Thursday, April 23, 2009  Gay Romance Novel Cover for The
Hartford Advocate  John Adamian of the Hartford Advocate emailed
me last week with a cover concept. They were doing a story about
the "#amazonfail" controversy, and they wanted a cover illo
parodying the cliche romance novel cover, but with a twist.
Instead of a strapping, Fabio-esque dude embracing a damsel
while waves crashed nearby, our Fabio would be clutching another
Fabio in his bulging arms. After a bit of thought, I suggested
that, rather than twin Fabios, why not make one of them a guy in
drag? The result: Sketch #1.  But there was one problem: the art
would be running on the cover of three sister papers, one of
which runs a big ol' strip ad along the bottom. This would
require a horizontal composition with a fair amount of wiggle
room, and my initial sketch, (featuring an actual paperback) was
vertical. It had plenty of dead space to the left and right, but
it wouldn't forgive any trimming at the bottom to accommodate
the ad.  The Advocate's