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| Best Cover Contemporary-2006 |
The 2011 Cover
Contest is now open for voting over at Cover Café. The sixty finalists in six
categories—alternate reality, two-image (cover plus stepback), historical,
contemporary, series, and worst—have been selected from more than 565 nominations.
I always take time to check out the finalists and cast my vote in all six
categories. I especially find it interesting that the covers that scream “romance
novel” most loudly are rarely among the finalists. Since I’m not a fan of
clinch covers, that’s fine with me.
Tastes in covers are almost as varied as tastes
in reading. I find the fifty best covers as chosen annually by AIGA, the
professional association for design, fascinating, but they are rarely the
covers I find most appealing. I did like the cover of a Martha Grimes mystery
and the one of a reissue of Machiavelli’s The Prince, both of which were among
AIGA’s 2010 selections.
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| One of AIGA's 50 Best Covers, 2010 |
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One of AIGA's 50 Best Covers, 2010
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I usually find some
covers I like a lot among the Cover Café finalists, but when the site conducted a best
of the best from 2005-2010, only the series winner matched my pick. Lisa
Kleypas’s Tempt Me at Twilight, historical winner 2009, was my choice for in
that category, and although I think the cover of Vision in White by Nora
Roberts is gorgeous, my vote would have gone to the 2010 contemporary winner,
Sugar Creek by Toni Blake. And Jo Beverley’s cover for Three Heroes, one of my
all-time favorite covers, gets little appreciation when covers are discussed.
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| Best of Best, Series |
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| Best Historical Cover, 2009 |
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Best Contemporary Cover, 2010
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You have until
midnight CST May 16 to vote in this year’s contest. I encourage you to cast
your vote. All you need do is view the finalists, give your name and email
address, and vote in at least three categories. Just groaning at the worst
cover nominees is worth the visit. Check out the best of the best results too
and the Chairs’ Honorable Mentions for 2011. The latter group included When
Beauty Tamed the Beast, one of my favorite covers of last year—and one of my
favorite books.
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| One of my all-time favorite covers |
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| A Cover Cafe Honorable Mention, 2011 |
Which covers would
you have voted for among those winners? What’s your all-time favorite book
cover?
4 comments:
I am torn, I like Stef Ann Holm's cover, and Lisa Kelypas bookcover, and also Toni Blake...
My vote for 'best of all' goes to 'Sugar Creek'.
Many covers these days seem to portray parts of a body, rather like my first amateur attempts at photography when the camera wasn't aimed correctly or the zoom was overdone!
This is illustrated by the Stef Ann Holm cover showing only one arm and no head or the Kleypas cover where the hat and dress dominate and we see no face.
Picasso would never have portrayed women like this and I rather like Picasso! LOL
I like them all too, Kathleen. I think the Lisa Kleypas cover is particularly lovely.
Q, I don't mind the body parts until they become such an entrenched trend that every book I pick up seems a variation of the last dozen. I really like Manda's Ugly Duckling covers because they show the heroine's expressive faces.
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