Books, Design and Culture
I am very, very late to this, but Penguin are in the process of reissuing Len Deighton’s thrillers as Modern Classics with new covers by Jim Stoddart inspired by Raymond Hawkey’s original paperback designs.
There are a lot more titles available now (Len Deighton wrote a lot of books!), but you can read more about the first wave of reissues in this Creative Review article from last year, and I’ve posted a few of my favourite covers below.
These posts are such a last minute scramble I don’t usually offer much in the way of commentary. It is hard to ignore, however, how many of my selections this year are illustrated. This may be a reflection of my personal preferences. Certainly, it isn’t new. As I mentioned in my look back at the year’s adult covers, the trends in 2021 felt very much like a continuation of the previous couple of years. Even so, I was struck by the sophistication and the range of YA illustrations this year. There are some illustrators whose work appears here more than once, but I don’t get the sense that there is a dominant style across category. It seems to depend very much on the specifics of the genre and the age range of the readership. That said, there is, perhaps, a common theme of ornate detail and decoration.
I am also finding it harder to differentiate between covers for more mature YA readers and adult covers of the same genre these days. If the cover blurbs and other identifiers (“A Novel”) didn’t give it away, the combination of the typography, colour palette, and the apparent age of the protagonist depicted used to give me a clue. Now it seems to me that there is a blurring of the lines, and I’ve had to check a couple of times recently to be sure of the intended readership age. I’d be curious to know if this is intentional on the part of publishers.
Anyway, there are some fantastic covers this year. Buzzfeed has a really decent list with design and illustration credits too if you’re looking for a second opinion (not that they need any clicks from me!). You can find my 2020 list here if you are interested.
Happy New Year!
All Of Us Villains by Amanda Foody and Christine Lynn Herman; design by Will Staehle (Tor Teen / November 2021)
Bad Girls Never Say Die by Jennifer Mathieu; design by Kerri Resnick (Roaring Brook Press / October 2021)
Before We Disappear by Shaun David Hutchinson; design by Jessie Gang; illustration by Valentina Remenar (Harperteen / September 2021)
Black Birds in the Sky by Brandy Colbert; art and design Natasha Cunningham (Balzer & Bray / October 2021)
Cazadora by Romina Garber; design by Kerri Resnick; illustation by Daria Hlazatova (Wednesday Books / August 2021)
The cover of Lobizona was on last year’s list:
City of Rust by Gemma Fowler; design by Steve Wells; illustration by Karl James Mountford (Chicken House / March 2021)
The Coming Storm by Regina M. Hansen; cover art by Tran Nguyen (Atheneum Books for Young Readers / June 2021)
Dark Rise by C. S. Pacat; design by Laura Mock; illustration by Magdalena Pagowska (Quill Tree Books / September 2021)
Drawn That Way by Elissa Sussman; design by Sarah Creech; lettering and illustration by art lettering Francesca Protopapa (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers / September 2021)
Dustborn by Erin Bowman; design by Mary Claire Cruz; illustration by Matt Griffin (Clarion / April 2021)
Aside from generally being a terrific SFF illustrator, I believe Matt Griffin illustrated the cover of Ace Books’ deluxe hardcover edition of Dune by Frank Herbert a couple of years ago, so he seems like an inspired choice here.
The Falling Girls by Hayley Krischer; design by Samira Iravani; illustration by Sarah Maxwell (Razorbill / October 2021)
Fat Chance, Charlie Vega by Crystal Maldonado; design by Chelsea Hunter; illustration Ericka Lugo (Holiday House / February 2021)
Fire with Fire by Destiny Soria; design by Mary Claire Cruz; illustration by Viv Tanner (Clarion / June 2021)
The Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley; design by Richard Deas; illustration Moses Lunham (Henry Holt & Company / March 2021)
(Sorry — I couldn’t find a cover image without the roundel. If anyone at Macmillan would like to send me one, I’ll be happy to replace it)
The Forest of Stolen Girls by June Hur; illustration Pedro Tapa (Feiwel & Friends / April 2021)
The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna; design Ray Shappell; cover art by Tarajosu (Delacorte Press / February 2021)
Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao; design by Talia Abramson; illustration Ashley Mackenzie (Penguin Teen / September 2021)
Lies Like Wildfire by Jennifer Lynn Alvarez; design by Casey Moses; cover art Mishko (Delacorte / September 2021)
Love is for Losers by Wibke Brueggemann; design by Rachel Vale (Macmillan Children’s Books / January 2021)
The cover of the US edition, published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR) in February, was designed by Aurora Parlagreco with an illustration by Sally Nixon. I like it a lot too. It’s interesting to see the contrast between the UK and US markets.
