Just because I’ve been MIA from the blogosphere doesn’t mean I haven’t been reading the hell out of new YA books or stalking the upcoming releases. In fact, these are my top picks for the rest of this year.
Have I missed any? Let me know in the comments!
I thought it was about time to shine some pretty lights on pretty covers, mostly because it’s been a while since anything got me excited. Is it just me, or does YA feel like it’s having a bit of a dry spell? I haven’t heard a whole lot of hype about any one book for some time, and none of the covers I’ve seen crawling off the shelves do our genre justice. There are still a ridiculous number of pretty dresses on pretty girls, but they are mixing it up because at least they don’t all look sad anymore. Now they don’t seem to have any particular expression at all! I’m so over this look. SO OVER IT. I can’t even bring myself to read the backs of them anymore.
Book covers are prime real estate. They take up the same amount of space as any one of the pages within to say visually to the potential reader the entire story they might enjoy if they only just reached out and picked it off the shelf. Most books only get one shot at getting the cover right, so you can understand why I hate when covers are squandered on pretty girls wearing pretty dresses because it says next to nothing about the story itself.
The book currently coming to mind is Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi. I really enjoyed the story, but ugh, if I hadn’t already loved Tahereh, I probably wouldn’t have picked up the book based on the cover. I think I’m even more disappointed by that cover because I loved the book itself and the scenes the heroine has to wear the pretty dress in are such tiny blips in the overall story. The dress is forced upon her. It’s the opposite of her identity and highlights the only part of the book where the heroine looks the way someone else wants her to look. That seems weird to me, although I give it points for at least having relevance to the story. I recently finished a book with a pretty girl in a pretty dress on the cover and the pretty girl never actually wears a pretty dress in the book and the background she’s standing in front of? Also not in the book.
This is the weird stuff that keeps me from being able to sleep at night, that irrelevant book covers are allowed to exist.
Not surprisingly, I’ve been drawn to illustrated book covers lately. Specifically, illustrated book covers with a certain look to them, sort of a comic book meets children’s book with a little edge and a little verve. I love this style on YA and adult books, I don’t know why exactly. It speaks to the part of me that is make-believe, I guess, and also because it is very, very pretty.
These illustrations are not generic. The artists who design them must become intimately familiar with at least part of the book – he or she had to have very in-depth conversations with the author or they read the book themselves. These illustrations are time consuming and require a certain amount of talent. They are deliberate. You cannot troll the photography copyright sites looking for a model to photoshop in order to achieve the level of artistry required to build these illustrations. They capture mood, atmosphere, character, suspense, story, tension, and mystery. I’m clearly biased. Art that is not meaningful and sublime isn’t trying hard enough.
My love affair with this style (and if there is a term for it, I’m ready to learn. Teach away!) began with this cover:
It’s really Capillya’s fault because she’s the one that introduced me to it in the first place. Gorgeous right? Look at the lines in the books, the movement between fantasy and reality and the sensation that the ground is insubstantial. One wrong turn can bring the whole house of cards down. This was a very deliberate cover.
Then there was This Girl is Different by JJ Johnson. I remember seeing it, touching it, and thinking, “Is this cover for real?”
Winter Town by Stephen Emond sort of fits because it makes me feel similarly the way I feel when I see This Girl is Different, though the illustration style is not like the others. And of course, The Big Crunch by Pete Hautman. I don’t even know what that book is about, but it’s on my Amazon Wishlist.
Capillya is also to blame for my sleepless nights spent thinking about August, the strangest book cover I have maybe ever seen, and also the most captivating. I want this book in my hands so bad. I would love to experience the strange vertigo feeling I get from looking at it on the screen but in real life. A good book cover can do that to you, get in your head like that.
Last week I was at Half Priced Books scoping out some new research books. By and large, used book stores are the way to go for research books you want to own, otherwise the library is your best bet. You’d be surprised how limited the selection on weather specific scientific essays there are in Barnes & Noble. In December I purchased a first person narrative on the experience of flight and a historical analysis of war-time footwear. They’re not exactly strong competition for Lindsey Lohan’s favorite pre-crime spree mixed drink retrospective, you know?
After finding my book on weather essays, I wandered over to the YA section to peruse the merchandise. Now, don’t get too worked up over me buying used books and not supporting my favorite authors. 99% of the time I buy my personal copies from Amazon (and Borders before it closed.) I do, however, pick up extra copies of books my husband teaches because his class sets are often smaller than his class body count and I also pick up new releases for his classroom library. Ellen Hopkins is a favorite of his students and I’d like to think she’d understand that I purchased my second, third, and fourth copies of Perfect used for his students who have never owned a book in their life but beg to get their hands on one of her books. We do what we can for them.
Anyway, so I was thumbing through the shelves and I stumbled across a book cover…no, no that’s not right. I was blinded by a book cover that screamed “PICK ME UP OR YOU WILL BURN IN HELL.”
The picture is nice but it doesn’t do the real life colors justice. It’s like the art of a Dr. Seuss book on…um…more acid than normal.
I’m unconvinced the book is actually YA and I have this sneaking suspicion it was shelved here because of the illustration style of the cover, but whatever. Isn’t it cool?
In that same trip I stumbled across They Came From Below by Blake Nelson which, I’ll be honest, has a pretty hokey premise but the reviews are pretty stellar so clearly I shouldn’t be judging a cover by its plot synopsis. I’d love to have this cover as a poster in my office. It’s very Dr. Seuss meets H.P. Lovecraft.
Alright, this is my last post on copyright and then we move on to things that are more fun and less difficult to wrap your brain around. Promise!
Next week is Banned Book Week and some of the posts are pretty content intense and full of revolution. Stick around!
Ok, just a few final words on copyright.
Pictures are the biggest copyright violation on the blogosophere. It’s hard to have a library of your own pictures and it is easy to use pretty great ones from other people. The fact that it is so easy makes it hard for people to even see what they are doing is wrong. How can something so illegal be so easy to do?
