Failed covers I have made - Buffalo Nickel Christmas

I thought I'd share with you some of the cover rejects from my attempts to come up with the cover for Buffalo Nickel Christmas. I'm taking a chance here - you might decide you like one of these over the one I chose, but here goes.

First, the one I chose:

And now, in no particular order, I present some failures...

In this one I tried to combine something "Christmasy" with the Professor (one of the characters) and the nickel (the main story element). Chuck Barris had the gong ready for this one.

This next wasn't so bad, but the photo was muddy and I'm just not that good with Photoshop, other than the hokey stuff I post to Facebook. This one had the five Ryans and the nickel, and I really wanted it to work, but it didn't. The kid on the bottom right was not in the original photo. I copied the kid on the bottom left, flipped him, and changed his hair, hat and arm. Sigh, I liked this one.

This next one was an attempt to combine the normal word (middle scene, which was a photo shot from our house after a huge snow a year or so ago), a magical sky, to represent the magical elements of the story, and the nickel which connects the two. It was too outer spacey, who is second cousin to Kevin Spacey.

Next, is a variation on the last one with a less spacey sky and Santa flying across the top. I still added a surreal background behind the photo from our house, but it just wasn't ringing any sleigh bells for me.

I went dark on this next one, dark foreboding sky, nickel, five kids, Santa flying, but just too dark and the kids in the nickel wasn't working for me.

I changed photos from the five kids and went with this one and the nickel. I liked the picture, but not the layout.

I finally came up with the photo inside the nickel, giving the impression that it was "through" the nickel that the story takes place. I toyed with backgrounds and came up with this old paper one, which was neat.

But when all was said and done, I arrived at this. I'm happy with it.

Feel free to vote. It won't hurt my feelings too much.

If you'd like to read a sample or purchase this book, please visit my website -> Larry's Website of Awesomeness and stuff

Buffalo Nickel Christmas

My new novel, Buffalo Nickel Christmas, is out. It's a Christmas story, my first Christmas story.

First, the cover...

It conjures so many images of Christmas, don't you think? A nickel with a bullet hole in it, two gun-toting thugs and their moll, oh and a Christmas tree! Rest assured the story is not about child gang wars of the 50s.

And now, the background...

For those who have read my other two books, you will recognize the narrator, Harry Ryan of  Four Years from Home from his days at Kenyon College, and the "Nickel's" protagonists Harry Ryan, Tom Ryan, and the Caswell gang from A King in a Court of Fools. Decades apart, they are brought together through the magic of the season to tell a story of the true meaning of Christmas.

Only those who have read Four Years from Home will appreciate the underlying irony always present in the character of Harry Ryan, but it is not necessary to know that to enjoy any story with him in it. Of course, if you are dying to know what that underlying irony is, you will just have to read  Four Years from Home.

Buffalo Nickel Christmas was written as a story for everyone. You can be a kid and enjoy the antics of the Ryans for the sheer fun of it, or you can be an adult or anything in between and appreciate it as a simple Christmas story.


And finally, the story...

It’s Christmas Eve in sleepy little Gambier, Ohio, and a massive snowstorm is giving the rural town more than just a white Christmas. Roads are closed, everything is shut down, and the monster outside is angry, rattling the windows and howling in the chimney.

Harry Ryan, a sophomore at college, has decided to stay at school over winter break to finish his term paper, but it’s not going well, and now he regrets the decision that has left him stranded so far from his family on such an important occasion. You see, as well as being Christmas, December 25^th is also Harry’s birthday.

As he looks out his window at the stark and beautiful campus, at the icicles on the bushes along Middle Path, and the snow pasted on the windward sides of trees, and the layers of vanilla icing covering the world’s chocolate cake, it reminds him of a Christmas a long time ago.

Buffalo Nickel Christmas is the story of that special day. It begins with an ordinary boy in an ordinary world, but as a monster storm approaches, and Christmas Eve finally arrives, the boy discovers that he is anything but ordinary, and the world becomes a very magical place indeed.

