Never judge a book by its cover... part 2

Books and their covers. I am looking at two right now. Neither are books that I would have picked in the past. It used to be that I would look for the bodice rippers. You know the ones that had Fabio on them. This was before he couldn't believe it wasn't butter. Well there is something nice to be said about half dressed men on the cover of a book it doesn't improve the readability of the book at all.

The two books on the table next to me are Therapy by Jonathan Kellerman and The Dangerous Days of Daniel X by James Patterson & Michael Ledwidge.


I am over half way through Therapy and need to have Daniel X's story read by Sundays book club. In fact I need to get back on track with reading my book a day.

Even though a book shouldn't be judged on its cover I still find some of the amateurish artwork (clip art, pre-made covers where you just change the title and author) that some of the independent authors use to be so unappealing as to pass over their books.

While designing a cover may not be easy it doesn't have to be expensive to hire a freelance graphic artist to do your cover design. It doesn't have to be fancy it just has to be your own. If I am scrolling through Amazon's kindle books I will see a picture of the cover, if it looks like a cover I have already purchased I will skip right over it.

Many authors are realizing this and taking the time to redesign their book covers from their first attempts. While it doesn't affect the quality of the reading material between the covers it does affect the readers perception of the quality of the the authors work.

And perception is everything when it comes to choosing a book. Whether that perception is based on the cover, the blurb on the back, or another readers recommendation that is how a reader will choose which new authors to read.

I've found something similar with Wine labels. I take my teenager wine shopping with me. She doesn't drink it but it seems she can look at a bottle and whether it is the label, the hue of the wine, or the weight of the bottle she always seems to help me add good wines to my collection. Not that they stay collected long because what good is wine if you can't drink it and share a bottle with friends


Good Books, Good Wine, Good Friends What Could be Better.