But it is illegal, as well as morally and ethically wrong. Anyone who has ever had something stolen from them and used by someone else, regardless of intentions, can tell you how much it hurts.
We are also human and a lot of people starting out blogging have no idea what these rules are. I know I didn’t when I began in 2000. I’m not even sure when I got a clue and wised up. I know I’ve made mistakes here before as well, and I understand copyright issues now way more than I used to (it comes up in my job.) And probably every blogger has made this mistake. Some try to correct it, some try to correct it going forward, some continue to labor under the misconception that it’s just a blog. Just a picture. It doesn’t matter.
I believe we can do better. I believe that this topic gets a lot of people very upset, but I believe the very best we can do is to do better. We can be better about recognizing the artistic abilities and ownership of other people and we can be better about not feeling put out by having to go the extra step to include attribution. I believe we can be better about communication. I just think we can be better.
Go forth and respect each other.
Yesterday I said you cannot copyright blog topic ideas, and you can’t. And we shouldn’t expect people to make an exception for our blog post idea just because we are so proud of it.
But I do personally make an exception for ideas that are really, really unique. I don’t have a suggestion for what is really, really unique, except when I go “OMG I WISH I HAD THOUGHT OF THAT FIRST” at which point I sort of emotionally apply a copyright to that idea to the person who came up with it first. This isn’t a legal thing, it’s just my thing.
For example, the blog Empty White Pages has this fantastic series of posts called Musical Stories where she lists several songs that exemplify types of storytelling – sci-fi, horror, childrens, YA. I am so jealous that I didn’t think up this idea first, it’s brilliant and creative. I don’t know, I’m sure someone has done this before, but it’s the first time *I* have seen it done and as far as I’m concerned, this is such a unique idea that it belongs to Empty White Pages. I’d never do it unless I asked permission first. Do I have to? No, but I would never feel comfortable riding on such awesome coattails without her OK.
That’s just my personal opinion. Take it however you want it.
This is another tricky topic, and I don’t have any clear rules on it or any legal background that tells me what the right thing to do is. So this is just my opinion and you can argue with me if you want or develop your own ideas. Go forth and consider.
According to Wikipedia, a Meme is a: “an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture.” Which is sort of the very definition of something that a single person call not claim copyright over.
That being said, when it comes to blogging, memes do have origin stories and I think it is important to respect that. The book blogger The Story Siren created a meme called In My Mailbox (IMM) and it has swept the blogosophere to the point where almost every book blogger I read participates in it. That’s cool, and I’m sure she’s very proud, and I bet it would just kill her if someone started using In My Mailbox and claimed ownership over it.
This is another one of those: Respect Your Community things. When it comes to these sorts of ideas, I am in favor of giving credit to the inventor of the Meme. It’s just good manners.
Weekly Themes have a similar flavor to them, but are trickier still. I have weekly themes (or somethings incredibly irregular themes I forget about.) Friday Ephemera is a weekly theme. I invented the name, but I sure didn’t invent the idea. Tons of blogs post links to the goings on in their nook of the blogosphere. I used to do a weekly theme called Inspiration Point which was similar to Friday Ephemera but had more to do with things I discovered and fell in love with that week, not just linking cool posts.
The Broke and the Bookish does a weekly theme post called Top Ten Tuesday. I’ve contributed to Top Ten Tuesday before, but I gave credit to The Broke and the Bookish for the post. Top Ten Tuesday belongs to that blog, as far as I’m concerned.
But does that mean you can’t do something similar on your own? Of course not. Come up with a clever name and some of your own rules for action and make your own theme post. There are lots of similar theme posts out there, but they all have different flavors, different looks, different intentions. Discover yours.
And blogfests? This is another item I think belongs to the person who invented it. I created MonsterFest, but I’m sure there will be lots of Halloween based blogfests coming up in October, and I don’t own the market on Halloween blogfests. I wouldn’t want anyone using MonsterFest, but I don’t care if other blogs do blogfests regarding monsters.
This one is tricky too. Technically, you can use book covers on reviews if the review is positive. If it’s negative, you can’t. Sounds crazy, right? Well, it has to do with Fair Use. One of the tenants is that an item falls under Fair Use if it doesn’t negatively impact the financial gain, which a negative review does.
If you received an ARC from a publisher for review purposes, this is consent to use their marketing materials as you see fit, negative or positive.
Amazon holds use rights for book covers on their site and technically, you can’t use theirs.
There is some debate whether or not book covers posted on GoodReads and LibraryThing is acceptable to use. Personally, I use GoodReads for book covers and if anyone took me to the mat on it, I’d argue on the use of promotional materials provided for the intention of promotion (I don’t post negative reviews anyway.) But I’m not sure how much legal backing I’d have. Copyright law is so not easy to interpret.
Marketing/promotional materials provided on an author’s website or on a publisher’s website, I believe, is granting permission for use. I’ve seen a lot of author and publisher websites with specific information about use of marketing materials that grant permissions.
And there’s also a non-profit element to using promotional items for advertising purposes which is covered under copyright law as an acceptable use. Again, this is not my area of expertise, and a search online has netted me a lot of conflicting information. A lot of people claiming to be experts, a lot of people working in publishing laughing at the idea we are afraid to using their promotional materials because it might be a violation of copyright, and a lot of those experts conflicting. Also lots of stories of angry authors, particularly self-published authors, demanding blogs remove pictures of their covers. So, I don’t know.
I personally believe that promotional materials, like book covers, can be used on blogs (although everyone should take care to use the final cover image, and not one of the early drafts.) Authors want their books to get some promotion and attention and book covers are the first thing anyone recognizes. If you have a different view on this, please share it in the comments.
I’m reposting these resources just in case you missed them yesterday:
There are a few great resources for finding art, graphics and pictures and you do not need to ask for permission to use. However, you still must cite the origin and owner and date if available.
1) Creative Commons- this is a designation used to let the internet world know that they can use your picture (or whatever) without permission, but there are some restrictions, usually it has to be cited and cannot be used for financial gain.