You will meet some unusual people in this story, and hear unbelievable things. You might even see a wizard and a king or two. Sixteen forevers will pass in this book. That’s a very long time. Many magical things can happen when it’s sixteen forevers and still no Christmas. Whatever you do, don’t listen to that little voice inside your head that tells you it’s illogical, that it doesn’t make sense. Listen for the whistling teakettle and be ready with your wish.

Other things that go bump in the night...

If you wish to purchase Buffalo Nickel Christmas for Kindle, Nook, or iPad, please visit any Amazon or Barnes & Noble website, or click here to go to my website. -> Purchase Information

If you want to read a four-chapter sample of Buffalo Nickel Christmas please click here ->  Sample PDF of Buffalo Nickel Christmas

Thanks very much,

Larry

V Trooper - a new novella by Thomas Drinkard

Thomas Drinkard was born and reared in the Deep South—Alabama. He graduated from the University of North Alabama with a degree in English.  At graduation, he was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the United States Army and went on active duty eight days later. Within two years, he volunteered and was accepted into the Special Forces (Green Berets) after Airborne and Special Forces school, he’d found a home. With a few other assignments in between, he spent ten years with the fabled unit. He was unhappy with the Army’s plans for his future and left active duty and moved into the reserves.  He is now a Major, retired reserves.

After the Army, he found his way into teaching and writing in the securities licensing preparation business.  His textbooks, articles and CE courses are in use today. His poetry can be found in a number of literary magazines, including Negative Capability, Cotton Boll/Atlanta Review, Elk River Review, Sisyphus and others. One of his Vietnam poems was chosen for inclusion in Whatever Remembers Us: An Anthology of Alabama poetry.

Piety and Murder was his first novel, and the prequel; Where There Were No Innocents followed.  The novella, V Trooper, is a departure for him in both form and genre. It is Tom’s first venture into the paranormal and the shorter format. The book is first in a series.

The first novella in a series, V Trooper, is published on Amazon as a Kindle book.  The series approaches the subject of the ancient vampire legend, from an unusual perspective.  Let’s let one of the principals in the book, Major Vic Russell, tell us the story through an interview.

Interviewer:  Hello Major Russell, we’ve heard you have a story to tell that you’d never expected.  Give us a bit of your background first.

Russell: When I was in Special Forces, I volunteered for the Delta Force and was fortunate to be accepted. I worked with Delta for three years until I was wounded in Iraq.  I lost my right leg below the knee.  During rehab, I was fitted with a prosthesis and, when I was physically and mentally ready, the Army assigned me to a logistics unit in Afghanistan. That’s where I met Wil Boyd.

I: What did you think of Boyd when you first met him?

R: I thought he was nuts.  He told me that he might be a vampire.

I: But you didn’t report it. Why?

R: I’m not, at heart, a logistician. I have a warrior instinct. I sensed the same leaning in Boyd. He told me that, as a vampire, he had superhuman abilities. If he was truly what he said, I could find a way to use him as a weapon against the Taliban.

I: Tell us more. How did you test his abilities?

R: I assigned him the task of catching thieves at one of our warehouses.

I: What happened?

R. He caught them. It was amazing!  His success began a progression of events that led to his first mission.

I: Can you tell us about that mission?

R. Sure. What a story it proved to be. It was a mission with interest all the way to the White House. A critical operation with international repercussions.   It’s in V Trooper, available on Amazon now.

Purchase or sample V Trooper - First Mission here http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00657YK94

A Christmas Novel

I've finished the third draft of my new novel due out for Christmas. It's going to be another Caswell Gang adventure, so look for Tom and Harry Ryan and the rest, but it's going to be a little different. Naturally, it would have to be different and somewhat magical since it is about Christmas.

Here's a teaser photo to get you thinking...

