Conrad A. Williams DECAY INEVITABLE Solaris Cover art by Dave McKean

Yay, abstraction! Good to see some abstraction in a genre cover illustration these days. It’s a Dave McKean and does the job well — grabs the eye and says “hey, check this out.”

Solaris [Read it all...]]]>

Books spotted 12/30/09 at Borders Books at Alamo Quarry

Conrad A. Williams
DECAY INEVITABLE
Solaris
Cover art by Dave McKean

Yay, abstraction! Good to see some abstraction in a genre cover illustration these days. It’s a Dave McKean and does the job well — grabs the eye and says “hey, check this out.”

Solaris is a UK-based publisher and even if you don’t know that, the typography choice says they are. It’s understated and lets the art do the talking. Seems to me that British publishers as a whole seem more willing to offer that subtlety in their type choices and point sizes (as well as capital and lower-case mixtures), while US type design choices tend toward outdoing neighboring books with bombast, and big capital letters, especially on mass market paperbacks. I wonder if US publishers feel like mass market books need to have giant type to have a chance to be seen? (Not speaking of all fiction, but genre fiction covers at any rate.) Wasn’t always that way with US genre covers, but it seems moreso these days.

Charles De Lint
MUSE AND REVERIE
Tor Books
Cover art by John Jude Palencar

Here’s an example of a US cover design that has really elegant and complementary type design. It’s not a mass-market book like the one above. It’s a trade paperback so it’s got a little more size to work with, but like the example above, it’s not trying to out-scream the competition. It lets the art do the talking. And it gets your attention. Strong illustration by John Jude Palencar.

Charles De Lint
MEMORY & DREAM
Orb Books
Cover art by John Howe
Cover design by Jamie Stafford-Hill

More understated typography on a US genre cover. Love the way the author’s name “rolls” around at the top. Great illustration by John Howe. I’m not sure what prompted the castellation effect across the top and bottom of the illustration frame, but it sure works to pull your eye in and out of the illo. Really smart.

A.M. Dellamonica
INDIGO SPRINGS
Tor Books
Cover art by Julie Bell

Lou Anders, editorial and art director of Pyr, brought this one to my attention. Made us both wonder if there’s a story behind the making of this cover. The cover illustration is by the great Julie Bell, which totally would have fooled me because of the cropping and design treatment of the illo. Normally her work is very narrative and presented in a straight-forward way. Instead, this one has unusual cropping, in addition to a pinstriping effect across the entire illo. Lou’s guess is that the design choices as well as the font choices are intended to neuter the genre aspect of the work and attempt to make it appear to be a trade fiction title. Good guess. Hard to say. Nevertheless, it’s an unusual, but elegant design solution.

THE DEAD THAT WALK Edited by Stephen Jones Ulysses Press Cover art by Les Edwards

Zombie book covers were all the rage this year, weren’t they? Just when I thought I was well and done with any more zombie covers, Les Edwards does one that [Read it all...]]]>

Books spotted 12/1/09 at Borders Books at Alamo Quarry

THE DEAD THAT WALK
Edited by Stephen Jones
Ulysses Press
Cover art by Les Edwards

Zombie book covers were all the rage this year, weren’t they? Just when I thought I was well and done with any more zombie covers, Les Edwards does one that makes it all seem fresh again. Dynamite cover art by Les. I like the way the type treatment integrates with the illo as the zombie hand intersects the “W”. Nice move. The type is still perfectly legible, and the cover gains added depth. It’s also nice to see that a gouged-out eye and a bloody, amputated limb are so mainstream now that this book got faced-out at Borders Books. Or does that mean that blood-sucking limb-eaters are so mainstream that they need to retire until they regain their edge? You make the call.

John Langan
HOUSE OF WINDOWS
Night Shade Books
Cover art by Santiago Caruso
Cover design by Michael Gin

This one makes me think fondly of THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI. It’s a great piece of cover illustration, and stands on its own. Caruso’s an Argentinian illustrator, and I’ve never heard of him before. Glanced at his blog, and I really like a lot of what I see. Not every image of his hits home for me, but the ones that do are deeply potent and resonant. I love the way he sees the world. Note: if you view his blog at your workplace, you might turn down the sound as he has a nice soundtrack that accompanies his blog. Terrific music, but probably not worth losing your job over.

