Time did an article about the popularity of the military hero, which I can't find a copy of that's not behind a paywall. However, it's the video that came with it is what caught my attention this week.
Sales figures may prove my opinion one of a very small reader group, but the gleaming man chest?
Doesn't do it for me as a reader. I know, I know. We spend so much time mocking the mantitty in these parts, it's rather surprising (not). The mantitty has never worked for me.
But the context of the video really grabbed my attention. The phrase “seduce the reader” stopped me cold. Kristine Mills-Noble, Creative Director at Kensington Publishing, says in the video, “The fantasy is that this is the man who is going to jump out of planes to recuse rescue me in any situation. We want to be seduced; we don't want to be overcome.”
I'm nodding at the second part but the first part, not so much. What makes me uncomfortable is the fact that the cover art seems created on the suggestion and assumption that I as a reader in some way insert myself into or be present in the story, and want to interact with the hero – either having him “seduce” me as one of the people suggests, or by being charmed and lured by the image to try the book.
In the succession of images shown in the video, it's a Rockette line of manchest after manchest, shirt unbuttoned (and, yes, still tucked in). There's a cowboy hat, a military rifle, some horses – and manchest. The people involved are thinking about the position of the model, Markus Ricci, and what messages are communicated by his arms and hands, the pose of his body. They're thinking about the image they project from the covers of their books.
Videos like this provide a glimpse into the thought and production that creates a romance cover – and I don't think any of the people involved are doing a bad job at all. They're doing exactly what a market demands. (Also, the part where the makeup artist is airbrushing makeup on the model's chest made me laugh. That must TICKLE.)
As I've said many times while talking about romance novels, the romance genre is written by women, read by women, and, as you know if you've been to a romance writers' conference, edited and produced mostly by women as well. So this video shows women marketing to other women through the production of female-centered narratives. I am aware that men within the publishing industry may have a say in how the covers are made and marketed, and what art is used, but in this video, it's all women, with the exception of the photographer and the model. Women marketing product created mostly by women and produced mostly by women to a readership of mostly women.
What strikes me is that despite being a romance reader, despite reading a ton of books every week, every month, every year, I am not in their targeted market. It makes me wonder at the divide that separates me from the reader who does gravitate toward the glistening mantitty, what differences lay between her and me, since we both read the same genre and likely some of the same books.
Why does that cover image work for her and not for me? Is it because I am not interested in the hero so much as I am interested in the story and the emotions of the characters? Are she and I looking for different things? Is it because I don't insert myself in any way into the story except through empathy for the hero and heroine? Is it because I don't involve myself in a way that other readers do?
The degree to which that video made me discomfited and confused is probably measurable with a yardstick. I kept thinking, 'This is about the genre I love and the books I enjoy – well, except for Janet Dailey but still. Why is this doing the opposite of working for me?'
[Unrelated Space Tangent: In THIS Time video, there's a profile of the Voyager spacecrafts launched in 1977. One is about to break past the boundaries of our solar system into interplanetary space. Check out the cool part with the disk of encoded information and greetings from earth that were attached to the outside of the Voyagers. SO COOL.]
What was your reaction? What did you think?
I do love me some good man titty. While I’m not against a little hair, I’m not all that big a fan of rather furry men. Tom Sellek I make an exception for any day though. I also love some sexy female in somewhat revealing clothing (or anything other than all skin but face and hands must be concealed Victorian era type dress).
What’s even better is when I have man titty and a partially undressed female on the same cover – because that hopefully means it’s going to be one hell of a good time. (Isobel Carr’s latest two covers—wowza!—and I haven’t even gotten them off the TBR pile, but I stilll love to drool over them when I’m shuffling my piles of books around)
Maybe because I don’t have kids, and haven’t cared what people thought about what I read for a long time now (you get used to it when they laugh at you no matter what you read – thank you public school!), but I’ve never been embarassed by what the cover might look like.
I sat in the theater lobby during a show last year with a man titty cover and no one said a thing. Well, I think there was one kid that stopped to drool for a minute or so. After I finished that one I had a steampunk one with a very attractive arty decoish type cover (just a woman and swirls and gears and stuff) and everyone asked what it was and then laughed when I said romance.
