I mean... I think it looks better with a drop shadow. I think my main problem is that the light is coming from different directions in all three images. (Scratch that — my main problem is I'm not a visual artist. But whatever.)
New version:
Previous version for comparison:
Here we have an example of two steps forward, one step back.
The dragon still isn't working, but you can definitely see it better, so... I don't know. Maybe I'll look for a different dragon that isn't so monochromatic.
Fading out the bottom makes the text much more readable. I opaqued the bricks slightly, but it's hard to tell I did it.
Oh well. It's an interesting exercise. And honestly, this is better than a significant percentage of the urban fantasy covers out there.
Here's the new version:
And the previous one for comparison:
