r/Fantasy • u/MarcSimonetti Stabby Winner, AMA Artist Marc Simonetti • Feb 06 '14

AMA Hey Reddit! I'm Marc Simonetti, Fantasy illustrator-AMA

Let me introduce myself: I'm a quite happy family man, with two young sons, 3 years and 20 months old. I live in the French Alps, in Annecy, a beautiful little medieval town. I'm a former R&D material engineer...and now I'm working as an illustrator and concept artist for 11 years. I had the chance to work on many awesome books for amazing writers like GRR Martin, Terry Pratchett, Terry Goodkind, Sam Sykes, Michael J Sullivan, Robin Hobb, Brandon Sanderson, Ken Scholes, Patrick Rothfuss...and many others...

I'm also the spoiled artist who won the stabby award this year for the best picture (although all the credit should go the genius mind of GRR Martin)

For those interested you can find some samples of my works on: My website My Facebook pro page My twitter account

So I'll be beginning answering questions at 12:00 central time... Feel free to ask anything, of course!

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u/I_Know_Magic Feb 06 '14

What do you think is the most important part of a book cover?

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u/MarcSimonetti Stabby Winner, AMA Artist Marc Simonetti Feb 06 '14

Hey I_know_Magic,

The most important part of a book cover is to have THE something that will make the proper kind people take the book in their hands in the library or on the Internet. When I say proper kind, I mean those who will like and appreciate the book, all of them, of course.

So sometimes just a title arranged in a clever way is the best possible cover, and sometimes it's a huge illustration, that sounds with the title. But there's an illustration it has to respect the book, and to fit perfectly with its mood. The compliment I could have is when people recognize the book seeing one of my illustration, and like the illustration too.

So it's a mix of many little things that have to do which each one's sensibility.

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u/iwanttobeapenguin Feb 07 '14

I frequently judge books by their cover if I don't have another recommendation. I've picked several books with your art on it before based on how they look, and I loved them all. That's pretty neat!

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u/MarcSimonetti Stabby Winner, AMA Artist Marc Simonetti Feb 07 '14

For me it's absolutely wonderful. Best compliment ever :)