Welcome back to Cover Snark, where we looking at covers and well…snark a bit.
From Kerri: I saw this cover and I have CONCERNS. Specifically where those tentacles are coming from and where they’re going. Also, are his nether regions just tentacles all the way down?
Sarah: It’s a good thing pools are mostly closed.
Elyse: That dude needs all the sunscreen. SPF80 at least.
Claudia: Is the kraken doing what I am thinking it is doing?
Lara: Claudia, the answer is yes. Yes, he is.
Sneezy: I can’t tell if he’s enjoying it or not. Or maybe he’s doing that thing where he’s trying to hold off on orgasming until whoever came to check on the pool has left. Which begs the question if only the people being debauched by the tentacles can see them.
From Anne H: For cover snark: Prize of the Alien Captain by Cordelia Archer in which a blue elf is sniffing a hunk’s armpit.
Sarah: Can confirm.
Tara: Their kink is not my kink and that’s okay.
Amanda: There’s something about that shade of blue that makes me think they’re made of chalk and I just got a full body shiver at the thought of touching chalk.
Sneezy: Is this a sci-fi take on Purple Rain?
From Lisa S: May I present: “Guy with buildings growing out of his head.”
Sarah: He’s got his mind on the towers of capitalism, I think. Or they’re on his mind whether he likes it or not?
Amanda: You know how sometimes, you see one detail and it’s all you can focus on? That’s how I feel about the weird little street lamp coming out of his nose.
Sneezy: Now it’s all I see too.
And you know what? If my brain were skyscrapers and the rest of my head the soil propping up their foundations, I’d be Broody McBrooderson, too.
Catherine: I mean, to do this cover justice, I think the artist has invented an entirely new species of shifter. Never seen a hero who could transform into a city before, and it gives a whole new meaning to ‘built’, if you think about it…
From Bree W: I am 37 and have loved romance since I was a teen I only recently read Beyond Heaving Bosoms and while it’s nearly 14 years too late I would love to nominate for Worst Possible Cover Ever: The Heart and the Holly by Nancy Richards-Akers it could quite possibly also be Sexiest Cover Ever but I haven’t made up my mind yet.
Sarah: MY GOSH Bree has gifted me with magnificence.
I am tempted to order a copy of this book so I might see it with my own eyeballs.
Lara: Not gonna lie. I am HERE FOR THIS!
Sarah: Is he pulling up his own thighs? Is he a waterfall selkie of some sort? I really think I need to order this book
Lara: He’s doing both and more. He’s liberated himself from The World of Pants.
Catherine: I am not at all sure that he has legs. Am voting merman.
Tara: I’m with Lara on this one. He’s taken the no-pants life to another level.
Sneezy: “I really need to find my pants, it- oh, you’ll do. You’ve enough skirts for both of us.”
Susan: Oh that’s his LEG, I was trying to work out why he had one tiny bit of fabric around his thighs.
EllenM: It’s so bad but I love it?!
Just ordered The Heart and the Holly because like it was said: I need to see this for reals.
International shipping fees cost more than the book did but I have a feeling it is going to be worth it..
Odd meteorological fact: luuurve and passion can create their own vortex. For example, based on their hair, the couple on THE HEART AND THE HOLLY clearly exist in a climate where the wind is simultaneously blowing in two different directions.
GIVE ME LOVE = Groot all grown up.
You probably want to be wearing pants if you’re around holly.
I saw that first cover and thought it HAD to be a Chuck Tingle.
I realize my eyesight isn’t great (thanks, near-sightedness plus glaucoma plus corneal dystrophy!), but I could not make out the title of the last book. That font, plus the color scheme… ugh!
OMG. I was going to look at Nancy Richards-Akers’ other book covers, so I googled her name and an old WaPo article from 1999 popped up. The poor woman! TW: murder/suicide
I tried to hide the details under a tag but it seems not to have worked. Sorry about that.
@HeatherS: similar to reading about what happened to Sherrilyn Kenyon (although, thankfully, she is still alive). The women who write the romances we love to read sometimes lead decidedly unromantic lives, alas.
https://www.vulture.com/2019/06/romance-author-sherrilyn-kenyon-said-her-husband-poisoned-her.html
Yeah. Sorry to take over the snark thread with a bummer, but I thought the article in Salon by Julia Gracen (re: romancec writers & abuse) was interestingly both like and unlike the conversations you hear nowadays in such cases. Slow progress in 2+ decades. One thing’s clear, the romance community reactions Gracen quotes are way better than the newspapers writing about the case (WaPo mentioned in the article was par for the course). There’s a definite sense of a new conversation.
The type on Hummingbird and Kraken makes it feel like it’s trying to be a wholesome, cozy story. It doesn’t seem at all like the cute and quirky PNR the summary suggests. I know it follows the trend in cover design of featuring buff!dude and animal, but they’re showcasing a visual element that already has a cultural connotation of hardcore hentai, so you don’t think “shifter romance” you think “it’s gonna get weirddddd”
You can tell Prize of the Alien Captain is set in space because they use space type. That style has been so overused that it has risen to the ranks of Comic Sans. How that area is utilized bothers me most. It’s too cramped and it makes the top illustration feel unanchored.
The type on Give Me Love is thumbs up, it fits with the space, but it feels like the buildings are there because the artist was like “shit, I have to balance the visual weight of the title somehow”. If this was a mystery set in the gritty city streets, I feel the buildings would be appropriate because the placement suggests they’re “on his mind”. I feel like they get points for not going with something obvious, but it doesn’t seem to be telling us anything about the story itself. I feel like maybe putting the guy in a layer over a color with texture would create the visual intrigue they want without it being distracting.
