Cover Design

Covers sell books. Well, not by themselves, but covers are the "curb appeal" of books. They are what first catches the eye and makes a book stand out from all the others so that the casual browser stops for another look. Perhaps picks it up and turns it over to read the back blurb.

So it's essential to get it right. The colour, the image, the amount of detail, the title, and the font all combine to give an overall impression of what's inside. Pastels like pinks and purples suggest a nice, gentle cozy, and a cat in the image cements the impression even before you get to the title "Baking up Murder". By contrast, vivid, violent, and clashing colours like red and orange are more likely an action thriller, and moody, dark colours like grey, brown, and dark blue, often with a single, haunting image, hint at menace. If you're not in the mood for a tortured, moving read, you won't pick up that one.

Cover designers rarely read the novel beforehand. They rely on the blurbs and descriptive material provided by the editors, and sometimes, as in the case of my publisher, Dundurn Press, they ask for suggestions from the author. Here are two examples of FIRE IN THE STARS, my first Amanda Doucette mystery. Because it was a new series, there were no guidelines for how the covers ought to look. I had suggested a Newfoundland landscape, so here is the first cover that was developed.

A beautiful scene that captures the essence of Newfoundland, but does it speak of danger and menace? The scene , with its calm ocean and its quaint houses, is too peaceful and colours are too soft. After this feedback, here is the cover the designer came up with. (Thank you, Laura Boyle, you are awesome.) I think it speaks for itself.

We are now just beginning the process of designing the cover for THE ANCIENT DEAD, the fourth Amanda Doucette mystery, and this time I sent Laura about five photos taken during last fall's location trip to the Alberta badlands, and although she may find something even better, they can be a starting point for her. Here are a couple of of them.

I can't wait to see what she comes up with!

Judging a Book by Its Cover

By Vicki Delany

We talk a lot about book covers here at Type M for Murder because Rick Blechta is a cover designer (and an extremely good one, if you’re looking to have some work done). He knows what’s good and perhaps more importantly what is not good.

But aside from being good, or not, a cover needs most of all to be appropriate. The cover is the contract the author extends to the reader. The cover should reveal the mood of the book, something of the setting maybe, certainly the genre or subgenre it falls in.

Think of a photograph of the US capital lit up at night, or Kremlin square in the rain. You’re expecting a thriller, something dark and world-threatening. Now think cats and books and comfortable arm chairs, maybe a cup of tea. What you are expecting is a cozy. And if serial killers break out, the reader is going to be darn disappointed. Maybe even angry.

Simple choice of colour can be a strong clue. Baby blue means “women’s fiction” (whatever that is) and light purple or violet is romance.

Most publishing houses know this. Unfortunately a lot of graphic artists, who are not book cover designers, do not. And a lot of self-published books are being put out there with totally inappropriate covers.

I’m not going to insult anyone by giving you examples of what I mean, but I am sure you’ve seen plenty.

Last time I told you about two totally different books I have coming out in the next few weeks. Have a look at the cover images, and you’ll realize that you don’t need much of description from me.

Blood and Belonging is set in a tropical paradise. A luxury hotel sitting on what’s been voted many times as the world’s best beach. But the colours chosen for this cover give you another side to the Caribbean paradise.

Here is what I consider perhaps to be the best book cover of all time. Talk about establishing mood and setting. It's just about perfect.

Cover Stories

Since All Men Fear Me came out, people are always asking me about the man on the cover, but since the publisher chose the cover and I had no more to do with it than to say, "I like it", I could never tell them who he is, only that he is a perfect depiction of the villain in the book. However, thanks to a curious reader who actually queried my publisher about the cover photo*, I now know who the man is!

Here's what the cover artist revealed: "I acquired the actual photo (not a scan or reproduction) from a collector. It is an original 1900s mug shot one of about a dozen that I purchased. The collection is quite intriguing; each mug shot has a frontal face photo, a profile photo and on the back is the name of the arrested and a hand-written description of their crime! Although there were some murderers in the collection of mug shots, this man was arrested for being a 'disorderly person'. His alias was 'Jack the Hugger' and he was arrested in Jersey City, NJ in 1903."

Now there's a story. I imagine old Jack was just a bubble off plumb, and was arrested for walking around Jersey City giving random hugs to people whether they liked it or not. The saga of the man in the photo has caused me to ponder the history of the covers on my novels. When my first book came out in 2005, Amazon and the ebook were not the juggernauts they are today. Just in the past few years, cover artists have to take into consideration that most people will first see the book cover as a thumbnail online.

