The July Book Cover of the Month Halfway-Point Update

Greetings all,

With just about seven days left in this month’s bracket, I thought this would be a good chance to update you all on how things have been progressing. This has been a record-setting month in a few ways.

4,918 votes (at the moment) is already enough to make this month’s bracket the second-most voted on bracket in the nine months I’ve been doing this. I thank everyone for their support. It’s always great to see people support their favorite artists and authors.

We’ve had three books hold the lead so far.  Winged Hussars by Mark Wandrey started out in the lead. The Strange Case of the Alchemist’s Daughter by Theodora Goss held the lead for a day before A Gathering of Ravens by Scott Oden took it for a few days. The Girl Who Could See by Kara Swanson has held the number one spot for the last few days. The Heresy Within by Rob J. Hayes even held the top spot for about 12 hours. This is a very tight race, and with this format, anyone can win if they get a solid push near the end of the voting time.

Most Voted on so far: Swanson has the most round wins and the most votes overall with 276 total votes.

Least Voted for: The Light of Burning Shadows by Chris Evans currently has the fewest votes (81). Fans of Evans should rally to help this cover get at least a bit more credit than that.

The Elite 8 is the closest round so far. The top four vote-earners in that round are within eight votes of each other. Swanson is only four votes ahead of Oden in the final four.  So looking at each round of votes, Swason has a pretty solid lead in the first two rounds, but life gets a bit tough after that.

A quick reminder of how the tournament works. The easiest way to win is to have the most people vote for you in every round (like Swanson). The trick is you have to have the most people vote you through in each round, all the way to the final.  As an example, 21 people (the most) have voted Winged Hussars all the way to the championship, but that’s not enough because Wandrey can’t make up the 63-vote deficit he has to Swanson in the initial round. The last time I did one of these contests, I was worried because I thought a person could win the championship without winning a round. I had a problem with that. Further study of this bracket and the reports I have access to have put my mind at ease. It’s not as simple as a round by round, but it at least won’t allow a person to snatch a championship with only a few people voting for them. Just remember. It’s not total votes. It’s not simple championship votes. The winning cover has to have the most votes in each round of the competition.

This will be the only update for this type of bracket. It’s been an amazing tournament to watch thus far, and I hope readers continue to support their authors by voting, liking, and sharing the bracket with as many people as possible.  You can vote at this address!

I’ll announce the winner is just seven days!

Thanks for reading,

Matt

 

 

The April Book Cover of the Month Bracket Begins!

Happy first everyone! It’s time to kick off a new bracket.  If you’re curios or new, check out the Book Covers for December, January, February, and March.

April’s bracket has 30 new covers.  Age of Myth is fighting more than I’ve ever seen a cover fight. Michael J. Sullivan finished with the top most votes in the semifinals, which earned him yet another shot in this month’s bracket. Frank Dorrian’s To Brave the End was last month’s runner up, so he gets another crack at the bracket as well.

As always, I’d appreciate it if you tag the authors and artists if you know them. I try to tag or friend every author I can, but sometimes it’s hard to track someone down. Max participation is a huge deal to me. The more people who vote, the more recognition these authors and artists receive, and I want this to be as legitimate as possible.

If you are the author, I feel the need to let’s remember some basic guidelines.  1) Please feel free to message or contact me at any time. 2) Please feel free to like, share, text, ask for support, and call everyone you know. I absolutely want max participation. However, if you’re going to offer giveaways or prizes, please offer them for voting, not just voting for you.

Also, while your summoning your army of voting soldiers, please make sure you ask them to vote in every match. Part of the idea of this is to get exposure to as many artists and authors as possible. By all means, if you can get 1,000 people to vote for your book, do it. Just please also send some eyeballs to the other matches.

A final note to authors and artists: I currently have links to the books’ Amazon pages. If you’d prefer I switch that link to sign up for your newsletter or like your social media page or whatever, just send me the link and let me know. I want this to help you. I want this to be as helpful as possible, so whatever you need me to do to facilitate that, just let me know.

Since we’ve been going, I’ve been evaluating how the participation has been. A few authors mentioned that it can be pretty exhausting having a 22-day-long tournament.  So I’m going to try a few new things.  This month, I’m simply trying to reduce the amount of time in the tournament.  This torment will run from today to the 14th.  I’ll do something different next mont.  I’d like your thoughts and feedback as to which way is best.  My goal is to have a fun, honest, meaningful competition that helps everyone. Your feedback will make that possible.

Round 1 will go from today to May 4.

The Sweet 16 will run from then to the 7th.

The Elite 8 will take it from there until the 10th.

The Final 4 runs from the 18th to the 12.

The Finals will go from the 20th to the 14.

I hope you keep having fun. Please, vote, share, and discuss as much as possible.

All you have to do now is head over here to vote!

Thanks for reading,

Matt