Blogger: Janet Kobobel Grant
Several elements go into deciding whether a book cover works, but today let’s look at three elements you don’t have to sweat. What if…
You detest the book cover’s color
Do you dislike the dominant color used in the cover? Not to worry. The reader could care less that emerald green resides on your all-time-most-hideous-color-ever list. What counts is whether the cover conveys the right “feel” for the book’s content. If green suggests the bright hope of tomorrow, and that’s what your book is about, learn to like green.
You don’t like the way the model looks
#2 on the list of details not to worry about is whether the model on the book cover matches how you perceived the protagonist (in the case of fiction). Sometimes it doesn’t matter that the cover designer saw the protagonist differently from how you did. It does matter if a historical detail is incorrect or if the protagonist is rendered a blonde when in the story she’s a brunette. Or if the model isn’t the protagonist’s age, or in the case of nonfiction, if the model isn’t a match for the age of your core audience. That would convey the wrong message about the intended reader’s age. If your audience is 40, but the model is 20, the book will attract a different audience than the content does.
You dislike the book cover’s fonts
#3 worry that you should ignore is whether the font appeals to you. Once again, personal preference doesn’t count. The three valid reasons to suggest a font change include:
- Whether the words are readable. If the person scanning through reading possibilities has to work to figure out the title or subtitle of your book, then your concern is valid.
- If the font conveys the wrong message about the book’s tone. I saw a cover recently with a font that suggested a historical time period even though the novel was contemporary–wrong message.
- Sometimes author is identified with a certain font that’s part of his or her brand. Often this is true for their name rather than for the title. The author’s name always appears in the same font, book after book.
Ultimately, our personal preferences should be the least of our concerns when we get our first gander at a book cover design.
Below are three book covers for you to evaluate. What does the color convey? Is the title presented in a compelling way? Does the image work? Does everything work in concert to invite the intended reader to pick up this book and BUY IT?
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3 book cover elements you shouldn’t sweat. Click to tweet.
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Interesting post, Janet. You raised some aspects I never considered, though they’re not something over which I would lose sleep. For the examples you give:
1) ‘Syracusa’ emphatically does not work for me. The Med. colours are set off by the black border, but the ‘shattered glass’ comes across as artsy and pretentious, as does the faux-antique look of the font. Overall, the effect is jarring and rather irritating, and since I associate Delia and Nora Ephron with the lovely romantic comedies of the late 20th century, I’d pass. I liked their previous work so much that I would not want to ruin that impression.
2) ‘Who Ate My Grapes’ has an effective colour scheme, but the use of a smaller black font size for ‘grapes’ is puzzling. I’ll grant that the delicious-looking grapes kind of make the word superfluous, but I’d have preferred to see a better-matched design. And the apple…well, I realize that it was needed for compositional balance, and had to have that ‘singular mass’ – another group of grapes wouldn’t do – but it doesn’t really fit. I’d probably pass here, as well. Sorry, Mr. King, but your name in a larger font doesn’t compel me to pick up the book, as I have no idea who you are.
3) ‘Eleanor & Park’ is a winner. It’s simple, and matching the hair and shirt colours with the names is just great, as is turning the headphone cable into an ampersand. The speech balloon ‘a novel’ above the author’s name is almost too precious, but the lighthearted feel of the whole design lets it breathe, and in breathing, it sings. But who on earth besides a hippie would name a kid ‘Rainbow’? (Asked he who once named a dog ‘Tulip’…and Tulip happened to be a boy.)
* Regarding depictions of characters on the cover, I have a couple of issues:
A) It takes away part of my enjoyment in building a mental image of the people about whom I’m reading, and since they are generally glamourized…and I am and always was homely (putting it kindly) it creates a kind of distance, that I can’t identify with them as well.
B) Competent portraitists are hard to find, and I very often see flaws in painting technique that come across as careless. Hands are often too big in relation to heads…which are often too small. Also, the ‘lay’ of clothing sometimes doesn’t match human anatomy (yes, guys, in order to paint clothed people you have to start out by painting naked people).
