Reminder: Judge a Book By Its Cover

I have posted many times in the past about the importance of using covers as part of our work with readers. From my "Judge a Book By Its Cover" post:

Please, please, please judge a book by its cover. The publishers pay a lot of money to make a cover that sells to book to people as they pass by. They articulate the appeal of the book-- who would most enjoy it-- with images. If they put so much time and effort into the covers, why aren't we using them to make our job easier?

Click here to keep reading that post. Or click here for every post I have tagged "covers" including this article I wrote on Horror cover artists for The Lineup this past Fall.

While I advocate for using covers as a tool when hand selling titles to readers, late last month, I saved this article from Book Riot which opened up a whole new avenue of conversation starter opportunities around covers. 

From the intro to that article entitled, "What Genres and Subgenres Should be Called, Based on Their Covers":

 If you spend time in libraries or bookstores, you’ve probably noticed book cover trends. Maybe you’ve picked up a book because its cover was unique or resembled another book. Maybe you like embossed gold covers or deckle edges.

Or you may think a lot of recent book covers look similar. Many 2020s literary fiction covers have titles in thick, all caps on a bright background. The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett and Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt are two prominent examples of this style. Some readers love this style; some find it overdone or generic.

This 2022 article explains that book designers have difficult and seemingly contradictory tasks: making covers unique but simultaneously attractive to algorithms. Covers often contain hidden details but must also be attention-grabbing, even in thumbnails online. Fitting into an existing trend isn’t necessarily cliché. It’s creative marketing that helps readers find books. 

Publishing trends can become memes. Social media users have compared food packaging to the fonts on Colleen Hoover covers. Many online book lists collect or parody the fantasy title format “A Blank of Blank and Blank.” Some covers of classic books contain blatant spoilers because designers think most readers already know the endings. So, here are some silly genre and subgenre names I made up to fit these cover trends.

Click through to see what the author did. While they claim it is "silly," I think there is not only a lot of truth here, but also much we can use (after the chuckle) to engaging our patrons in conversation about popular books and genre trends. 

At the very least you can use the funny genre titles and put some books that fit the description on display (or in an online list). These cover based displays work extremely well because they subvert what our library users think we are going to say. As I began my column in The Lineup (also referenced above):

Psst…. I have a dark, dirty library secret for all of you. I think we have been doing this column long enough that I can trust you enough to share it with you. Here it is…

I judge books by their covers.

I will give you all a moment to recover from shock, but it is 100% true. And not only do I judge books by their covers, but I train library workers all over the world to do the very same thing.

Now I know all of you probably heard from a librarian or teacher at some point in your childhood, “Don’t judge a book by its cover,” and I am sure some of you have taken this as fact and carried it into your own adult reading life, even passing it on to new generations of readers. Well, I am here to tell you to forget it.

Why?

Well let’s start with this actual fact: Publishers want their books to have a cover that sells the book to its best reader. They need the cover to do the heavy lifting of attracting readers as they walk by...

But they also want them to be the right readers, ones who if they are attracted by the cover, stop and read the back and then decide to buy the book.

If publishers are putting that much effort, money, and thought into the covers of their books, why aren’t we using the covers to help readers find the best book for them as well? It actually seems irresponsible for me, someone whose job it is to match books with their best readers, to NOT consider the covers. A cover can never tell you exactly what will happen in the book, but those covers created by the very best artists can absolutely tell you quite a bit about the feel of the book to follow, setting the tone for the story that follows.

So get out there and shock your patrons by showing them that you too judge books by their covers. They will be excited to see that you are no different than them, yes, but you will also teach them how to make the covers work for them as they choose books to read going forward.

And you can all have a chuckle together.