Professional Book Cover Analysis

While searching for Fabio-esque covers, I found this one published by Harlequin. I really like this one. (the Fabioesque ones will come later...)



Concept: It's not a novel, but a diary cover for chronicling baby's arrival.

Composition: It's simple, yet not simplistic. The mom is lined up the exact same. She has the same hair style, which is retros 50's. And the simple progression plus the subtle use of the head makes the composition work. (Humans like seeing stories and sequences... another rule of graphic design.)


Colors: It manages to use different colors to show the change. However, it's deceptive since there is a limited color palate.

They also colored the person so it could be for most races. (Also the hair style, since in the 1950's all different women of color used that hairstyle.)

Typography: Again, simple san-serif, with nice rounded curves, I don't think it's Helvetica, but does not echo the retro style, but rather the simplicity of the drawings.

The script font I tend to dislike, however, they did choose something that is 1950's and only used it for a subtitle, so I'd let that slide. (You can see on this why script fonts tend to be frowned upon... can you read that?)

White on pink I also tend to dislike as well... at least a dark pink and a mostly easy-to-read font was used, which means less negative space issues. I also think the white on pink was supposed to evoke those 50's diner signs to some effect as well. (Notice it didn't scream it.)

Rules broken:

- Compositions like this usually are frowned upon, but for something that shows progression, this fits into the rule well, so the composition is understandable. They also got around some of the issues by head positioning.

- Typography on script fonts... usually not done...

I like this one since the more you look at it the more I see the thought put into the composition and design. It is quite minimalistic. But I would think fairly easy to execute.

First 4 are high concept. Fifth one I can understand.
Sixth one is recognizable on what they are going for.
Seventh (the one with the A) I kinda dislike.
Eighth one I really dislike "A novel" on that one. I guess they didn't get the redundancy and more than one font and the no copperplate lesson.
Tenth cover, I think manages to be high concept, simple, yet fun. There, I still dislike a novel, but the piece is well put into space and it shows a pretty good understanding of negative and positive space.

11th one I like because it attracts attention in odd ways.

12th one I dislike for a number of reasons. One, I have to stare at it to get it, which is fail. And 2 it doesn't seem to relate...

13 is high concept except the novel also seems like it's a literary novel? Definitely do not need "A Novel" there either.

14 I can't quite like, but I feel like I'm missing information.

15 has personality. I think it succeeds.

16 I like after some examination.

17 is interesting use of concept and typography.

18 I like

19 isn't graphically bad in any way, but my personal taste likes minimalistic more on typography. I can see what they are trying for and it is achieved, but personal taste is against it.

20 Meh.

21 achieves what it wanted to...

22 is minimalistic, I'd have to know the book better to judge, but if it's going over electronic age of music, it works.

23 I don't understand. I need the blurb on that one.

24 I know the concept, I still don't like it despite the execution was well done.

25 I don't get. It's cranberry out of a can which makes me go so what? That's graphic artist fail.

From the collection none of them seem to be from Fantasy or Science Fiction or Horror--they are all from the Literary crowd, which tells you a lot about the reviewrs. They all employ good color theory and examine the laws of saturation fairly well. When rules are broken the majority do it well, though I wish they'd cut the "A novel" (The person is standing in the fiction section... they will figure it out).

The majority chosen are minimalistic. (the art movement) But the majority of Literary book covers tend to be minimalistic. (Also high concept)

Somehow I think this board is more slanted than the larger one that reviews all covers made for the year and sometimes picks genre fiction among the number and give the blurb/justification. I think I linked it.

aruna said:

I hated the German cover (that "flat screen" thing in the middle!)

Loved the Danish one.

Click to expand...

aruna said:

I have no idea how large 400 pixels is and how to find out the size of an image, so I'm going to just post the links to the images instead.

Here's the trade paperback cover of my first book. Everyone loved this cover. The butterfly was embossed. I didn't like the butterfly so much, but I adored the background.

Here's the mass market paperback cover of the same book. I really disliked this one. I especially disliked the fact that they made my name too large. The butterfly dominates, the background, which I loved so much, isn't nearly as evocative as in the trade. Again, the butterfly was embossed.

Click to expand...

Good instinct with your own covers. Maybe your daughter also inherited it in part from you?

Romance Cover Edition

I would have done it sooner, but I got distracted by the whole Cover 200 thing and wanted to figure it out. (Which was harder than I thought).

I did some thinking about romance covers while searching through some good and bad ones (though the romance community itself wants to get away from the Fabio-esque covers in some camps)

The first thought that occurred to me is that the in-legible type was a way to cover up the fact one was reading romance originally. (Some guys call it girl porn, whatever.)

