After many months of writing, tweeting, and Facebook posting about straight-arrow Sam Owen and his bizarre, eccentric and titular catgirl roommate, I decided it was high time to give a face to my comedy novel-in-progress.

Of course, this decision required a lot of additional decisions before it could be put into action, so I sat down and started asking myself questions.

Should I use a photo, or draw something from scratch?

A search of the internet revealed a definite lack of catgirl photos that matched Nyla's appearance, a definite surplus of exaggerated breasts and butts, and a possible inclination of the online community toward bestiality, so I decided to draw something myself.

Should it be cartoonish, or realistic?

I'm good at drawing anime-style and semi-realistic, but I have yet to succeed in making something look truly realistic.

I could have hired a professional artist for the job, but that can get very expensive, and a cartoonish look seemed like a better match for the goofy tone of a comedy novel anyway.

So I decided to go with a look that was semi-realistic, but still somewhat cartoonish.

What pose and scenario should I draw?​

This was one of the tougher decisions.

There are a lot of funny moments in Catgirl Roommate - it's a comedy novel, so there'd better be! - and I wasn't sure which one would best encapsulate the story and characters.

The candidates were narrowed down somewhat by the fact that the picture needed to fit in a vertical rectangle, and to look good as a thumbnail.

A busy picture with a lot of small details wouldn't be as effective as a simple one whose focal image was big enough to look good at thumbnail size.

Here are a few of the candidates I considered:

1. Sam holding his food out of Nyla’s reach, while Nyla swats at it.

2. Nyla crouching in a box, with half of the neighbour's hamster dangling from her mouth.

3. Nyla forcibly grooming Sam while Sam protests.

4. Nyla’s bathroom disaster. She decided that she needed to punish Sam, and she was quite thorough about it.

Number four was probably the funniest scenario, but I soon concluded that it would probably be a better wallpaper than a book cover. There were so many small details that it wouldn't fit neatly into a vertical rectangle, and it probably wouldn't have looked very good as a thumbnail.

It's one of those situations that requires a large landscape-style image to show the disaster in its full glory.

Number one was tempting, but one of the challenges of drawing Nyla in a cover image is that, as a catgirl, she hates clothes. So I wanted to find a pose that would conceal the essentials without looking contrived, and the food-stealing scenario wasn't very conducive to that.

Though, delayed intelligence just informed me that she could try to steal it from the table rather than his hand, so the table could hide her... hm... maybe...

With number two, I struck pay dirt. A sufficiently large box can hide all the private parts while showing her feline tail and ears, and sitting in a box is a classic cat behavior that cat owners will probably recognize instantly.

Number three would probably also work, if Nyla was on bottom; I drew a quick, rough sketch of that when the concept art for number two was already partly drawn, but by that time number two was looking so good that I might not finish the sketch for number three.

So do we get to see the picture, or not?

OK, OK, I've kept you in suspense long enough. The picture isn't complete, and I haven't firmly decided on the text style for the subtitle and author name, but here's the work-in-progress for the cover of Catgirl Roommate:

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What do you think of it so far?

Does it catch your interest, and make you want to check out the book?

And do you have any suggestions to tweak or improve it? (Aside, of course, from the obvious one of "finish the darn thing". :P )

I look forward to your feedback and comments!

***
UPDATE
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The cover art is now complete! You can see the finished product below, and compare it to the messy sketch above to see how far it's come. :)

Do you love getting sneak peeks into novels, but hate downloading files?

​Then I've got something special for you:

​Excerpts of all four of my novels can now be read directly on my site, without downloading anything!

​Two of the excerpts are funny, and the other two are more eerie, ominous and poetic. Scroll down to see the descriptions of each book, and to get links to the free excerpts:

​In this humor novel for cat lovers, straight-arrow college student Sam accepts the offer of free rent in exchange for taking care of Nyla, a woman with the ears, tail and mindset of a cat.

If you own and/or love cats, this is your chance to watch someone else experience the same feline foibles and misadventures you've probably endured... and you get to laugh at it, because this time, you aren't the one who has to clean it up.

​I don't have cover art for this one yet, but you can read the excerpt by clicking the button below:
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Note: The excerpt links all open in a new tab, so you can click on them without losing your place on this blog post. 'Cause I like to make things easy for you. ;)

​In this dark twist on the superhero genre, Alexandra deceives an alien supervillain into abducting her instead of her closest friend.

