We’re excited to share the cover for the UK edition of V.E. Schwab’s A Conjuring of Light—the final book in the Shades of Magic series publishes February 2017, available from Titan Books in the UK and Tor Books in the US.
What are you waiting for? Check out the full cover below!
Designer Julia Lloyd had this to say about working on the series:
When I began working on the first title in this fantasy trilogy in August 2014, I knew we had to go a similar route to the cover for Vicious (V.E. Schwab’s first novel for Titan Books). So, a very graphic, commercial approach was required. This series, however, is very different to Vicious… A Darker Shade of Magic needed to have it’s own identity and one that could carry over the three books.
The colours, which for me normally come later in the thought process, are from the books themselves, so in a way V.E. Schwab had already done that part for me! The four different Londons are red, black, grey and white, visually a very strong colour combination.
The concept which now appears across the covers came about by wanting to do something a little different with the title type. This series needed something to set it apart, so, rather than placing the type either top or bottom of the cover, I decided to give the title the space it deserved… words like that need an appropriate frame. I wanted a figure to be this frame. The characters are strong and it was obvious that they had to take centre stage.
Next step in the thought process was getting across the travel aspect of the four Londons and to how to add movement. I envisaged the character walking towards the reader, stepping across the parallel universes with the swishing of the cape adding shape and colour. With each book, I could see a different character, with a different shape of cape, walking over a rotating set of four Londons.
A Conjuring of Light publishes February 2017—read an excerpt at EW. From the catalog copy:
Londons fall and kingdoms rise while darkness sweeps the Maresh Empire—and the fraught balance of magic blossoms into dangerous territory while heroes and foes struggle alike. The direct sequel to A Gathering of Shadows, and the final book in the Shades of Magic epic fantasy series, A Conjuring of Light sees Schwab reach a thrilling culmination concerning the fate of beloved protagonists—and old enemies.
