I assume the length issue is all about wanting to produce a print edition - since ebooks shouldn't have such restriction.
Perhaps you could break the emotional arc issue by arranging and marketing it as two books in a single binding. Pay for a mono-chrome cover image (preferably a line drawing), inserted as a page on its own, to separate Heart of Rock from the earlier stories - if the facing page is blank it should work okay. Then arrange the actual cover so that it has a double title: "Dragons and Dreams: bedtime stories" at the top, "and Heart of Rock: a story of ???" at the the bottom (I think a relevant subtitle might help the balance). Yes there is going to be some additional cost, but limited to the two cover images it might be feasible?
|