Do a Creative Commons search here
2) Flickr Blue Mountains: I like this search engine – it searches Flickr for pictures marked as Creative Commons. You can search by topic and each picture has the proper citation listed for you to cut and paste.
4) If you use WordPress.org, try out the plugin called PhotoDropper. It puts a button on your posts that, when clicked, bricks up search bar. Put in a search for a picture you want, and it searches all Creative Commons listed pictures on Flickr. If you find one you like, when you insert it, PhotoDropper will put the proper citation into your post for you.
No matter what happens in your blogging life, whether you get an angry email or comment from someone demanding you take down a picture or whether you see someone use your work without permission. Whether someone says something you don’t agree with or when someone decides they don’t like what you have to say. No matter what happens, don’t forget to be awesome. Be grateful, professional, and polite. No one owes anyone anything, but almost everyone is willing to give all they have.
The very best thing we can do for each other around here is treat each other like humans the exact way we’d like to be treated. Communicate every step of the way and build strong ties within the community. Become a pillar, a contributor, a person worth knowing. Don’t be too coy or condescending or “above it all.” Don’t be a celebrity. Be you, just you, and the very best of you you have to offer.
Build a stronger community.
Sharing breeds awareness. Awarness inspires action. Action educates change. Change reinvents the world.
I just want to say thank you thank you thank you to Capillya, Vic, and Amanda for guesting here on Tell Great Stories. The covers they all picked were gorgeous and some of my favorites. There are a great many beautiful covers in the YA world. They are as varied and unique as the stories they protect. I can’t wait to see what cover ends up on my stories some day.
I have a lot of favorites and it was very hard to narrow them down.
1. Do you think good cover design is important to a book? Why/Why not?
I can’t tell you how many books I have chosen to read because of the cover. I suspect that is one of the most important things about a book – getting it picked up and read.
2. Do you think cover design will be more or less important for self-published works?
More. Much more. While the stigma of self-published works as being unprofessional remains, the less a self-published work looks self-published, the easier it will be to sell. Anyone can purchase a piece of stock photography and slap a title and author name on it, but professionally designed covers have all the markings of someone who has studied arrangement, composition, and the emotional response of art. With the ocean of self-published novels and novellas showing up these days, it will be more important than ever to stand out in that ocean.
3. What design features most often catch your eye?
I love beautiful composition and arresting color. It doesn’t matter what the trend is – silhouettes, models, art – I like the interesting way the different elements work together. I’ll talk more about that with my favorite covers. I also prefer covers have a little artistic something about them.
4. Are there any design features that will turn you off from even picking up a book? If so, why do you think they cause you to react this way?
Legs. When a stock model’s legs are the only thing on the cover. I don’t really get it. I have a serious reaction to these covers in that I go the other way. I know I shouldn’t.
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My favorites.
hush, hush by Becca Fitzpatrick is my favorite of all the book covers I’ve ever had the pleasure of loving. Look at the details, the tiny bit of red on some of the features, the violence in the monochromatic skies. I read the designer got the model shot by having the model jumping on a trampoline. I love the position of his body, the extreme arch. This is not standard stock photography and it is both painful and violent to see. I love the triangular arrangement and how the top of the sky is bright while earth is dark and stormy. I can feel the movement, the wind, the rain, and the emotion. It’s such a tactile cover. I would like this on a poster on my office wall.
Boneshaker by Cherie Priest takes advantage of art and there is nothing childish about it. Like hush, hush, the designer uses monochromatic base and an emphasis of one color choice to make this cover really pop. Boneshaker is special too because the design is carried through into the book itself. The type is not black, it’s sort of this dark coppery color and there are illustrations used at the beginning of each chapter. I love the American neo-victorian details in the font choice for author and title and the treatment around the author’s name. It is very pulpy. As far as art goes, it’s just gorgeous. I love that you can see the brush strokes, the “dirtying up” of the woman, the wet lank hair, the shine of the brass. I feel like I can smell the dirty, coal-coated air and hear the whistle of the dirigible as it passes above. For me, these are the markings of a brilliant cover when I feel swept up in the atmosphere and all my senses are turned on.
A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness- HELLO NIGHTMARES. I adore this cover because it scares me the f-bomb out. There are a lot of horror and supernatural novels out there, but I can’t recall any covers that truly capture the horrifying heart of the story like this one does. The composition, the absolute stark lack of color, the little light in the window in that house that is about to have a very unwelcome visitor…what can I say? I got this book based entirely off the cover. This is American Midwest Gothic and like the distance in this piece of art work, I want to live this story without getting too close. This is also a great example of using, or rather, not using typeface to work a cover. The typeface is in all caps but is otherwise unimpressive. It’s plain, white, but that’s ok because it stands out but does not try to add or detract from the picture which, in this case, is more important than the title or the author.
Paranormalcy by Kiersten White is sort of the epitome of Sad Girls in Pretty Dresses, but I love how beautiful the color and composition is. Can you see a theme? I love that. I love the monochromatic background and the pink dress. I like the depth and the wind and the storm. Mostly I love the color here. I’m usually not much for models on covers, which is ironic since there are models on three of my cover examples, but when I like them I REALLY like them. I think if there hadn’t been so much movement with the wind and the sky, this cover would have failed. It’s not enough to just be a sad girl in a pretty dress. It has to mean something, and I think this sad girl portrays the atmosphere of the book very well.
There’s a message here, in the way her face looks, in the rising violence in the weather – Something is coming. Something bad.
Tris & Izzie by Mette Ivie Harrison – ok, you’re probably going to get tired of hearing me say this, but look at that color and composition! 
I love the shape of their bodies against each other, the color of the title matching the color of the water and the color of the author matching the color of the beautiful autumn leaves. This cover doesn’t scream “STOCK PHOTOGRAPHY” and I appreciate that.
I know the story of Tristan and Isolde and no matter what iteration it appears in, it is always a tragic and beautiful story. Autumn usually signifies the end of something, just before the cold dark death of winter, and the tragic nature of the story of Tristan and Isolde mimics this beautifully. And the depth created with the blurred close objects and the blurred far away objects, creates such an intimate space here.
