Official A Kill in the Morning Thread

[Shimbo]

Rather than have multiple posts about A Kill in the Morning I thought it'd be better to bring it all together in one thread.

You might already know the backstory of A Kill in the Morning. I wrote it here in 2009-11 as a 'James Bond versus the Nazis' story. It was very popular, winning the Superlative Turtledove Award for overall best story in 2011

Well that was three years ago. Several rewrites and a shortlisting for the Terry Pratchett Prize later, it's going to be commercially published.

Yay! And it shows it can be done for all us aspiring AH authors.

Previously, I released the A Kill in the Morning tagline wallpaper which if you remember looked like this:

Today I’m releasing the first ‘teaser ‘wallpaper for A Kill in the Morning. Like the tagline wallpaper it features an element from the cover, in this case a mysterious German jet bomber.

The plane is a Messerschmitt Me P.1108/II a long-range bomber project that was never built. It was planned to be a delta wing layout with a single vertical fin and four He S011 turbojets buried in the wing. A crew of two was envisioned and the bomb load was to be 2500 kg (5500 lbs).

In the alternative history of A Kill in the Morning, the bomber is built, along with lots of other alternate history weapons that are all part of the fun of the novel.

I've produced the wallpaper for all the most common screen sizes - desktops, laptops, phones and tablets. You can find yours and download the right size here: Wallpaper for A Kill in the Morning.

 

[trekchu]

Sir, you rule. You have a customer. A few questions:

1) Will there be a kindle-compatible version? (Just for convenience, I will buy the dead tree version if not)

2) Where will we be able to buy it?

3) Is there a link to the original version? I'm working on an alternate Bond myself (though without Nazis, rest assured) and I could do with a few pointers in regards to writing style for my Alternate Ian Fleming.

 

[Shimbo]

Sir, you rule. You have a customer. A few questions:

1) Will there be a kindle-compatible version? (Just for convenience, I will buy the dead tree version if not)

Yep. Here's a link to the Kindle version on Amazon.

2) Where will we be able to buy it?

One of the advantages of commercial publishing is they have distribution. It's basically everywhere: Amazon, iBooks, Waterstones, Blackwells, etc.

Once it's out, it'll be in the actual proper shops. I'm really looking forward to seeing it in W.H. Smith's and places like that. It'll seem real then.

3) Is there a link to the original version? I'm working on an alternate Bond myself (though without Nazis, rest assured) and I could do with a few pointers in regards to writing style for my Alternate Ian Fleming.

The original is gone now, but link me to what you've got and I'll have a look and make some suggestions. This link has some good ideas too.

 

[trekchu]

Thanks on all the info.

Anyway, for my alternate I'm only in the planning stage yet. At the moment the biggest difference to ours would be the mental state of Bond, as that version of Casino Royale would probably be set either in the tail end of or literally weeks after the end of World War Two. But thanks for the offer.

 

[Darth_Kiryan]

An AU Bond, James Bond book being published.

I liked this story, but damn if you get this published, just wow.

 

[Shimbo]

Today I’m releasing the second ‘teaser ‘wallpaper for A Kill in the Morning. Like the earlier A Kill in the Morning tagline wallpaper and first A Kill in the Morning wallpaper it features an element from the cover of the novel, in this case the heroine, Molly Ravenhill.

Who is Molly Ravenhill?
She’s one of the two female protagonists of my novel A Kill in the Morning . She’s an experienced covert operative and saboteur, who has been fighting against the Nazis for years before getting involved with the male protagonist near the start of the novel.

Here’s what it says about her in her dossier:

Driven to hatred of Germany by the events leading to her mother’s death, Miss Ravenhill joined SOE in 1941. As she was fluent in French, she was trained by F Section and operated as a courier, 1942 – 45. After a period instructing at Beaulieu 45 – 50 she returned to F Section as a sabotage group leader 50 – 54. Currently she is on secondment to the Cage as an interpreter/interrogator.
​

If you want to read a short except from the novel, where Molly first meets the protagonist, it's here: February Short Story.

I've produced the wallpaper for all the most common screen sizes - desktops, laptops, phones and tablets. You can find yours and download the right size here: Molly Ravenhill Wallpaper for A Kill in the Morning

I’ll be releasing one more wallpaper, featuring the cover of the novel, soon.

 

[stirlingdraka]

Very nice Shimbo. Can`t wait to read the novel in June.

 

[Shimbo]

How we designed the cover for A Kill in the Morning

The high concept of A Kill in the Morning is ‘James Bond versus the Nazis’ (or ‘ Fatherland meets Thunderball ‘) And my editor felt its new spin on classic spy style had a Tarantino flavour to it.

So the book cover design needed to say:

• Genre: Alternative History & Spy Thriller
• Target audience: Mass market commercial fiction, spy genre readers
• What’s the appeal: It’s a Tarantino-style remix of classic spy thrillers with a twist.
• High Concept: James Bond versus the Nazis

Concepts

Two movie posters that we felt captured the style of A Kill in the Morning were From Russia With Love and Inglourious Basterds.

