of one of the key settings in my world: the library. As Lyam is a Scribe, he spends a lot of time around books, and the library is his refuge when events start tumbling out of control. Skillustrates managed to pick up on so many little details from the book that the first time I saw this piece I screeched and flapped my hands at my laptop in excitement. I would really like to visit this library, I could easily lose hours among these ancient myths.
So there we have it! I really could not be more amazed by how talented Skillustrates is. I’m notoriously difficult to work with as I have no capacity to visualise things at all (seriously, have you seen that scale with the apple? I’m a full 0. There are no pictures in my head) but Skillustrates managed to take my clunky descriptions and turn them into something beautiful. This art is going up on my wall and I can’t wait to share it with you all too.
Come and enter the world of the Life-Giver, there are many secrets to uncover…
More info: Parliament House blog post
FOLLOW SKILLUSTRATES, THE AMAZING ARTIST:
Twitter: @skillustrates
Instagram: @skillustrates
Facebook: @skillustrates
Twitch: @skillustrates
Come and follow me on social media (I even have a tik tok now where I sometimes record my writing days. I don’t really understand it, but I’m having a lot of fun)
Twitter: @jasewrites
Instagram: @jasewrites
Facebook: @jasepuddicombewrites
Tik Tok: @jasewrites