The type on the last one gives me anxiety for some reason. I think it’s the centered text being off center. I also hate that her face is smashed into his tiddies. It feels like it should be moist and looking at it makes my face feel slimy.
@HeatherS: Added it into our spoiler tags.
Oh blimey a kracken shifter, just when I thought I couldn’t beay the troll from yesterday’s sales page.
Just stopping by to mention that, as the kraken is believed to be based on sitings of giant squid sucker marks, whatever that kraken is doing, it has A BEAK.
BUT WHAT HAPPENED TO THE HUMMINGBIRD?!
@Darlynne: Yes! Exactly… I am also wondering about the hummingbird
PS. Could we host the “Heart and the Rose” for the next CS? It has a looooot of potential…
HEART/HOLLY I am impressed how the wind seems to be blowing in opposite directions at the same time.
I read ‘Give Me Love’ as ‘Give Me Cove’ because of the font, which made me think maybe the city growing out of his head was on a cove…
‘The Heart and the Holly’ – is he holding her (really tiny) wrist in his giant man paw? And they both have flowing black hair, so I at first thought her hair was part of his hair…
I enjoy these so much. 🙂
Cover 1: Those tentacles look very much like a plastic toy. Inflatable sex toy kraken?
Cover 2: Blue person’s hand seems an odd match for blue person’s arm– slender and very femme vs. bulging biceps. I also thought the bit sticking out of the hair was a horn at first.
Can’t unsee those tentacles… and yes, we need to know about the hummingbird!
The Heart and the Holly… OMG, yes, I want to know the name that meteorological phenomenon *lol*.
I had read that about Nancy Richards-Akers before – beyond words. But besides what looks like some crazy old skool romances, she also wrote some Regencies, and Miss Wickham’s Betrothal is actually one of my favourite old-fashioned (meaning no sex!) romances from way, way back… and no brutal warlord hero ;-).
It’s not a Kraken-shifter.
It’s Galaxy Quest. Come on, guys, get a room. Oh! That’s not right!
I still have my original copy of The Heart and the Holly that I mostly bought because of the cover. That is, the man is very naked and the woman is dressed and her back is showing so that she’s not spilling out of her dress in the front. In my opinion, this was a big step forward in covers that attracted me. Unfortunately, I think the artist’s sense of proportion was a little off so the hero looks a little skewed. But, still, he’s naked and she’s not so I’ll keep it!
Hummingbird and Kraken: Er … on what continent, in what historical or mythological era does this union take place? (Irrelevant aside: I just recently read a fantasy novel set in pre-Islamic Persia. Somewhere along the line, someone or something was compared to a hummingbird. Move over, Potato Rage.) And where is the hummingbird, anyway? Did the kraken eat it before the cover artist arrived?
Prize of the Alien Captain: And now we get to the runners-up in this year’s collage contest, featuring a clever but ultimately unsuccessful attempt at interlocking two cardboard cutouts.
Give Me Love: “a novel”? Really? Thanks for telling us, or I would have thought it was a Yellow Cab. (Query: Under what circumstances is the subtitle “a novel” ever warranted?)
The Heart and the Holly: Yes, that’s what any rational person would assume. But look closer and you’ll see the title is in fact The Heart And The Holly. Someone needs to go back to design school and learn the rules for Title Case.
Great set of covers. I look forward to these.
My immediate thought regarding Hummingbird and Kraken: that’s….not biologically possible.
I am reasonably certain the blue alien on the second cover is meant to reference Star Trek’s Andorian species. The coloring and ears are just a bit too spot-on, but I’d need to see if there are antennae.
The city shifter didn’t even register as odd. I think I’m just becoming inured to these covers.
I’m with Catherine, that guy is a merman.
Louise, I’ve been wondering for years about “a novel” on all those covers! Are we likely to mistake it for something else, like a work of nonfiction? WHY.
Holy shit the blurb for Hummingbird and Kraken is something else:
GEIR
Geir lives alone in the woods for a reason. And he likes it that way.
Until Declan lands on his doorstep, with a bubbly personality, shimmery lipstick, and dreams of adventure. Surely he can let him stay for a few days without giving in to temptation.
Or letting him discover that he’s a kraken shifter.
Only Declan has other ideas. Because Declan loves his tentacles. And he believes that Geir can be the Daddy that he needs.
DECLAN
Declan might be a teeny little bit impulsive. Alright, a lot impulsive. But he’s still allowed to believe in love at first sight, right? Geir is practically perfect, with his stern scowl, sexy secret, and possessive doting. When Declan settles in and makes friends with the neighboring shifter tribe, it feels like he might have found a home.
Of course, it isn’t that easy.
Strangers lurk in the area, harassing Declan for information about his shifter friends. Geir inexplicably disappears for hours every day. Declan’s only clues seem to lie in Native American legends, as he tries to unravel Geir’s past and their future together.
When danger threatens their small community, Declan’s loyalty is put to the test. And Geir must decide who he trusts, who he cares about, and who he is.
“Hummingbird and Kraken” is an expansion of the short story “My Kraken.” It has non-mpreg shifters, a happy-go-lucky boy, a grumpy old kraken, bad guys on the loose, plenty of tentacles, and a HEA.
Wow, Hummingbird and the Kraken sounds bonkers, but has good reviews!