There's even a bit of a legend that Shards of Honour started out as a Star Trek fic with Aral as a Klingon officer and Cordelia from the, uh, Federationwhatsit (as you can see I'm not up on Star Trek myself); but it's been refuted by Lois. She had some vague idea in that direction long before starting the book, but there were several other ideas that went into it as well, and once she started writing for real it was all original.
Lois even used to read fics of her own stories until she realised that carried its own dangers (if a future plot resembles a fic she's read, perhaps the author would sue)... But when it comes to other series, she still reads sometimes, apparently. (She's said that for a year after her mother's death in the early 00s, fanfiction was the only thing she was able to make herself read, for some reason.)
When it comes to that new cover, I think of it as how Cordelia would look in the popular Barrayaran imagination at that moment, so there's no visible stress or dirtiness, and everyone looks their best! ^_^ (Okay, the general public probably has no clue that Drou and Bothari were there, but still... *handwaves*)
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Lois even used to read fics of her own stories until she realised that carried its own dangers (if a future plot resembles a fic she's read, perhaps the author would sue)... But when it comes to other series, she still reads sometimes, apparently. (She's said that for a year after her mother's death in the early 00s, fanfiction was the only thing she was able to make herself read, for some reason.)
When it comes to that new cover, I think of it as how Cordelia would look in the popular Barrayaran imagination at that moment, so there's no visible stress or dirtiness, and everyone looks their best! ^_^ (Okay, the general public probably has no clue that Drou and Bothari were there, but still... *handwaves*)