Best book covers...

[Nefret]

Didn't see a thread for this, so I decided to start one.

Any books that you just really enjoy the cover art? List here.

A few of mine:

Victoria Victorious by Jean Plaidy
Queen of this Realm by Jean Plaidy
The Concubine by Norah Lofts
Here Was a Man by Norah Lofts
Daughter of the Forest by Juliet Marillier
Son of Shadows by Juliet Marillier
Child of the Prophecy by Juliet Marillier


(Note: The Lofts and Plaidy books are the US reissues. The Marillier books are the mass market paperback editions.)

[Anna Elliott]

I second the Juliet Marillier covers! I love the cover art for The Well of Shades, too, also by Marillier.

[Nefret]

I second the Juliet Marillier covers! I love the cover art for The Well of Shades, too, also by Marillier.

The Bridei Chronicles has some lovely covers. As does Heir of Sevenwaters.

Btw, the Twilight of Avalon cover is very nice. Where is that from?

[theredsoldier]

I was acually very pleased with my last one, even if it does sound a little pompous... I didint; create or design it though so it wasn't my creation - that makes e feel a little better about saying that I guess.

http://www.theredsoldier.com/graphics/cover-big.jpg

[Divia]

My fav cover is a classic
http://www.hhspanthertheater.com/LittleWomenBook3.jpg

[nona]

I just saw Michelle Moran's Heretic Queen in the new soft/paperback and I love the cover it's of a woman walking away through the columns, very pretty I think.


http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0307381765/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_1?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0307381757&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=0JJHCWBYG0MVEPBXZHPY#

[Misfit]

I like the Little Women cover. Great idea for a thread, it will take some thinking about this. Wonder if we need a cheesiest cover thread.....

[Nefret]

I like the Little Women cover. Great idea for a thread, it will take some thinking about this. Wonder if we need a cheesiest cover thread.....

Thanks. The Jean Plaidy thread gave me the idea for this. Not sure which copy of Little Women I have, but that cover is nice.

And you can be in charge of the cheesiest cover thread. ;)

[Anna Elliott]

The Bridei Chronicles has some lovely covers. As does Heir of Sevenwaters.

Btw, the Twilight of Avalon cover is very nice. Where is that from?

Thank you! The painting used for the Twilight of Avalon cover is Boreas, by John William Waterhouse. The next book, Dark Moon of Avalon, has a Waterhouse cover, too. I was really pleased with the art dept.'s choice-- I love his paintings!

And I love the Heir of Sevenwaters cover, too. Have you seen Juliet Marillier's website? She has a gallery of all versions of her covers--some of the non-US editions are even lovelier, I think.

[Ariadne]

The first Australian edition for Child of the Prophecy has a beautiful cover. Even the JPG on her site doesn't do it justice.

[Nefret]

Thank you! The painting used for the Twilight of Avalon cover is Boreas, by John William Waterhouse. The next book, Dark Moon of Avalon, has a Waterhouse cover, too. I was really pleased with the art dept.'s choice-- I love his paintings!

And I love the Heir of Sevenwaters cover, too. Have you seen Juliet Marillier's website? She has a gallery of all versions of her covers--some of the non-US editions are even lovelier, I think.

You're welcome. I must look out for other Waterhouse paintings.

I have seen the covers gallery. The Australian and UK versions are my favourites. Oh, she changed the site. It's even prettier now.

[boswellbaxter]

Susan Carroll's covers always attract me in the store (though I've yet to buy one of the books). Anne Easter Smith has lovely covers on her three books, and the designer did a nice job of relating them to each other. I'm also fond of the UK covers for the Jean Plaidy reissues.

Oh, and I also like Susan Holloway Scott's covers, and the cover from The Nature of Monsters.

[Nefret]

I have not really seen the UK Plaidy covers. But I like the covers for the Dark Queen series. Which I have read most of in the library.

Anna- The Lady of Shalott is one of my favourite paintings. Did not realize your cover was the same artist. No wonder it made me think of that. And a very good choice for your book covers.

[Margaret]

The cover of Kamila Shamsie's Burnt Shadows, about a woman who suffered in the WWII bombing of Nagasaki, is absolutely gorgeous.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nXKHZ4gXH8I/SbaRidyGmqI/AAAAAAAADPE/xpL2LZtsfp4/s1600-h/Burnt-Shadows-Front.jpg

[Misfit]

The cover of Kamila Shamsie's Burnt Shadows, about a woman who suffered in the WWII bombing of Nagasaki, is absolutely gorgeous.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nXKHZ4gXH8I/SbaRidyGmqI/AAAAAAAADPE/xpL2LZtsfp4/s1600-h/Burnt-Shadows-Front.jpg

Gorgeous.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_nXKHZ4gXH8I/SbaRidyGmqI/AAAAAAAADPE/xpL2LZtsfp4/s1600/Burnt-Shadows-Front.jpg

[Nefret]

The Lord of the Rings. With the Alan Lee illustrations. Those are just beautiful.

