The good ol’ author pic is the ire of almost all authors. Often found on the back sleeve of a book, it’s easy to see why the common author treats their back-of-the-book pic with general disdain. There’s a reason movie directors don’t flash their portaits onto the big screen at the end of their movies. I mean, would the final scene of Thelma & Louise have the same impact if it was followed by this?
But to undigress (not an official word) my label mate at Hardie Grant Egmont, author Chris Morphew, recently blogged about his own author pics and proceeded to label one of my author pics as a ‘Classic Mope’.
I think he’s probably right. Some other favourite classic author poses include:
The Guru Pose.
The ‘I’m so doey-eyed how could you not believe me?’ Pose.
And the ‘I signed a movie contract and hired a stylist” Pose.
If a classic author pose cannot be struck the next best way to show yourself as an author is to turn the author photo black and white.
Nothing says ‘author’ more than grayscaling the author pic.
And here’s my label-mate Chris Morphew author-ised.
Although I guess there are some people who are just never going to look like authors.
Nice writing style. I look forward to reading more in the future.
Some authors have no pic on their book jackets for a reason. Robert Drewe, for example, looks like an egg. ‘The Mope’ works well for you. I think I go for the ‘doey-eyed’ with added ‘over the glasses’ mystery.
I like to call yours `Soulful Puppy’, or `Take-me-home-and-feed-me.’