Art Director: Heather Dean Brewer
Designer: Heather Dean Brewer
About the book: Real, raw, and achingly honest, A Glorious Dark meets readers in the ambiguity, doubt, and uncertainty we feel when our beliefs about the world don't match up to reality. Tackling tough questions like Why is faith so hard? Why do I doubt? Why does God allow me to suffer? and Is God really with me in the midst of my pain? A. J. Swoboda puts into sharp focus a faith that is greater than our personal comfort or fulfilment. He invites readers to develop a faith that embraces the tension between what we believe and what we experience, showing that the very tension we seek to eliminate is where God meets us.
Design inspired by the excerpt:
“I sometimes see my faith a little like that dead, frozen river in my backyard. Often, I still hear my dad tell me about the cold, hidden mysterious water rushing below. Then hope sails into my little harbor. No matter how dark the river may look or how cold and frozen it may get, with the Bearer of Life, there is always resurrection flowing down below. We just have to learn how to see it.”
“I sometimes see my faith a little like that dead, frozen river in my backyard. Often, I still hear my dad tell me about the cold, hidden mysterious water rushing below. Then hope sails into my little harbor. No matter how dark the river may look or how cold and frozen it may get, with the Bearer of Life, there is always resurrection flowing down below. We just have to learn how to see it.”
Here are two of the early comps in the process. You can see in the comp on the right that the design was originally black and white. I added a color wash to the final design to add dimension and interest. As the book says, even in the dark there is movement and hope--the color is there to represent that promise.
