Book Cover Illustrations

During my career I’ve worked with and for all sorts of publishers, from the giants like HarperCollins to mid-sized operations like Paladin Press to small presses and self publishers. I even have my own “press” that puts out a title now and then. I’ve enjoyed all the work and worked with a lot of enjoyable [...]

The first half of 2010 has been busy, with many self-publishing authors and small presses realizing that in order to compete with big presses, a quality cover illustration can be key in attracting buyers. On the “established press” side of things, I’ve also been busy, currently finishing up a collection of illustrations for a graphic [...]

Richard Thieme’s Mind Games continues to garner good reviews. I found one posted at Amazon.com by J. M. Arrigo (who is, I am told, a professor familiar with intelligence operations). Here are some excepts: This extraordinary book of short stories draws the reader into multiple levels of reality and multiple dimensions. The settings are mostly [...]

I just completed the book cover illustration for Dora Machado’s Stonewiser III, available from Mermaid Press later this year (or possibly early 2011). Machado’s first two book (which I also had the pleasure of creating book cover illustrations for) have garnered a number of awards, and everyone’s hopeful for this third book in the trilogy. [...]

Another of the B&W book illustrations I created for Victor Thorn’s upcoming book, Reality Bomb. The illustration is titled Forsake All Hope Ye Who Enter Here — with the phrase appearing in tiny print on one of the windows as well. ===================== Duncan Long is a freelance book illustrator who has done work for HarperCollins, [...]

Second opinions can be good. They can also be disastrous. When it comes to second opinions, sometimes an illustrator’s clients can be the client’s own worse enemies. That’s the reason I always shudder when I hear a client start a statement with, “I asked my [son, secretary, neighbor] what they thought about the book illustration [...]

I had the pleasure of hearing from Victor Thorn (talk show host, reporter, and writer). He wanted to use 32 of my pictures in his upcoming book, Reality Bomb. I was happy to see so many of my illustrations getting exposure in his upcoming book (and a little cash in the exchange didn’t hurt anything, [...]

One of Richard Thieme’s science fiction short stories “Northward into the Night” from Mind Games (published April 2010 under the Duncan Long Publications imprint) is now available for a “free read” at nycBigCityLit.com. The illustration (above) was been used in its black-and-white version to illustrate the story in the book. A color version graces the [...]

As an illustrator, I love printed books and magazines. Nothing can match a crisp page with beautiful type inked onto its surface. Book illustrations are best in print without a doubt (though that might change in the future given a screen’s potential for higher dark/light contrast and greater color pallet). But as a reader, I [...]

As readers of my past posts know, I occasionally work as a graphic designer, laying out books I create illustrations for. One such book was Richard Thieme’s Mind Games which I also “published” under my Duncan Long Publications imprint. With all the work that went into this book, it is a bit nearer and dearer [...]