Scott Westerfeld
LEVIATHAN
Simon & Schuster/Simon Pulse
Jacket design & illustration by Sammy Yuen, Jr.
Wing illustration by Keith Thompson

Westerfeld’s LEVIATHAN probably doesn’t need any further pimping from me. It’s been well-pimped throughout the intertubes and its readers already can’t wait for the next book, but I’ve gotta tip my hat to Westerfeld and Thompson for shining a spotlight on inspired writer/artist collaboration for the interior illos and storytelling. And I think the cover packaging speaks for itself for sheer baroque steampunky goodness.

Jeff Vandermeer
FINCH
Underland Press
Cover art & design by John Coulthart

I’ve commented on Twitter how much I admire this cover. Now that FINCH has been released in softcover here in the US, let me restate that. Coulthart’s long been admired as a supremely gifted designer, but this is one of his greatest hits ever. Whenever he works on a Vandermeer book, it seems to bring out the best in him (remember THE THACKERY T. LAMBSHEAD POCKET GUIDE TO ECCENTRIC & DISCREDITED DISEASES?). This is definitely one of my favorite covers of 2009.

David Anthony Durham THE OTHER LANDS Doubleday Cover art by Mikko Kinnunen Cover design by Michael J. Windsor

The first time I met David Anthony Durham, we were both guests at the 2007 Elf Fantasy Fair in the Netherlands. At the time, I don’t think [Read it all...]]]>

Books spotted 10/01/09 at Barnes & Noble (410/San Pedro)

David Anthony Durham
THE OTHER LANDS
Doubleday
Cover art by Mikko Kinnunen
Cover design by Michael J. Windsor

The first time I met David Anthony Durham, we were both guests at the 2007 Elf Fantasy Fair in the Netherlands. At the time, I don’t think too many of those 25,000 attendees knew who he was. Six months later, I couldn’t walk into a major American bookstore without tripping over his new book ACACIA. His days as a relatively unknown name were fading fast, and his publisher, Doubleday, was treating him right. Critics raved about his book. Fast forward to the present and he’s now the 2009 John W. Campbell Award winner for Best New Writer, and his new book THE OTHER LANDS shows that his publisher loves him as much as ever. How can you tell? When they trick out an author’s cover with this much embossing and gloss/matte treatment, that’s when you know. ‘Happy to see this guy succeeding.

Ben Bova
THE RETURN
Tor
Cover art by Thom Tenery

I dig this cover art because it’s unabashedly and unapologetically abstract. Richard Powers illustrated so many successful abstract science fiction covers for Ballantine in the 1950′s and 60′s. Since then, it seems to me that publishing sales and marketing departments have become increasingly conservative in their art tastes. I think it’s led to abstract illustration being lost as a viable, commercial option. I’m glad to see Tor hasn’t lost sight of it. When I saw this cover on the shelf, it popped off next to its more conservative, more literal and scene-driven neighbors, and it made me want to pick it up.

Bernard Beckett
GENESIS
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Cover design by Michael J. Windsor

Find this book on the shelf and pick it up. Try to resist not opening it. I bet you can’t do it. I couldn’t. Great design work here with the red hair beckoning you to crack the cover. Really smart. It made me read the front end flap text and marked the book in my head as one I’ll probably pick up sometime, whereas without the great design it would have certainly escaped my notice.

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
FRANKENSTEIN
Dark Horse
Cover art & interiors by Bernie Wrightson

With Halloween approaching, it seems only fitting to give a shoutout to the legendary pen-and-ink work of Bernie Wrightson’s FRANKENSTEIN. Dark Horse has re-packaged his adaptation in a striking hardcover. I love this quote from Wrightson: “I’ve always had a thing for Frankenstein, and it was a labor of love. It was not an assignment, it was not a job. I would do the drawings in between paying gigs, when I had enough to be caught up with bills and groceries and what-not. I would take three days here, a week there, to work on the Frankenstein volume. It took about seven years….” As for the cover, what can you say other than iconic and timeless?

