New Look

Posted on by scott

No, you’re not going insane . . . This is my blog’s amazing new look!

Because we all know that the old look was lame. It was one of those generic WordPress templates, which somehow seemed cool back in the ancient days of last year when I picked it. But it was lame and blue and not befitting.

This new template rocks, though. (Thanks, Justine!)

But what is that image at the top? Well, it’s a tiny fraction of the new cover for Peeps. You see, when Peeps comes out in paperback, it’s going to be wearing a new look too. One that goes better with the semi-secret The Last Days cover that you haven’t seen yet.

It’s all very complicated. Just repeat after me: “Everything’s getting slightly better all the time.”

And speaking of The Last Days, you can order it right now on Amazon. You will receive it September 7, or perhaps sooner in that myserious way of book release dates.

That’s it, except that Specials is holding at number 9 on the NYT Children’s Chapterbook list. Let the w00ting continue!

I know it’s a bit shakey and uneven right now, but it will be lovely soon.

97 thoughts on “New Look”

  1. i’m very glad to know i’m not going crazy. 😀

    i like it a lot! the eyes are wonderfully creepy……

  2. COOL!AWESOME new look Scott, I think orangedragonfly could have done with a warning though 😉 heheh… HEY, Last Days comes out in September?! YEAH!!! long time, but less time than I thought, so YEAH!

  3. much better – wow justine has a sence of design – who would have thought 😉 – need to fix up the book images over lapping the border

  4. september 7, just before my birthday. i’ll pre-order it as a birthday present to myself. 😀 i’m so so so excited that that there is a sequal (or companion or whatever) to peeps. yay!! i can’t wait to see what the cover art looks like……….

  6. ‘Tis good, methinks. I gonna need to buy the paperback, my copy exploded on a school trip. It fell in a lake.

  7. Niki: I still have no design skills. I simply found a template (or rather had Chris McLaren find one for me) that I could figure out how to tweak. This one is called Relaxation 3 and is by Clemens Orth. Thank you, Chris (and Clemens)!

    I’m too tired to do anymore tweaking. The book images will just have to keep overlapping for awhile.

  10. Hey, great new look. It’s killing me that not only do we have to wait till September for Last Days (c’mon Scott, you really could have pulled that graduation sneak peek through for me…) but we don’t know what the cover looks like either! Do we have to wait until that fateful September morning to know more?

    -Hannah

  11. I seriously thought I had the wrong site. Woah, it’s so different… and yeah. It’s awesome though, just going to be an adjustment.

  12. I totally love the new look!

    Seriously, i was hating that you are such a great writer with such an unorignal blog face. That and standard templates suck.

    Much better now.

    -jess

    p.s. i just finished specials and it rocked!

  14. Ohhh I’m really glad there’s going to be a sequel to Peeps. You kinda just left us hanging. And I really liked the book and wanted to find out what was going to happen with the “new” strand of virus. Love the layout by the way.

    ~breana

  15. Layout is amazing, thanks Justine for fixing your husbands lame layout *sorry scott, its the truth that none of us wanted to tell you* its true, behind every great man there is an even greater woman saving their sorry behind! lol sorry scott, us women have to stay together, no matter how awsome you are. ^.^

  16. Breana: Actually it’s not really a sequel, from the way Scott’s described it, it’s more of a…companion prequel sort of book. Zombie apocalypse, all that good stuff.

  18. w00ting still going on, and still waiting on the news and W0W nice flippin page now. I like the change. I feel like i want to pay attention and post more now for some odd reason?

  19. rob, it’s those freaky eyes at the top of the page. they’re actually hypnotizing you, saying over and over in your brain “post more, post more, post more…”

    hee hee

  21. can’t wait to see the whole cover. and the last days, too! argh, i’m not good at waiting.

  22. i love those eyes they are magnetic, they kinda hypnotize me……whoa. that is sooo cool. i think the brown eye is my fav

  23. “Everything’s getting slightly better all the time.”
    That really helped. 😀

    I like this new look. ‘Tis good.

  24. Or are you going to take it down after everyone has said how much they like it and then be like “What new look? I think you guys are going crazy…”

  26. Hey scott, did u know that if you go on google, and search for scott westerfeld that on the first page there is a picture of you “flipping the bird”? lol, i know its random, but i just thought u should know if you didnt. lol. ^.^

  27. o and if u search for justine her pic is on the second page of google (again, flipping off the camera) what was happening at that convention? lol

  28. Glad you guys like the look. Thanks again to Justine.

    Ah yes, the fanous bird-flipping event. It was the 2003 World Science Convention in Toronto, and it was a bit late and we’d all been schmoozing at the bar. Scott Edelman (a scifi.com guy) foolishly handed his camera to his boss while he stepped away to make a phone call. So in highly mature and writerly fashion, his boss took pictures of numerous sf writers, editors, and publishers doing what you see in these pictures:

    http://www.scottedelman.com/worldcon2003_2.html

    Let this be a lesson to you all: The internet never forgets!