Me (Moth) by Amber McBride; design and illustration by Richard Deas (Feiwel & Friends / August 2021)
Muse by Brittany Cavallaro; design by David Curtis; illustration by Florian Schommer (Katherine Tegen Books / February 2021)
Namesake by Adrienne Young; design by Kerri Resnick; photograph by Sveltana Belyaeva (Wednesday Books / March 2021)
Fable, the other half of this cover, was published in September 2020 and featured in last year’s YA cover round-up.
Oculta by Maya Motayne; design by Aurora Parlagreco and Jenna Stempel-Lobell; art by Mark Van Leeuwen (Balzer & Bray / April 2021)
The cover of Nocturna, the previous book in the series, was featured in my 2019 YA round-up.
The Ones We’re Meant To Find by Joan He; design Aurora Parlagreco; illustration Aykut Aydogdu (Roaring Brook Press / May 2021)
Red Wolf by Rachel Vincent; design Alice Wang; illustration Dan Burgess (Harperteen / July 2021)
The River Has Teeth by Erica Waters; design by Jenna Stempel-Lobell; illustration by Chervelle Fryer (Harperteen / July 2021)
Six Crimson Cranes by Elizabeth Lim; design Alison Impey; cover art by Tran Nguyen; lettering by Alix Northrup (Alfred A. Knopf BYR / July 2021)
Skin of the Sea by Natasha Bowen; cover art by Jeff Manning (Random House BYR / November 2021)
Smoke by Darcy Woods; design Ray Shappell; lettering and photography Agustina Gastaldi Ferrario (Crown BYR / June 2021)
Soul Lanterns by Shaw Kuzki; design Carol Ly; illustration Shoko Ishida (Delacorte / March 2021)
A Spindle Splintered by Alix E. Harrow; design David Curtis (Tordotcom / October 2021)
(I’m not sure that this is actually YA technically speaking, but it fits better on this list than the other one)
Terciel & Elinor by Garth Nix; design David Curtis; illustration Ashley Mackenzie (Katherine Tegen Books / November 2021)
The Theft of Sunlight by Intisar Khanani; cover art Jenny Zemanek (Harperteen / March 2021)
This goes very nicely with the cover of Thorn, the author’s previous book, published in hardcover last year.
This Poison Heart by Kalynn Bayron; design by Jet Purdie; illustration by Raymond Sébastien (Bloomsbury YA / June 2021)
This Will Be Funny Someday by Katie Henry; design David Curtis (Katherine Tegen Books / January 2021)
Tides of Mutiny by Rebecca Rode; design Leo Nickolls (Jimmy Patterson / September 2021)
The Verdigris Pawn by Alysa Wishingrad; design by Laura Mock ; illustration Júlia Sardà (HarperCollins / July 2021)
Yes, this is middle-grade and not YA, but I really like the lettering and I love Júlia Sardà’s illustrations so I’m allowing it.
When You Look Like Us by Pamela N. Harris; design David Dewitt; illustration Shane Ramos (Quill Tree Books / January 2021)
Within These Wicked Walls by Lauren Blackwood; design Kerri Resnick; illustration Palesa (Wednesday Books / October 2021)
(Another cover image with a roundel. Apologies. At least it is somewhat less obtrusive here.)
Yolk by Mary H. K. Choi; design Lizzy Bromley; cover art by gg (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers / March 2021)
The covers of Emergency Contact and Permanent Record by Mary H.K. Choi designed by Lizzy Bromley with art by gg have featured in previous year’s lists.
