I remember being in the fourth grade, in a dusty Catholic school library. Our teacher had overheard the conversation of my friends and me (I guess we weren't making any effort to be quiet in the library, lol!) about which books had the nicest covers. I remember my teacher spouting the well-known adage, "Don't judge a book by its cover!" in her stern teacher voice.
Of course we did, and still do. Everyone judges appearances, even if we like to think we are more enlightened than that. In her blog entry for the Huffington Post, YA author Maureen Johnson discusses how women have historically been sidelined in the world of literature, and how an overly "girly" bookcover can affect our perceptions of the "seriousness" of the author, because women are still perceived as not being able to write "serious" books. She started a Twitter campaign, #coverflip, which some of you may have participated in, asking folks to re-imagine gendered book covers (turning the girly masculine and vice versa). The results can be seen here. This blog entry made me think about the books my own daughter reads, which I talked about in last week's entry.
As my own middle-grade manuscript reaches completion, this article has me thinking about what the cover is going to look like, what kind of message it will send. Any writers out there have any interesting experiences with their publisher and book covers? Feel free to share in the comments section below!
In traditional publishing the author has zero control over the cover, and I've witnessed plenty of (not public) authors' angst over this. I've been happy with my covers, but my (small) publishers did ask for my input and opinion. They needed me to feel good about it. From my limited exposure to this issue, I gather that the unhappiest authors are with large publishers, and their sadness has to do with having a clear notion about the flavor of their book betrayed by a cover that took no notice of it.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad that you've had a positive experience. I read in the comments section of another article similar to Maureen Johnson's, that said that agents can sometimes negotiate having a say over the cover into the contract, but I have zero experience in this matter, so I don't really know. It's interesting to think about though!
DeleteI'd looked at some of those flipped covers awhile back- very interesting! As for YA, I'd have to say I'm tired of girls in gorgeous dresses. What I really like are silhouette covers. They're mysterious and artsy-fartsy at the same time! =0)
ReplyDeleteI agree! The new covers for Zilpha Keatley Snyder books are are silhouette and they look so cool and artsy, and they don't necessarily cater to a certain gender. (I'm not sure how long ago they changed them, the last time I saw a cover for the Egypt Game was in the 1990s so...lol)
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