Yes, I meant better in terms of layout and coherence. But, yes, I agree if this is a thriller then it needs more drama. At the moment, I read it more as the contemplative memoirs of an ex-navy seal.
Thanks. I’m working on it.
Gotcha.
I’ll be back with more drama. Thanks.
I just realized I never shared the book’s back cover blurb.
Does this version of the cover say “thriller”? Does it fit the blurb? Thanks.
The US president’s seven-year-old nephew has been kidnapped. The nation is horrified, but the crime turns out to be just the break that disgraced former Navy SEALs Shelby Ryder and Earl Bernstein need. If they’re able to rescue the boy, who’s being held somewhere in the Florida Everglades, the president assures them he’ll restore their SEAL trident pins. But something’s not right. Support people don’t show. Others won’t reveal their real names. Many seem more mercenary than military. Shelby and Earl are suspicious, but they’re desperate to be SEALs again, and there’s a boy out there in need of rescue. And so, into the depths of the humid, alligator-infested Everglades they go, to start a mission they were never intended to survive.
I’m no gun expert, but that rifle appears to be an AK-47 rather than an M16. Check your time period and body text for accuracy.
Yes, it matters.
@Tag I’m not saying to copy others, but a google search of “navy seal books” shows books that usually use the Navy Seal insignia on them. A lot of blue and gold, a lot of high contrast images. It might be a good starting point to see what works and what doesn’t.
If I didn’t read your outline, I would never have gotten that its about navy seals or Florida from the cover art. I see a field and a guy with a gun… is he protecting his land…?
I also think the title should be above the authors name.
Do you want them to draw a picture of the state of Florida and put a Navy Seal Logo on the guy’s shirt?
Or does the illustration on the cover have to illustrate “Betrayed Heroes”?
Doubtful that silhouette is a Navy Seal. Little outta shape and carrying an AK? Hmmmm…dunno. Depends on what the story is actually about.
Very doubtful.
He looks a lot more like a rural American gun rights zealot than anyone prepared for battle of any kind, let alone a “hero”.
Right again. That is surely not a soldier’s weapon.
Yeah, the photo just doesn’t match up with the title. Instead, the silhouette looks more like a slightly overweight, 30 or 40-year-old gun rights guy in a t-shirt who’s forgotten his military basic training on how to properly hold a rifle. The only thing missing is his baseball cap. There’s just not enough implied heroism or professionalism in the photo.
In the word BETRAYED, the A and Y need to be moved closer together. I’d also pull the edges of that word away from the edges of the book a little bit and tighten up the leading between the two lines.
That’s (the blue and gold) is what I tried to do originally. I believe you need authorization from the Dept. of the Navy to use the SEAL trident logo.
Yep. I see what you’re saying. I’ll keep searching for a concept that conveys both. A part of the difficulty is that the book isn’t a slam-bang Navy SEAL thriller, so no explosions, no SEALs in tactical gear etc.
Well, here’s the blurb again. (That’s my story.)
@Just-B
I’ll be back with another. (This one is FUBAR.)
@Tag I’m not sure if you need approval to use the insignia or not. This is a screenshot of a google image search for Navy Seals Book and you can see that easily 90% use the insignia.
Off topic … but I must say … I had no idea there was such a vast library of Navy Seal genre books. 
… and I see a few middle aged, dad bod’s in that list lol 
An AK-47 is indeed a soldier’s weapon. You can drag those rifles through the mud and they would still work. They were used extensively in Vietnam by some US forces lucky enough to find them. That’s why I said, check your story and your time period. A SEAL could very well have had such a weapon while in the military and especially in Vietnam. But that isn’t the case here.
Today, fully automatic AK-47s require a special license to own in the US (getting a machine gun permit is next to impossible and the pricetag on legal-date, operable machine guns can be well north of $10,000.)
Any criminal offense, military or civilian, would make owning any firearm illegal in the US. But that detail might be overlooked in fiction. Might depend on how your SEALs were disgraced or if the author cares.
Thanks Craig. That was helpful. Yes, the trident but that also makes it easy to see the blue and gold connection.
@Kat LOL
@PrintDriver Thanks for the details on that.
Being a non-vet someone told me: “Whatever details you try to present will probably be wrong, so be vague.”
Of course you can’t be totally vague but I think there’s a lot to what he said.
I’m not a vet either. But I hang around with quite a number of them a lot these days. Mostly Vietnam-era guys.
This one is much better than the first concept. You should look more into how the water reacts with the wind produced by the helicopter. Here it looks like the helicopter is dropping water.
Kind of ironic American armed forces using Soviet weapon.