Sam Sykes Finally Gets an Awesome Cover

I’ve been saying for years that Sam Sykes’s books need some awesome covers. Don’t get me wrong, Sam’s covers for his original series weren’t ‘terrible’, but I did feel that his work deserved so much more. For those who have read Sam’s work you will know that there is something very unique about his voice, style and ability to move from utterly despicable to utterly hilarious in the blink of an eye.

Unfortunately, Sam’s publishers aren’t yet redoing the covers for his first three books, but what they are doing is launching his new series with a completely new artistic direction. Below is the cover for The City Stained City, which is the first in a new trilogy called Bring Down Heaven.

Cover designed by Lauren Panepinto

Sam recently said on his blog that he doesn’t ‘really get emotionally invested in cover art’, but admitted that he ‘like[s] hooded men. Hooded anyone, really: men, women, some with swords, some with magical spells, some fighting things.’ Well, he may not have a hood, but he has a badass cloak and that blade has him looking like he is ready to fight something… or at least stealthily slide it into someone’s ribcage. Either way, I’m willing to bet that he is pretty pleased with it. Who wouldn’t be? It actually reminds me a lot of The Path of Anger‘s cover, which was one of my favourite covers of 2013 and that just, today, ended up being longlisted for a David Gemmell award… perhaps a good omen then?

Here’s what Sam had to say about what’s in store for readers who are anticipating The City Stained Red. Be sure to pick it up in the late summer / early autumn:

The City Stained Red is the first chapter in my new trilogy, Bring Down Heaven. Set against the city of Cier’Djaal, economic powerhouse of the world whose horse-sized spiders produce the silk that every nation craves, it is a tale of collapse.

It is the story of how the morals of a society collapse before pragmatism, revolutionary cultists crowing the name of their god in hell as they throw themselves at the organized dynasty of assassins and thieves that have run the city since it began.

It is the story of how the ideas of harmony collapse before ideas of independence, with several races, human and monstrous, set upon a tiny spit of land and given just so many resources to share it and seeing how long it takes for one of them to pick up a knife.

It is the story of how gods collapse before mortals, when god cannot save a man languishing in the shadow of his wealthy neighbors and he finds himself putting aside prayer and picking up a blade.

It is the story of how things change between six people when they find themselves standing at the center of a field full of corpses and wondering just how the hell it happened that they can’t let go of the sword in their hands.

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