Guest post by Liza Trevino, Author of 'All That Glitters'

The cover for All That Glitters was not an obvious choice.  How it came together was through an initial submission of ideas from me to the publisher and then those ideas were provided to a couple of graphic artists who produced a series of covers. It was a fun, creative process that really made me think about the different ways my book could be interpreted into a visual image.

There were several different ideas that we considered for signifying the story. Overall, the idea I wanted to convey with the cover was that this story was sexy, Latina-oriented, and had a glamorous Hollywood setting.  So, that created a wide lane of creativity.

Ultimately, the drafts of covers fell into two main categories. The one cover type were artist renderings of the Hollywood sign and klieg lights that were either full color or had a very cool-looking 1980s-ish type of scrawl font for the title.  They were very graphic-oriented, like Jackie Collins or Judith Krantz covers from that 1980s era, which is when All That Glitters mostly takes place. The other type of covers were photographic-based, using a model of one sort or another. Obviously, this is the kind of cover that we used. But, even within this category, there were hard decisions to make.

To go with a color or black-n-white photograph? There was a series for each type of photograph. What I liked about the full-color covers was that they featured prominently an image of a Latina-looking woman. However, there was concern that that type of cover might be too literal. And that’s why we liked the black-n-white covers. There was something more provocative and mysterious about those images.

The final stage in the process was a cover poll.  We chose two finalist covers, one from the artist rendering, graphic cover collection and one from the photograph-based collection. The publisher put the poll on their website and also was provided to me to post on social media to get ‘public’ opinion.

That’s when the ‘right’ choice of covers really became obvious. And that’s the cover we ultimately used.

It’s funny, the book cover that we went with wasn’t my initial favorite of all the covers provided. But, as I’ve become buddies with this cover over the last months, it’s grown on me. I like that it has mystery and is filled with questions. Each time I glance at it, it tells me different things, kind of like a mood ring. I think that is what makes a successful cover. An eye-catching blend of graphic elements that definitely telegraph a story, but is also open to many interpretations.

Liza Treviño hails from Texas, spending many of her formative years on the I-35 corridor of San Antonio, Austin and Dallas.  In pursuit of adventure and a Ph.D., Liza moved to Los Angeles where she compiled a collection of short-term, low-level Hollywood jobs like script girl, producer assistant and production assistant.  Her time as a Hollywood Jane-of-all-trades gave her an insider's view to a world most only see from the outside, providing the inspiration for creating a new breed of Latina heroine.

Click to Buy on Amazon: All That Glitters