I was told that a book cover is like a movie poster. The whole point is to intrigue the potential reader. For my early novels in the Alafair Tucker series, the production supervisor asked me to send family photos for the cover artist to work with. So I provided the photo on novels one through four, which have rather busy covers and look a bit cut-and-paste to me.



By 2011, when the fifth novel, Crying Blood, came out, the internet was the thing, and nobody asked me to provide anything. The only input I had was when they sent me the mock-up and said, "here it is. Hope you like it." The cover artist had created a simple, colorful cover that looks good online or on a physical book. When All Men came out late last year, the cover was down to its bare essentials. The book is looking right at you. "Buy me," it says, "or you'll be sorry."

One of my favorites, the tornado book, 2014

_______________

*Here is what the curious reader said to the publisher: "he must have been a murderer! His face was so creepy that I had to turn the book face down on the coffee table when I wasn't reading it!" She then called back a little while later to clarify that she did not mean to insult the cover--in fact, quite the opposite; she thought it caught the spirit of the villain and the book perfectly!

Guest Post - Christina Freeburn

Today's guest is Christina Freeburn, author of the Faith Hunter Scrap This Mystery Series. Visit her at www.christinafreeburn.com Take it away, Christina! 

That First Glimpse 

by Christina Freeburn 

 

Anticipation. Nervousness. Excitement. A little bit of fear. All of these emotions tumble through me when it’s the first time to see my book cover. It’s like a child sneaking toward the Christmas tree, peeking with one eye open as they hope and fear at the same time about what Santa left. Will it be the Red Ryder BB gun with a compass in the stock, or a pink bunny suit made by Aunt Clara.

I’ve been seeing the book for about a year or longer on my computer and paper, but it’s been just words. No pictures. The only images of the book are the words that I’ve written: dialogue, description, how I’ve structured the plot. It’s all been me (and the suggestion of my wonderful editor) to show the story to the reader. But soon, the cover will arrive in my inbox and it will no longer only be about how I see it, but how the cover artist envisioned the book through my description of it.

Was I able to convey all the emotions and theme of the book adequately? Will my book look the way I’ve started to imagine it? Or will it be completely different? I had filled out a cover art sheet listing all the important elements in the book and what I think should be portrayed to the reader. The location: small town West Virginia. The mood of the book: for Framed to Death an optimistic, lighthearted tone coupled with a serious community issue. Which one (or ones) will the cover artist choose as being the stronger focal point to really show the story and will work best on a cover?

Being a scrapbooker, I’ve learned that less is often times more when it comes to design layout. When I started scrapbooking, I’d include every possible picture of an event (even if it meant cutting them into weird shapes), and layer on stickers and die cuts to fill all spot available. I would make sure to leave some room for some journaling so I could tell (more times than not retelling) what the pictures portrayed. After a few years, I realized I was overpowering the photographs with too many extras so I streamlined the amount of embellishments I put on the page, and chose the best pictures that showed the heart of the memory, and what I wanted myself and my family to remember about the event.

When the email pops with the subject line cover draft, I prepare for my first glimpse. All open programs are closed. I set my cell phone to vibrate and move it to the work station behind me. I don’t want anything distracting me from taking in the moment of that first look at my book. For me, it’s like meeting someone for the first time and I want to give my undivided attention. With one eye closed and the other opened a tiny bit, I click on the email and enlarge the attachment. Once I know the cover is full size on the monitor, I open my eyes. There it is. My book! A picture of my book!

The moment I saw Framed to Death, the first words that pop into my mind are: “I’m in love, I’m in love, and I don’t care who knows it.” (It was during December so I was in the middle of my holiday movie binging season and I had just got done watching Elf.) The colors fit the fall season that book takes place and I love the frame chosen for the focal picture. It shows an element of the story without revealing it. I’d gush more about the new cover but I’m afraid I might give part of the plot away.

Framed to Death, the fourth book in the Faith Hunter Scrap This Mystery series, will be released on April 26, 2016. The other books in the series are Cropped to Death, Designed to Death, and Embellished to Death.

Christina Freeburn served in the US Army JAG Corps and also worked as a paralegal, librarian, and church secretary. The Scrap This Mystery Series (Cropped to Death, Designed to Death, Embellished to Death and forthcoming Framed to Death) brings together her love of mysteries, scrapbooking, and West Virginia. She's working on future books in the Faith Hunter Scrap This mystery series published by Henery Press. Christina blogs at www.theselfrescueprincess.wordpress.com where she chats about books, especially heroines and holiday themed stories, crafting, writing, and new hobbies she’s exploring