Publish Post

WANTED

On Dead Tree Paperback or Alive in EBook!

For Having Way too Much Fun

Name: Tom Ryan

Age: 10

Physical Description: Too big for his britches, too tough for his own good

Distinguishing features: a scar in the shape of your nose on his right hand

Aliases: “The King,” “Tom Terrific,” “Hey Ryan,” and “Big Trouble”

Known to frequent: The Cherry Tree Hideout, Isaly’s, The Harris Theater, South Park Drive-In

To report a sighting, to read a sample, or purchase please contact A King in a Court of Fools

REWARD

Hours of enjoyment reading stories from the


Book of Tom

Statement from Tom’s brother, Harry who chronicles Tom Ryan’s exploits

It’s been a while since I’ve seen it, but that’s how I remember the chicken scratch from the cover of Tom’s journal. Tom Ryan — he’s my big brother. He was in sixth grade at the time he started keeping it. He was ten and I was five. Sister Jeanne Lorette made him do it, he said. Tom thought it was punishment for constantly misbehaving in her class. He would say that. That’s how he was. I think she was just trying to help him express himself in ways more productive than his usual tough guy act.

Speaking of tough guy acts, I’ve always imagined that if Tom had the room on that composition book cover, he would have added:

You’re still reading, aren’t you? I warned you, but you couldn’t stop, could you, you nosey-baloney? Well, it’s too late now. And don’t bother wiping your prints off the book. I have my ways. And don’t try to hide either. I’ll find you.

Go ahead, keep reading, but once you know the secrets, it will be the last thing you ever read.

Tom was big on threats. That was his modus operandi. He was under the impression that it was the only way to get anyone to do what he wanted. So he picked on us a lot, but we all knew he was a softy deep down — all talk, no action. You know the type. I honestly don’t remember him doing anything really nasty to anyone, except kids who were picking on us. And I’m sure he felt totally justified in those cases because he was doing it for a good cause.

Of course, I can’t speak to his behavior once he moved on to high school. I saw less and less of him and the gang had, by then, disbanded. But before that, we were all part of his gang and under his protection, whether we wanted to be or not.

Tom’s journal is long gone. It’s unfortunate in a way. It would be much better hearing his story in his own words rather than from my memory of the events that took place that year. It seems like so many years ago. But I imagine like all the other evidence he wanted “lost,” he covered it with Testors cement and burned it when he moved on to the seventh grade. Or maybe he buried it in the side yard. We’ll probably never know. I’m sure he’ll never tell, and I doubt Mom and Dad will be digging up the yard any time soon to find it.

That leaves you with me to piece this together. You have to keep in mind that I was only in first grade at the time, so my reading skills were limited. Simple chapter books were easy, but not sixth grade Tom-ese. He used words I’d never heard of, words I found out later I was better off not knowing.

How did we get our hands on Tom’s secret journal? My other brother, Sam and I found it. We used to sneak into Tom’s bedroom despite the threat of the “Keep Out or Die” sign on his headquarters door. Or maybe it was because of that sign and the inherent danger involved in tempting fate. In any case, we’d play with the toys he never let us touch, we’d look out his window at the Ioli’s house across the street just like he did when he was preparing for a mission, and we’d rifle through his drawers looking for his secret stuff. That’s how we found it. He kept it hidden under a pile of shoes in his closet. It smelled like old shoes, too. That was cool, but the coolest thing? The journal was about us.

Tom was chronicling the adventures of his gang for Sister Jeanne Lorette. Every chance we got, we would sneak in, and Sam would read it to me or I would try reading to him. We had a blast with it. The way Tom described his adventure we couldn’t believe it was about us at first, but there was no doubt after several pages that this story was our adventure as seen through his imagination. And did he ever have an imagination.

So, if you’re willing to accept it on that basis and for what’s it worth, I invite you to enjoy the story of A King in a Court of Fools.

H. Ryan