Guest Post: Gillian Philip’s thoughts on the cover for The Opposite of Amber

I love the cover for The Opposite of Amber. I’ve been incredibly lucky with all my covers so far – I know authors who have had bad experiences, and we rarely get input into cover design. But I’ve never had a cover I didn’t like.

This is one of my favourites. I love the cold beauty of it, the starkness. It’s delicate but it has a very sinister edge.

My editor had originally discussed the possibility of depicting a face under ice, but using the amber pendant – an important feature in the story – for a strong contrast. I loved that idea, but when I saw the first version of this design, it had me at hello.

There’s something so vulnerable about the girl; I especially like her grubby feet. The Opposite Of Amber references a lot of fairy tales, and this picture reflected that – she’s otherworldly, but real, if that makes sense. The image is lovely but sad, and that iciness is a feature of so many fairy stories
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The original colour palette wasn’t quite so pale and frosted; the title lettering was all in a deeper blue and it didn’t have that sheen of ice. There was a distinct blood splash, too. When I saw the revised version I was a little unsure to start with, but now I think it’s an improvement on a cover I loved already. The frosting, that extra coldness, gives it a sense of the ethereal.

I can’t help thinking my cover luck is going to run out one of these days... but in the meantime I feel very, very fortunate – with The Opposite of Amber in particular.

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Read my review of The Opposite of Amber here!

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