I was, frankly, hoping for something a bit, well, colder, I have to admit. For a novel called ‘The Cold Commands‘, there’s certainly a lot of warm reds, oranges and browns. Still, I like the style of the cover, which takes its cue from the paperback release of The Steel Remains (which, frankly, would better suit The Cold Commands, with its cool colours.) Should look pretty once they print it with nice, shiny foil, like The Steel Remains.
This cover reminds me a lot of Abercrombie’s covers. Not bad, but not incredibly unique either (in my humble opinion).
First of all, I just found this blog a week or two ago, and am very much enjoying it.
Secondly, this cover seems profoundly unimpressive to me. I agree with Sarah that it seems reminiscent of the UK Abercrombie covers, with the weapon on parchment, but it’s less interesting – there’s nothing actually on the parchment, leading me to wonder why it’s there in the first place. To me, it accentuates the empty space in the cover more than is ideal – I agree that the background from The Steel Remains would have been more appropriate, and probably more successful.
And don’t even get me started on the incredibly bad teaser at the bottom: “Fantasy. Harder, faster, bloodier…” Ugh – sounds like a vampiric porno.
Glad you enjoy the blog!
To be fair to the publisher, Gollancz, they also published and designed the Abercrombie covers, so the apple hasn’t fallen far from the tree in that regard. Still, as you two say, it’s not quite so successful as the Abercrombie covers.
I didn’t even noticed the tag line at the bottom. I suppose they’re trying, again, to capitalize on Abercrombie’s success, though Morgan’s been writing ‘Science Fiction. Harder, faster, bloodier…’ for a while now.
[…] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Aidan Moher, Aidan Moher. Aidan Moher said: New Blog Post – The UK cover for THE COLD COMMANDS by Richard Morgan, coming from @gollancz: http://bit.ly/chXMQF […]
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