Michael’s an old friend—and we had some time to hang out. Our panel together was “Starting Out Together”, which we did—my first novel and one of his first covers. We helped each other out—me with what proved a popular series, and him, providing a killer cover…
Gate of Ivrel happened to be the book, and the cover.
It’s good to see him and Audrey again. Patty and Mike Briggs are there, Maggie Bonham, John Dalmas, Tanya Huff, lots of very down-to-earth nice folk who also happen to be pros in this business, the great plus of going to cons—friends you don’t get to see often enough.
Silly program makes the whole post a link, but the link does work. He’s doing some wonderful things—wish you had a chance to be there to hear Michael explain how he does what he does and why he does it. Such beautiful stuff.
Nice! Brings back a lot of happy memories. 🙂
Looking through his work made me realise that his covers grace the works of some of my favourite authors.
Seeing his work up close—there are so many details that just don’t make it into clarity on the covers, like the little cluster of stsho in the background where the hani and the kif are coming down the steps.
Michael’s work, as wonderful as it is on a cover, is even more amazing, intricate, and more beautiful up close.
One example: THE WILDING: the woman’s irises (eyes) are not round. Look closely and they have subtle little “notches”. To hear Michael explain how he imbues his paintings with symbolism…wow.
THE FOUNDATION: the elongated mushroom shape of the towers rising in the background was probably influenced by footage he had on TV at the time about Hiroshima & Nagasaki’s bombings.
http://www.glassonion.com/catalog/collectiondetail.php?products_id=90&title=HARI+%3Cbr%3E%3Ci%3E%28Foundation%29%3C%2Fi%3E&cat_id=&osCsid=c823ee9ad3ec74e47dd230ccd74438ff
That striking cover by Whelan is what drew my attention to “Gate of Ivrel” when it was first published way back when. I also recall seeing his cover of “Little Fuzzy” and buying it and loving it and then reading the rest of H.Beam Piper’s work. I later saw the original covers from when the Fuzzy books were first published and realized I’d seen them but passed over the books as the covers didn’t do the novels justice (which is a great pity in light of what happened to Piper). I bet Whelan contributed to the success of many first time authors with his wonderful artwork.
You aren’t kidding. A lot of writers owe Michael bigtime. And he and Audrey are world-class nice people. Success has never made them anything they weren’t before.
And Tully is Michael, “haggard.”
http://www.michaelwhelan.com/catalog/collectiondetail.php?products_id=294&title=PRIDE+OF+CHANUR&cat_id=
^always wondered about the resemblance. I scored a copy of the print on ebay several years ago, need to pack it up and sent it to CJ to get an autograph.
ooooh, I never saw his cover for Chanur’s homecoming – wonderful image of Jik which cures me of thinking of the Mahendo’sat as slightly less woolly Wookies! my copy of Homecoming has a Mick Posen cover with Pyanfar standing unprotected on what seems to be an open-to-space dock … with stars in the background .. 🙁
Love the slideshows on Michael’s website. I didn’t realize he did so much I recognized – the 2010 “child,” and Pern covers. I wish I could have been there at the Con!
I know this is a bit late, but Michael also did the cover for 2010: Odyssey Two