This Girl is Different by JJ Johnson
I have to thank Capillya at That Cover Girl for introducing me to this book cover. It combines several artistic mediums in such a chaotic, but beautiful way. I feel like it’s about to animate for me. And goodness gracious look at that title treatment. This is another cover I’d like in poster form on my wall. Capillya at That Cover Girl did a great post about this coverthat sums up my feelings pretty well. This is actually a cover I find I have trouble analyzing because I just want to look at it and feel what it makes me feel. It seems wrong to tear this part for more meaning. It’s one of those covers that should be experienced, but maybe not understood.
This guest post is written by Amanda Plavich. Amanda is a writer and blogger and also a photographer. I was blown away by her steampunk author photos for author Susan Dennard. She has a beautiful eye for composition and imagination!
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I totally judge a book by its cover.
Yep.
I said it.
Is it a good thing?
Dunno, but it is very realistic. The cover of a book is the first thing most consumers see and it has to grab their attention.
I’m no different. Maybe it’s the photographer in me, but I expect an attractive cover for a well-written book.
Sommer sweetly asked me to guest blog on some of my favorite covers and why, which got me really excited. I have very definitive opinions on what aesthetically appeals to me and I’m excited to share!
Disclaimer: I fully expect everyone on the interwebz to agree with my position – you have been warned. 
But I think it’s important to hear opinions from a variety of people, especially when it comes to the arts (and I totally believe covers fit into that category).
Before I reveal my favorites, I want to address the questions set forth by the lovely Sommer:
1. Do you think good cover design is important to a book? Why/Why not?
Very. I’m looking at this from a consumer-driven perspective. When I’m walking between the rows at my local B&N I’m not picking each book up and reading the blurb to see if it interests me. In an ideal world that’s what buyers would do, but let’s get real.
It ain’t happenin’.
Instead, I’m looking for covers that catch my attention. It may be bright colors or a kick-butt character I wish I could be that draws me in. It might be something that begs me to wonder what in the world the story could be about. It might be a cool image that feels really conceptual.
Regardless of what it is, the fact remains that something has to draw the customer to pick it up and investigate it further.
Is the cover the only thing that sells the book?
Well, no.
But you have to get your foot in the door somehow, so to speak.
And to be perfectly honest – I expect the publisher to invest in a quality cover if they believe in the book. If it looks like crap, what does that say about their belief in its ability to succeed?
2. Do you think cover design will be more or less important for self-published works?
In all honestly, I think it’s even more important than books that go through a traditional publisher. Self-published works are already fighting so many hurdles to be viewed as legit, so if you slap up some stupid, cheesy clip art with papyrus font, consider your credibility gone.
I have to be really wowed by both a cover and blurb to invest in a self-published book. This is not because I think self-published books suck, but there is a lot of true crap out there to wade through.
I want to know you believe enough in your book to invest in it.
3. What design features most often catch your eye?
I like covers that use models, but there are a few things I want out of that type of cover. I want the face obscured in some way and I do not want a literal photograph. I want unique editing, etc. to blend the model into the background.
I want to build my own idea about who the characters are and I don’t want a model messing with it; mainly because we know how publishing can be in terms of their marketing direction regarding models (Justine Larbalestier’s Liar anyone?). This isn’t a must in terms of my picking up a novel, but it’s something that does catch my eye (I’ll give an example or two later).
If the cover looks too realistic, it’s hard for me to get into the fantasy of whatever story I’m being told. I want the editing to reflect the mood of the novel and if that can be effectively done artistically, I’m hooked.
I’m also a fan of whimsical art that has a modern edge to it.
4. Are there any design features that will turn you off from even picking up a book? If so, why do you think they cause you to react this way?
Artwork that screams ‘stock photo’ is a major turn off.
That and cheesy text.
I know, so weird! But if your text has overdone shadows, is in some silly font, or is in a TOTALLY random color (like, lime green when the picture is sepia) and unbefitting to the rest of the cover…yeah, that’s a negative.
And the why is simple – it screams CHEAP! UNINSPIRED!
Did I mention cheap?
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Now, to my favorite covers. Let me preface this by saying this is only my opinion of the cover art, not the actual novel. I’m also a YA girl, so these are all covers in or near my genre.
Matched/Crossed by Allie Condie
First is the Matched/Crossed combo. I love these.
Simplicity!!! They tell a story without filling the paper with a ton of crap that makes my eyes bleed. And then the imagery of the girl in the bubble tells you right away what the MC is experiencing – trapped in her society.
The theme carries over to the sequel and though I haven’t read it yet, it’s obvious this book will be about her breaking out of the mold she’s been put into.
Plus, it’s pretty. 
I knew I wanted to read it from the cover alone.
Torment by Lauren Kate
Another favorite is Torment, the sequel to Fallen. The Fallen cover was nice, but it wasn’t anything particularly original.
I feel differently about Torment and it’s because of a teensy-weensy detail – the curve of her upper back as she leans to the right, her hair pulling in that direction, as well. It’s beautiful compositionally, as it takes a subject that is dead center, but pulls your eye to the upper right of the image. The way her hands are tangled in her hair says so much about the anguish she’s in.
<3
Princess Academy by Shannon Hale
This one is actually a middle grade novel, but I’m in love with the cover.
The original is one of my favorites and I still haven’t figured out why they changed it (you hear that Bloombury?!?!).
It was beautiful! The art work captured the essence and emotion of the entire novel. It’s whimsical, yet had the faint feel of grime that would be associated with mine-life.
Across the Universe by Beth Revis
It’s rare to get two-for-one when it comes to covers, but Across the Universe delivers. I’m not typically a sci-fi fan, but this cover told me I needed to investigate further and upon reading the summary, I knew I had to buy it. The color scheme was perfection and it almost looked like one of those old woman/young woman illusions.
I saw the pink universe first and only after someone pointed it out did I see the shapes of the faces in the purple. Maybe I’m the only one, but I got really excited because I was able to see so much in just that one image.