[Divia]

You guys need to post the covers cause I dont know any that you are talkin about save Michelles, which I agree is very nice. Oh and Ms. Elliott's which I like as well and cannot wait for the next book.

[Nefret]

Don't know how to post images. Otherwise I would.

[Margaret]

To post a link to an image, go to a website where the image is shown, move your cursor on top of the image, right-click, and select the option that says "copy link" or something similar. I just figured this out - one of these days I'll figure out how to post the image itself!

[annis]

Took me a while to work this out, but if you set up a Flickr account, once you copy and save your image you can upload it to your Flickr page (a process simple enough that even someone technolgically challenged like me can manage it :))

Click on the image you've now uploaded and saved on Flickr. Now click on the "All Sizes" option which should appear above your image.

Choose the size you want and now your image has its own URL. Copy this URL

Click the Image icon at the top of the post toolbar - it's the one which looks like a yellow envelope. A box should now come up into which you paste your URL,

Click "OK" and you're done. Magic- a picture should now appear in your post!

You can also edit your picture before posting if you want- the option comes up at the same point as the "All Sizes" one.

I'm sure that there are other ways of adding images to HFF posts, but this one is very straightforward and works for me!

[annis]

Thought I'd better add a favourite book cover while I'm here. This was painted for a fantasy title, "Dragonsbane", by Barbara Hambly. The artist is Michael Whelan.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2518/3886008049_d84a71be4a.jpg

[Misfit]

Don't know how to post images. Otherwise I would.

It took me a while as well and I just figured out how to do thumbnail attachments. In addition to the way Margaret mentioned, if it's a jpeg (so similar) stored on your PC - scroll down to the options underneath the reply post and click on the manage file attachment button. Follow through from there.

[Ludmilla]

Thought I'd better add a favourite book cover while I'm here. This was painted for a fantasy title, "Dragonsbane", by Barbara Hambly. The artist is Michael Whelan.



Whelan is famous for his SF covers. Some of them look kind of cheesy to me, but I really like the ones he did for Joan Vinge's Snow Queen cycle (see the first cover in the attachment).

Luis Royo is another artist who has done a lot of SF covers... I really like the ones he did for Julie Czerneda's books, but most particularly, her recent Stratification series. They actually depict scenes from the novels and the characters actually look within reason like characters in the books. The Reap the Wild Wind cover has a lot going on and to my mind was a rather complex scene for him to tackle, but he captures it beautifully. He has a website if you want to look... don't want to bog down post with too many attachments or graphics, and the covers are probably meaningless if you haven't read the books.

I'll have to think about historical fiction covers that have captured my attention.

[Anna Elliott]

I have not really seen the UK Plaidy covers. But I like the covers for the Dark Queen series. Which I have read most of in the library.

Anna- The Lady of Shalott is one of my favourite paintings. Did not realize your cover was the same artist. No wonder it made me think of that. And a very good choice for your book covers.

Waterhouse and the other pre-Raphaelites did some of the most gorgeous Arthurian-inspired paintings, I think. Very useful for the HF novelist! :) Rosalind Miles has some lovely Waterhouse covers, too:

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/0609808028.01.MZZZZZZZ.jpg

[Ludmilla]

Here's another that I've always thought was very intriguing: Sandor Marai's The Rebels.

[annis]

This is a new book out- its cover struck me as being particularly effective.

MK Hume
"Dragon's Child" (King Arthur trilogy, Bk 1)

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3535/3887213407_089da3833c_m.jpg

[Chatterbox]

Must admit that I don't fuss too much about covers. Occasionally I will see something really awful -- the kind of cover that I'd be embarrassed to be seen with in public. Or there are some that have jagged letters and zig zags that can give me migraines. But otherwise I just note them in passing. I do like a series to look like a series (i.e. to have covers that relate to each other). And there are some covers I like more than others. (I'm a sucker for pre-Raphaelites & the colors they used, for instance). But I just don't notice a lot of things that other folks do. I just want to get to what is inside the covers!!!

