Take the Evening Book Group's December selection The Time in Between as an example. It was published in Canada with a gorgeous and appropriate jacket featuring an attractive Vietnamese woman in traditional dress riding a bicycle.
The American edition of the same book also shows a Vietnamese woman on a bicycle but this photo is out-of-focus and of a decidedly nontraditional and somewhat tawdry specimen. Have they improved the cover or made it more representative of the story? I think not plus I don't think it would necessarily sell more books.
The U.S. trade paperback abandons the female cyclist all together and uses a dogtags graphic instead. Less colour and perhaps cheaper to print?
American publishers have also seen fit to replace the cover of the Senior Book Club December selection, The Big Over Easy, as well. The colourful British cover has nursery-rhyme primary colours (or pulp fiction detective story) overtones.
The American jacket is still cartoony, still witty but with much less colour.Its interesting to note that the reverse seldom happens. Canadian and British publishers usually get the American cover at the same time as they acquire the rights to the text. Do we feel less need to put our cultural stamp on the product? Do Americans feel they need to Americanize book covers so that the content will be perceived to be more palatable? Are Canadians and Brits less xenophobic?
Those of us in the book business in Canada who are obliged to keep the many reincarnations straight readily concur with the old adage that "You can't tell a book by it's cover".
2 comments:
Yes, book covers are fascinating. And I think quite often authors have little control over them, at least until they become bestselling pros.
Chip Kidd is the current king of book covers. USA Today said he is "the closest thing to a rock star" in graphic design". The Library has a collection of his work, CHIP KIDD by Veronique Vienne [741.64 KID] as well as his first novel, CHEESE MONKEYS.
Litblogger "Bookslut" has a piece today, "Judging a Book by Its Cover: The Best of 2006"
"Feh. Don't talk to me about 2006. For those who like to choose books based on whether they look good in conjunction with one's new, olive-green, chunky Clark Kent glasses, or how well they look next to a single orchid on the windowsill ... -- well, it's been a rough year. For the most part, book design continued to play out ill-conceived fads that began a decade ago. If we could only go back in time, grab Chip Kidd by the shoulders and slap him like we're in a B movie, screaming "No, Chip, No! Your whimsical use of stock photography will spawn a legion of evil robot clones!" Meanwhile, the publishing industry forges ahead in its willingness to lull the children of the Boomer generation into believing that they do not, indeed, need to wear reading glasses, ever, really, their youth is eternal, and thus every new hardcover is roughly the size of the Merriam-Webster Dictionary and disturbs the line of one's messenger bag.
But it's important to keep one's chin up. Remember the airbrush? And Vintage New Directions Paperbacks? Those were dark times. We live in a golden age by comparison."
http://www.bookslut.com/features/2006_12_010320.php
Post a Comment