Ready to look at some pretty covers?
Maya: Here’s something that made me feel better!
Aarya: Oh, hot damn
How do I buy that jacket? People on covers have the best clothes.
And the way the heart “splatters” to the side. Wow. Kudos to the cover designer.
Amanda: The first one was good, cover-wise, but I think I like this one better.
Maya: Agreed, I love the jacket and the functional boots!
Sarah: I love this cover.
CarrieS: The use of color, with that bold red background, really sets it apart, I love that!
Catherine: I agree, the colours really are gorgeous! Especially the woods in the background. And I love that her clothes are gorgeous but also something you could use a sword in. Fantastic.
Sneezy: BAMF alert!
Amanda: I’m getting some kickass Wonder Woman vibes from the cover.
Sarah: Another cover with somewhat functional battle garments? What is happening?
Elyse: I love it when there’s no boob-armor. She looks badass.
Catherine: Sarah, I was about to say the same. (And Elyse, your comment made me think of the Chicks In Chainmail anthology by Esther Friesner, which has a grand time poking fun at that particular trope in a variety of ways).
Sneezy: These functional kickass gear for women are giving me LIFE!
Lara: I want to be her so badly.
I couldn’t find information on the designer, but the cover was inspired by Jacques-Louis David’s portrait of Napoleon.
Amanda: I know there are major composition issues with this cover, but it really taps into my niche dream of being able to ride a galloping horse through a field while I’m wearing a gorgeous dress.
Claudia: Sidesaddle, no less!!
Sarah: I have concerns for the horse tripping on the skirts, and the closeness to the canon, and the fact that her hair is not moving at all, but I agree, that’s an image.
Amanda: DON’T RUIN THIS DREAM FOR ME, SARAH
Carrie: Horsie! Also, she’s gonna fall off.
Such a dreamy, movement filled cover, very Calgon Take Me Away. I want to be there. But not sitting in that position.
Tara: Definitely. She’s barely holding on.
Sarah: Maybe she’s about to jump down and whoop some ass?
Tara: She will probably tumble down that hill when she gets tangled in her own skirts.
Amanda: Wow everyone, feeling real attacked right now.
Tara: Amanda, I want you to have your dream. But also, safety first.
Sarah: I don’t know, maybe the spy training helps her leap from the back of a horse with ease and perfectly coiffed hair, so she can use that crop (?) in her hand to beat some dumbasses down?
Tara: Maybe the skirts tear away when needed?
Sarah: Or split into surprise trousers?
Tara: YES
Sarah: I would love every dress I have to wear to spontaneously evolve into surprise trousers.
Tara: I haven’t a dress in more than a decade, but I want this for you too. Also for my daughters, who have chosen instead to embrace shorts or pants under dresses because that isn’t available for them.
Sarah: AGREED.
Lara: It’s clear to me that this is a still frame taken from a high-speed chase in which our heroine leapt onto the horse, and is about to horsey-gymnastics flick herself over to the other side of the horse. Then she’ll shoot a bow and arrow at her pursuers. It’s going to be EPIC!
Amanda: Yes exactly! Lara gets it!
Catherine: …actually, that cover suggests that someone has read the book, even if they don’t understand how horseriding works, so points for that.
I mean, the heroine is great with horses and also has a spectacular red dress. She does not combine these two elements, but still.
Sneezy: Ugh, Catherine, you just reminded me of all the time Munchkin Sneezy had been SO CONFUSED and SO DISAPPOINTED when the cover doesn’t match the book perfectly!!!
If only I had Trouser Dresses to console me.
Shana: I love this cover and it really makes me want to read the book. Is that too low a bar? I worry that my barometer for fab LGBTQIA covers has been irrevocably warped by by reading too much lesfic.
Amanda: You are allowed to love whatever covers you wish! But I think the chalk don’t and the little constellations are adorable.
