Judging a Book by Its Cover – How Authors Get it Wrong
An author friend recently had a book in a cover contest and reached out asking for honest votes. I eagerly clicked on the link (because I like her cover) and it turned into such an intriguing exercise. The contest had several categories to vote for, though all the books were romance books. Which I think it the first wrong step authors/publishers make in covering a book. No book is simply romance. You can’t tell a story about love without something else surrounding it. Maybe it’s in a contemporary setting. Or futuristic. Or Historical. Now, read those choices again: contemporary, futuristic, historical. What did you picture? A naked man chest in every single one of them? Probably not. Let’s say the cover does have a naked man chest, but the guy is wearing a pair of worn (and probably tight) jeans, a cowboy hat and tossing a bail of hay – what kind of story do you expect to read? Because of the elements portrayed, you will probably expect a western. Back to the c...