Cover reveal for DESTINY, REWRITTEN!

Illustrated by Erwin Madrid

the book jacket

I'm entirely delighted to reveal the cover of my third novel for middle grade readers, entitled, DESTINY, REWRITTEN, which will be released March 1, 2013, from HarperCollins.  Molly O’Neill is the editor.  I am so fortunate to have worked with her on this book because Molly is one of those editors who somehow knows the exact thing a manuscript needs but has not yet been put into words.  Her suggestions are often perfect, and she has a gentle way of making it seem as if the (perfect) idea was mine all along! 

The brilliant book designers were Joel Tippie and Amy Ryan.  They made the book jacket look a bit roughed/scratched up, as if it has been sitting on a shelf in a used bookstore somewhere.  (There is a very good reason they did this, you’ll see why when you read the book.)

The illustrator, of course, is the wonderful Erwin Madrid.  You can find his website here: http://www.erwinmadrid.com/ www.erwinmadrid.com

Mr. Madrid also illustrated the paperback cover of THE YEAR THE SWALLOWS CAME EARLY.  I couldn’t be happier with the DESTINY, REWRITTEN cover.  It’s ideal and completely captures Emily’s quest. 

For my twentieth birthday, my grandmother, who was a science fiction author, gave me a copy of THE COMPLETE POEMS OF EMILY DICKISON.  Inside the front cover, she wrote, E.D. is a revered poet.  Perhaps the same will be said of you one day.  The inscription was the starting point for this story.  Several days after she passed away, I made a copy of that page and hung it in my home office.  With its fancy handwriting and loving words of hope, it is almost like having her here, but not quite. 

Writing a book about destiny has a way of making one think about the choices that have been made, and about all of the people who have helped along the way.  Do we make our own destiny?  Or is it preset?  You will get a thousand different answers to this question depending on whom you ask.

And in case you’re wondering what this book is about, here is the flap copy:

Des·tin·y: |destinē/

(noun) The hidden power believed to control what will happen in the future; fate.

Eleven-year-old Emily Elizabeth Davis has been told for her entire life that her destiny is to become a poet, just like her famous namesake, Emily Dickinson. But Emily doesn’t even really like poetry, and she has a secret career ambition that she suspects her English-professor mother will frown on. Then a seeming tragedy strikes: just after discovering that it contains an important family secret, she accidentally loses the special copy of Emily Dickinson’s poetry that was given to her at birth. As Emily and her friends search for the lost book in used bookstores and thrift shops all across town, Emily’s understanding of destiny begins to unravel and then rewrite itself in a marvelous new way.

 In her third novel, Kathryn Fitzmaurice again weaves a richly textured and delightful story about unexpected connections, about the ways that friends can help us see ourselves for who we truly are, and about the most perfect kinds of happy endings: those that happen just on time.

Thank you to everyone who worked on the book at HarperCollins, most especially, Molly.