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Make a Book Cover

Turn any story - real or made up - into a real book cover with a title the AI spells right.

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    01

    Name your book

    Every book cover starts with a name. It can be a real book you love, or one you make up right now.

    Keep it short and punchy. Big feelings in a few words always win.

    Type the exact title you want on the cover. Spelling counts - the AI will copy it letter for letter.

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    02

    Sign it with an author name

    Every cover has an author - the person who wrote it. That can be you!

    Use your real name, or make up a cool pen name. A pen name is a pretend author name.

    Type the author name exactly how you want it spelled on the cover.

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    03

    Pick the kind of story

    The kind of story is called the genre. Think spooky, funny, space, magic, mystery, or sports.

    The genre tells the cover how to feel before anyone reads a single word.

    Type what kind of story your book is.

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    04

    Choose ONE big picture

    Cover rule number one: one big image, not ten tiny ones. A single strong picture grabs eyes from across a room.

    Pick the one thing that matters most in your story - an object, a place, or a character.

    Type the one big picture you want filling the whole cover.

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    05

    Match the mood

    Cover rule number two: the mood must match the story. A funny book should not look scary, and a scary book should not look silly.

    Mood is the feeling you get just from looking. Cozy? Creepy? Brave? Dreamy?

    Type the mood your cover should give off.

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    06

    Pick your colors

    Colors carry mood. Dark blues feel spooky. Bright yellows feel happy. Soft pinks feel gentle.

    Pick two colors that match your mood. Two is plenty - too many colors turn to mush.

    Type your two cover colors.

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    07

    Make the title easy to read

    Cover rule number three: a clear title. If a reader cannot read it fast, the cover fails.

    Now describe how the letters should look. Tall and bold? Round and soft? Cracked and glowing?

    Type how you want your title letters to look.

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    08

    Choose a drawing style

    The art style is how the picture is drawn. Painted? Cartoon? Photo-real? Pixel? Papercut?

    Pick one style and stick with it. One style keeps the whole cover looking like one book.

    Type the art style you want.

  9. Finish the step above first
    09

    Open Ideogram and test the spelling

    Time to meet your tool. Ideogram is an AI image maker that can actually spell words inside a picture. Most image tools cannot do that.

    First a quick spelling test. Copy the prompt below, paste it into Ideogram, and press generate.

    Check that your title comes out spelled exactly right. If a letter is wrong, just try again - that is normal.

    what will really happen

    Ideogram spells better than most image tools, but it still botches a letter sometimes.

    You may need to generate 2 or 3 times before the title comes out clean.

    It gives you several images per try, so pick the best - do not expect the first to be it.

    Open Ideogram (new tab)
    A plain test poster on a simple flat background. Spell this word in big, bold, [letters], perfectly centered and easy to read: [title]. Every letter must be clear and spelled exactly right, with no extra words.
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    10

    Build your full cover prompt

    Now snap all your choices together into one powerful prompt. This is the real thing - a full book-cover recipe.

    The page fills in your title, author, image, mood, colors, letters, and style below.

    Read it once. Every word is a choice you made, not slop from a machine.

    Do the steps above and your Your full book-cover prompt shows up here.
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    11

    Make your cover in Ideogram

    Copy your full cover prompt from the step above. Paste it into Ideogram and hit generate.

    Look at the result with cover eyes. Is there one big image? Can you read the title fast? Does the mood match the story?

    If something is off, change just one word in your prompt and try again. Small tweaks, big wins.

    Open Ideogram (new tab)
    hold on - judge it, do not celebrate
    • Is this the cover you pictured, or just the first thing Ideogram gave you?
    • What is the ONE part that feels generic - the image, the mood, or the letters?
    • What would you change to make it more YOURS?

    Did you try more than one version, or keep the first?

  12. Finish the step above first
    12

    Show off your cover

    You did it - a real book cover that is 100 percent yours.

    Save your favorite version and give it a proud look. You designed that.

    Share your cover with #Glunty on the class wall so everyone can see the book only you could dream up.

The class wall - share yours

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Your Cover Is On the Shelf!

You did not pull the lever for random slop - you brought your own title, your own big image, and your own mood, so this cover is truly yours. Now go write the story that belongs behind it, or design a cover for a book you already love.

Embedded tool from glunty.com