Cover Marketing
I was flipping through the New York Times Book Review looking for the article on Sebastian Junger’s newest, A Death In Belmont (as I mentioned yesterday and, if you missed yesterday, this is the guy who wrote The Perfect Storm), and saw an ad for Indecision by Benjamin Kunkel. I blogged about this book when it first came out in hardcover. The hardcover has a head on it. For some reason, it always reminds me of Jonathan Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, which has a hand on the cover. Why I think of one along with the other, I do not know.
But…I may not have been the only person who got stuck on Kunkel’s cover. The paperback version has a new look. It’s a bit freaky. I think it’s fingerprints with smiley faces on them. No, really.
Here they are. You decide:
April 18th, 2006 at 6:55 am
Hey, HelenKay. Check out: http://nytimesbooks.blogspot.com/ — the book designer who runs that blog was just discussion the new cover.
I don’t know why they change covers for paperbacks. Perhaps there is a certain population who will be fooled into thinking they haven’t yet read the book?
April 18th, 2006 at 7:00 am
Look at that! I’m not alone in wondering. Although, I’m thinking it may have been a good ploy because seeing the fingerprint thing and Kunkel’s name made me stop and read the ad where I otherwise likely would have skipped it.
I think the cover changes come from marketing and sales decisions. My editor has remarked on the covers for Brava trade paperbacks versus the later mass market editions. They are the same right now at Brava, but she was trying to figure out if some of the Trade covers translated into mass market covers, or if they needed to repackage. Not sure why this would be, but certainly it is an issue on the minds of folks at publishing houses.
April 20th, 2006 at 2:40 am
Here’s another convergence with the original cover: or go to http://www.geocities.jp/izahro2000/tago.jpg if that doesn’t work
April 20th, 2006 at 10:27 am
I definitely would have at least stopped to look at the fingerprint cover. The head and the hand though I would have walked right by. All the Brava mass market covers that are different from the trade ones have been a step down in my estimation so I hope yours stay the same.