This will be the last of the monthly cover round-ups for 2021 because I have to turn my attention to the year as a whole, but there are some really top-notch covers in this month’s post so it feels like a good place leave off…
Anarchism and the Black Revolution by Lorenzo Kom’Boa Ervin; design by David Pearson (Pluto Press / October 2021)
Bewilderment by Richard Powers; design by Jennifer Griffiths (Random House Canada / October 2021)
Burntcoat by Sarah Hall; design by Jo Walker (Faber & Faber / October 2021)
Concepcion by Albert Samaha; design by Lauren Peters-Collaer (Riverhead / October 2021)
Cultish by Amanda Montell; design by Joanne O’Neill (Harper Wave / June 2021)
Empty Wardrobes by Maria Judite de Carvalho, translated by Margaret Jull Costa; design Gabriele Wilson (Two Lines Press / October 2021)
God of Mercy by Okezie Nwọka; design Sara Wood (Astra House / November 2021)
I Love You But I’ve Chosen Darkness by Claire Vaye Watkins; design by Rachel Willey (Riverhead / October 2021)
The cover of the UK edition, publishing next year I believe, was designed by Jack Smyth:
Jacket Weather by Mike DeCapite; design by Michael Salu (Soft Skull / October 2021)
I was reminded of the cover of The Empty Chair by Bruce Wagner designed by Gregg Kulick from what seems like an age ago (2013 I think?) . It’s very possible I have been doing this for too long…
Machete by Tomás Q. Morín; design by Braulio Amado (Knopf / October 2021)
The Making of Incarnation by Tom McCarthy; design by Peter Mendelsund (Knopf / November 2021)
This seems like a reasonable excuse to post Peter Mendelsund’s cover designs for the two previous novels by Tom McCarthy…
The cover of the UK edition of The Making of Incarnation, published last month by Jonathan Cape, was designed by Mario de Meyer:
My Best Mistake by Terry O’Reilly; design by David Gee (HarperCollins Canada / October 2021)
North by Brad Kessler; design by David Drummond (Harry N. Abrams / October 2021)
Two Canadian designers doing the big magical sky thing to great effect!
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood by Quentin Tarantino; design by Joanne O’Neill; art by Paul Mann (Harper / November 2021)
Joanne O’Neill also designed the cover of the mass market paperback edition released earlier this year.
Orwell’s Roses by Rebecca Solnit; design by Gray318 (Viking / October 2021)
The Third Unconsciousness by Franco ‘Bifo’ Berardi; design by Erik Carter (Verso / October 2021)
I love that the cover had to include “Bifo” in inverted commas.
Virtue by Hermione Hoby; design by Ben Denzer (Riverhead / July 2021)
This Weightless World by Adam Soto; design by Tyler Comrie (Astra House / November 2021)
Comments closedA big, messy post this month as I catch up on the new releases and some of the covers I missed over the summer. I expect the next couple of month’s might be a bit like this as I work towards my round-up of the year, so feel free to let me know about stuff that you think I’ve overlooked in 2021.
The Afghanistan Papers by Craig Whitlock; design by David Litman (Simon & Schuster / August 2021)
The Book of Form and Emptiness by Ruth Ozeki; design by Gill Heeley (Canongate Books / September 2021)
A Calling for Charlie Barnes by Joshua Ferris; design by Gregg Kulick (Little Brown and Company / September 2021)
The China Room by Sunjeev Sahota; design by Tyler Comrie (Viking / July 2021)
Disorientation by Ian Williams; design by Lisa Jager (Random House Canada / September 2021)
The Hunter and the Old Woman by Pamela Korgemagi; design by Alysia Shewchuk (House of Anansi / August 2021)
King Richard by Michael Dobbs; design by Tyler Comrie (Knopf / May 2021)
Tyler Comrie also designed the cover of The Unwanted by Michael Dobbs. I like how the covers look related without looking the same.
Last Words on Earth by Javier Serena; design by Jack Smyth (Open Letter / September 2021)
Matrix by Lauren Groff; design by Grace Han (Riverhead / September 2021)
The cover of the UK edition was designed by Henry Petrides. He wrote about his process for SPINE.
