[Eric Zawadzki]

My co-author and I are looking for a cover artist for an epic fantasy novel we're hoping to release late in the year. I've gone through the KB Yellow Pages and have done some Google fu, but I'd like to expand my search further. The reason we're struggling is we really need to commission original fantasy art - not because we are insane or have a huge budget, but because we want to look professional and get across the feel of the story/world in our cover.

If you are an indie epic fantasy author who has commissioned book covers, I would like answers to as many of these questions as you're willing to give me.

- Who did your cover art?
- How would you rate their professionalism (ability to meet deadlines, openness of communications, willingness to take direction)?
- What was the turnaround like for the project from initial contact to finished product?
- If you feel comfortable sharing, what was the cost like (low/mid/high $100s, $1,000s, etc.)?
- Were you ultimately satisfied with the result (value for the money)?

Thank you in advance for any help you can give us on this. The cover artist we had hoped to work with has proven unreliable (currently 4 months behind schedule), and I can't even begin to describe how frustrating this has made an otherwise straightforward publication process.

 

[Eric Zawadzki]

Thank you all for your recommendations. At least half a dozen of these seem to be a good match for this project. Still gotta go through the process of getting quotes, discussing with my co-author, and so forth, but this gives me a huge start over where I was yesterday. If others have more recommendations, keep 'em coming.