I'm so excited about the new cover for THE CURSED CLOAK OF THE WRETCHED WRAITH, the third book in my Horrible Bag series, that I just had to share it with you all.

Perhaps you've already run across this image on Twitter or Instagram. But I'm going to give you a brief peek inside the creative process that went into creating this cover. 

**Please do not share any of the following images publicly. They are meant FOR YOUR EYES ONLY. I'll get into a lot of trouble with my publisher if they leak out. I'm trusting y'all, so please be cool.**

Before the image for the cover could be chosen, we first had to settle on the title of the book. (Duh.) I was pretty sure that I wanted the third cover to feature the Wraith so almost all my title suggestions circled around that character. After deciding on the title and getting it approved, I did some thumbnail sketches for possible cover ideas. The final cover was one of three concepts I presented. As you can see the other two were pretty similar.

These two alternates and the final all feature the Wraith and the title and that's pretty much it. And yet, it was a real challenge to make the title read clearly against all the textures and patterning of the art. In the second image, it's almost like I'm yelling for the Wraith to "get out of the way" of the title.

Even in rough thumbnail form, you can see how much easier it is to read the title against the black cloak. And once we gave the Wraith broader shoulders and completely surrounded the yellow letters with black, the title really popped. (In this image, I'm already starting to think about the back cover. Wait till you see how that turned out!)

All credit goes to my stellar illustrator M.S Corley and crack designer Mary Claire Cruz, who have turned my rough ideas and doodles for all three books in the series into amazing covers. I hope you're as wowed by this artwork as I am and that you'll consider taking THE CURSED CLOAK into your home. You can read more about Zenith Maelstrom's third adventure in GrahBhag and preorder the book at the link below.

The Cursed Cloak of The Wretched Wraith