Once More With Feeling by Sophie McCreesh; design by Jennifer Griffiths (Anchor Canada / August 2021)
Probably Ruby by Lisa Bird-Wilson; design Jennifer Griffiths (Doubleday Canada / August 2021)
The sweeps of paint brought to mind the snake on Anna Morrison‘s cover for the Pushkin Press edition of My Cat Yugoslavia from a couple of year’s ago…
Red Milk by Sjón; design by Natalie Chen; illustration by Owen Gent (Sceptre / May 2021)
The UK cover of CoDex 1962 by Sjón also features artwork by Owen Gent.
The Shimmering State by Meredith Westgate; design Chelsea McGuckin (Atria / August 2021)
Something Under the Sun by Alexandra Kleeman; design by Emma Pidsley (Fourth Estate / August 2021)
The cover of the US edition was designed by Donna Cheng.
Songs for the Flames by Juan Gabriel Vásquez; design by Alex Merto (Riverhead / August 2021)
Stranger to the Moon by Evelio Rosero; design by Janet Hansen (New Directions / September 2021)
For some reason, I was reminded of this saucy Jacob Covey cover, which I thought was killed in favour of something more (ahem) traditional, but it still exists on Amazon, so who knows? (Jacob probably knows; I do not).
The War for Gloria by Atticus Lish; design by Linda Huang (Knopf / September 2021)
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Following on from my post about Jack Smyth earlier this month, I didn’t realise that the interview with Totally Dublin was part of a short series of Q & As with Irish book cover designers (I am not the brightest).
Anna Morrison and Sarahmay Wilkinson, both of whose work has featured here, and Fiachra McCarthy and Graham Thew, whose work is new to me, also answered the magazine’s questions about their design process.
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Irish designer Jack Smyth, whose work has featured here more than a few times, talked to Totally Dublin about his process for designing book covers:
The best briefs are the ones that give you everything you need but prescribe nothing, and are genuinely trying to achieve something new… When I’m working on fiction, tone is the thing that really interests me. I think trying to capture the tone of the author’s writing can be a really powerful way of communicating with the viewer and, as a result, I often try to avoid leaning too much specific imagery. Of course, this isn’t always the case, but I do always try to keep tone/the author’s voice as the main directive element. I think this is what makes or breaks a book for a reader, not necessarily the location, any element or makeup of characters… I try not to rely on figurative elements too much in the hope that I can draw people in in more subtle ways.
Jack also recently chatted to The Resting Willow blog about book covers, including his design Pure Gold by John Patrick McHugh:
The cover is quite simple – it’s type and colours and textures, but hopefully it captures the tone of John’s voice and the character of the stories. I think these are my favourite types of covers, the ones where there’s almost no figurative elements, but they feel right.
Nice work, Jack. :-)
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Alana Pockros talked to designers and others in the publishing community about trends in book cover design for the AIGA blog Eye on Design:
The guiding principle of “like that book but different” cover design has existed for decades. In the 1960s, the late book designer Paul Bacon pioneered the “Big Book Look,” which we might associate with Philip Roth’s Portnoy’s Complaint or Joan Didion’s The White Album: type-driven covers with large author names and ample negative space that rely more on hue and font than imagery. Philip DiBello and Devin Washburn, founders of the design studio No Ideas, believe we’re currently seeing an evolution of the Big Book Look. “[There’s] a wave of similar covers that play with type intertwined with a key visual in a striking way,” they suggested. In The Look of the Book, Peter Mendelsund and David Alworth’s 2020 monograph, the authors call this mutative style “the interchangeable, big-type, colorful cover.” It’s a look Mendelsund and Alworth first noticed on the 2015 novel, Fates and Furies, and the style they see as the progenitor of the tired “it will work well as a thumbnail on Amazon” rationale.
It is always interesting to hear designers talk about how they view the process and why we get certain trends. But the post itself, entitled “The Endless Life Cycle of Book Cover Trends”, is a variation on the well-worn, trend-focused ‘why do book covers look the same?’ article that has appeared in various guises over the years. Pokros herself references a New York Times article from 1974(!) that explains that jackets must be identifiable on television, and a Vulture piece from 2019 that postulates that book covers are now being designed for Amazon and Instagram. You could also read this post on Eye on Design from 2019 about the ubiquity of stock images, or this The New Yorker piece on design by committee from 2013, or this story in The Atlantic from 2012 (it’s e-readers fault!) among others.
