Category Archives: cover art

First this Lu Kimmel Sex Sells cover from 1955.

This 1929 Weird Tales cover by Hugh Rankin is another Sex Sells cover. Less sexy, though, despite the woman wearing less clothes.

On this uncredited pulp cover, the woman is only in the text. Seriously though, who thought “J. Edgar Hoover vs. Machine-Gun Kelly’s widow” was a gripping idea?

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The one below, by Peter Stevens.

It does convey this is a story of exotic Arabia, with harems, sultans, turbans and swords. But what is the dude doing? Leading an attack on the women? Pointing at where to kidnap them? Or just going “Yeah, chicks!” And why is the seated woman doing what appears to be jazz hands?

And why does the swordsman keep one of his weapons tucked into a belt right over his groin?

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Cover by Jack Faragasso

This one’s by Richard Powers, natch.

An odd but eerie one by Ed Soyka

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This cover doesn’t work for me — it adds nothing to the cover copy at the top, doesn’t show anything about the book except that it involves … well, people.

This one is more effective in catching the eye, and conveys a sense of story even without the cover copy.

This one too, a 1945 novel showing a situation — misguided passion during wartime — that lots of people experienced. Some discussion of the book and the author here. And like The Tigress it’s a more interesting scene than the floating heads.

And here we have an example of that classic sub-genre of Southern fiction, the Sexy Swamp Chick. The image doesn’t tell a story but it does sell the book.

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I love this quote about cover art from The Look of the Book.

I was reminded of that quote looking at the 1958 cover below, by James Meese. Does it make genre visible?

The cover copy tells us it’s a mystery involving pearls and microfilm. The image gives us the tropics, a beautiful, worried woman in a swimsuit and a villain. Without the copy I think I’d assume it was some kind of “jeop” (‘woman in jeopardy’ story) — with the woman targeted by some kind of stalker. Or maybe a romance. Nothing about the cover says “spy” or “mystery.” Without the cover copy it doesn’t make genre visible.

However the cover does have copy so the genre comes across. I suppose it was reasonable to factor that in and go with a sexy woman as the hook (as so many paperbacks did in that era). Still, it’s at best adequate, nothing special

For another look at the same topic, one of the books I read during my recent Charleston trip was GOOD MOVIES AS OLD BOOKS: Films Reimagined as Vintage Book Covers by Matt Stevens. The premise is exactly what it sounds like. Here are more examples.

Most of the covers look cool. Some of them, like The Usual Suspects and Cast Away, are inspired. However I don’t think most of them would make good real book covers. Where The Usual Suspects is arresting, John Wick doesn’t tell us anything about what makes the movie compelling — hell it doesn’t tell us anything other than it involves a man with a gun. Ditto Say Anything on the book cover. They would not, shall we say, move the merchandise even though they’re pretty.

Part of that’s because Stevens is working primarily in the style of serious, tasteful literary paperbacks as I remember from the 1960s and early 1970s — the kind that, as Look of the Book says, doesn’t do anything so tacky as a vivid cover scene. The subtext is that you’re supposed to pick the book up because it’s Quality, not because it grabbed you with a lurid image (if you check out my cover art posts you’ll find lots of those).

The covers also have a certain sameness after a while (I’d have parceled them out over time but I had to get this back to the library). The book would have been more entertaining if we’d had more variety — the only really off-the-wall one is the psychedelic 1970s style for Fury Road. Great idea, not entirely satisfactory results.

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I don’t know the artist, nor the book. It looks interesting though John Brunner’s work is very hit or miss with me.

And a cover by Richard Powers because that’s always worth posting.

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First, Jack Gaughan’s cover — weirder, I think, than many of his, though the lack of background is typical of his work.

Second, Ed Veligursky’s cover foreshadowing the world of climate change.

Third, a nicely weird looking but uncredited cover.

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Another one where I don’t think either cover works.

This Stan Zuckerberg cover, for instance — I like the use of the reflecting mirror but the cop’s expression looks too dyspeptic at the sight of the woman.

Despite the swastikas, Julian Paul’s cover here looks more like shenanigans around a swimming pool than anything else.

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This Tom Dunn cover captures an era when women working in Washington way outstripped the number of available men. This was a thing in WW I; I don’t know if it was true when this book came out in hardback in 1951.

This is one of those covers that looks a little strange in every era. Artist is uncredited.

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