EPIC Cover

I'm usually terrible at entering competitions—too clueless to know about them, and lazy to do something about the few I know—but for once got my shit together enough to enter a couple of my cover designs to EPIC. One of them was chosen to be a finalist. This is the full print version of the cover:

The book's not m/m but straight-up mystery. Most of the covers I design are not even romance, and I like the variety. The concept came from the author, as it's generally the case. It has more individual elements than any cover I've done so far. This is where it begun:

Yes, it was a bit of work putting it all together. :P

Wednesday Word: Propinquity

propinquity |prəˈpiNGkwətē| noun1 the state of being close to someone or something; proximity: he kept his distance as though afraid propinquity might lead him into temptation.2 technical close kinship.ORIGIN late Middle English: from Old French propinquité, from Latin propinquitas, from propinquus ‘near,’ from prope ‘near to.’
I acquired this word curtesy of P.G. Wodehouse. Propinquity, desired and otherwise, is a major theme of his books. And pigs.

Characters in British books have such great names. Like Gussy Fink-Nottle. American books suffer from a shortage of Fink-Nottles and the like. Somebody much more assiduous than me could do a scholarly research about the relationship between national character and naming of fictional characters. I've often wondered how Terry Pratchett named the denizens of Discworld.