It’s not that they’re necessarily wrong. There are clearly trends and tropes in book cover design as there are in any other kind of design (and pointing them out is fun — I do it frequently!). And there are lots of designs that aren’t great. That’s true of everything. It’s just that on the whole, book covers (like movie posters) don’t all look the same. Not really. Sure, books in the same genre frequently do. Covers sharing similar traits helps readers identify what kind of books they are buying. It doesn’t mean they are B-A-D. Perhaps part of what gets people so twitchy about high-profile literary fiction covers looking familiar is that they don’t like to think of certain kinds of literary fiction as genres?
I don’t know… I’m one of the marketing people whose fault this usually is.
I guess if you really want to get into it, trends in book covers often reflect trends in publishing itself. When similar books intended to appeal to similar readers are published by similar people at similar imprints that are part of similar, very large publishing conglomerates, maybe the issue isn’t really that they have similar covers?
Anyway TL: DR, if you’re seeing a lot of covers that look the same maybe it says more about the kind of books we are exposed to in our daily lives than about the range of covers that are actually out there?
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Here are this month’s cover selections with a few more words than are strictly necessary…
After the Sun by Jonas Eika; design by Lauren Peters-Collaer; art by Dorian Legret (Riverhead / August 2021)
They look very different, but I was reminded of another sunset sky cover designed by Lauren from earlier this year. It’s interesting to see the (presumably) coincidental themes in a designers work.
Blind Man’s Bluff by James Tate Hill; design by Sarahmay Wilkinson (W. W. Norton / August 2021)
Damnation Spring by Ash Davidson; design by Jaya Miceli; art by Jeremy Miranda (Scribner / August 2021)
I quite enjoy seeing contemporary painting being used on book covers. A couple of other recent examples that come to mind are Jennifer Carrow’s recent cover for Lorna Mott Comes Home with art by Barbara Hoogeweegen, and Stephen Brayda’s cover for last year’s The End of the Ocean by Maja Lunde with art by Scott Naismith (another sunset sky cover! I guess After the Sun could also be included in this trend broadly speaking. It is not quite the kind of painterly art I am thinking of though…).
Don’t Shed Your Tears for Anyone Who Lives on These Streets by Patricio Pron; design by Tyler Comrie (Vintage / April 2021)
I’m drawing lots of unnecessary comparisons today, but I was reminded of this Oliver Munday cover from a while back if only for the similar-ish colour combinations (I was going to say palette, but… ). It reminds me of something else too, I just can’t quite put my finger on it…
The Good Hand by Michael Patrick F. Smith; design by Jon Bush (Viking / February 2021)
If I didn’t already know who the publisher was, I would not have been able to tell you if this was an American or British cover despite the subtitle and very American imagery. I don’t think it would like out of place on the Allen Lane list for example.
Immediate Family by Ashley Nelson Levy; design by Thomas Colligan (Farrar, Straus & Giroux / August 2021)
Mrs. March by Virginia Feito; design by Jaya Miceli (Liveright / August 2021)
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder; design by Emily Mahon (Doubleday / July 2021)
Paradise by Lizzie Johnson; design by Elena Giavaldi (Crown / August 2021)
The Republic of False Truths by Alaa Al Aswany; design John Gall (Knopf / August 2021)
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Tom Gauld’s first picture book for children, The Little Wooden Robot and the Log Princess, is out this month! According to the publisher blurb, the book is inspired by a bedtime story he made up for his daughters:
“I was trying to make a book inspired by three different sets of books: The books that I remember enjoying as a child, the books that I watched my daughters enjoying, and the books I enjoy now as an adult. I wanted the book to have its own quirky feeling but also to function like a classic bedtime story.”
It looks wonderful.