The steampunk one was an example of when I thought the cover better than what was inside. Talk about disapointment. Man titty never seems to disapoint me, but then I could be going at it expecting something less serious in the first place.
I honestly would rather see more man titty rather than yet another chick in some mass produced leather outfit with a really big sword she may or may not be able to actually lift…unless it’s some crazy anime or something. I’m pretty sure the paranormal world has more for women to wear than leather pants.
I think I would be disturbed if a half naked man was staring at the newspaper and drinking a cup of java in his Stewie pajama bottoms while his love is in a bathrobe with bad hair scrubbing a plate behind him.
It’s romance. It’s ALL about self-insert. Whether you are empathizing with the emotions (thereby making a connection through emotions that you have experienced yourself) or pretending the too stupid to live heroine is 6 feet under and you are in his arms it is all the same. You are connecting to the book. Whether the picture on the front gets your loins tingling (I was going to say burning but then thought better…) or turns you off the intent is all the same. They want you to invest some part of yourself into the book. And as a reader you do.
I’m put off by man titty on a book,all I can think is,he’s waxed hairless,and gleaming,and probably a bit airbrushed,eww-I assume it’ll be a rather boring superficial novel.
But a hint of the pecs on a slightly unbuttoned shirt do attract me,I admit.
I’m not attracted to the mantitty, at least in the sense they seem to think, but it serves as a nice velvet rope. If you want a romance (or erotica) then you know it’s for you. If you don’t want that, you also know to avoid (or will soon learn). I love the more women’s-fic-type or artsy covers, but it’s easy because I buy online where I can check genre or I already know the authors, etc. If I were in a bookstore browsing, I would assume those covers mean Literature-with-a-capital-L, which I read on occasion, but would not expect a romance.
Ahahahahaaa! I finally figured it out!! I love mantitty covers when the genre is m/m, but find it so icky when it’s m/f. And watching that video made it oh so clear to me – the men on those covers aren’t attracted to Any woman, so it looks completely ridiculous to me to see some panting lady climbing up the leg of her best gay friend. It doesn’t work. I’m sure they think they’re appealing to female audiences with those shots, but, much like Playgirl Magazine, women find it curious but meh, but gay men enjoy them very much – It was like when Anthony Weiner got busted for sending those crotch shots. Women everywhere were like, ‘Really? You Really think I want to see your package? I mean, it’s nice and all, but REALLY? You’re sure you don’t want to send those pictures to those women’s brothers or something?”
I know I’m using very broad terms here, suggesting that just because *I* don’t believe that man in the video (and men gracing the covers of romance books) likes girls that *no one* would believe it, but my goodness. We’re romance readers! I’m guessing we have pretty decent gaydar, you know? And if the couple’s supposed to be selling HEAT and chemistry, you’ve got to pick someone who might actually want to do more than dress a woman.
Not only do I not like the man titty covers, I actively try to avoid buying paper copies of any books with those covers, because I have a son and I don’t want him growing up in a house where at least half my books are covered with very objectified, half-naked musclebound guys on the covers. I know that if my own dad had had the same kind of covers in reverse (half-naked bombshell women, that is) spread all around our house as I’d grown up, that would have seriously unnerved me as a teenage girl figuring out my own appearance issues (thanks for NOT doing that, Dad!), and I really don’t want to do that to my son.
So I always try to buy cover-free Kindle versions of those books…and when there aren’t any Kindle versions available for them over here in the UK, I have to decide whether I REALLY want the book or not…which means that often I end up not buying them after all, even if I would really like to read the book inside. As an author myself, I feel really guilty avoiding a book for its cover (I really do know their authors are not at ALL to blame!), but as a mom, those covers just make me too uncomfortable to buy and keep spread around our house.
I’m just glad Fabio isn’t on covers any more!
Stephanie, I don’t blame you at all for feeling that way. I hadn’t thought of it that way, but I have sons, too, and i don’t want them to have similar feelings. And yes, if I’d grown up in a house with bombshell objectified women on book covers everywhere, I’d have had a squicktastic experience with that for years.
