Thoughts on YA Book Covers

Sean Willis says that YA covers are embarrassing to the genre. Phoebe North points out that they're targeting a certain demographic and, hopefully, making promises about the content within. As a reader who is highly influenced by covers (way. too. much. seriously.), this conversation is super-interesting to me and I wanted to join in.

I'm in my twenties. I read YA. Like, all the time. And am I embarrassed about carrying around, say, Elizabeth Rudnick's Tweet Heart? Well... it depends. It depends on where I am, who I'm with, and how I happen to be feeling that day. Covers give a certain message about the story underneath and while, as Phoebe points out, that message is intended to be something of a promise about what is contained in the story, one snapshot can't capture 60 thousand words. The incredibly complex The Hunger Games is not summed up by that gold-on-black image of a mythical bird. The cover gives one idea. In the case of Tweet Heart, it promises a cute love story. In the case of The Hunger Games it promises something decidedly darker -- if I had to guess I'd say a science fiction story set in a future world. And I wouldn't be far off, but is that how you describe The Hunger Games to somebody? Uh, no. Because while there are plenty of science fiction/dystopian novels set in a future world, only one of them is The Hunger Games. And Tweet Heart? I'm not going to tell someone it's a cute, light love story. No, I'm going to tell them IT'S A NOVEL WRITTEN IN TWEETS!!! AND ONE OF THE CHARACTERS LOVES STAR TREK!! (Obviously I'm trying to sell the book to... myself.) But you get the point. Cover does not equal story. It's a representation, sure, but it's the rare cover that actually captures the essence of a novel.

The cover's job isn't to sum up the book. It's to get you to look closer, to pick up the book, to buy the book. It's an advertisement for a product that is, essentially, black marks on white paper. While the best covers pick up on a particular part of the story, that's not a requirement and, in fact, it doesn't always help. Until you've read The Hunger Games, you don't know how significant the cover image of that bird really is. Sometimes it's only after you've read a novel that the cover becomes amazing.

All of this is maybe (definitely) getting away from the question if are YA covers embarrassing? Really though, there's not one answer for that. Maybe you cringe when you walk into the YA section and see all those glossy, shiny covers with girls in pretty dresses. Maybe you love covers that are a big more ambiguous, a bit abstract or artsy or have illustrations instead of photographs or any one of a dozen other cover styles out there. Personally I love YA covers. Sure, there are a few that make me shake my head but for the most part I think they're the best covers out there. But then, I'm partial to the genre in the first place, and that plays a big part, I think, in our reactions to a cover.

So what do you guys think? Are YA covers embarrassing? Do they do the books justice? Love them or hate them? 

Cover Mini-Trend

I don't typically do cover posts, but in looking at my recent reads I'm noticing a little mini-trend.

The back-of-the-head aspect makes perfect sense for Sean Griswold's Head, but I'm a little surprised to see it on the other covers as well. I typically don't pay a huge amount to cover trends; what I mostly notice is when a cover is particularly striking. However, these covers... I like them. I love being able to imagine what a character looks like and faces on covers can sometimes be distracting or confusing in this case, but the backwards-shot is a nice alternative to covers without people on them or the infamous Headless Girl covers that, thankfully, seem to be becoming more and more rare lately.

What do you think of these covers? As I said, I like them, and Purple Daze is particularly striking in real life. Plus, I love the chalkboard and pie chart of Sean Griswold's Head and the dress/truck (at least, I think it's a truck) combo of Taking Off.

Blog Hop: Sept 3-6 (Cover Judgements)

This week's Blog Hop question (hosted by Jennifer, of Crazy for Books) is about covers:

Do you judge a book by its cover?

Absolutely. I'm such a sucker for a pretty cover (and especially pretty fonts). This really comes into play whenever I go to a bookstore, especially a used bookstore where a lot of the book are in not-great condition. I love the ones that have nice, modern-looking covers. One thing that really annoys me with book covers (and yes, I realize this is done for a reason) is when the author's name is bigger than the title of the book. It happens a lot with big-time authors and even sometimes in YA, especially with some of Sarah Dessen's books and, most notably, the paperback version of AN ABUNDANCE OF KATHERINES, by John

Green. This has always bothered me and though I know the author has nothing to do with it and it probably is very good advertisement, especially if the author is well-known, I'm more likely to buy a book where the title is the focus, not the author's name.

As for what I do like in book covers?

• Color. (example: THE EXTRAORDINARY SECRETS OF APRIL, MAY, AND JUNE)
• Fonts. Pretty fonts, that is. I like Helvetica (dear Helvetica, I love you.) and fonts that look hand-written especially. (example: THE SUMMER I TURNED PRETTY)
• Simple, conceptual designs. There are many I can think of for this one, but I like the unobtrusive, eye-catching pictures that give a hint to what the book is about. (examples: SCRAMBLED EGGS AT MIDNIGHT and THE UNWRITTEN RULE)
• Matte finish. Hey, I like a shiny book cover as much as the next person, but not if "shiny" means "every fingerprint is going to show." That's just annoying.

To be completely honest, and just to show how much I love pretty covers, I own a few books that I don't even like but I constantly find myself wanting to reread them just because of how beautiful the cover is. So yeah, I judge the covers. It doesn't come into play when considering what I think of the story and writing, but in choosing what to buy it definitely does.

What about you? Do you choose what to buy based on covers? What do you love (or hate) in covers?