* By far the best fiction covers I’ve seen are the original layouts or Andrew Greeley’s ‘The Cardinal Sins’ and Tom Clancy’s ‘Without Remorse’. The former showed a nude woman, seated and shown from the back, with a background of red drapery. Clancy’s book, as close as he got to a romance, showed two descending smoke trails against a blue-sky field, moving downward from upper left to lower right. (Later editions of both books changed the designs for the banal.)
The grapes cover is particularly puzzling. It struck me as artifice to put “grapes” in black, and of course it gets lost, but I found myself looking for it anyway. A cover that feels like it’s using trickery is not a good cover, in my opinion.
And the apple? Maybe it makes sense if one read the book, but since the assumption should be that the person looking at the cover is trying to decide whether to buy it, the apple also serves only to puzzle.
I took the apple to mean that perhaps this was a book about wine and cider making. (A vineyard forced to to turn to apples or perhaps in competition with an orchard in the cut throat world of alcoholic beverage industry!)
But then I hail from the west country in the UK, home of cider and scrumpy. 🙂
Nicholas, well, I live in California’s wine country, and vineyards are starting to plant apple trees to make hard cider so…that story idea makes sense to me! That, however, isn’t what this book is about; so we’re still wondering about the apple.
Count me in with Andrew–I prefer to conjure up my own images of the heroine or hero. Keep the faces in the shadows, or far far away or better yet, off the cover.
*As to your intriguing covers here, Janet:
*The first is eye-catching in a jarring way (seven years bad luck?). Only a glowing recommendation from a friend will make me buy it.
*#2–I lost the word “grapes”– Who ate what? Is this about Eve and the fruit? Why the glass? Is it about wine, not grapes? I might turn it over and read the back cover.
*Are Eleanor & Park listening to each other? What with the earphones and the speech bubble, this better be a story about communication.
*I’m from the “don’t judge a book by its cover” crowd. My to-read list (and I have an ever-growing list) is compiled from comments I read and hear from others. I include new books from authors I know and love. I’d be fine with just the title and author in large, legible font.
Siracusa is about two marriages that shatter during a trip to Italy. So knowing the essence of the story helps to make sense of the cover.
Eleanor & Park is a YA novel about two teens who fall madly in love with each. I think the headphones and being connected via the wire symbolize “connection” they felt for each other.
While a title and the author’s name might be sufficient for you, that makes me think a bad cover could result in your not wanting to read a book.
Janet, you’re dead on about ‘Eleanor and Park’. The headphones symbolizing connexion is enchanting, and it makes me want to like the characters from the outset.
* And maybe that is the most important part of a cover…to give the feeling, “I am REALLY going to ENJOY this book, these people!”
* Love to hear your thoughts on that assumption, Janet.
You’ve got my number, Janet. I am more likely to not buy a product because I hate the ad than I am to buy something because I like the ad.
*I’ve happily paid next to nothing at the used-book shop for paperbacks without covers.
Great post, Janet. We definitely hear authors’ cover nightmare stories. I know authors have to trust the publishers to know what is going to sell. I appreciate how you share what authors should speak up about, and what they need to just let go of. It must be hard, sometimes, to do this. I have a friend who had to really work to get a cover that worked for her book. And her “push back” was justified, in that case.
*I’m going to guess that for authors, as they trust (and hopefully get to offer some input) their publishers to create a good cover that will sell, that creates good relationships . . . At least that is what it looks like from this side of the publishing journey. 🙂
Jeanne, I think covers are more likely to strain the author-publisher relationship rather than make it closer. Unless the author absolutely loves the cover at first sight or has only minor suggestions.
But if the author thinks the cover doesn’t work or if the author wants to make changes based on personal taste, then things can get tense.
Covers often are on tight deadlines, and the publisher is creating a lot of covers at once. So it doesn’t take much for tensions to rise.
Janet, a question…to put it in perspective for those of us who might ‘demand’ cover changes, is there a typical dollar amount that a publisher would budget for a mid-list author’s cover?
I’m missing the word “grape” too. And on the third book, “Eleanor & Park” … on my phone, I had to click on it just to read it better, the writing above and below title. It seems so subtle, but that’s okay. I actually would probably pick it up over the other two because of the softer colors.
