Showing posts with label book covers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label book covers. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 3, 2014

2014's Best Book Covers (#amonthoffaves)

The Month of Favorites continues!

Today we're chatting about our 10 favorite book covers.  I couldn't tell from the prompt if we were supposed to keep this to books that we read in 2014 (or if it even has to be books that we've read...perhaps book covers we've admired but not yet picked up?), but since it's the end of the year and we're wrapping up, I decided to limit this to books I read in 2014.

However...I've only read 43 books so far this year, and choosing 10 would mean nearly a quarter of the books I read this year would have to have eye-catching covers.  Which is not the case, unfortunately.  So instead, this is my top 5 book covers of books I read in 2014, because I was only honestly able to pick out 5 that seemed exceptional!

In no particular order...

1. Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult  (review)

It's just so pretty and calming.  Sometimes simplicity is all I want from a book cover.

2. The Blonde by Anna Godbersen  (review)

As much as I disliked the book itself, the cover is fairly dramatic.

3. Croak by Gina Damico  (review)

If you've read this book, you'll know that the main character (Lex) is fairly sassy and bad-ass, and this picture sums her up so well.  Plus, you know, scythe.  Kind of disarming.

4. What I Had Before I Had You by Sarah Cornwell  (review)

Makes me want summer and roller coasters and slurpees.

5. The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman  (review)

The image of the girl in the water is beautiful, but also rather haunting.  A perfect fit for this novel.

What say you, readers?  Did you read anything with an especially lovely cover this year?

Thursday, February 7, 2013

Cover Snobbery

Everyone always says "don't judge a book by its cover."  Which I think is great advice...for everything except books.

Yes, I try not to be judgmental of others based on appearances.  If everyone judged me by MY cover, I would not have had any friends when I was between the ages of 8 and 14.  Truth.
At the age of 9, the Well-Read Redhead enjoyed perms, florescent Disney t-shirts, and coke bottle glasses.  Not pictured: scoliosis back brace.
Friends' faces blurred to hide their embarrassment.
But throw an unappealing book cover in front of me, and unless someone can make a pretty strong case for it, you can bet I'm picking up something else to read.

A couple months back, I read a post by Melissa at the Harley Bear Book Blog that addressed this very conundrum.  Popular books that she had no desire to read, because the covers didn't strike her fancy.  I feel this way ALL THE TIME.  It's amazing what a bad cover can do for first impressions.

That's not to say I don't make exceptions--I do, and I'm often glad for it.  My favorite example of this is The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern.  The #1 reason it took me so long to read it is because I disliked the cover--it felt cartoonish and too...magicky.  And then it ended up being one of my top books of 2012.  Moral of the story: exceptions are necessary, but the judging still happens.

So, what cover elements are the biggest turnoffs for me?

1. Any movie-inspired cover

Whenever a book is offered with either its original cover or its Hollywoodized version, I always go for the original.  I feel like the movie covers "cheapen" the appearance, for lack of a better word.  This is probably because I often think the book is 1000 times better than the movie, anyway.

2. The author's name is bigger than the title

Unfortunately, I see this trend more and more these days, and it is a serious pet peeve of mine.  Big-name authors often have their name blown up bigger than the title on the front cover.  I'm sure it helps with book sales (if you have a large following, some people don't care what the book's about--just that YOU wrote it), but as a reader, it annoys me.  The book is about the plot, not about the author.  (And yes, I know two of my faves--Stephen King and Jodi Picoult--are top offenders here.)

3. Poorly/awkwardly Photoshopped

Pertains to approximately 95% of all the self-published covers I've ever seen.  I understand the design budget is smaller, but...really?  There are some really well-done self-published covers too (The Thief of Auschwitz and Bluff are two of them) so you can't use that as an excuse.

4. Too intricate

If there's too many details on a cover, it turns me off.  I want to take one quick look and get some idea of where the book is going, or a mystery that might be revealed.  I don't want to have to pull out my magnifying glass to figure it out.

5. Too cutesy

Even if it's YA, I don't necessarily want to feel like I'm reading an after school special.

So readers, what cover elements do YOU shy away from?  And please feel free to share awkward photos of your younger selves.
 
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