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Thinking of changing my book covers 7/28/2011 12:15:25 PM
The book cover dilemma
I've been thinking about changing my book covers, it's a worry.
They say 'never judge a book by its cover' but I don't know, I saw a post on a reader's thread the other day. It was alarming for many reasons but the one that stood out for me was about book covers. The person posting had listed their many ways to judge if an ebook is garbage without buying it, I know, sad but true.
One of the ways was by its cover.
Now for many reasons the post was horrifying; not least because there was no mention of the wonderful facility to actually read some of the book on Amazon or Smashwords, or any of the blogs, and book websites that publish excerpts, and free chapters. Which is what all writers hope the reader will do, just like when we all used to read the blurb, and the opening pages, browsing in the bookshop. Well I have to admit I still do that, read the blurb, read the book description, read the free download taster.
So back to what I found most alarming; the person posting on the thread was determined that the cover would tell all.
I can't see it, I feel that often it's purely subjective why people think a cover is good or not, isn't it that we like one and not another? That mysterious 'like' that kicks in when we look at graphic images, art, posters, and advertisements.
I think maybe there are cultural and educational aspects as to what we like, and don't like, when we look at pictures.
So because I had been thinking of changing my covers, it 'kind of' hit home when the person posting, elaborated on a cover signalling that the book would be garbage. I say 'kind of', because I don't think my covers indicate my books are garbage, I just think they could be more exciting, to better reflect the story.
There are a huge number of Indie's out there that really cannot afford a professional cover and many do a fair enough to excellent job of producing a cover in an Adobe program, or similar.
So far, but we hope that will change , the cover is in black and white on kindles, even though if you download to your laptop, netbook, iPad whatever else you use to read ebooks and can see the cover in colour. The thread post maintained a non-professional cover indicated a garbage book, not an equation I am buying into.
Someone on the thread valiantly replied with what about the saying 'never judge a book by its cover', it's got to be true, hasn't it?
