Another version - a first third-round prototype - hopefully avoiding those generic,
one idea fits all images,but intimating a bit more what the book might be about.
one idea fits all images,but intimating a bit more what the book might be about.
(I haven't yet re-thought the blurb, and black is not right for the back page text, but the wood-grain title is an improvement, I think.)
Lots of things to consider here. I like the font. Very "stamped onto a crate" if you get my meaning. I suspect that was your intention.
ReplyDeleteGut reaction is that I prefer the bottom one. For some reason it puts me in mind of Jonathan Coe - although it isn't like any of his actual book covers, and certainly unlike the more recent imprints.
However, thinking strictly commercially.... The top one looks more like something people pick up at airports and railway stations so you might have a bigger market with it.
The back page blurb tells me too much. It's a fine line, but I think you need to be just the other side of it. And I can't get "When these brides said 'till death us do part' they didn't realise it would be so soon" out of my head. Or am I writing the film trailer?
One last thing. The top one looks like it's set in the present. The bottom one makes me think 1970s. No idea why. Maybe the colour schemes.
I hope some of that makes sense.
Morning AJ - thank you for these thoughtful comments - much appreciated. Yes, the crate stencil was what kick-started the whole thing, via the Book Blurb meme I was following at the time, and I know exactly what you mean about the bottom one because I've hung on to that through hell and high etc. but was ever aware that it didn't say enough about what to expect of the book.
DeleteInteresting indeed what you say about the blurb, because it was deliberately expanded to 'warn' readers that there were individual stories to wade through before the story got started, but since my daughter pointed out how seriously mistaken I was in persisting with that (telling me what I already knew, but ...) I have re-written and restructured more than half of it, and no longer need all that. And it is set in the present.
When the film is made I'll be back in touch for permission :) But thanks.