{"id":5123,"date":"2014-09-28T07:06:55","date_gmt":"2014-09-28T06:06:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/janetgover.com\/?p=5123"},"modified":"2014-09-28T07:06:55","modified_gmt":"2014-09-28T06:06:55","slug":"judging-books-by-their-covers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/?p=5123","title":{"rendered":"Judging books by their covers"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"This<\/a>
This is a book I bought purely because the cover reminded me of a favourite statue in Central Park in New York – loved the book and bought the sequel.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

According to ancient wisdom \u2013 we\u2019re not supposed to\u2026 but we do it all the time.<\/p>\n

Book lovers will stick with a favourite author and just buy everything they write (hence the groaning noises coming from my bookshelves). But what about finding new authors \u2013 people we have never read before?<\/p>\n

Personal recommendations count for a lot \u2013 but without a recommendation, I think it\u2019s down to the covers.<\/p>\n

Whether I\u2019m in a book shop or online, a great cover will make me at least pause long enough to check out the book blurb. At that point \u2013 I am on the road to buying the book. A good blurb will have me reaching for my credit card.<\/p>\n

So \u2013 I thought I would post some book covers I really like \u2013 and maybe a few I don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

It seems strange to think there was once a time when I had not read Terry Pratchett. Now he\u2019s on my automatic buy list and I\u2019ve visited the discworld many, many times.<\/p>\n

For me \u2013 the Josh Kirby covers are wonderful. Before I\u2019d read a single word of that first book \u2013 the cover had already taken me into the world. I even have a framed, signed poster of one of the covers in my house.<\/p>\n

\"These<\/a>
These covers capture the Discworld so well – I was a little annoyed when the publisher decided to give the books different covers.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Twilight books are the sort of thing you either love or you hate \u2013 but I don\u2019t think anyone can doubt the impact of those covers. I thought they were great\u2026 particularly the first one. Obviously the publishers thought so too\u2026 there are many copycat covers on the YA shelves.<\/p>\n

\"These<\/a>
These covers were real attention grabbers when first released – but now there are so many similar designs, they don’t stand out quite so well.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Even more controversial \u2013 Fifty Shades. I confess I haven\u2019t read the books. I started, but they were not to my taste. The covers, however, were very striking\u2026 and again that style has been copied many many times on similar books.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>
A brilliant cover design – which no doubt added to the book’s amazing success.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I am not a fan of covers that show the faces of the hero and heroine. If that picture is not how I see them in my mind \u2013 then my enjoyment of the book is lessened.<\/p>\n

\"These<\/a>
These are not bad books – I read these authors – but these are not the people I see in my head as I read.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

YA covers are great. Do publishers put more effort into those than others? I don\u2019t know, but it seems to me a lot of YA covers are far more interesting than a lot of adult covers. Here are some that really caught my eye.<\/p>\n

\"Y.A.<\/a>
Y.A. novels – and fantasy – are an exception to my ‘no faces’ rule – especially when they are as beautiful as these.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Bu contrast \u2013 the modern UK romance cover really doesn\u2019t do it for me. There is a sameness about them. No book seems to stand out \u2013 and I\u2019m always looking for the stand-out books.<\/p>\n

\"I<\/a>
I have read and really enjoyed each of these authors. They write standout books – but I don’t think the covers stand out. Each cover is fine by itself – but there are too many on the bookshelves that are too similar.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Also deserving of better covers \u2013 the amazing Robyn Carr. Love her books \u2013 but the covers leave me cold.<\/p>\n

\"Robyn<\/a>
Robyn Carrs’ books are wonderful – full of emotion. But I find her covers to be cold and lacking emotion.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Finally \u2013 and I guess this comes under the heading of shameless promotion \u2013 I love the covers done by Choc Lit \u2013 my own publisher. It was one of the things that attracted me to them. The covers fit the genres \u2013 but don\u2019t conform to the stereotypes. I love both the covers they have done for me. Here are a few of my favourites among the other Choc Lit titles.<\/p>\n

\"There<\/a>
There are so many lovely Choc L:it covers that I could have included here. These are some that really captured my imagination the first time I saw them. Having read the most of the books – I think they embody the stories really well.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

According to ancient wisdom \u2013 we\u2019re not supposed to\u2026 but we do it all the time. Book lovers will stick with a favourite author and just buy everything they write (hence the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reading"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7g6jm-1kD","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5123\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/janetgover.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}