It makes me think about what the covers communicate about men, vs what the content of the book communicates about men—and how different those two things are sometimes. Yes, they are often muscled or ripply or hard with muscles that have muscles of their own, but at the same time, they aren’t always superheroes of identical mold. I like the heroes who AREN’T like heroes I’ve already read for that reason.
Only once in a while do I actually ogle a cover for its oily loveliness. Most of the time it is embarrassing as well as just… lazy? at this point. Romance novel = man titty. I glaze over it, and I can’t see how that’s good for sales. I go to a site like AllRomance and it’s a sea of lookalike titties.
I almost wish we could have crazy unique covers, but with the word “ROMANCE” stamped somewhere so we’d still know there was a magic hoo hoo inside. Or maybe just “OPEN HERE FOR MAGIC HOO HOO!” So to speak.
I’ve had quite a few books published and I can say that in my experience at book signings at RT and RWA, the one book cover that consistently has women stop in their tracks and backtrack to take another look at it is the one for an old EC title of mine Planet Mail, which is a man’s torso in a weird futuristic purple plant setting. (It’s actually up on my FB page at the moment because I’m writing another one in the series.) Women love that cover and I’m certain that’s why it still sells. I like the cover but its not my favorite because, as a reader, I don’t really think too much about the cover, I just read the blurb and make a decision from that.
The super muscled stomachs make me think of arthropods. Segmentation. I don’t find it sexy. It doesn’t stop me from buying the book. I used to find the covers agonizingly bad, but I grew to love them because they were signifiers of content that I loved. I was sort of disappointed when the industry moved from nursing mom to a random embossed tchotchke on the cover. I wasn’t thrilled when we embarked on this gay porn stage, but I’m pretty immune to what they put on the cover now.
The Hellboy arm on ” Dark Taste of Rapture” doesn’t bother anyone? I found this cover totally off putting.
@Kate, the cover is eye catching for sure. I love the use of the armband. Very yummy. It went on my TBR list as a result. lol.
Yeah the whole looking into the reader’s eyes thing is creepy. The lack of chest hair is actually kind of weird to me. I feel like I’m looking at an overdeveloped 12 year old boy which is SO not my thing. I buy a lot of romance novels on my nook specifically because they have embarrassing covers. Some of those poses were ridiculous. If you’re going to have a partially clothed man on the cover then at least have him doing something manly and not just standing there. I love my nook simply because I can skip the awkward cover pages.
I found the video disheartening (but I do appreciate that peek into the marketing mindset).
IMHO, the idea of a cover being used to seduce a reader is actually about the manipulation of a reader. It’s a marketing ploy reducing romance to the “sex sells” formula.
It’s one thing to sell a certain type of fantasy and appeal to readers who consent to being seduced. But in watching that video, I felt like I was being force-fed a certain fantasy Clockwork Orange-style—a fantasy that is only one of many in the genre. If there were more of the other types of cover & story fantasies being represented, the “seduce the readers” covers wouldn’t bother me as much. As it is, it feels as though publishers and booksellers are dictating to me that there’s only one type of cover fantasy I’m allowed to enjoy.
I’m a reader who would like to see more heroines represented in positions of power/more powerfully on covers (particularly for romances with action-adventure/SF/F elements). I’d like to see heroines on the pedestal right up there with the heroes. Probably too much to ask these days, but I’m going to throw the idea out there anyway.
I wonder…if all of the mantitty covers disappeared tomorrow, would the bottom drop out of the romance market? How dependent have publishers become on selling mostly the sex aspect in order for romance to maintain its current level of success? I’m awfully curious about that.
I think that the freedom of what women can write in romance these days is fantastic. But the marketing of their work—particularly the covers but also the blurbs—seems to send the message that sex is all the stories have to offer and that’s just not true.
I’m not ashamed to admit that the cover of “Rejar” is the reason I bought it. Sometimes the cover does influence me. On the other hand, I’m currently reading Courtney Milan’s “Trial by Desire” the cover of which I’m having a love/hate relationship with. I dislike it because it seems the popularity of vampires really influenced it – even though this is not a paranormal, it sure looks like he’s about to go in for a bite. But, damn, that is one compellling look in his eyes. His staring at me eyes.
