Who should a book's cover speak to?

On his blog, Seth Godin argues that the job of a book cover is not to attract everyone's attention, just the right people's attention in the right way.

Is the purpose of the cover to sell books, to accurately describe what's in the book, or to tee up the reader so the book has maximum impact?

The third.

It's the third because if the book has maximum impact, then word of mouth is created, and word of mouth is what sells your product, not the cover.

His argument makes sense. The people who should be attracted to a book are the people who would like that particular book, who will be thrilled when they get to its contents. Disappointed customers won't help an author's reputation, while happy readers will build it.

Then again, in a competitive marketplace, isn't it nice to capture any attention you can? I am a big fan of the cover of Julie Oringer's short story collection "How to Breathe Underwater" -- to me it implies freedom and secrecy and emergence. But a male literary friend -- who liked it a lot -- really only saw hot, almost-naked chicks. I imagine both reactions would please the book jacket's designer, and author.

Should a cover sell books to any old passer-by? Or should it speak to a specific audience, setting them up for maximum impact?

-- Carolyn Kellogg

Comments

[Stephen Stark]

Way back when, when my second novel, SECOND SON, was published, it had a very dark and brooding jacket, which I had chosen from two pieces of artwork. The designer won a first place award for novel jackets for it. It was the wrong cover for the book. In those days I was living in New York, and I used to go down to the bookstore on Columbus Ave that hasn't been there for years (the name of which I cannot recall). I used to count the copies of my books to see if any sold. The first one they sold was bought by Peter Straub, who apparently lived in the neighborhood. At the time I was thrilled. But later, when the hardcover didn't sell, I came to think that the dark and brooding cover had promised a very different book from the one I'd written. Had I chose the other, which was lesser art but truer to the novel, who knows what would have happened?

[Gerry Boyle]

When I received the cover design for my last crime novel, PORT CITY SHAKEDOWN, set on the waterfront of Portland, Maine, I said, "Wait a minute! Where in Maine is that?":
The cover was--and is--a noirish, nightime photo of an industrial drydock. It wasn't Portland, Maine, by a longshot. More like Long Beach. And at first I thought the publisher had goofed. But now I agree with Seth Godin. The cover doesn't wholly recreate the setting of the book. It doesn't really represent the plot, either. (There's waterfront in the book, but it's more fishing boats and yachts than container ships). But the cover does have visual impact. It says waterfront. It says danger. It says intrigue. And the people who are most likely to buy this book and this sort of book will respond to that.
I've learned slowly that cover designs are not just an extension of the content and shouldn't be. And writers should stick to what they do best, which is the stuff between the covers, not out front.

[Lesa Holstine]

I recently reviewed a book that, in my opinion, totally missed its audience because of the cover. The Lost Recipe for Happiness by Barbara O'Neal (Bantam) has a cover that makes it appear to be chick lit, with a dog, and a long-legged woman with an eggbeater in her hand.

This book is not chick lit. It's a sensuous story of two people, the woman in her mid-thirties, the man about 50, who have had tragic lives. They come together to start a new restaurant. But, the book is sensual, with food and scents and description. It has ghosts and tragedy. This book definitely needed a different cover.

Seth Grodin is right. This book needed to speak to its audience, and it missed the audience.

[Sarah McCoy]

Great post, Carolyn! An interesting topic for both readers and those of us in the industry.

I was so intrigued that I wrote a post in response: http://sarahmccoy.wordpress.com/

[Jake]

Funny you mention this issue—a few minutes ago, I posted about the trend toward white covers on pop science books (see http://jseliger.com/2009/07/02/white-covers-on-nonfiction-books ). I can't decide if a) this trend is real or b) I have too small a sample size. But assuming the answer to be a), I'm still not sure what publishers are trying to convey with white dust jackets. That their owners are persnickety enough to keep the jackets clean, and therefore are uptight and conscientious in general? Do they sell white because it looks good, gets dirty quickly, and then can't as easily be resold? I have no good answer.

[Jeremy Hatch]

I would just like to stick up for men, like myself, who see both the freedom, secrecy and emergence, and the hot near-nakedness of those chicks. Come to think of it, one of the things that makes them so sexy is that sense of innocent-yet-probably-forbidden adventure in the picture.

I'm in a tiny minority with this next thing, but the cover also pretty much nails the mood (as well as reproducing some of the elements) of "The Smoothest Way Is Full of Stones," one of the very finest stories in the collection. I'd previously read it in Zoetrope and it made a huge impression on me, so when I saw that cover for the first time in a bookstore, it made a direct connection with me, and I bought the book without really even looking at the rest of it.

[Lori A. May]

Great topic, Carolyn. I linked to and mentioned your piece in my blog today: http://loriamay.blogspot.com/