“Under the Covers” – Meet Tule’s Design and Editorial Assistant, Genevieve!

Hello, Book Girls!

I’m so thrilled that I get to gab with you all a bit about the covers for our 2016 Tule Christmas lineup! But, before we dive too much into this, let me introduce myself! I’m the newest addition to the Tule office team, and the in-house design and editorial assistant. Which means I work very closely on our creative projects, and assist with covers, graphics, and our vision. It’s such an exciting and fulfilling process to communicate great voices through visuals, and to try to convey so much about the story and an author’s brand.

Romance book covers (and eBook covers in particular) are really a lot more than just the title card of an author’s story. They set the overall tone that a reader has of the type of experience to expect; they need to convey enough information about the story and properly utilize things like color, composition, and typography; and, most importantly, they need to stand out and convince readers – at just a split-second glance, mind – that the story underneath is something worthwhile. They are the face of a story and, often, its first impression.

Crafting looks for this Tule Christmas was definitely an exciting undertaking! First of all, who doesn’t love Christmas aesthetics? I’m of the mind that things make more of an effort and just generally look better when the holidays roll around, and we wanted these covers to evoke those same feelings of holiday magic. We definitely wanted to also convey feelings of fun, festivity, and – most importantly – ROMANCE. We work with designers from all over to develop imagery that matches our authors’ voices and wonderful stories, but it was equally important this season to incorporate the third element of the holiday.

One particular set of covers that holds a special place in my heart this season is our Holiday imprint Christmas Royals series – it was the first complete series look that I had ever worked on for Tule! This three-part holiday collection is full of sweet romance with a regal flavor, and we wanted these covers to be appealing across many generations of our readers. We not only had to find models that matched our authors’ heroines, we also had to match the typography and color palettes to both the seasonal preferences and contemporary glam styling trends.

Holiday imprint Christmas Royals:

We also have NINE (wow!!!) Montana Born Christmas titles this year, and these covers all had to hit those holiday notes but needed to feel very much Marietta and Montana Born. One thing that makes Marietta, Montana so special is that the people who live (and love) in this small town are people just like you and me; Marietta has such deep and established roots – and a community that is very much alive and thriving – so we always need to make sure that the models and environments we design around have that same feeling of Home that comes across in these stories.

Montana Born Christmas covers designed by Yours Truly

There are so many delightful and beautiful Tule stories hitting those eShelves this holiday season, and it’s going to be so difficult for me to decide which I’m going to read first. Whether you like Princes, Princesses, complex heroes, hot MDs, destination holidays, spicy cowboys, sweet treats, or historicals – we’ve got something for everybody! (Plus gorgeous covers – that were super fun to work on behind-the-scenes – to boot.) Have you seen the complete final lineup??? LOVE.

Which are you most excited for? Let us know in the comments!

As a lover of art and literature, native southern Californian Genevieve has always dreamed of a life filled with stories. In the summer of 2016, this cat-enthusiast made a career switch from a life in the stacks as a children’s librarian to applying her eye for detail in another literary way: crafting designs and assisting with editorial projects for Tule! Having begun her creative education at the age of seven, she’s now had twenty years of experience in playing with paint and mashing computer keyboards – and she still has plenty to learn. When she’s not staring at bright screens she can be found tracking down local coffee roasters, hugging fluffy animals, and driving PCH with the music playing (probably) way too loudly.