  31. Is it sad that I feel like buying the paperback Peeps, even though I already have the hardback, just so that I can have that picture?

    More importantly, do I care if it’s sad?

  33. Did you ever get the feeling that you were being watched? 🙂 Excellent new layout. That does Peeps justice. I like the cat-esque blue eye on the left the best.

    I received a text message from a friend and, based on the content, knew immediately that he was done reading BLUE NOON. (Aw, he cried.)

  34. Wow, yes, very awesome new layout! Though I didn’t really mind the unoriginal one either, it was just kind of “you”. Good job to Justine and “helpers” for making it.

    Well, as for Specials, I’m not surprised. It’s been a very anticipated book, after all.

  35. Wow.
    the layout is so different!! but i totally love the eyes at the top, and i agree, the blue eyes are the best!! and i am sooo ordering the last days.
    btw, is it like another one in new york, or is it like actaully a sequel to peeps with the same characters and parasite positive people??

    either way i now it will rock so yah

  36. i really like it, but i keep jumping when i load the blog, im soooo used to the other type, lol. but erally i think its awsome.

  39. “Did you ever get the feeling that you were being watched?” -Little Willow, heheh, I think Scott has a thing with trying to make you feel like you’re being watched, I had to take my Specials cover because Tally was staring at me while I read. And I think Tally’s eye is on the spine of Uglies too… so it peeks out at me from my bookshelf lol.
    And uh, “someone”, Specials is already out, and it ROCKED, best of the three

  40. mi gusta!
    i like how there are little numbers on the comment boxes.
    very snart kuje!

    to someone: its already out! yaya!!!

    also just finished specials,
    took me a few hours in which i laughed and cried. extremely icy scott!!!
    oh and to just let you know,
    you were my first entry in my book lust! yay!
    And if you don’t know,
    book lust is this nitto (who says that anymore?) little journal about books.
    you should totally get one, only $2.98!
    http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1570614539/qid=1149281742/sr=2-3/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_3/102-2448089-2264114?s=books&v=glance&n=283155
    ^go there!

  41. rhe face on the cover for peeps looks awesome….it has a sense of mystery in it…..
    kool!

  42. WHOA! It changed magically before my eyes! The image at the top is definitely my favorite part. I really want to go buy the paperback copy now.

    “it’s those freaky eyes at the top of the page. they’re actually hypnotizing you, saying over and over in your brain ‘post more, post more, post more…'”
    Hahahahahahaha, like I needed that….

    “Let this be a lesson to you all: The internet never forgets!”
    Oh. That kind of flipping the bird. As opposed to the other kind. Dude, that is so going in my bookmarks for whenever I need a good laugh.

    “I had to take my Specials cover because Tally was staring at me while I read.”
    Yeah, me too. Because her other eye was staring at me from the inside flap while I read and I kept getting startled. 😛

  45. That Book Lust thing looks kinda cool, I have sooooooooo many books I haven’t finished, usually feel sad when I finish a book too, don’t usually think to write about that though *shrugs* might be a good idea though. Just finished a book by Isabel Allede, Daughter of Fortune, and now I keep on going up to my room looking for it thinking “I have to finish this” but of course, I’ve already finished it, weird… 🙁
    heh, did I mention I like the eye coloring of the Peeps people? Because everything else is kinda brown in the pictures, but the eyes are bright, I like that kinda stuff, even though it’s kind of a creepy little girl in red Shindler’s List kinda thing… still cool though lol

  46. Pretty! I love the new look. The eyes are so cool…Except for when I first saw them and was like “what?! what is this?!” and then I saw the words “new look” and understood. Then I decided I wanted eyes like the brown ones. They are awesome! The new cover of Peeps looks really cool, I bet.

    “I had to take my Specials cover because Tally was staring at me while I read.”
    – Yes, that was kind of strange. I kept the cover on because I was afraid I’d loose it. But my friend saw the cover-flap as I was reading and was like “that is weird. that eye is weird. is that supposed to be tally? thats werid…” She thought the whole eye was black, because the pages covered up the non-iris part of the eye.

    “Specials is holding at number 9 on the NYT Children’s Chapterbook list. Let the w00ting continue!”
    – woot! :] Yay Specials!

