First Direbound character art!

Character art, ARC timing, and other updates...

Happy 2025!

So excited to start the year off with a bang by sharing some art with all of you amazing newsletter readers. You all are the first to see this, and you’ll be the only group to see the sketch version, as that’s just a newsletter goodie!

I’ve gotten in notes from beta readers on Direbound and alongside the many insightful, helpful editorial comments, there was another message that rang loud and clear: readers are just as eager for Direbound art as I am!

Luckily, my co-writer and I had already contacted some artists before the turn of the year, and it has been insanely fun to work with two very talented artists on some character portraits.

The artists are taking very different approaches: one is doing just a small handful of larger, more detailed portraits of the main characters; the other is doing looser close-ups portraits, headshots if you will, of a whole bunch of the cast of characters. The latter is what has come in first, close-ups by the phenomenal artist Takacukasa (link to their artist profile if you want to see more art!).

And the very first character we focused on, of course? None other than our FMC Meryn! Thrilled to share the sketch we got first…

I don’t know about you, but I was immediately in love.

However, after lots of thought and scrutiny, we asked for a few tweaks; we thought Meryn’s face looked maybe a touch too young, and wondered if her haircut (which, ahem, beta readers will remember) should be a little less even and professional looking.

I could not be more enamored with the final version!

What do you think? For those of you who beta read the draft, does she come close to the Meryn in your head? For those of you who have yet to read, does she look like an FMC you’re excited to know better?

All thoughts welcome!

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One more note before I sign off: we are still adding even more ARC readers to the list! If you have bookish friends who love romantasy and might want to participate as an ARC reader, feel free to send them the link to sign up - https://tinyurl.com/direboundARC

Current aim is to have the ARC to all the wonderful folks on the list sometime the first week of February. (If you think you’re already signed up, you likely are — but if you want me to check I’m happy to, just shoot me an email if you’re not sure!)

Any other questions about ARCs or anything else, please feel free to shoot me an email.

Until next time,

Sable