I’m delighted to show off our cover visuals for Shattered Minds by Laura Lam—and it’s rather “eye-catching” don’t you think?! (Sorry readers!) Our talented in-house designer Neil Lang worked on the cover, and we think he’s done a terrific job.
We wanted to go simple here, with a central iconic image as per False Hearts—Laura’s thrilling adult debut which was set in the same world. There was plenty of symbolism to choose from in her new book, as a bee, a rose, a thorn, a drop of blood, and two heterochromic eyes are featured. But I always love an eye on a cover—it really draws the reader into the design. And in this case, the eye is so relevant to the plot.
Shattered Minds stars a female ‘Dexter’ with a drug problem and a conscience, who experiences a vision of a young victim of an experimental procedure gone badly wrong. Our tormented protagonist, Carina, comes to realize this vision has been planted in her mind—coded within it by her ex-colleague Mark in an effort to expose the darker side of Sudice Inc.’s medical program. If she can unlock the symbols Mark has placed in her mind, she may uncover the truth—if she lives to tell the tale. The eye pictured on both the US and UK covers features heavily among these symbols, and also represents the book’s larger theme of identity in a high-technology society.
Shattered Minds publishes June 2017 with Tor Books and Tor Books UK. Here’s a bit more about the plot:
She’ll fight corruption, but can she save others from herself?
Former neuro-scientist Carina craves killing. But to protect others, she self-medicates with Zeal, an addictive drug which allows her to satisfy these urges in dreams. Sudice Inc. damaged her mind when she worked on their secretive brain-mapping project—and this violence is the price she pays.
Carina wants to be left alone to self-destruct, until an ex-colleague passes her dangerous information on Sudice. She finds herself unwillingly drawn into a plot involving illegal experiments on unwilling volunteers, blackmail and assassination.
As Carina races to stop Sudice, she needs the incriminating data Mark locked in her mind. She persuades a band of hackers to decrypt her broken memories. One is a former doctor, Dax, who helps Carina fight her addiction to Zeal. If she can hold on to her humanity, they might have a future together. But all shall be for nothing if they can’t bring their enemy down, never to rise again.