However, the stigma has lifted since then, with you, know, the women's movement, so it may be understandable that it's also shifted in the romance community.

If you apply the psychological principle of convention being preferred overall... that may explain a few things here and there.

Taking this theory into account, most of the covers do break all sorts of typography rules. Some of them come off busy as well.

I didn't read any of these books, but I did read the summaries. Also looked into the authors.

To off set the journey, I did find a decent cover...



While technically the author name and the title shouldn't be the same size, it obeys most of the other rules--there are margins, there is obedience to color theory (Somewhere between triadic and analogous for those paying attention. And objects are ranked fairly well.

Granted, it doesn't have people on the cover, concept-wise, but it still feels like a romance novel. (The painting effect, etc).



The typography makes me heave a sigh of not the good kind. Pretty much everything I said you shouldn't do when choosing type and putting it over, yeah.

The image itself isn't bad, but it's getting obscured by the type, so I'm not sure what to look at. (I kinda dislike the idea of cutting off women's heads, most likely because women's heads on covers are more likely to get cut off than men's. (By survey and studies.)

The color scheme is roughly complimentary. (yellow and purple).

The breaking of the rules here might be deliberate in the early days, as highlighted. You didn't want people to know what you were reading, but this is actually a relatively recent book. =P I think women's liberation and all of that can make us move away from such covers where the branding and the name of the book is obscured. But that's my opinion... (Which will never lord or Lady over Harlequin, etc.)



This cover I thought was well done except for the margins. Granted, it has a Historical element, which may be influencing some of the choices, (And I personally thing the "The" could have stayed in the same font) But I think it was designed rather intelligently. As this is a subsequent book in the author's resume, the author's name is bigger. Color Scheme is somewhere in the complimentary range, though they sneakily tried to make the dress darker and blue in almost and so there is a second analogous scheme going with the yellow, green and faked blue.


I like the typography in the upper left. And then you get to the rest of the typography and it's a headache. It has a total of four fonts on the cover. FOUR. Even for a romance cover, that doesn't have a good excuse.

Also the anatomy.... The neck doesn't twist that far unless you're in something like the Ring... and then the wrinkles on the dress (near the hand)... and the more you stare at it, the more mistakes come out...

(Also the nonsensical plaid against a dress that's not Scottish or Irish, but we're just getting into the thick of it and it's veering away from graphic design into just plain drawing).

Anyway, I found this cover very problematic...


This one is nonsensical to me. It's busy, it's cluttered, It uses more than one font. And I have no idea from the blurb why that lady is staring at us. (Plus the tag line is just weird.) (To be fair, this was listed on a Romance site as a bad cover).

But I think it's fair to see why... it just doesn't congeal properly in concept or design. It doesn't even read properly as Paranormal romance until you strain yourself to read the tagline... and then the tagline makes me, personally go, huh? (Plus the tagline shouldn't be that long... taglines are 5 words or less).

Romance with your mother watching? that happens in some bent out of shape London? ;; I haven't got a clue. Also doesn't really match the book which just made me scratch my head more.

I should note that Harlequin used to do a lot of bodice ripper novels with the copperplate font, but current covers from them have been modernized to include the more feminist thought that women have a right to read romance boldly and have clear titles plus some experimentation into minimalism on some covers. (I spent a few hours perusing through romance covers)

Note: Because Photobucket is sometime fussy, the images may initially cache larger than they are saved as on photobucket. Give it a few minutes. (Nothing was that large to begin with)

Alessandra Kelley said:

I think it would be helpful to see some images of really well done covers with explanations of why they are well done.

Bad covers can be enlightening and they can be amusing, but they are not nearly so useful as successfully made good covers.

Click to expand...

Bad covers help highlight common mistakes, even made by professionals... it's easier often to *see* why rather than *explain* why, especially with a visual medium. Also, it helps to show that a good cover isn't that far out of reach of the common person either--i.e. if you mind these things and you know what they are, then you won't repeat them.

Just like people learn from other people's mistakes. And one learns by critiquing.

But the major point I wanted to make in the previous post was more along the lines of maybe this is why the covers turned out the way they did and it became convention. Such things are also worth thinking over. When does convention become helpful? When does it become hurtful? What is the aim in following or detracting? <--something my prof would go over frequently. He absolutely said to not blindly follow.

For that you need both follow the convention (Well and horribly) and break the convention and also you're trying too hard. It's easier on pro covers.