These were the first concepts the book cover designer came up with:

Although my editor and I thought the right hand one was OK, and some of my friends liked the swooping eagle, these designs didn’t really work for me.

Mood Board

To help the designer, I got together a mood board for the novel to give a sense of the style we were looking for.

The process of producing a mood board takes time, but it’s enjoyable.

I found Fotor to be the best free software for producing the collage of images for the mood board.

Drafts and Revisions

With the more visual brief to refer to, the book cover designer sketched this design, which was much more the style we were looking for.

As a draft this was great and I could immediately see the potential. But there were some issues.

• It looked too much like a war thriller and not enough like a spy thriller.
• Lots of the elements weren’t actually in the book.
• It didn’t have any hint of the alternate history.

Based on that feedback the designer redrew the cover to include:

• A German jet bomber to imply alternate history.
• Heydrich, the antagonist of the novel, in the gun-sight instead of a generic Nazi.
• Molly Ravenhill, the heroine of the novel, in a less military pose.

The Result

With a design sketched out and agreed, the drafting stage was over and the cover design went away to an artist to be painted.

The painted elements came back from the artist and the designer tweaked them a bit and added the lettering and tagline to produce the finished cover:

We started with our brand inspirations: James Bond and Quentin Tarantino. Let’s revisit them and see how A Kill in the Morning compares:

It looks pretty good to me!

And now of course we can see where the teaser posters were coming from, as the tagline poster used the gun sight, the first teaser was the plane and the second was Molly Ravenhill. put them all together and add the hero, the title and my name and you've got a cover.

There's a more detailed explanation of the design process on my website.

 

[Geordie]

Looks fantastic Shimbo!

 

[stirlingdraka]

That looks awesome. I can`t wait to read it in June.

 

[Faeelin]

And on my birthday too!

 

[theReturner]

Aren't their copyright issues?

 

[LeX]

Aren't their copyright issues?

I think it got changed so that it isn't James Bond anymore. Hopefully Shimbo leaves it ambiguous so we can imagine that "the assassin", as he is called, is still Bond.

 

[Shimbo]

Looks fantastic Shimbo!

That looks awesome. I can`t wait to read it in June.

And on my birthday too!

Thanks, guys. I'm getting quite excited now, too.

Aren't their copyright issues?

Nope. The original story that I wrote here used Bond and, yeah, I'd never have got it published like that due to copyright, but that was only the first draft. It has changed hugely (it's 85K words now, not less than 60K, for one thing) and, well, you'll see...

 

[Shimbo]

I think it got changed so that it isn't James Bond anymore. Hopefully Shimbo leaves it ambiguous so we can imagine that "the assassin", as he is called, is still Bond.

This is exactly right. It'll be interesting to see how many people spot the clues - they're there if you look for them, but some are quite subtle.

Once it's out, I might run a competition to see who can spot the most references to classic spy fiction novels, including Bond.

 

[Shimbo]

Giveaway

Just to let you know: if you're on on Goodreads then then you might like to enter my competition: I'm giving away a signed first UK edition of A Kill in the Morning, to celebrate its launch in the UK.

The winner will also receive a print featuring concept art for the novel.

If you'd like to win a copy, the page on Goodreads is: https://www.goodreads.com/giveaway/show/93985-a-kill-in-the-morning

The competition runs until the launch date on 19th June.

(This competition is UK only, but I'll do some more for other countries later).

 

[trekchu]

You know, I think I am going to treat myself to at least the Kindle version for my Birthday (20th). Dead Tree will have to wait, as the money is a bit tight at the moment.

 

[Shimbo]

You know, I think I am going to treat myself to at least the Kindle version for my Birthday (20th). Dead Tree will have to wait, as the money is a bit tight at the moment.

Actually, dude, you're on my list for a free copy, because you commented on the original draft/thread

BTW: There will be a cheaper paperback eventually, what's called the Mass Market Paperback. The first version is what's called a Trade Paperback which is bigger and more prestigious.

 

[trekchu]

Actually, dude, you're on my list for a free copy, because you commented on the original draft/thread

BTW: There will be a cheaper paperback eventually, what's called the Mass Market Paperback. The first version is what's called a Trade Paperback which is bigger and more prestigious.

Sweet, thanks. Since my particular corner of Furrin is in Europe, east of France but west of Poland, shipping shouldn't be too much.

EDIT: And if I may, the original, i.e. English version, please. I do it like that since the first Harry Potter.

 

[Shimbo]

Just to bring the historical threads about A Kill in the Morning together for background:

2011: AKITM wins the superlative story Turtledove Award on AH.com
2013: AKITM gets shortlisted for the Terry Pratchett Prize
2013: AKITM gets a publishing dea
2013: AKITM wins YouWriteOn Book of the Year

And also to remind people of my "thank you" offer:

"As well as sharing my good fortune, I wanted to remind you all of my promise of free copies for anyone on AH.com who commented on the original thread or otherwise helped me. As I said before: I literally could not have written the book without the help of AH.com. So please comment or PM if you want to stake a claim for a copy."