Then to flip it over and get the blueprint version – yeah, perfection.
So there is my opinion in a nutshell.
This guest post is written by Victoria Caswell at Hairnets and Hopes. Vic was my first blog friend, the first person I got to know and she is really, really wonderful. But on top of being a writer and a blogger, Vic is also an artist. She’s an amazing artist, and I knew I needed her to chime in with some great thoughts on book covers! Thanks Vic!
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We all have our pet peeves when it comes to cover art. Some hate photography, others are sick of eyes or flames or skinny models— the list goes on and on. Honestly, it’s impossible to have a cover design that everyone will love, too subjective.
But the most important thing about a book cover, the CRUCIAL thing is that the cover accurately represents your novel.
There are so many ways you can go about this: an illustrated scene (the Alan Lee illustrated editions of LOTR), a model pic who resembles your character (PARANORMALCY by Kiersten White), a significant symbol from your story (THE HUNGER GAMES by Suzanne Collins).
You have a TON of options as far as subject matter goes, but the aspect you should be a stickler for is the ATMOSPHERE that your cover portrays. So, when our sweet Sommer asked me to talk about one of my favorite book covers, the first one that came to my mind was Brenna Yovanoff’s THE REPLACEMENT.
I’m really, really going to try not to spoiler this book! (You should definitely read it though!)
So, let’s talk art!
Usually my eye is caught by diagonal compositions, but this one has a strong, straight-forward “T” composition. For this cover what caught my eye first was the color palette (ooh! And the metallics). Color used well is one of elements of an image that quickly establishes atmosphere. Certain colors (of course context needs to be applied here) evoke certain emotions. Red- powerful, strong, angry. Light blue- hopeful, airy, free. And so on.
Well, grey- especially as it’s used in this composition- has a solemn, sad, creepy kind of connotation. It is well suited for horror- as is the scarlet used in the lettering. Horror often has black and white palettes with red splashed here and there giving it a bloodied effect, but that’s not what this cover does. No one’s going to look at this cover and think “slasher” book. The palette is muted, rainy, contemplative, and eerie. You have the feeling of a horror LOOMING about. Which really fits with the writing and the suspense.
Then there is the subject matter.
The base of the “T” composition is the pram. It is strikingly the first thing that your eye will go to when looking at the cover. That is because while most of the cover is more midtone grays, it is a bold, chunky black.
It has this old-fashioned-scrollwork kind of richness to it. It twists and curves and is a beautiful thing, but it’s black and red and colors completely unexpected of baby furnishings. So also, Ms. Yovanoff’s prose twists and curves and is a beautiful thing- but darkly so…
Here’s a tiny excerpt from the beginning:
“I don’t remember any of the true, important parts, but there’s this dream I have. Everything is cold and branches scrape the window screen. Giant trees, rattling, clattering with leaves. White rain gutter, the curtain flapping. Pansies, violets, sunflowers. I know the fabric pattern by heart. They’re a list in my head, like a poem.”
You see, just so vivid. A setting that should be safe: an early memory or dream, flower print curtains… but it’s not. There is something hiding amongst those clattering leaves. And that’s what this cover subject matter says as well. A baby pram= safe—- except it’s twisted and scrolled and black. Then the leading line of the “T” composition brings your eye up… and you see them: scissors, a horseshoe, a knife, etc. A mobile like none other.
Instantly you think either: A.) the parents are PSYCHO!!!! Or B.) what exactly is IN that pram!?!?!?!?
So, the eye searches and rises up to the title (which by the way POPS as ALL titles should! Great color usage and I love how the tree branch both underlines the title and glues it to the composition). And you see THE REPLACEMENT. And you know that there’s something wrong with this kid.
So- you MUST flip it over! There’s no choice to it! And the back reads:
“In the story, Emma’s four years old. She gets out of bed and pads across the floor in her footie pajamas. When she reaches her hand between the bars, the thing in the crib moves closer. It tries to bite her and she takes her hand out again but doesn’t back away. They spend all night looking at each other in the dark. In the morning, the thing is still crouched on the lamb-and-duckling mattress pad, staring at her. It isn’t her brother. IT’S ME.”
At that point (for me at least) it’s a DEFINITE purchase.
But if I hated creepy, beautiful, twisty stories- I wouldn’t have been drawn to this book by its cover, because the cover does its job perfectly. It is a pictorial representation of the atmosphere of the book. It draws in the readers who would like the story contained in its pages.
I could go on and discuss the blurb and the little catch line or discuss the contents of the story and the significance of the imagery- but I don’t want to spoiler you. And a cover really shouldn’t spoiler the story either. But I think I’ve blabbed long enough!
Thanks Sommer for having me! I hope I made some sense! J Have any of you guys read this book? Do you agree with me about covers needed to represent the atmosphere of the novel? Thanks for your time and have an awesome day!
-vic
Guest post written by Capilla from That Cover Girl! If you haven’t read That Cover Girl yet, you are totally missing out. That Cover Girl has introduced me to the world of cover designers and sparked my interest in them. She’s passionate about YA books and YA covers and I recommend her blog as a top resource for learning more about book covers.
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When Sommer asked me if I wanted to contribute to her series on cover design, I was flattered that she’d asked me — and immediately on board. When she asked me to feature my favorite cover of all time…I freaked out a little bit.
Oh sure, it’s easy for me to name my favorite movie, song, and color. I can easily and quickly list all the ingredients involved in my absolute favorite meal. But cover? From one book? Just one?
It was impossible for me to feature one absolute favorite! Therefore, I’ve pulled aside a few covers that have never ceased to make me stop and stare. They’re unusual, unique, beautiful, creative, and classic in their own right.
Even coming up with these four titles put me through an emotional roller coaster, I’m afraid. (I can be quite dramatic when it comes to cover design.) But, it goes without saying that I wholeheartedly believe that good design is very, very important when it comes to gracing the face of any novel.
