WHEN AN OUTSIDE MET AN INSIDE

CAN YOU JUDGE A BOOK BY ITS COVER?

The publisher of my next book marked the new year by sending me a draft of its cover design. This will be the fifth title I’ve done for them, and, to my taste, the design falls somewhere in the middle - not as good as Eating Eternity ….

…..but definitely better than Chronicles of Old Paris.

Interestingly, none of the three personalities illustrated - Napoleon, Marie Antoinette and Josephine Baker - was actually born in Paris, or even French, except by marriage.

But such considerations play little part in cover design. Covers are selling tools, their primary aim to place the book on the shelf or in the Amazon category where potential readers are most likely to look. Hence the presence of the ubquitous Eiffel Tower, as reliable a geographic indicator as the Statue of Liberty or Sydney’s Opera House (both, ironically designed by men not native to the country where they stand.).

Take A Pound of Paper, my book about book collecting. The British edition was a critical success, but sales suffered from the cover having no clear indication of its topic.

The American publisher, more pragmatic, came up with his own design which removed all doubt about its content. (For the record, I don’t much like either version.)

A transformation also took place between the first printing of my novel about the auction business…..

…..and its paperback appearance. But bonking will always trump bidding when the chips are down.

My favourite cover? Well, predictably, it’s one I designed myself, for a collection of unpublished non-fiction. I like to think it conveys a healthy scepticism about covers in general.