Railsea - young adult cover

Back in July last year I was lucky enough to be asked to provide the cover art for the 'Young Adult' paperback version of China Miéville's brilliant novel Railsea. I always find it difficult to refuse the chance to draw fantastical locamotives, giant albino moles, and general high adventure.... so I didn't. Finally the results are about to be unleashed on the unsuspecting British public. Above is the cover that will be shunting it's way onto UK bookshelves when it's published on 25th April. The usual (very cool looking) 'old' adult paperback edition is published on the same date.

Below is the final artwork I delivered (click the image for a larger version... if you dare).

As it's usually unwise to judge a book by it's cover alone, the nice people at Tor/Pan Macmillan have allowed you to read the first two chapters here.

I'll be posting more Railsea related stuff here soon in an attempt to work out how we arrived at this final image.