Sure, I like a manly chest (Chris Hemsworth shirtless in Thor…mmmm), but I would rather it not be on my book covers. In a manner it gives the jackasses who call romance tripe and trash a soap box to call it porn for women. And yeah, I’ve never put myself into the story or would want to.
So if so many feel the same way, who are TPTB polling?
My husband will be so pleased to hear that. He’s going to feel so pretty with his rugged, hairy-man-chest now XD
I wonder if they wax their legs, too? Bikini lines?
I hate mantitty for a few reasons, all of which I’m about to explain badly and incoherently (please bear with me).
1) When I’m seeking romance or sensuality or erotica outside of my own reality, I personally prefer it to be in written form to visual media. No slight to the porn lovers, just a personal thing. I don’t want the image of the hero’s chest forced into my brain. I want to be able to create that for myself, which is the beauty of books. If I want visual stimulation, I’ll go out and get visual stimulation. I just want words on a page, damnit!
2) There is almost no diversity among the mantitty! Always white. Always hairless and gleaming with sweat or whatever. Sometimes for kicks I imagine the characters to be physically different from what’s on the cover in order to satiate my need for diversity. A gleaming white chest on the front cover makes it hard for me to pretend in my head that the hero is not white.
3) If my husband were reading in bed and turned to me for a little something-something and I discovered he was reading Playboy or Maxim or whatever (i.e. cover models I do not resemble), I would not be too excited. I suspect it’s the same for him. If I were reading a book with a huge mantitty on the front (i.e.. a cover model he in no way resembles), I doubt his ego would be up for some good times.
I neither insert myself into books, nor am I a fan of the mantitty—or at least I wasn’t until I saw this bit of yumminess: http://www.amazon.com/gp/produ…
Even with the undeniable allure the cover had for me, though, I still didn’t buy the book. I’m not a huge fan of stories about how much better small-town life is. For me, it’s all about the story, and not at all about the cover. In fact, I love my Kindle so much partly because it shields me from the shame of showing mantitty covers on my commute!
I am definitely a big fan of good-looking men with muscles and without their shirts! I started reading romance novels because I saw a copy of Johanna Lindsey’s “Defy Not the Heart” with Fabio on the cover, showing his wonderful chest. I picked it up and have been reading romance ever since. I only buy books that have pictures of gorgeous men on the cover. If it’s a landscape or just a woman or something similar, I get it from the library. I don’t re-read books so the only reason I purchase is to add that small work of art to my collection (it’s cheaper than Picasso). In fact, I just got back from the bookstore and every book I bought has a gorgeous man on the cover, stepback, or back. I don’t like the headless ones, however, because I like a gorgeous face as well as a gorgeous body. As for content, I find great authors this way and I find authors I’ll never read again, though I may well buy the book for the cover. I am never embarrassed by the book covers and I don’t hide them from anybody.
I did grow up in a house with a father who openly had a subscription to Playboy and with a mother who bought him the Playboy calendar for Christmas every year so I’m used to seeing unclothed human bodies. My preference just happens to be for the male body.
I love illustrations for cover art, too. I bought Bewitched by Bella’s Brother because of the illustration—and it’s also how I discovered Z. A. Maxfield, because I liked the cover of Drawn Together so much.
I don’t have strong feelings about specific parts of the male anatomy, but I do like covers that are unique in some way and well-designed. There are a finite number of man-titty configurations that can adorn a cover, so it’s the details that keep covers interesting. Details can include color scheme, costume, setting, facial features or expressions, and overall composition. The cover should be attractive, not just the people on it. It would be nice if publishers appealed more to the readers’ aesthetic sense and curiosity than to their imaginary libidos.
Also, too many manly chests seem to have the identical blocky musculature and greasy hairless shine. Cookie cutter torsos in trite poses don’t do it for me. For my daughter, the hairless chest says jail bait regardless of the knotted thews. I on the other hand see the Governator. Either way, not sexy. Like Sarah, I don’t identify with the heroine and desire the hero. As a reader, I bear witness rather than participate. However, I don’t mind a direct gaze from the cover if it reveals an interesting the character engages my interest. The headless tid bit nipply view? Not so much.