Shana: Those are my favorite parts too! I could happily lose the film tho, I’m sure it’s relevant to the plot but it doesn’t seem particularly necessary.
Amanda: And I would die if a coffee shop did foam art ghosts.
Tara: Relevant to the convo!
Shana: Swoon. This is making me realize that I adore barista romances. I didn’t find working at a coffeehouse to be particularly romantic, but I want all the coffee-themed books.
Amanda: I think Knit Tight by Annabeth Albert has a barista and a knitter. Elyse really liked it.
Elyse: Yessssssss! Loved it!
Tara: Melissa Brayden has one too. Hearts Like Hers. It’s not my fav of hers, but I liked it. Also, Harper Bliss has the Pink Bean series and at least three of them feature baristas because they’re all centered around a coffee shop chain
Carrie: Coffee and constellations are really all I require from a book cover.
Sarah: I love the ghost. This design is adorable!
Sneezy: I love the little ghostie, too!!!! (Although I’m far less enamoured with the idea of drinking haunted coffee.) And Shana, that is not a low bar at all. My lust for books regularly begins with the covers.
Lara: I’m usually a bit of a party pooper with cartoon-style covers, but that little ghost is making me squee with cute!
Lol, I competed in sidesaddle shows a few years back and had to wear a habit, one time halfway through my skirt came undone and almost fell off and I had to be re-buttoned. That was embarrassing. I cannot imagine riding sidesaddle in a massive dress like that.
Loved the comments. But gotta say that yes her skirt is too long. However, riding habit skirts are typically longer than a normal skirt (but not this long) so that it doesn’t pull up and show her legs while she rides. They drag the ground a bit once off the horse and have to be held up. The sidesaddle has a horn that her right leg is hooked over. Also some saddles have another horn called the leaping horn that curves down over her left leg. You can squeeze those horns between your leg to give you some security in the saddle. That said sidesaddles are much more dangerous than riding astride.
I love the Ghosting You cover except it gets a little anachronistic(?) with having both the film and camera and the phone. Most people today don’t use film cameras, they use digital, and if they have a smartphone they will use that to take photos. So the setup makes it a little unclear in what time period the book takes place. Unless they’re using a special ghost-hunting camera and film? In any event it’s very effective and just the info on the cover is giving me On-A-Clear-Day-You-Can-See-Forever vibes and grabby hands.
@Shana, Laid Bare, the first book of Lauren Dane’s Brown Siblings series features a rock star turned barista (also hot menage, but that’s another post).
Shout out to the barista’s at Cook Street Coffee in Barrington who put a smile on your face by handing you your to go cup without a lid so you can see they made your latte just as pretty as the table service cups. They can surround you with Starbucks and I’d parkour my way over and around to get to you.
Also, she’s totally sliding off that horse, bad seat or skilled fighting move up to you, but she’s coming down.
So glad you like the Ghosting You cover! I’m the designer (I designed all of Alex’s books (inside and out) actually). The story is amazing by the way!
I’m confused by the comments on Dead Rising. How is wearing a metal bra and one forearm guard over a shiny shirt functional? Anyone trying to kill her would just stab or slash her apparently unprotected abdomen, which is a more effective target area and therefore much more important to protect. Even if the material over her belly is supposed to be leather, still seems like the metal parts are positioned more cosmetically than functionally.
The ghost latte art (on Ghosting You) is adorable, and would almost make it worthwhile to drink a latte.
Sorry, Amanda. My first impression upon seeing the Putney cover was that I got a definite Isadora Duncan vibe. It’s gorgeous, but you know it’s going to end in tragedy.
I would guess that the reason the Ghosting You cover has film on it is because ghosts show up in film photography, or at least you can double expose an image on film to get ghost images. And as a photographer, I definitely would take both a film camera and a phone or digital camera if ghost hunting.
The Ghosting You cover may be my favorite book cover art of the year!
@DonnaMarie Thank you for the suggestion of Laid Bare! I just checked it out from the library.