This meme was started by Books by Proxy, whose fabulous idea was to compare UK and US book covers and decide which is we prefer. This meme is being nurtured by Lynn’s Book Blog and this week we are featuring covers with GLASSES. I’ve selected My Sister, the Serial Killer – by Oyinkan Braithwaite.
This edition was produced by Doubleday Books in November 2018. I think it is a fabulous cover. The woman on the front is sublimely beautiful and yet we cannot fully connect with her, because of those sunglasses – which reflect a raised hand clutching a knife. So clever! While that catchy title pings off the cover in a luminous green that makes me wonder why more cover designers don’t use it. This is the default cover and my favourite.
Published in November 2019 by Alpha Decay, this Spanish edition isn’t nearly so successful. The manner in which we are prevented from fully connecting with the strong young woman on the cover is far clumsier. While those tiny textboxes are making a poor job of highlighting the title and author, while at the same time further disrupting the cover design.
This Arabic edition, published by العربي للنشر والتوزيع in January 2020, demonstrates why I hate textboxes so much. The woman featured on the cover is even more mysteriously alluring than the one adorning the Doubleday edition. I love the colours of her headscarf and the bold, blue lipstick – and they have the good sense to hold onto those marvellous sunglasses. Then they go and ruin it by covering up a quarter of that marvellous image with a mustard-coloured textbox! Worse, they plaster another charmless effort right across her forehead… Otherwise, this design would have been a real contender.
This Portuguese edition, produced by Kapulana in April 2019, has done away with beautiful girls wearing sunglasses – and instead gives us the CSI version. We have a cover featuring some of the utensils necessary for getting rid of a body. The bright yellow font nicely pops from the reddish brown background – the colour of drying blood? But I personally still prefer the first offering.
This Macedonian edition, published by Антолог in 2020 is back to poised beauty hiding behind those sunglasses reflecting the stabbing knife. This time, the image has been given the graphic novel treatment, which I think works really well. I love the shading and the fact we see more of her neck and shoulders. I also love the grimy yellow background and bold, tilted treatment of the title font, with the author’s name featured along the top. This is a classy, sophisticated cover that so very nearly got my vote… but which is your favourite?
Brainfluff 