Eleanor & Park can loose much of the detail, especially the words, when it’s reduced. I like the cover, but in that sense, it’s not a strong cover. A book’s jacket has to stand up to being reduced on phones–or on Amazon.
Janet, I’m such a visual person… when someone asks me for directions I want to draw them a map. It’s what I’d need for myself. I’m no different with book covers. I need visual appeal to direct me to that particular book. I spend time each week scouring the YA section and find the ongoing trend for covers is still very dark (in color.) This gets confusing with all the spines facing out and once again I find my eye drawn to covers that can do the Worm in this crowded ballroom. If I could have any say at all in the cover design for my own YA, it would be the predominant background color.
When considering your book selection above:
#1 I spent several seconds trying to decide if the title was actually written backwards, a reflection in a broken mirror, which is an interesting concept, but also an irritation once I discovered my mistake. However, it did make me take notice of the book.
#2 I was attracted by the colors and fond memories of Still Life Drawing in college. The award label would be my biggest incentive to pick up this book.
#3 I like the simplicity of the art work and color choice. It made me want to learn more about the characters inside. I haven’t read this YA so I’ll be on the hunt for it.
* I don’t necessarily need a book’s cover to tell me what the story is about, but it does need to peak my interest. An easy to read font is also a big plus.
Lara, I remember walking into a bookstore and being confronted by a front table display of the best-selling titles. I was struck by how purple or lavender was used on every cover–and often large swaths of it. That must have been the color of that year in design of every kind so cover designers were picking it as well.
But you’re right that your book will get extra attention if it doesn’t fit in the visual trend of the season.
I like the broken mirror effect of Siracusa.
*The small black font for grapes doesn’t appeal to me. I also don’t like the name being in a font so much larger than the title. Nothing about the cover would draw me to pick the book up.
*A more general question, Janet. I can understand a publisher adding “A Novel” to a book with a title that could work for nonfiction, but why does a publisher choose to add that to a cover that is obviously fiction?
Carol, your question for Janet reminded me of something…in 1974 Edwards park published “Nanette”, a memoir of his service as a fighter pilot in New Guinea in 1943. He disguised the names of his fellow pilots, and identified the units only by nicknames, and called it – on the cover – ‘An Exaggeration.’ * It was the first time I saw that done (and I think the only time), and it felt apt, for the way he handled the story. (Interestingly, twenty years later Park wrote a straight memoir, “Angels Twenty”, which mirrored the events recounted in “Nanette” quite faithfully. What was missing from the latter book, though, was the sense of adventure and fun, even in the face of discomfort and the probability of sudden violent death. In “Nanette” Park caught the meaning; and the meaning was enough, and not an exaggeration at all.
Janet, some extra questions. When listing a novel in a bibliography, is the “A Novel” considered part of the title that should be included like “eleanor & park: a novel”, or is it more of an editorial comment that is omitted? Also, if the author didn’t capitalize, does the bibliography use no caps? This book title is all caps on the copyright page shown at Amazon. (I wouldn’t recommend reading even the first page in chapter 1. I made that mistake and found a lot of “non-CBA” language.) What if the title on the cover is no cap while the title inside the cover is all caps or just first-letter caps in standard title format? What’s the right way to treat the variations in a bibliographic reference?
Carol, the correct way to handle capitalization in a bibliography is to use The Chicago Manual of Style rules.
You do not need to add “A Novel,” as that’s not part of the title.
I apologize that the first page of Eleanor & Park was offensive. I haven’t read any of these books but was picking them solely based on having an interesting conversation about covers.
“A Novel” sometimes is added to a cover to make sure readers know what it is and sometimes because it works for the designer to have that added element.
Thanks!
The book with grapes on the cover makes the title appear as Who Ate My Ivan King. I thought the third book’s title was Rainbow Rowell and the author was Eleanor Park.
I so agree with what you said about fonts. There have been so many indie published books recently that have almost unreadable titles because of the extreme cursive font. When one sees the cover in small size the title and author’s name are completely unreadable. The cover is a mess of tangled fonts and images in various colors.