  47. i like book lists. or books lusts. whatever. whenever i run out of new books to read and mom wont me take me to the library i either play the sims for several hours or look at lists of books and write down ones i want to read later. right now i’m reading the rather disturbing biography of Jack the Ripper (serial killer in the late 1800’s). its called..Portrait of a Killer, by Patricia Cornwell. sometimes its nice to take a step out of my usual genre. ilove sf and fantasy best, i think i always will, but i read a lot of different stuff. i think everyone should, youd be surprised how much interesting stuff is out there.

  49. WOW! mucho better! i like it alot. thing are getting better all the time. and school is almost out ( for me) only 12 more days. thank god. freshman year sucked!

  50. huh, does anyone think this looks kinda Halloweenish? just thought of that… (sorry if I ruined the look, but it’s a GOOD thing! Like Samhain… ha, like in Midnighters!)

  51. Hmm, I wouldn’t use Halloweenish to describe it, though it is pretty sf and scary-ish looking. I like it. =P

  52. ok i obviously dont have a life, cause like i have been staring at the eyes for like 10 minutes and something is bugging me about them. Well its really tiny but like i, having no life, noticed it. The glare reflecting off the lights is from like 3 different directions, like on the blue eye, it comes fromg the right, while the browns comes from the left, and the green well its farther away but its more dead on….just an observation

  53. Korbe, you have the designer’s eye. 🙂 But you could say that there’s several different sources of light. Although then, should the eyes have two reflections? I dunno. Interesting.

  55. whoo, new look, it looks really cool scott!
    the comments are even numbered! awsome. go #55!

  56. Oh yeah. I was gonna ask, what does registering to your blog DO? Like, email us when you update or something?

  57. Yeah, the blog registration thing just pops up automatically, so I left it there. All it does is put you on my mailing list. Of course, if you’ve written me any email directly, you’re already there.

    And choosing a password? That doesn’t do anything, except give you one more password to remember.

    Yes, the eyes are cat’s eyes (peeps eyes, really), except for Cal. I suppose the two girls are Morgan, in back, and Sarah. And on the lighting front: I added the lens flare in Cal’s eye, because I wanted it to be shinier.

    I’ll post the whole thing soon. Like, when I have nothing else interesting to post about.

  58. two of my cats (i have three) have blue eyes–they’re siamese. they aren’t that bright, creepy blue…….but they’re still beautiful!!

  62. Cool Website. Hard to see the leave a reply signal…i want specails so badly…i wonder if they have it at the library? Same with Magic Or Madness? Intrestng…

  65. Hey!
    Well, I just started reading the Ugly Trilogy in late May. I couldn’t stop reading Uglies. It was soooooo goood. Then I went to my little towns Hastings and they didn’t have Pretties. I was so mad. I couldn’t stand to wait for them to order it in and all and I had to know what happened next. (What a cliff hanger by the way! :D) So, I went to the Hastings in a nearby town and bought Pretties. It took me about a day to read it because I had to do chores and that sort of junk that teenagers have to do. So I finished Pretties and I had mixed emotions. I wanted to finish the trilogy of course but I didn’t know where you were going with it. So I bought Specials. I got home at about 10:30 that night and finished it at 2:32 in the morning. I couldn’t put it down. I didn’t want to go to sleep cause then I wouldn’t know how everything turned out. Then at one point in the book I put it down. I couldn’t believe that you just wrote what had happened. I seore I wouldn’t read the rest but within the minute i was reading again. You are a very talented writer. I can’t wait to read some of your other books. I really hope that you will possibly make another book but then it would no longer be a trilogy would it? Oh well. Well thanks for taking time to read this extreamly long post.
    Sara

  66. i highly suggest the midnighters trilogy Sara Bell, i absolutely loved it, and so yesterday, and peeps! they are the best books EVER! i hope you enjoy them! ^.^

  67. i think i’ve decided that peeps is my very favorite of scott’s books. (that may change someday, of course. and that doesn’t mean i didn’t love them all!!) there was, however, one line in so yesterday that made me laugh so hard i literally fell off the couch from laughter. i was laughing like a loon in a loon factory. i seriously think i laughed for upwards of five minutes. and i don’t think any other line from any other book (or movie, or anything) has ever done that before. (in retrospect, it probably wasn’t *that* funny. i could have hurt myself. but i still laugh just thinking about it, so…kudos for the funny!)

