My book cover!

I'm so excited to share my book cover for my debut novel, SISTERS OF MISERY. I fell in love with cover (just as my amazing editor, Danielle Chiotti at Kensington said I would) the minute I first laid eyes on it. Even though I'm still going through revisions (ugh! The revision process!), having the cover and the book jacket copy is really helping over the last hurdle. The finish line is definitely in sight.

Over the past few months, I also created a MySpace page for my main character, Maddie Crane. It was a great way to connect with readers and to get the word out about my book. At first, however, I pretended that I really was the character and that my cousin, Cordelia LeClaire, had gone missing. I thought it would be a good way to pique readers' interest. However, most of the people that I tried to "friend" were very skeptical, and didn't want to accept my friendship. While I applaud the teenage girls who were smart enough about the Internet to question a random "friend request." at the same time I felt really bad that I was frightening them. I was ready for Chris Matthews and Dateline to burst through the door with a segment on "To Catch A MySpace Predator"!!

So, once I got the jpeg of my cover, I was able to replace the stock photo with my book cover. One would think that that would put most people's minds at ease. Not really! I continued to get
emails from teenage girls saying, "Who R U? Do I no U?" Once I allowed my grammar geek self to get over the TERRIBLE text message/shorthand way that teens write these days, I was surprised to see how skeptical everyone was. I figured once they saw the book cover, they'd understand that I was simply trying to promote my book. (As a literary publicist, that's kind of what I do--promote books!)

On one hand, I applaud the girls for being so cautious online. It's so important to realize that the person on the other side of the email or MySpace message may not be who they say they are. (In my case, it was true. I wasn't a 15 year old girl named Maddie Crane whose cousin had just disappeared. Yet, I wasn't trying to harm or trick anyone.) So, I'm happy that people are becoming aware of the dangers of the Internet. It's something that I will try to teach my five year old daughter, especially since going online and sending emails is something that she sees me do every day. To her, there isn't any danger associated with going online. It's my job to teach her the dangers of the Internet. (Hopefully, I won't have to do that for at least a few more years. But Piper is five going on fifteen, so it will most likely be sooner than later.)

Here's my link to my MySpace SISTERS OF MISERY page. Enjoy!

http://www.myspace.com/mkh_books