Human perception is interesting. We can give someone a quick once-over at the grocery store and assume whether they’re small-talk worthy or not. We can glance at a few tweets and label someone who constantly discusses inane worries. The same goes for a cover of a novel — it’s the face you put on to get noticed, the blurb that makes someone want to get to know your story. And for me, there has to be some sort of insta-connect to make me want to pick up a novel. When I’m wandering around a bookstore or library and come across a novel with an unfamiliar title, cover design creates that immediate insta-connect.
But what was it about Dry, Bird, Incarceron, and A Love Story Starring My Dead Best Friend that somehow put them in a collective of good design? I can tell you it wasn’t one element, that’s for sure. I’m a sucker for illustration. I love simple design — clean lines, negative space, sans serif type and the like. But I also love the type of cover that tells an entire story within its art — stories that are riddled with secrets and symbolism that cause you to turn back to the cover while you’re reading a novel’s pages. I love cover art that doesn’t mimic other cover design and can stand on its own. Here’s a definition I’ve come to use more often:
A “pick-me-up-and-hold-me” cover has the ability to make itself grab-worthy through an effortless melding of tone, type treatment, color palette, title, and texture.
When it comes to self-published works, I’m inclined to say that good design would be even more important. I can look at the Trylle Trilogy and honestly say I purchased the first ebook because I thought the cover was pretty nice. And then found out later that Hocking was self-pubbed? Say what?
As much as I’d like to pretend to be as harsh as my What Were YA Thinkin’ posts over on That Cover Girl, there hasn’t been a cover I’ve come across that has prevented me from picking up a book. I think the implications of bad design is that even while they are so terrible, I still must know what a craptastic cover’s story is about. And then there are those covers that are so middle-of-the-road that seem to blend together because there’s nothing in particular that stands out about them, sure. Then there are the covers that all look so much alike (ahem, I’m looking at YOU, YA paranormal and adult sci-fi covers). I suppose there’s a need for these types of covers, if only to make great cover art stand out even more.
A well-designed book cover makes you want to put it a poster frame, throw it in your foyer and make everyone who comes into your house stare at it. You refuse to borrow it from the library because you want to own it and put it on display in your home library. Beautiful book covers give you just a tiny glimpse of the story lying in wait– they are the gateway drug to those infatuated with the written word. And there’s a lot of blood, sweat and tears that go into their design. Cheers to those designers, art directors, illustrators and photographers who give book and art-lovers like me something to rave and blog about on a weekly basis.
This week I talked about What is Visual Rhetoric, Typography, and Color Theory.
So taking everything as a whole, let’s see what’s going on with some of these covers, shall we?
Keep in mind: These are not critiques. These are analyses of what I think is going on in these covers. My opinion is but one. You might feel and see something else entirely. Visual rhetoric is one part science and two parts opinion.
There are two main visual objects going on here. 1) The girl and boy and truck in the background 2) the fuzzy overlay that looks like an out of reception tv screen but is actually binary (like The Matrix). Both of these visual objects are very important to this design.
The overlay makes seeing the two characters difficult. They are out of focus, no discernable features. The way they are standing – alarmed, clutching each other – and looking off page at something we can’t see, sets the scene for tension. We don’t even have to have read the summary to know that.
The code overlay reminds us of The Matrix, and what we know of The Matrix is that the characters are living inside a computer program and everything looks perfectly normal but when they leave the program everything is scary and weird and dark. This cover is very dark and so I wonder if we will get a similar set up – one piece of the kids’ lives are fake and bright while the reality is dark and ominous.
Let’s move on to the text. This is a normal weighted, sans-serif font. We are meant to focus in on the word “future” for two reasons. It is 1) at the very center of the cover and 2) the “f” extends both above and below the rest of the word and was left lower case on purpose. You can tell this is on purpose because of the “F” in the word “OF” is upper case (as are all the rest of the letters.)
Since “future” is so important for us to notice, combined with the programming code, without having read the summary we can expect technology is about to really mess up their future. Because the two characters are clutching each other the way they are, we can also assume that the title also references their relationship.
The authors are left at the bottom in much smaller point of the same font used for the title. The “&” is colored to match the boy’s shirt – a burnt copper color which is, not by accident, the only real color in the whole picture. The references to the author’s other publications are even smaller and set at the same stair-step angle as the title. This information is not important, but it does add weight and balance to the bottom half of the cover, and I think that anchors the other visual objects that are harder to pin down.
(For the record, I actually really love this cover. I can’t even tell you why.)
Summary: It’s 1996, and less than half of all American high school students have ever used the Internet. Emma just got her first computer and an America Online CD-ROM. Josh is her best friend. They power up and log on–and discover themselves on Facebook, fifteen years in the future. Everybody wonders what their Destiny will be. Josh and Emma are about to find out.
When I first saw this cover it actually took me several glances to really understand what was going on. And then *mind blown.*
Ok, so, the main visual object here (the girl) does not appear in the upper left. Instead, the cover blurb by Beth Revis was deemed more important. As anyone who has picked up enough books can attest, that’s not uncommon. But it is small type, and stays out of the way of the main visual object.
The visual object on this cover MAKES this cover. Check the girl out: She’s walking DOWN the wall. The shape of her body (the extended back leg) and the extended hair and dress, fill the page pretty completely. Check out the back toe too – it is bent at a weird angle that suggests she’s dragging it and unaware that it looks broken. It is both creepy and graceful.
Check the purple wallpaper – purple is very big right now on supernatural covers – combined with the tapestry print of the wallpaper and a girl walking down a wall, I immediately think Traditional Gothic Ghosts. Freaky, creepy, skin crawling GHOSTS. The girl reminds me of the Exorcist girl. This cover gives me the creepy-crawlies, and I really love that. I think traditional Gothic flavor is trickling into a lot of book covers these days. Check out The House of Dead Maids and Anna Dressed in Blood for other recent examples.
I am not sure what font is being used for the title – but what we know of it is that it is an italic typeface with some pretty intense swashes. (Swashes are like super flourished serifs.) This font is interesting too – most swashes swash left, but the “h” swashes right. Look at the position of the tip of the swash on the H and G – they line up. I think this is interesting but it is a little confusing – I personally think this font would be better used on the cover of a historical romance. I feel like there is a little tug-of-war contradiction between the font style (romantic, elegant) and the main visual object (creepy, gothic, horror-ish).
