People love to say, “never judge a book by its cover.”
This phrase is usually speaking to the idea that a person or thing is more than they appear to be. But when it comes to actual books, you very much should judge them by their covers.
Book covers are very important to the reach of the book.
The cover of a book is very much a part of its branding and attempt to reach a specific audience. If you are looking for a new book to read, it is not crazy to look at the visual attempt to grab whatever demographic the book is marketed to. Looking for horror? Look for a cover with a dark gloomy forest or house and a big scary title font. Looking for cheesy romance? Look for a cover with a big buff man and a million rose petals. Though this will not always work, most of the time, the book cover is a great way to understand the contents of a novel.
A good book cover will signify to the reader immediately what the general subject and feeling of the book will be. If your book is about a giant whale who torments the main character, then you might want to include that menacing whale on your cover. A really effective book cover is often one that stands out from the rest of the books on the shelf.
This can be done in two major ways.
One of these ways is to create a cover or work with another artist to create a piece that works well with the novel and creates a cohesive visual for the story the author wants to tell.
The other way to do this is to be published by one of the few extremely famous publishers and brand the author's novel with the publisher's logo. Think of how the Penguin logo automatically assures the buyer of the product’s quality.
Book covers can also be highly controversial.
“Lolita” is a book that was and still is highly controversial. Originally written as a condemnation of pedophilia, the author, Vladimir Nabokov, first instructed publishers to never include a picture of a young girl (the titular Lolita) on the cover. For the first couple of editions this was followed, but it only takes a google search of the novel to see how his original wishes have been ignored. This has led to a complete confusion in the messages of the novel in a really disgusting way.
Another example of this sort of controversy would be Franz Kafka. Kafka famously did not want any cover of his story, “Metamorphosis,” to feature the bug that the main character transforms into. Still, almost every cover you see features depictions of the bugs.
Ultimately, there is a huge gap between the wishes of the author and the wishes of the public. Oftentimes (but not all the time), the author wants to cover their book in something that accurately represents its content, whereas the publisher wants to cover the author’s book in something that will draw the most readers.
This can work out well, but sometimes it results in a boring, bland cover that only serves as a portrait of every market trend of that quarter, which hides the wonderful words within.
Many modern novels veer to the side of minimalism. Using big shapes and few recognizable figures with a focus on the title and font, these covers are a dime a dozen and completely fade into a sea of other novels, making it very difficult for readers and writers alike to find each other.
Minimalism is a bizarre turn for covers, considering that a lot of early covers were bejeweled and gold encrusted. Books were very treasured items before the advent of the printing press, and even for a long time after. Not many people could read and those that could were those that could afford to learn reading and writing – the very wealthy.
It is under-appreciated how wide an access we have to books in the modern day. Anything you want to read, you can. But when books become only products to sell, they lose much of the appeal they have had for centuries, coveted as luxury items. So get experimental. Find an audience by working with artists to put out the vision that authors work so hard to put into reality.
The key is almost always artistic collaboration.
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