That said, I do love it when classic books are re-released with the original "look". I remember that Penguin (one of the earlier paperback publishers) re-released some of their first titles in lookalike versions of the original. And I look as much at the graphic design as the illustration, thanks to a friend who is doing a PhD in the subject right now, and has designed CD covers and book jackets and stuff. (His stuff is very stark and elegant) One book series I love (altho it's not HF) from both a content and design standpoint is the Penguin Great Ideas series. All very disparate, yet somehow tied together/linked in size and overall concept. Immense creativity there, not just finding an image or hiring an artist. The antithesis to that would be the cover of PG's the White Queen -- hire an artist, get a picture done, slap it on the cover.

[sweetpotatoboy]

Anyone interested in book cover design might like this site:
http://covers.fwis.com/
Covers posted and commented on.

[emr]

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/512FEGTGTCL.jpg

If we can ignore the blue seal and the not too fortunate font I love the baroque air and the autumn colors of the picture. She looks like a bird. It's a german edition of Lady of Hay.

[Vanessa]

Wow! Very colourful.

[Madeleine]

Blimey - not too sure about the headdress though, would someone in that period really have looked this exotic?

[Nefret]

Wow! Very colourful.

That's just what I thought.

[Misfit]

That's just what I thought.

That's three of us ;)

[Telynor]

There are two covers that I remember vividly from the 80's that sucked me right into the books. Curiously, they're both by Sharon Kay Penman. The first one wa the original US hardcover for The Sunne In Splendour, that was painted by David Palladini -- just glorious! The other was for Here Be Dragons by Kuniko Craft, very lush and a bit over the top.

[Misfit]

Most definitely not the *best* book covers, but priceless all the same. Michele at Reader's Respite has just posted a few classics here (http://readersrespite.blogspot.com/2009/09/pulp-novels.html).

[emr]

I dont usually buy books by the cover but the other day I was almost tempted with these two:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51xqm0hqnLL._SS400_.jpg http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51iaSpEfGYL._SS400_.jpg


Yesterday I coulnt resist this one though:

http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/429/cover049.jpg
I'm reading it and not much convinced by the novel but I still like the cover anyway :)

[Telynor]

I dont usually buy books by the cover but the other day I was almost tempted with these two:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51xqm0hqnLL._SS400_.jpg http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51iaSpEfGYL._SS400_.jpg


Yesterday I coulnt resist this one though:

http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/429/cover049.jpg
I'm reading it and not much convinced by the novel but I still like the cover anyway :)

I think that is a Waterhouse painting, The Garden of Psyche. It is lovely.

[Kasthu]

I dont usually buy books by the cover but the other day I was almost tempted with these two:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51xqm0hqnLL._SS400_.jpg http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51iaSpEfGYL._SS400_.jpg


Yesterday I coulnt resist this one though:

http://img32.imageshack.us/img32/429/cover049.jpg
I'm reading it and not much convinced by the novel but I still like the cover anyway :)


I think the last cover has appeared on several other books, including Karen Harper's last book. But it is a lovely image; I can see why it gets used over and over again.

[Nefret]

I think the last cover has appeared on several other books, including Karen Harper's last book. But it is a lovely image; I can see why it gets used over and over again.

I was just going to say that. But those are some lovely paintings.

[cw gortner]

I really like the cover for Karen Harper's next book. I wanted Ballantine to use this image in a similiar close-up view for my Catherine de Medici book and sent them the names of the artist and portrait it's licensed from. Sigh. Now, of course, they're looking for a different image. But still, lovely cover.

[nona]

oh thank you CW I didn't even know Karen Harper had a new coming out, I love her works and the covers are wonderful

[Margaret]

Karen Harper's Mistress Shakespeare is the one that uses the painting of the woman with the roses. (Anyone know, offhand, who the artist was? It looks pre-Raphaelite to me.) It's been out since February, at least in the U.S.

And coincidentally, Moseyer contributed a review of Mistress Shakespeare that I just posted at HistoricalNovels.info (http://www.HistoricalNovels.info/Mistress-Shakespeare.html). The beautiful cover struck me so much that I even commented about it on today's blog post (http://www.historicalnovels.info/historical-novels-blog.html)!

[Ariadne]

Good question! I guessed it might be Waterhouse so went online and found a gallery of his works. That one's called "My Sweet Rose (http://www.jwwaterhouse.com/view.cfm?recordid=21)." I read Mistress Shakespeare earlier this year and enjoyed it.

[Madeleine]

Karen Harper's Mistress Shakespeare is the one that uses the painting of the woman with the roses. (Anyone know, offhand, who the artist was? It looks pre-Raphaelite to me.) It's been out since February, at least in the U.S.



Yes I thought that too!:)

[gyrehead]

Not to rub salt or anything CW, but I do like that image. And how it was used.