This is Myra’s first book, so her name is pretty unimportant to the design. Also check out arrangement of the three typographical elements: the blurb at the top, the title, her name all form the shape of an upside down triangle – much like the top half of an hourglass!
Summary: For seventeen-year-old Emerson Cole, life is about seeing what isn’t there: swooning Southern Belles; soldiers long forgotten; a haunting jazz trio that vanishes in an instant. Plagued by phantoms since her parents’ death, she just wants the apparitions to stop so she can be normal. She’s tried everything, but the visions keep coming back.So when her well-meaning brother brings in a consultant from a secretive organization called the Hourglass, Emerson’s willing to try one last cure. But meeting Michael Weaver may not only change her future, it may change her past.
Who is this dark, mysterious, sympathetic guy, barely older than Emerson herself, who seems to believe every crazy word she says? Why does an electric charge seem to run through the room whenever he’s around? And why is he so insistent that he needs her help to prevent a death that never should have happened?
So first, the main visual object is the camera which fills the entire surface of the cover. The secondary visual object is the couple at the center. It is a loving embrace and they are looking off into a desaturated distance (which makes them the most important objects in the shot.)
The thing I like about this cover is the incorporation of the title and author name into the design. It isn’t just slapped down somewhere- it has purpose. Bent around the iris of the camera, it looks like a camera brand name. I even like that the author’s name is in red – my non-digital camera has information about the camera in the same spot in red. I love this detail.
The title “STALKER girl” brings attention to the word “stalker” in all uppercase. At first I didn’t like the blue italicized font used for the word “girl” until I started really thinking about it. When you think of a stalker, you think of an old creepy guy who lives in his parent’s basement and takes pictures of pretty girls and follows them around and scares them in dark parking lots. You NEVER think of a girly girl (as hinted by the baby blue text color and italics) as being a stalker. So with the emphasis on “girl” we can assume that there is a girl stalking a boy and his girlfriend, taking pictures of them from behind. Very unique. Very creepy.
The only thing that bothers me is that you can’t see anything looking down the iris of a camera, and that ruins the effect for me. I get the imagery they were going for, but the camera is pointed at us and yet is showing a view of someone else. I think it would have been more powerful, maybe, if we were looking through the camera as if we, the audience, were participating in the stalking (CREEPY). Artistically it is fine, I suppose, but I can’t help but feel like something is off because of it.
Summary: When Carly’s mother ends her relationship with her boyfriend, Carly is given two options for the summer: either go live temporarily with her father and stepmother in Ohio, or take a job at Stony Hollow, an exclusive sleepaway camp at which her mother is the Interim Director. Opting to take the camp position, Carly finds that she desperately misses city life and is unnerved by ordinary sounds in the woods, but soon falls in love with Brian, her fellow kitchen worker and a talented musician. Summer camp comes to an end all too quickly, and Carly finds herself back at her expensive Manhattan all-girls prep school, while Brian rents an apartment in Brooklyn. Greater exposure and praise of his band lead to an increase in female fans, heightening Carly’s insecurity and resulting in an irrevocable split in the relationship. When Taylor, Brian’s new girlfriend, arrives on the scene, Carly’s obsession and stalker tendencies go beyond the pale, leading to unintended and fateful consequences.
I have never been crazy about this cover, even though I loved loved loved the book. (Sorry Kody. But the book really is wonderful. I have purchased 2 other copies over the last year for friends.)
The main visual object should be the girl’s face – it takes up the entire book cover. But unfortunately, the title treatment becomes the main visual object, and a garish one at that. It is the first thing we see, helped by the color and the heaviness of the sans-serif font (it looks like Arial Black.)
The title of the book is The DUFF, which stands for designated ugly fat friend. It’s an ugly term, and the main character is described as being one. Naturally, you’d want the title to mimic the look of the girl – you make it garish and heavy. The letters are fat, they kind of hurt your eyes, you don’t want anything to do with them. Making the letters stair step like that paints them across the girl’s face, masking whatever might be beneath. Like the girl in the story, the girl on the cover’s identity is tied to the giant DUFF on her face.
I like balance in design, but see where the D is brought to the left edge of the cover using the word “The” to anchor it, but the second “F” doesn’t meet the right side of the cover at all? The lack of balance really bugs me here.
The red words inside the yellow letters tell us what the DUFF stands for. I think it looks kind of awkward, but I like how it slows you down to read each word, like each word has a period after it. You are the Designated. Ugly. Fat. Friend.
This is the author’s debut novel so her name is tiny at the bottom, in the same yellow, but another color is introduced “a novel by” is in pink. I honestly don’t know why you’d want to emphasize that.
Here is what I do like: I like the face of the girl. I love the color of her bubble gum and how it matches the color on her eyelid. She’s got somewhat round cheeks, a weird shaped nose, and lots of freckles. I don’t think she’s much of a DUFF, but anyone who has read the book can attest, that’s kind of the point. I also like that she’s got some attitude there with her bubble and her straight on stare.
As far as color goes, I think there is way too much going on here. I have no idea what to focus on and great designs have to have an anchor, a focus point so you can figure out how to “read” the visual rhetoric.
Summary: Seventeen-year-old Bianca Piper is cynical and loyal, and she doesn’t think she’s the prettiest of her friends by a long shot. She’s also way too smart to fall for the charms of man-slut and slimy school hottie Wesley Rush. In fact, Bianca hates him. And when he nicknames her “the Duff,” she throws her Coke in his face.
But things aren’t so great at home right now, and Bianca is desperate for a distraction. She ends up kissing Wesley. Worse, she likes it. Eager for escape, Bianca throws herself into a closeted enemies-with-benefits relationship with him.
Until it all goes horribly awry. It turns out Wesley isn’t such a bad listener, and his life is pretty screwed up, too. Suddenly Bianca realizes with absolute horror that she’s falling for the guy she thought she hated more than anyone.
