Advice on the cover. Exact to the story or not?

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colealpaugh

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... I really feel a cover is more powerful if one sees the character's face.

Jeez, I had a three month battle trying to convince my pub's PR guru of the power of a partially obscured face. She is of the camp that is convinced to never use a face. While she won - and I was ultimately satisfied with the cover - I still look at the mock-ups with the face and wonder if it would have sold more.

IMO, an artist would jump all over your description. If there was ever a no-brainer. I know I got an instant image ...
 

WriterDude

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I still have to disagree, although I do agree there are lots of ways to make a cover that won't conflict with the story. If it's really important to the author, then the publisher should tweak things to keep them happy.

But the book cover is a marketing tool, and marketing tools are there to "position" the product, i.e. let the audience know what type of book this is so they can decide whether it's the type of book they enjoy.

Like the title, like the genre shelf the novel gets housed on, the cover is a funnel that directs people who like that sort of book over to that book.

There is zero reason to be precious about how accurate your cover image is provided it's doing its job of slurping interested buyers over. And honestly, not very many readers will scrutinize the cover after enjoying the book and be so put off by a small mismatch that they will refuse to read any other novels by that author. It's quite rare to have such a strong reaction.
Yes. If the story has a castle and a dragon in it, and they are both depicted dramatically on the cover, but are not in the same chapter, i won't feel lied to. I just knew what type of tale to expect inside.

If the book has neither dragon nor castle maybe, but even then.
 

ishtar'sgate

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I like being true to the story. Especially after I read the story. When the cover and the story don't match, it makes me wonder what the cover artist, or writer, was thinking. It leaves me feeling mildly ticked off.

Not to mention the fact that I probably won't see the character's face the same way the cover artist sees it.

Agree. I don't know how many books I've read that have misleading covers. I find that really annoying. I think the one that ticked me off the most (and much of the entire thing ticked me off so that was just one of the things) was D.J. McIntosh's the Witch of Babylon. Now anything about Babylon piques my interest and the cover carried a drawing of a gate that I assumed was supposed to represent the Ishtar Gate, the main northern gate of Babylon. The rendering wasn't that accurate but accurate enough to make me expect I'd get inside Babylon, either a glimpse into its past or onto the archaeological site itself. Not a chance. No Babylon whatsoever despite the title and cover. Major disappointment.
 
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