Ha! I hadn’t read the grape title as you did, but it sure enough can be read that way.
Indie published books often shout “indie” because of the fonts. Publishers actually buy fonts rather than using what’s readily available so they tend to be more complex in design but remain–for the most part–quite readable.
Janet, I hope it’s OK if I share a personal ‘cover experience’ in the SP world.
* When I wrote ‘Emerald Isle’ I had no doubt that the cover would have to be a rainbow reflected in a lake, both for hope, and a specific metaphor for the story line.
* What I DIDN’T know at the time was that the rainbow had been co-opted…well, hijacked, to me – as a symbol for gay pride. It was suggested that I find another visual image.
* Well, as they say where my wife grew up, “I don’ a’holt with that thar stuff nohow”, and the cover has an unrepentant rainbow arcing from upper left to middle right. A DOUBLE rainbow, reflected in a lake.
* Thus do I refute the modern world. I do not regret the decision. I want my treasured symbology back, and I am willing to fight for it.
Okay, I have the ultimate Weird Book Cover Story. I think.
* In the late 60s, a paperback edition of Stanley Johnson’s “Queen Of The Flat-Tops” was published. The book recounted his experiences as a war correspondent on the USS Lexington up to its sinking in the Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942.
* The cover, a painted illustration, showed a flaming Grumman F6F about to land on the Lex…but there are three problems.
1) The Lex was lost before the F6F ‘Hellcat’ came into squadron service. It only fielded the F4F ‘Wildcat’.
2) No aeroplane on fire would be batted in to land on a carrier; an aircraft carrier was already a pyromaniac’s dream, loaded with tons of bunker fuel, aviation fuel, and ordnance. The pilot would have been directed by radio or signal flags to bail out or land in the sea.
3) The illustration showed the aeroplane landing from the Lex’s BOW, and everyone knows that all aircraft carriers land aeroplanes from the stern, with takeoffs from the bow.
* Well, wait. The Lex (and its sister, the USS Saratoga) were converted into aircraft carriers from battlecruisers, and their powerplants actually could back the ships at considerable speed. Therefor both the Lex and the Sara could – and did – land aircraft on the bow whilst going full speed astern, and launch of the stern.
* I rather suspect that the artist did not know the last point. But it’s a dramatic cover, nonetheless, and I hop[e that if caused many to buy a fine book about a brave ship and her stalwart crew. It’s a splendid read, even today.
As a follow-up…if anyone’s still with me…there was a second USS Lexington, an Essex-class carrier that was renamed for the lost Queen…and Edgar Steichen, the famed photographer, left a wonderful visual/narrative record of his time aboard her. He was, as you know, husband to one Georgia O’Keefe, the artistic icon of my residential state of New Mexico.
* Here’s the Amazon link to Steichen’s “The Blue Ghost”. Buy it, please, and treasure the images of the very young men who went forth willing to die to keep your freedoms.
https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Ghost-photographic-narrative-Lexington/dp/B0007EFZ1I
I didn’t like any of the covers. The first two give no idea what the book is about and I disliked the small word. The third one is so pale I had to lean toward my screen to read it.
The cover on my first book, The Peril of the Sinister Scientist has a photo of a kid who is much younger and has different coloring than the main character. That book hasn’t sold well, and the cover is part of the reason.
Jan, the anguish of your book’s cover puts me in mind of the difficulties of dealing with an editorial board, pithily expressed by Nevil Shute:
“A board is long, hard and narrow. It is made of wood.”
Firstly, greetings from a place that has actual internet!!
Ahem…
The Delia Ephron cover is ruined by the broken glass effect.
Grapes? What grapes? What is that all about? Why hide a word?
I do like the name Rainbow Rowell, but the word bubble should go after Rowell.
And a few years ago, someone who had a very short career in cover design put out a cover with a blonde girl in a plaid shirt and I think she was wearing jeans.
A BLONDE in a *shirt* and *jeans*?
The book?
LM Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables.
That cover was only off on three major points (that you’ve mentioned, anyway). What’s the problem?
I know, right? I must be picky or something. 😉