Comments on: Cover Art | Orbit Responds to Best Served Cold Cover Criticisms

By: J.Cormier

J.Cormier — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 03:08:06 +0000

The Orbit post notes, and I agree, that a “slick photographic style” says urban fantasy, as far as fantasy book covers go. I agree. For me, it’s not the fact that a woman is on the cover that screams Urban Fantasy as it is the fact that it’s clearly a doctored-up photograph of a woman.

I always presumed that Urban Fantasy covers (and many romance covers, for that matter) used photographic images because they were cheaper than actually commissioning an original painting (or other piece of artwork). Presumably it’s less costly for someone to photoshop a stock image (or even a new photo of an actor in costume) than it is to have someone like Michael Whelan create a custom painting.

Give the current prominence of Urban Fantasy, however, I’m not sure that’s an accurate presumption. Anyone have any idea?

By: newman

newman — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 08:07:46 +0000

such an understated art form the old cover art-
cool post,

newman

By: Josh

Josh — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 04:30:23 +0000

I always felt that The First Law covers DID stand out from the crowd. In a genre that is increasingly dominated by character-heavy covers, the artwork on Abercrombie’s novels eschews this attempt to capture an individual character (which suggests a single primary protagonist) or a party of characters (which often looks too busy and fails to capture the character interplay and group dynamics found inside). And yet, I would rank The First Law among the most character-driven fantasy I have encountered, to the point of developing a distinct character and narrator voice for each POV. Incredibly real and complex character interaction moves the story along even more than plot developments. I can only assume that Best Served Cold will include a similar depth of character, even if the plot is brisker.
I understand that Best Served Cold will focus primarily, if not entirely, on a single protagonist. In this light, I can understand the desire to dominate the cover with the protagonist’s image. However, The First Law covers were able to accurately sum up Abercrombie’s style and tone precisely because they avoided integrating characters. Not to insult the artist(s) or fans of the US cover, but it seems to me that any reader who is roped into reading the book solely due to a prominently placed (female) character is unlikely to get quite what they are expecting. There is just so much intricacy and depth to the author’s work that I don’t think a single character can grasp the whole essence of the world he is building. And while I find it hard to believe anyone could not like Abercrombie’s writing, I still feel the cover risks misleading both new and old fans. It seems only proper that all books stemming from The First Law sequence should share a cohesive cover design, just as we expect Abercrombie’s style to remain largely the same from book to book. The UK cover accomplishes this; the US cover doesn’t.
That’s my five cents’ worth, anyway.

By: Rob B

Rob B — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 15:04:23 +0000

I completely understand their logic on why they went this route for the cover. Although I think the covers for his first trilogy are nice, they don’t immediately stand out from the crowd too much.

I prefer the US design, myself.

By: Iain Coleman

Iain Coleman — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 14:02:49 +0000

Rather than fully commiting to either design, they settled on something in the middle that fails to do either ‘look’ properly.

That’s the key point. Th UK cover is very nicely designed. The iconography of sword, map and money is clearly laid out, the text is easy to read and eye-catching, and the blood-splatters are carefully kept to the corners in order to avoid reducing the clarity of the design.

The cover with the black-clad woman on it is basically less well designed. The title is harder to read, and the decoration above the “S” and below the “O” merge confusingly with the picture. That could be solved easily enough, but the more fundamental problem the designers have is that it’s yet another fantasy novel with a black-clad action woman on the cover.

What they should have done at that point was come up with a new design concept. You can’t polish a turd, and if the basic idea of the design is flawed then you need to go back to the drawing board. Unfortunately, they fell into the trap of trying to push and pull their failed idea into something that ticked enough boxes for them to convince themselves it was working.

They’ve ended up with something truly horrible. Two completely different design concepts are smashed together, and neither complements the other. The text is a bit clearer, at least, but the blood-splatters are now all over the place such that they confuse both the title and the iconography. That’s not to say some kind of cover design involving the protagonist, a sword, a coin and a blood-spattered map couldn’t work – but to do it well, you’d have to start over, not mess around with two existing, radically contradictory designs.

Of course, that would mean more expense in artwork and/or photography, and in the real world that may not have been possible. In which case, the best thing to do would be to say “We have one good cover, and one crap one. Let’s use the good one”, and just go with the UK version. That would involve an admission of failure, which is always hard, but at least Mr Abercrombie’s book would have an attractive cover in the US.

By: Jersey 11 988

Jersey 11 988 — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 06:33:08 +0000

Looks like a lot of good information here.. I learned about book packaging from keeping up with fantasy authors Christine and Ethan Rose.. you have GOT to check them out on their sites! http://www.RowanoftheWood.com and youtube/tuberrose. Their book rocks! because it has a female vampire in it.

By: sbp

sbp — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 02:18:51 +0000

Yeah its enough to make a person go to drink. Unfortunately the mainstream beers here mainly suck. :O(

By: Gabriele

Gabriele — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 00:50:29 +0000

Boy am I glad Amazon.de has the UK version. That ‘woman’ on the US cover is so ugly I really don’t want to see more of her than the pics here.

By: sbp

sbp — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 00:11:14 +0000

So partly in order to challenge the ugly stereotype that fantasy reading folks believe a cover with a woman on it is urban fantasy, Orbit came up with this lame mishmash thus confirming the ugly, but unfortunately true, stereotype that US fantasy books have worse covers than their UK editions! Bravo.

By: Swainson

Swainson — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:43:25 +0000

Reading the book won’t make the cover any better.

I expect the book to be as good as Joe says it will be, scrub that, nothing is that good, but I still expect very high standard.

Woman with sword, lots of blood; this does not sound like an eostrogen overload!

I suspect calling a woman on the covers of books a Chick gives you an idea of the market they are pushing.

By: aidan

aidan — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:08:53 +0000

I'm looking forward to it as well. I'm curious to see how Joe handles the female lead, especially after the testosterone fueled First Law trilogy. I'm a sucker for strong, female lead characters, so I expect Best Served Cold is going to be right up my alley.

By: Lauren P.

Lauren P. — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 21:58:50 +0000

Thank you for the kind reposting. I would love to hear what you think of the cover again after you read the book. You may not like a cover with a kick-ass chick on it, but Joe Abercrombie wrote a great book with a kick-ass chick IN it.