NaNoWriMo is still going

My word count is just a tad north of 45K. Finishing today will be a challenge. I'll try, but no guarantees.

I'm attempting a space opera this year. I went into it with a ludicrously abysmal level of world building. Which means basically there wasn't any. This type of story requires the creation of planets and cultures and non-human sentient species and technology and ... and ... and thinking the story would happen without all those things was, in hindsight, just the kind of craziness NaNo is all about.

This story has more [bracket info needed] than anything I've ever written before. I've even given up on naming characters! [person name] [character name needed] [somebody] are far too common in this document!

I suspect my future self will have some succinct, unprintable-type words for my present self.

BUT

Cover! That's a first for me, having a cover. Over Thanksgiving dinner, my daughter, her roommate and I were discussing the story and came up with a pulp science fiction magazine type cover idea. One of those with Strong Man Holding Weapon in one hand with other arm wrapped around Woman With Arms Raised and Mouth Open to Scream and an especially Menacing Tentacle wrapping both of them.

I really liked it.

And while procrastinating thinking about the story, I googled pulp SF covers and discovered this AMAZING website where you can make your own cover! Of course, that image already in my head wasn't available. C'est la vie, n'est pas?

There then passed a mumbly mumbly amount of time. But I has cover! (Several actually, but I think this one is the best.)

So now I must finish writing the story. 

(The phrase "unrealistically sexy" is homage to Shadow Unit and its unrealistically sexy FBI agents.)

Book Cover Art

I have three novels in various stages of revision.  Maybe someday one of them will be published and there will be cover art.  I hope I get something that not only is related to the story inside but depicts my character(s) in natural-looking poses.  Recently several authors have tried to reproduce the positions women are put into on some covers:  

http://jimhines.livejournal.com/612200.html

Jim concedes he may have had issues with some of these because, well, he's a guy and his hips don't move in the same way as a woman's would.  Jim has 'reproduced' only covers with women in his post.

http://genrereviews.livejournal.com/371367.html

Anna says several of the poses were painful for her and she's been a dancer!  Anna does some of the same covers Jim did, with the addition of similar covers with men on them.  Her conclusion is that the men are depicted in natural positions of strength and capability while the women are in awkward to painful positions that emphasize sexy over competence.

I admire both Jim and Anna for doing this.  Reading their posts and seeing their pictures is a lot of fun.  But what those covers say about our society - men are strong and women are sexy - is disturbing.  Women's lib and a sense of equality haven't reached this area. 

I won't select or reject a book strictly based on the cover art (especially since few authors have any say about what's on the cover of their books put out by the publishing houses), but I'm going to be looking at them in a different way now.  And I'll favor the one's with more realistically depicted women!