I sure do miss being able to edit my comment. Sigh….
In thinking about the covers that I like best, I realize they almost always involve a very romantic embrace (and sometimes yes it is as subtle as hand placement, but more about tenderness than seduction). The first example that comes to mind is the cover for Kristan Higgins’ “All I Ever Wanted,” with her sitting in his lap in a rocking chair. I also really appreciate the pretty art covers, especially if the face of the gentleman is attractive, or he has touchable hair… like the 1999 mass market edition of Barbara Hazard’s “The Scottish Legacy”: I find him attractive, and I rather like the clinch, too.
Here’s a link to the latter, if I can get it to work:
http://www.amazon.com/Scottish…
I’m going to try to provide an image of the most over-the-top man-titty cover I’ve ever seen with the +Image button here. It’s from a m/m mystery romance that I actually LOVE…but the cover—EEK. It’s Twice the Man-Titty for Two Times the YIKES. I want to run away from my ereader every time I see it. And if I hadn’t already read and enjoyed many other titles by this author (or if I had to read it in paperback, instead of on the privacy on my nook screen)…never in a million years would I have picked this up.
I don’t think of myself as a prude—not when I’m reading about dudes who wanna bang each other anyway—but MY EYES! MY EYES!
Count me as both another anti-man-titty and someone who isn’t sure she’s the “accepted demographic” of romance marketing despite being a reader of the genre for 15+ years now. I am with the commenters above who think either:
-shirtless in snowstorm = TSTL
-shirtless and waxed and that buff = way too self-absorbed (and probably dumb) to be interesting to me
-shirtless faceless man on the cover = this book is about sex and only sex, and I want me some sex and emotion sundae thankyouverymuch
So I rarely even pick up to examine back cover of man-titty books. In fact, I’m not sure I ever have unless the title was just so ludicrous I couldn’t ignore it (and wanted to laugh at it, Extreme Jacuzzi style) or it was by an author I did know and like. My thought is, while it may draw in a number of women it probably offputs an equal number. But maybe the books rife with acres of bare waxed chests really aren’t what I’m looking for, so in that sense it IS good visual shorthand?
When I was a kid, a camp counselor told me thunder happened with clouds banged together in the sky. Maybe this is what she was talking about, only instead of “clouds” she meant “epic man titty.”
Did you see the way the “professional” executive who’s been doing this for 20 years actually stroked her computer monitor at the end of the video? Methinks she enjoys her job a wee bit!
Personally, I prefer there to be an obvious chemistry between a hero and heroine on the cover of my novel rather than have a lone guy “staring seductively at me” from the cover. I find that kind of creepy too. I’d prefer to have my sexy, shirtless guy staring off into the distance lost in thought than have him staring directly at me.
And “glistening mantitty”? Now, there’s a phrase you don’t hear every day! I may just have to find a way to work that one into a conversation somehow in the near future! 🙂
I do not buy for the cover art—I’ll grant some is more eye-catching than others, but it’s the blurb that draws me in. Typically, I then move to reading the first few pages—if it’s engaging and well-written, I plunk down my money. If not, I walk on…and let me tell you, I’ve walked away from a LOT. (My book budget is very, very small, and there’s nothing I hate more in reading than coming away from a book and feeling I wasted my money AND time.)
In regards to mantitty, well…I have a Kindle for a reason. If I want to read a TB, I want to do it without everyone knowing. My coworkers would snicker and snark on me about it, and I don’t need that crap. Just let me read in peace, will ya? Besides, it’s not like seeing a bare chest switches off my coherent thought. (I voted “meh” in the poll, can you tell?)
The video: If they want to shoot a fireman look, can we put his clothes back on? I’d go for a fully geared-up, caught-in-motion frame cover over that “gee, the smoke’s thick in here, and it’s hot—let me walk around this joint shirtless” one. That’s just stupid.
(I am NOT going to talk about why I want accuracy and logic going on in romance novel covers. I’m just finicky that way. Real Men > Fantasy Men.)