Brom THE CHILD THIEF HarperCollins/Eos Cover illustration & design by Brom

Everyone knows Brom as a preeminent fantasy painter, but the guy can write too. This is a novel-length work with interior illustrations. Brom creates a terrific cover as usual, and I especially love the [Read it all...]]]>

Books spotted 8/31/09 at Borders Books at Alamo Quarry

Brom
THE CHILD THIEF
HarperCollins/Eos
Cover illustration & design by Brom

Everyone knows Brom as a preeminent fantasy painter, but the guy can write too. This is a novel-length work with interior illustrations. Brom creates a terrific cover as usual, and I especially love the use of spot gloss on the color painting against the matte background. Notice that the book is wider than the normal hardcover. I’m not sure why HarperCollins/Eos did this, but I sure like it. When the book is spine-out on a store shelf, the spine pops forward from adjacent spines, because of the book’s wider cover proportion. Nice move. I enjoyed Brom’s earlier illustrated works, THE PLUCKER and THE DEVIL’S ROSE, and I’m really looking forward to this book.

Jonathan L. Howard
JOHANNES CABAL: THE NECROMANCER
Doubleday
Cover design by Michael J. Windsor

This is a striking cover design. It grabs attention, but does anyone have any guesses what’s up with the big red “X”? It doesn’t have anything to do with the title, as far as I can tell. Perhaps there’s a narrative reason for it that can’t be deciphered by surface inspection? I hope so. Heads up — if this book becomes a runaway bestseller, look for some marketing genius to get the bright idea that giant random red letters on covers are the new hot thing. (Don’t laugh. It’ll happen.)

Ray Bradbury
FAHRENHEIT 451
Ballantine/Del Rey
Cover illustration by Joseph Mugnaini

I believe this is the cover art for FAHRENHEIT 451′s first edition. The book has had a slew of covers over the course of its 56-year publication life, but Ballantine has chosen to re-issue the book with the original. Still incredibly resonant, isn’t it? I love this image.

George Mann
THE AFFINITY BRIDGE
Tor
Cover illustration by Viktor Koen

I like the nice, restrained cover art by the collage illustrator Viktor Koen, and I really dig the frame of gears and clock pieces. You can’t see the cover’s soft metallic finish, but it looks really good when you see it on the shelf. I like the font choice as well. SFSignal calls this “an engrossing steampunk/Sherlock Holmes story. With zombies.” It’s interesting that the cover doesn’t choose to offer any overt signal to Holmes fans. I wonder if the publisher’s strategy was to go that way in hopes that non-genre readers might pick up the book. Steampunk is so hot right now that anything with a zeppelin on it sucks in cash these days. This book is getting outstanding buzz and rave reviews, so it’s a winner all around.

Actually, this installment should be called “Spinespotting in SA”. As a guy who draws and paints book covers for a living, I love seeing books face-out, but in bookstores, they’re usually not displayed that way. The spine is oh-so-important to the visibility and shelf [Read it all...]]]>

Books spotted this month at Borders Books at Alamo Quarry

Actually, this installment should be called “Spinespotting in SA”. As a guy who draws and paints book covers for a living, I love seeing books face-out, but in bookstores, they’re usually not displayed that way. The spine is oh-so-important to the visibility and shelf life of a book in the marketplace.

***********************************************************************************

Brent Weeks
BEYOND THE SHADOWS
Orbit
Design by Peter Cotton
Art by Calvin Chu

I’m not sure if Orbit started the fad of hooded figures on white backgrounds, but if they didn’t, they’ve certainly perfected it. The spines of these Brent Weeks mass market paperback really pop forward on a bookstore shelf, largely due to the hooded figure on the white background. Note that this big figure causes all of the typography to get small, and Orbit’s chosen to have the titles all read with zero degrees of rotation. That’s a fair amount of spine type to juggle, but it all balances very nicely. Designers have gotta love authors with short names — those always seems to open up fresh design possibilities.

