NEW RELEASES FOR THE NEW YEAR
BY STEFAN NADELMAN | permalink | posted January 5, 2009

As we enter the ninth year of the twenty-first century, let’s have a gander at a handful of books due to release this month. It’s sadly fascinating how consistently similar these covers are, which wouldn’t be so bad if they were pleasing to look at.

A. Black Ops | by W.E.B. Griffin
Pub. Date: December 30, 2008
Green, glowing type, green, glowing jet planes…night vision! Oh this reeks of espionage, clandestine operations, and military mischief. Number five in the Presidential Agent series, at least this cover stays true to the slab serif typeface, type size, and type placement of its predecessors.

B. The Big Idea | by Donny Deutsch
Pub. Date: December 2008
Donny Deutsch is the chairman of $2.7 billion marketing company. It appears he’s run out of crap to market so he’s decided to market himself. This book cover is a sad remix of Donald Trump meets self-help.

C. Fire and Ice | by Julie Garwood
Pub. Date: December 30, 2008
Get a room guys. Ah, they must be a new couple. Or recently married. I wonder what the fire and ice are…crabs and diamonds? All I really know is that I’m not a girl, so I probably shouldn’t be reading this book.

D. Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating | by Mark Bittman
Pub. Date: December 2008
This design is painstakingly formulaic but soundly executed. Get out your quinoa and join the green revolution.

E. Running Hot | by Jayne Ann Krentz
Pub. Date: December 30, 2008
Chooch + Risky Business sunglasses + palm trees = cocaine dealer. When I see my mother reading these kinds of books I yell at her. “I can hear your brain atrophying,” I tell her. I dare anyone to not agree if you like Danielle Steele then you’ll like this book.

F. Becoming Enlightened | by His Holiness the Dalai Lama
Pub. Date: January 2009
Here’s something new. Let’s divide the cover into three sections. Hooray, I knew the Dalai Lama’s people would think outside the box, albeit not too far away from the box. Is anyone bothered by that sliver of blue sky in the upper left? My OCD just made karma its bitch.

G. Plum Spooky | by Janet Evanovich
Pub. Date: January 06, 2009
Someone let a high school student run amok with Photoshop. This book is part of the Stephanie Plum series and I have to admit, some of the other jacket designs for this series are rather clean and snappy. But this one is plum depressing.

H. Bones of the Dragon | by Margaret Weis, Tracy Hickman
Pub. Date: January 06, 2009
This classical Roman-German typeface and heroic, middle-earth adventure scene goads me to roll the D20, don my +3 armor, and pray that my dexterity saves your wizard’s ass.

I. Daemon | by Daniel Suarez
Pub. Date: January 2009
As a sci-fi enthusiast, I’d probably read this book despite its use of the tired nineties tech typeface over top a futuristic cityscape. Because in the future this will be the only typeface available and all the buildings will be super tall and shiny, just like William Gibson and Neal Stephenson predicted. The future will be awesome.

J. Eclipse | by Richard North Patterson
Pub. Date: January 06, 2009
The overall treatment of type and color here is okay, but no one’s reinvented the wheel on this one.

K. GUILTY: Liberal “Victims” and Their Assault on America | by Ann Coulter
Pub. Date: January 06, 2009
There it is again: red, white, and blue. Ann Coulter must be a true patriot. On Donny Deutch’s show, The Big Idea, she says that Christians (like herself) are “perfected Jews”. If Ann Coulter was charged with making Christians and Republicans look like bible-thumping Jesus lovers then this book is aptly titled.

L. Mounting Fears | by Stuart Woods
Pub. Date: January 13, 2009
What’s with the yellow and the purple? And the stock photo from Corbis? I fear that people are actually getting paid to design such covers.

M. The Best of Everything | by Kimberla Lawson Roby
Pub. Date: January 13, 2009
Skirt, high heels, and shopping bags. Delicate, curvy typefaces. Wavy colored lines like the packaging of a feminine product. I guess this is a book for the girl who wants/has everything.

N. The Last Straw (Diary of a Wimpy Kid) | by Jeff Kinney
Pub. Date: January 13, 2009
I’m sure this guy has been picked on enough in his life so I’ll withhold my comments. I can be wimpy too.

O. Agincourt | by Bernard Cornwell
Pub. Date: January 20, 2009
Unsheath ye sword and prepare to meet thy foe. That’s how people spoke back in the day. An alternate title could reasonably be There Will Be Blood.

P. We Can Have Peace in the Holy Land | by Jimmy Carter
Pub. Date: January 20, 2009
There will be blood Jimmy Carter. Haven’t you read Agincourt already?

Q. The Temptation of the Night Jasmine | by Lauren Willig
Pub. Date: January 22, 2009
The designer of this cover is clearly a scrapbooker. Look at all the flair in there! As number five in the Pink Carnation series, it fits well in this collection where each cover is based on a different flower and color accompanied by a painterly rendition of a woman.

R. The Associate | by John Grisham
Pub. Date: January 27, 2009
Wait, I thought John Grisham was banned from Lit Mob. He is, but since we’re talking about pulp-shlock book covers here, then he’s the king. Look: shady, rich, business dude doing something mysterious. Cocaine? Ponzi scheme? Your curiosity is running wild now.

S. Dark of Night | by Suzanne Brockmann
Pub. Date: January 27, 2009
Deep-voiced movie trailer voiceover guy: “In a world where the dark of the night is actually…light blue and a soothing shade of lavender…”

T. A Darker Place | by Jack Higgins
Pub. Date: January 27, 2009
This cover was a response to the Dark of Night which didn’t meet Higgins’ standard of darkness.

U. Mistress of the Monarchy: The Life of Katherine Swynford, Duchess of Lancaster | by Alison Weir
Pub. Date: January 27, 2009
This illustration is not without merit and it certainly sets the time period in the same way the Agincourt cover does. I just hope the language is clearer than Canterbury Tales otherwise I’ll need those Cliff notes again. I’m not afraid to admit it.

V. Promises in Death | by J. D. Robb
Pub. Date: February 24, 2009
J.D. Robb is a New York Times bestselling author, therefore the rules state that his name must appear no smaller than 130 point type. This is number twenty-eight in the In Death series and, to my surprise, all of the previous covers use different typefaces and different layouts. The only thing consistent here is the author’s name in screamer type.

The rate in which books are released supersedes the rate in which good design can be employed. However, I’m willing to accept that the content of these books may not warrant a worthy cover to begin with. Looking forward into February and beyond it’s more of the same fare, like molded chicken nuggets. The good news is there are still wonderful book covers out there, I just have to look a little harder next time.