I do not insert myself into the stories—I don’t know that I ever did that, even growing up. I remember reading Little Women and wishing I’d find my own Fritz to walk me home under the umbrella, or my own Dr MacNeill in the Tennessee mountains, but I’ve never read a book and tried to Mary Sue the character. (The “seduce the reader” approach doesn’t do it for me.) I do wonder, however, if adult readers doing that today did the same in their youth, or if some used to and stopped in adulthood. Is there a pattern in the self-insertion reader type?
Kim S. (who, for unexplained reasons, has suddenly equated mantitty as reader seduction to tossing out chum for sharks)
I’m also going to admit that I do like the “chesty” man covers but only to a certain extent. The Jaci Burton and Pamela Claire’s (sp) Breaking Point covers…hawt! Viscerally (and superficially too I suppose), I just find a nicely shaped sweaty (albeit headless) man appealing. Now some of the covers over at EC…over the top, like ewww. I don’t know where you draw the line. I guess it comes right down to what appeals to each of us individually. However, I think the fully clothed covers can be just as appealing i.e. Julie James. Funny though, since ereaders came along the only time I see any cover is when I get a peek at them on the internet. Very rarely do I get one when I download a book.
And here’s another strange thing. When I was filling out the questionnaire for my own book cover I specifically asked for “No man-titty!” because it has to fit with what’s inside the book too, don’t you think? If a shirtless sweaty man is plastered all over the cover, shouldn’t there be a reason for him to be that way in the story?
In print I think it’s a double-edged sword for publishers. On the one hand it’s eye catching to some readers. But on the other hand, some readers may be embarassed about taking that same book to the register to pay for it or whip it out of their purse and read it on the bus.
I feel the same way. I have both sons and daughters and I would in no way want them to think that mommy’s “there-is-no-one-perfect-beauty-we- are-all different-and-beautiful-in-our-unique-funkiness” diatribe was a big lie and that my ideal- and apparently a number of womens’ ideal- is a buffed out pillsbury doughboy with skin the color of oily sesame butter.
Which leads me to my next thought: the romance novels that I really love are the ones with to people who fight to have each other- by battling evil kings, drooling pirates, flying metal bugs or what have you- and those characters are never by any means perfect. Yes, I know they all posses lantern jawed steeliness and flashing eyes that go on for days etc, but the best and most interesting characters manage to seem terribly flawed and far more interesting than what passes for most covers.
And also- because I have a cold and I’m cranky- that guy was super young and I hated the way he winked.
I’m still thinking about this topic. Another thought that came to mind is that as the number of mantitty covers increase, it seems as though the heroines are subsequently being erased from the stories. The idea that the heroines aren’t as important as seducing the reader bothers me.
Not a fan of the mantitty covers. I’m as much a fan of a good looking’ guy as any woman, but I find it narrows us as mostly women readers reading a genre written primarily for women.
I would rather use my mind to picture the main characters than a visual.
Mantitty doesn’t do much for me either. Arms on the other hand … mmmmm!
Sadly, overdone (and oiled) mantitty screams “steroids” to me and, as a physician, I know how much that can cramp the sexorizing. So, no, not a fan of much of what’s out there. OTOH, a healthy torso peaking through an appropriate amount of unbuttoning is fine.
And the last time I inserted myself into a story, I was twelve, had just read Kipling’s Kim, and wanted desperately to be the boy spy.
Great point. I can’t add my agreement that heroines are being erased from the stories in great quantities in the romance genre, as it’s not my primary reading genre, but it’s giving me something to think about. But I’m not a self-inserter (except, um, when reading Harry Potter), and I need a strong, unique heroine to make the romance worthwhile. I need the give and take and the chemistry between both characters. That being said, I would probably argue that there’s nothing wrong with bland heroines and self-inserting. To each their own…
This cover is such a swirling vortex of cosmic manliness, it could be a Syfy Original movie called Clash of the Tittyans.
I love thses covers!
I don’t really insert myself into the story either. . .
I actually prefer the early 2000 artsy contemporary covers (like Katie Mac’s A Hard Day’s Knight) and the older Historical covers with swishy fabric and a knick-knack (like Julie Garwood’s original cover of The Secret).
I like to create my own mind picture for what the characters look like.
It drives me bananas when the heroine has red hair in the story but there is a blonde on the cover.