I’m unplugging for a bit, so just a cheeky quick one this month…
Astra by Cedar Bowers; design by Lisa Jager (McClelland and Stewart / June 2021)
Believers by Lisa Wells; design Na Kim; art by Lisa Ericson (Farrar, Strauss & Giroux / July 2022)
The Coward by Jarred McGinnis; design by Valeri Rangelov; photograph by Peter van Agtmael (Canongate / July 2021)
Falling by T. J. Newman; design by David Litman (Simon & Schuster / July 2021)
I get big 1970s disaster movie vibes from this… Airport and its sequels come to mind.
The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix design by David Litman (Berkley Books / July 2021)
If I remember correctly, David actually dipped a miniature folding chair in paint and photographed it for this… (I don’t think I’m making that up)
Anyway a nice Litman double…
Like Me by Hayley Phelan; design Emma Dolan (Doubleday Canada / July 2021)
Lorna Mott Comes Home by Diane Johnson; design by Jenny Carrow; art by Barbara Hoogeweegen (Knopf / June 2021)
On Time and Water by Andri Snær Magnason; design Zoe Norvell (Open Letter / March 2021)
Something Wild by Hanna Halperin; design by Lynn Buckley (Viking / June 2021)
Comments closedA little bit rushed again this month for various reasons (will I ever catch up? No. No I won’t…), but here are my cover picks for June…
Animal by Lisa Taddeo; design by Greg Heinimann (Bloomsbury / June 2021)
The cover of the US edition of Animal, published by Simon & Schuster, was designed by Alison Forner and Zak Tebbal:
Fear and Trembling by Søren Kierkegaard; design Richard Ljoenes (Liveright / June 2021)
Folklorn by Angela Mi Young Hur; design by Helen Crawford-White (Erewhon Books / April 2021)
The Great Mistake by Jonathan Lee; design by Nathan Burton (Granta / June 2021)
The cover of the US edition, published by Knopf, was designed by none other than John Gall:
(The Knopf cover actually reminds me of this Lauren Peters-Collaer silhouette cover from a couple of years ago for Verso)
How the Word is Passed by Clint Smith; design by Lucy Kim (Little Brown and Company / June 2021)
Island by Siri Ranva Hjelm Jacobsen; design by Anna Morrison (Pushkin Press / June 2021)
July by Kathleen Ossip; design by Alban Fischer (Sarabande Books / June 2021)
The Ones We’re Meant To Find by Joan He; design Aurora Parlagreco; illustration Aykut Aydogdu (Roaring Brook Press / May 2021)
Pure Flame by Michelle Orange; design by Na Kim (Farrar, Straus and Giroux / June 2021)
In the ongoing game of books I think look alike but actually don’t when you put them side by side, the cover of Pure Flame brought to mind Peter Mendelsund‘s design for Civil Wars by David Armitage from a few years ago. Of course they don’t really look anything alike, but that’s how this game works…
A Shock by Keith Ridgway; design by Nathan Burton (Picador / June 2021)
A read an ARC of A Shock earlier this month and thought it was extraordinary. A recent review in the Observer described it a collection voyeuristic vignettes, which I suppose is accurate. The book is made up of interconnected and intimate stories, often about loneliness and confinement of one kind or another (particularly resonant during the pandemic). They are prying and unsettling… stories about seeing and been seen (or not). But in a wider sense, A Shock is about the telling and retelling stories (myths even!), and the way that is revealed in the novel itself is what elevates it above and beyond the usual fare. Anyway… I liked it. It won’t be for everyone.
The cover of the US edition, available from New Directions next month, was designed by the one and only Mr. Keenan:
Tokyo Redux by David Peace; design by Luke Bird (Faber & Faber / June 2021)
The War Against the BBC by Patrick Barwise and Peter York; design by Richard Green (Penguin / March 2021)
Who doesn’t love a really long subtitle and an all text cover?
With Teeth by Kristen Arnett; design by Lauren Peters-Collaer (Riverhead / June 2021)
A Year Without a Name by Cyrus Dunham; design by Alex Merto (Back Bay Books / June 2021)
The hardcover of A Year Without a Name, released in 2019, was designed by Lucy Kim.
Tom Gauld celebrates Independent Bookshop Week (which was last week, but isn’t every week independent bookshop week when you think about it?)
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