Sneak Peak at One of the First Official Illustrations

The Legend of the Twelve Gems will be an illustrated series. I personally believe that illustrations engage the reader in a way that the written word cannot. In an essence, illustrations are a piece of writing in themselves because they can add a great deal of visual information to the story. As the saying goes, "A picture is worth a thousand words."

Here is the very first completed illustration, depicting one of the Gems (I'll leave her unnamed for the moment) being comforted by a Swarla, one of the beautiful, fantastical creatures that roam the world of Nocrist. They are seated on one of the balconies of the many livable trees in the Swarla community, those of which can be seen in the background. This illustration still lacks stars in the sky which will be added later digitally, so this is a very raw version.

I drew this illustration myself under a different name, using charcoal and ebony. The higher quality version will appear in the published book.
Hope you like it!