  68. you know, it’s probably a good thing no one was home during the aforementioned incident. they probably would have put me in a loon factory. 😀

  70. jane-la, i have the distinct impression i’m being laughed at. but that’s okay, i don’t mind. 🙂

    loon in a loon factory…it’s something i picked up from the georgia nicolson books….kind of like “loony bin” aka, where they put you if you’re off your rocker. hee hee

  71. hey orangedragonfly, which line was it? or is it a spoiler line? i doubt it. but i do agree with you: so many parts of Peeps just made me crack up!

  72. jess–it wasn’t a peeps line, it was a so yesterday line. if you’ve read it…can you guess? (mostly i just wonder if i was the only one who went into hysterics 🙂 )

  73. “loon in a loon factory…it’s something i picked up from the georgia nicolson books….kind of like “loony bin” aka, where they put you if you’re off your rocker. hee hee”
    Those are some funny books, those are. 😀 And your mention of looney bin made me think of my cat, Luna. Hehehehe, I call her Luny Bin because of her name and also because she’s nutcase.

    “hey orangedragonfly, which line was it?”
    Yeah, which line? That whole book was full of funny stuff. I wanna know which one made you crack up. I know I laughed like loon, but can’t remember the specific lines anymore. I’m going to have to go look them up….

  74. “And speaking of The Last Days, you can order it right now on Amazon. You will receive it September 7, or perhaps sooner in that myserious way of book release dates.”
    Will definitely be doing that this time. \:|

  75. man when do we get to see the last days cover- well you mentioned a ‘new’ one so i dont know…it better be cool, all the other book covers are!

  77. Ah sorry, must have somehow skipped the words ‘so yesterday’… from the excitement of seeing the word PEEPS. lol.

  79. ahh..if you can’t guess on your own, you’ll just have to wait until morning…it’s after midnight, and i have to sleep sometime!

  80. rebecca–i have a nutcase cat too. we call her sarah, but her full name is sarah-bellum (cerebellum). we named her after part of the brain because she doesn’t have one. 😉

  82. Argh! I’m searching through pages…. I’m going to take a wild guess. Was it “You fiddle lucker!”? And do I get a prize if I get it right? Mmmm, cookies. 😛

  83. you’re right, rebecca! (and just reading it on the screen made me giggle…i’m hopeless) and if we’re talking cybercookies, why not go for chocolate cake? i make a mean melts-when-it-hits-your-tongue chocolate cake. 🙂

  84. I loved the google line. That book was really funny… I should go reread it. And about the Peeps eyes, have you guys seen those contacts that give you cat-eyes? Those things freak me out.

  85. i was thinking…what are some of my other sir westerscott lines? only…i can’t go look at my books, because *every one of them* is out on loan. *sigh*

  87. Mmmmmm, chooooooocolate! I’ll have some of that cake, please. 😀

    “i can’t go look at my books, because *every one of them* is out on loan. *sigh*”
    That’s my problem. Someone’s got my Uglies, and up until a few days ago I didn’t have So Yesteray either.

  88. ive stopped renting my books out cause its summer, and i prolly wont get them back, and im definately not ready to give up my books!

  89. well…my best friend was in town, and she hadn’t read *any* of scott’s books (can you believe it??) and when i started telling her about them she wanted them all. and i can’t say no to her, she’s my best friend. she took more than my copies of scott’s books, she took magic or madness too, and five or six others. the good thing is, she left me a stack of her books too. we share. 🙂

  92. orangedragonfly- i have a friend that i share books with, its really great. she is the only one that i let touch my westerfeld books. lol.

  93. korbe-wa…shell is my best friend in the whole world. we have been friends for almost 23 years!! (wow, i feel old..) i know i can trust her to treat my books kindly. 🙂

  94. I just finished Peeps and I postivly adored it! This was the most sensible place I could find to sya that, and I’m sure everyoen already guessed that, considering its such an amazing book. Back to the midnighters board…

  95. i looooved peeps, its the mose recent one ive read, and i plan to reread the midnighters series in the near future. but peeps is really great, the parasite thing is a bit icky, but still its awsome! *directed to kelly*

  96. so, every once and I while when I’m reading through the comments on Scott’s blog, I see someone celebrating because his next book is coming out on their birthday. I always smile and think I’m such a grown-up (30 yo), because it’s the book that matters, not that it just happens to be coming out on your birthday.

    But, then, today: ‘THE LAST DAYS’ IS COMING OUT ON MY BIRTHDAY!!!! Awesome! It’s extra special just for me!

    Thanks, Scott!
    alicia

  97. How is So Yesterday? I read the back and i didn’t like the plot so much, but it’s one of Scotts books so i feel obligated to read it. Still i haven’t gotten it. Is it any good?

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