For the supervillain, the abduction was supposed to be a routine crime to lure his superpowered nemesis into combat. Instead, he finds himself in a battle of wits with a playfully snarky, insightful reporter who wants to know why he's kidnapping humans... and she won't stop teasing him and getting herself captured until she finds out.

In the excerpt, you'll watch her cheerfully sarcastic snark barrage collide with his stoic, solemn facade, and get a taste of the mysteries that Alexandra will unravel as she digs to the core of a web of lies far crueler than her own.

Amid the ruins of a destroyed building, a young woman finds a fresh corpse, a tightly-bound prisoner of war with a bloody knife beside his one free hand... and a deadly choice to make.

She knows this man is dangerous, and yet she’s drawn to him. He needs her help, and for a person who’s spent a lifetime defining herself by being strong for those who need her, that is enough.

Read the excerpt to witness their first meeting, the beginning of a journey that will end with either her saving him, or the fugitive taking her down with him.

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I hope you enjoy these excerpts! If you do, please share them with your friends. And if one of them makes you want to see more, just purchase the book and download your copy, and you can start reading within minutes.

Some people have no desire to write a book - and that's perfectly fine. But when people WANT to put their story or knowledge into writing, they often run into a certain set of obstacles that can stop you in your tracks if you let it.

Maria Murnane, best-selling author of the Waverly Bryson series, Cassidy Lane, Katwalk, and Wait for the Rain, recently wrote an article explaining why many would-be authors don't complete their books.

She also offered a mindset shift to help you get past those obstacles, so you can finally complete the literary masterpiece that's hidden in your head.

So if you have a book that's trapped inside you, or you're curious about why some authors don't complete their books, click the button below to check out her article.

A few days ago, my brain and I had a conversation about art.

Me: "YAAY! My new graphics tablet arrived! I can finally draw all the pictures I had in my head, without relying on my wimpy scanner or having to painstakingly scratch them out with a clumsy mouse or touchpad! So, brain, what do you think we should draw first?"

Brain: "How about some Undertale fan art? I don't think you've sufficiently convinced your inner circle that you're obsessed with Undertale yet, but a good piece of fan art should do the trick."

Me: "Like a post-Pacifist Ending fluff comic?"

Brain: "Yes. Something far more elaborately shaded and extravagantly detailed than the joke even remotely requires."

Me: "...That is an excellent plan."

And so, the comic below was born. Obviously, stop scrolling down right now if you fear Undertale spoilers. ;)

Sans was a challenge to draw - especially in the bottom panel, where he's supposed to look happy and friendly, but it's really hard to make that effect when his battle eye is glowing. :/

There was also the fact that the light in that panel was hitting him from two different directions - the ceiling light and the fire - which initially threw off my shading.

Papyrus, on the other hand, needed relatively little tinkering to turn out just right. The drawing style I used makes it difficult to keep things from looking like plastic, but his battle body looks kind of plastic-y to begin with, so that was just fine.

I'm pretty happy with all the little nerdy touches I put in the last panel. The Delta Rune angel, Papyrus' overly tall sink, the spaghetti and socks on the Christmas tree, the Christmas-colored sprinkles on Sans' pet rock... and, of course, the Annoying Dog, stealing Papyrus' stuff yet again while Papyrus follows in his mentor's footsteps by setting the kitchen on fire.

Speaking of fire, note to self: draw the stuff behind the fire first, THEN draw the fire. Thank goodness for Photoshop's Erase tool.

My next art project will probably be some concept art for the cover of Catgirl Roommate, now that I've had some practice with the graphics tablet and indulged in a fit of extravagant nerdiness.

Brain: "Psst, Stephanie... if you're almost done writing this blog post, you know what you should do?"

Me: "NOT obsess over the tiny details of this picture, tweaking every little thing that isn't close enough to being perfect?"

Brain: "Obsess over the tiny details of this picture, tweaking every little thing that isn't close enough to being perfect."

Me: "Brain, no."

Brain: "Brain, yes. Sans' head in the second panel might be too tall."

Me: "I'm not going back to edit it."

Brain: "And also, he's using the wrong hand. Sans is left-handed."

Me: "AAAAUUUUUUGH." *edits*

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