Mark Chadbourn
AGE OF MISRULE Trilogy
Pyr
Design by Nicole Sommer-Lecht
Art by John Picacio

It’s nice to see these on the shelves as a set. Editorial director (and 2009 Chesley Award-winning art director) Lou Anders made the call to put the big number at the top of these spines. That large treatment conveniently signals to readers that these are a series. The common spine design across all three trade paperbacks reinforces that as well. Note the missing Pyr logo on the first book, WORLD’S END. This wasn’t intentional, but a printing error. So if you manage to find one of these first editions without the logo, you may have yourself a collectible. That said, these books are terrific epic fantasy reads and that fact alone is enough reason to grab them.

Sarah Micklem
WILDFIRE
Scribner
Design by Uncredited
Art by Mark Stutzman

The WILDFIRE spine caught my attention because it’s unusual to see this much hand-illustrated typography on a book spine these days. The Mieville spine alongside it uses contrast to grab attention with Mieville’s name sized big against a white band. That kind of contrast generally attracts the eye first. However, the WILDFIRE spine is so unusual that it compelled me to pick it up just to see what it is.

Brian Selznick
THE INVENTION OF HUGO CABRET
Scholastic Press
Design by Brian Selznick & David Saylor
Art by Brian Selznick

This is the spine of a YA book that has the virtue of being 2″ wide — huge real estate for opportunity, in spine design terms. Hard to argue with the simplicity of this half-face filling the spine and staring out at the buyer. This book — standing alone and spine-out — is more compelling than the faced-out adjacent books. I think this is one of the simplest and most effective spine designs I’ve ever seen.

Joel Shepherd BREAKAWAY Pyr Cover art by Stephan Martiniere

Love the strong diagonal here. Visually, it’s a tall mass-market paperback (in between the scale of a traditional mmp and a trade paperback) and therefore grabs your attention right away. I hear lots of griping about [Read it all...]]]>

Books spotted 7/1/09 at Borders Books at Alamo Quarry

Joel Shepherd
BREAKAWAY
Pyr
Cover art by Stephan Martiniere

Love the strong diagonal here. Visually, it’s a tall mass-market paperback (in between the scale of a traditional mmp and a trade paperback) and therefore grabs your attention right away. I hear lots of griping about the price point of tall mmps and I’m not getting into that here, but visually, it’s a striking package. Nice work by Jacqueline Cooke to use the format to the art’s advantage and vice versa.

Mark Chadbourn
AGE OF MISRULE: BOOK THREE
ALWAYS FOREVER
Pyr
Cover art by John Picacio

Yup, that’s my cover art. Guilty as charged. And to the left, is the second book in the series, DARKEST HOUR. It’s a nice sight to see them shelved together right there at the front of the store on the New Fiction shelf. AGE OF MISRULE is amongst the best contemporary epic fantasies I’ve ever read. Here’s a quick q&a with Chadbourn, regarding the series.

A. Lee Martinez
MONSTER
Orbit
Cover design by Will Staehle

This cover really pops, doesn’t it? When Orbit initially launched, they were known for cover designs that eschewed illustration. Their initial dependency on photography seemed a bit apologetic when trying to sell works of genre imagination. Not so much lately, and it’s fun to see them mixing illustration into their rosters (see recent covers by John Jude Palencar and Cliff Nielsen), along with their always-strong typographic sense. This cover is smart and bold, and says “pick me up.” However if this book becomes a runaway bestseller, how many copycat canary yellow covers do you think we’ll see from other houses?

Brian Cronin
WAS SUPERMAN A SPY?
AND OTHER COMIC BOOK LEGENDS REVEALED!
Plume
Cover illustration & design by Mickey Duzyj

I thought this was Chris Ware‘s work when I first saw it out of the corner of my eye. It doesn’t have the intricacy of a Chris Ware piece but it’s certainly got a strong Acme Novelty Library riff running through it. That said, it’s a terrific design solution by Duzyj. One of the oldest (and trickiest) tricks in the business of getting noticed is contrast vs. the competing products. Mission accomplished here.

Books spotted 6/2/09 at Borders Books at the Alamo Quarry