# Covers!



## Jeko (Dec 28, 2012)

There are some covers I love and some I hate. I know you can't judge a book by its cover, but you can certainly judge a cover by the book it's for.

For example, this is one I hate:







It makes the main character look like a serial killer.

So, what covers do you love/loathe?


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## Deleted member 49710 (Dec 28, 2012)

I hate it when covers have a picture of someone who's supposed to be the MC. I'd rather imagine the characters myself, I don't want some artist's rendition and marketing department's selection in my head.

I get annoyed when the cover tries to tell the story, too. Like if I pick up a book called "The Mysterious Thing in the Cave" and there's a picture of a dragon in a cave. Or a picture of the big climactic action scene. Always looks cheesy to me.

Basically I like abstract images that maybe convey a mood or a general idea without giving anything away. Here are two books I got for Christmas which I think have fine covers:


Gives an impression of swirling and things breaking apart, maybe a whirlpool and wood floating on water. Not flashy but there's a mood set without telling too much.


I haven't read this yet so I'll just say what the cover says to me, without knowing how it relates to the actual contents of the book: we've got the planet and numbers, a pretty female face obscured by them, the eye being most prominent. So the human and the individual, the sensual and the spiritual, getting obscured by the planetary and the mathematical/logical. And that all goes with the post-apocalyptic/dystopian theme that the title suggests.


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## Jon M (Dec 28, 2012)

So many covers are awful. Like, bad photoshop collage stuff where the salient plot-points are rehashed. I prefer a cover image that is oblique, communicates a mood. Uta Barth's photography, for example, or Michael Wolf.

Chuck Wendig's got a good cover for his book, _Blackbirds_.


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## moderan (Dec 29, 2012)

I too hate when covers have some stereotyped action scene or bad collages trying to be "arty"-most seem culled from a high-school graphic arts department. That's part of what originally attracted me to horror and science fiction-I got to those genres from comic books and they usually featured striking art. A plain old monochrome look can be attractive, or something that reflects something of the story without getting all "spoiler-y".
For instance, the cover I commissioned for my themed-collection (due in April):





Here's an sf cover I found very effective when I first saw it:


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## Jeko (Dec 29, 2012)

> I hate it when covers have a picture of someone who's supposed to be the MC.



Ab-sa-tive-ly (to quote Anansi Boys). Another reason why I hate the I Am Number Four cover. I grew to like the main character; I thought he was sweet and gentle, not this weird guy covered in dirt who stares at me like I've broken his xbox.


I hate covers with annoying taglines that don't really seem to work with the rest of the cover. I seem to find a lot of those in YA fiction. To refer to I Am Number Four again, with that guy staring at me, I extrapolate the tagline. 'Three are dead... because I killed them.' Something like that. Doesn't set a good mood.


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## Kevin (Dec 29, 2012)

http://jacobcharlesdietz.com/site/w...e-illustrated-man-book-cover-ray-bradbury.png  - Don't know how well the cover tied in with the story, but the nailheads always intrigued... I thought the art could stand on its own.


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## moderan (Dec 29, 2012)

That cover tied in with the story perfectly. You should read it.


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## Kevin (Dec 29, 2012)

I only read picture books.

I miss my old Frazetta book covers. http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=frazetta&qpvt=frazetta&FORM=IGRE   and here's another place you might go: http://jcharlesdietz.com/ ( same artist as the Bradbury cover?) Click on the middle image *_visit the site*_ once you get there. It gets real interesting.


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## moderan (Dec 29, 2012)

I have several books that have nothing but sf book covers. My version of fine art.


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## Charlie (Dec 30, 2012)

I tend to gravitate toward simple understated covers, but I'm in the 50+ crowd, so that may have something to do with my upbringing. For instance:


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## Circadian (Dec 30, 2012)

I kind of like the Discworld covers.  They're simple, cute, and sometimes kinda funny.


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## TheSaintsAreComing (Jan 21, 2013)

I think I'll resuscitate this conversation. I prefer simplicity in my covers. No award stamps. No taglines. No commentary on the book. The Scribner reprints of old Hemingway novels are a perfect example. 



See that? Simple and engaging. Just some white text and a distorted photo of a matador.


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