This is a great example of the use of symbolism to say more than what is obvious on the cover. Unlike most of the other covers we’ve looked at, the blurb and author name are at the top while the main visual object and title is at the bottom. This can often look weird, but here it works really well. Let’s take a look at why.
I actually want to start with color because color plays a big part in why this cover works so well. First, the top half of the cover is washed out and out of focus. There are two colors here – white and green. The lower section of the cover is in sharp focus, with black, gray, and white being the predominant colors while that bright apple red sticks out as your main visual object and compliments the flavor of green at the top. Beautiful choices. The white, gray, and black used in the middle section of the cover (her shirt, the title, the ground) are supposed to act as monochromatic background so that the two pieces of color really pop.
Let’s start with the apple. Ah the apple. The symbol of women’s downfall from grace. The symbol of innocence and innocence broken, of all American apple pies and the color of love. Here the apple has been bitten into – the forbidden fruit tasted, and the shape of a heart emphasizes that. It also emphasizes the corruption of love and innocence by being bitten out of the forbidden fruit. Forbidden fruit – the apple – has also been used to symbolize virginity. I’m guessing that’s what’s happening here too. Holy religious symbolism, Batman!
The girl is in white – another color of innocence. The way she is laying on the ground (never a place for a young lady to end up) with her face covered by her hand, we can only assume something shameful has happened here. This underage girl has probably lost her innocence, though whether it was her choice or it was forced is hard to tell. I’m going to assume the heart signifies trust or love. Possibly ill-fated. Possibly wrongly given and betrayed. I don’t think it matters that we figure out what exactly happened. The enticement is in reading and finding out if our suspicions are correct.
Something else that is interesting here is that there are two different fonts at work on this title. That does not usually go over well and often looks unprofessional, but here, again, it works. Here’s a tip: when pairing two fonts together, one should be serif while the other sans-serif. From the same family, two fonts can look terrible together.
“Small Town” is an italicized font (no swashes) and looks like handwriting. It’s got a down home look – the handwriting that should be on the label of homemade jam and jelly. “Sinners” however, is in a serif font, but a special one. Check out the serifs – they don’t appear on every corner like most serif alphabets, and the few spots they do appear look more like devil horns and hooves. Check out the “Ns” in particular – you rarely see half serifs like that pointing left, they usually point right (like swashes.) Check out the “I” too – it looks like a formal column, like in a church maybe? And also like a knife. There’s a lot of religious symbolism here. I feel for the girl on the cover.
Summary: Lacey Anne Byer is a perennial good girl and lifelong member of the House of Enlightenment, the Evangelical church in her small town. With her driver’s license in hand and the chance to try out for a lead role in Hell House, her church’s annual haunted house of sin, Lacey’s junior year is looking promising. But when a cute new stranger comes to town, something begins to stir inside her. Ty Davis doesn’t know the sweet, shy Lacey Anne Byer everyone else does. With Ty, Lacey could reinvent herself. As her feelings for Ty make Lacey test her boundaries, events surrounding Hell House make her question her religion.Melissa Walker has crafted the perfect balance of engrossing, thought-provoking topics and relatable, likable characters. Set against the backdrop of extreme religion, Small Town Sinners is foremost a universal story of first love and finding yourself, and it will stay with readers long after the last page.
The reason I brought this cover up is because it bamboozled me. When I purchased it (I’ve read only the first few chapters so far) I thought I was getting a book very different from the one I got. I did not read the back, which is my fault. Fortunately, the book is quite good so far!
Anyway, let’s look at this cover as if I didn’t already know what it was about – how I saw it originally.
The color, of course, is the most important part of this cover. The primary visual object is the girl’s picture at the top, but you could make an argument that it is actually the satin red background that steals the show, particularly because the title references it directly. It’s a gorgeous color, the same color as crushed velvet theater curtains, jewels, and blood. It’s the color of passion and of love.
The picture at the top is locket-like, something old fashioned. The girl’s hair and clothing also make me think this is an 1880s girl. The silver flourishes play a big part in this design, and because they extend from the four corners, it makes me think the cover is trying to look like a book. I know I know, a book trying to look like a book. How avant-garde.
The matching silver is used in the title, which is a serif font, but also a special serif font. Serif fonts do not tend to be very flourishy, or very ornamental, but this one has a beautiful swooping R and Y. The curves of the B and the D aren’t hard and measured, but feel more fluid an curved. The other text fills the space well and disappears in the space.
And the time piece at the bottom? Unfortunately it disappears in the flourishes. I never even noticed it until I sat down to do this analysis. And remember, I own this book. Having noticed it now, it still makes me think Victorian.
So when I first saw this cover and chose to buy it, here’s what I thought it was about: I thought it was a re-imagined English-born fairy tale, maybe Snow White because of the title and the color of the cover. Passion and love are pretty part and parcel to Snow White’s tale.
It is actually about a girl with the supernatural ability to time travel. She meets a boy with the same gift and they travel through time to both the 18th century London, and modern London (where she’s from.) There’s something fishy going on with her birth and that she’s not supposed to have this ability. I was way off base!
Summary: Gwyneth Shepherd’s sophisticated, beautiful cousin Charlotte has been prepared her entire life for traveling through time. But unexpectedly, it is Gwyneth, who in the middle of class takes a sudden spin to a different era!
Gwyneth must now unearth the mystery of why her mother would lie about her birth date to ward off suspicion about her ability, brush up on her history, and work with Gideon–the time traveler from a similarly gifted family that passes the gene through its male line, and whose presence becomes, in time, less insufferable and more essential. Together, Gwyneth and Gideon journey through time to discover who, in the 18th century and in contemporary London, they can trust.
Even now, knowing what it is about, I still don’t see the time traveling bit. It still screams “FAIRY TALE” to me. Maybe it will be a bit of a fairy tale in the end, but I think this is a good example of a beautiful book cover that does not accurately portray the story inside.
What do you guys think?