Cover Snark: Wonderful, Reader-Submitted Snark

Welcome back to Cover Snark! Most of these were sent in by you all, and oh, buddy…they are good. I also want to issue a content warning for discussion of self harm in the first cover in this series.

Seducing Destiny by Amelia Hutchins. A naked woman is being hugged from behind by a man. Her arms are reaching up behind her to grab his neck. She may have snapped it. Dark green and red vines circle their arms.

Lara: Is it okay sometimes to not be clever? To look at something and just go, “Ew”

Amanda: It is very okay, Lara

Lara: I can’t even put my finger on what repulses me. My whole body just does a shiver.

Heck, maybe that’s the cover designer’s intention!?

Carrie: It’s the red…it looks like self-harm…this is really concerning.

Lara: That’s it!

Shana: It also looks like the guy behind her is a dead body

Tara: SHANA

Now that you’ve said it, I can’t unsee it.

Carrie: Oh yeah…can’t unsee it…that dude is dead.

Catherine: And even though I counted the arms carefully, it somehow looks like there are too many of them.

Tara: So, is it actually not self-harm? Maybe she’s taken his blood?

Catherine: It looks more like she is in the process of twisting his head off. Still lethal, but not so bloody?

Tara: Not yet, anyway…

Sarah: She is 100% popping his head off his neck with her magical super strength. Which is fine, I get it. If I were grabbed from behind like that unexpectedly I might do the same thing.

I hope it makes the Ken doll head sound.

She's Everything by Sable Hunter. This cover is front of a livestock pasture with a fence. A shirtless man is ripping open a woman's plaid button-down shirt as she bends backward. He's kissing her neck and their chests are pressed together.

From Jenny: I don’t know what happened to the guy’s arm – the proportions seem off, unless part of it is off-page. Her pose seems really uncomfortable. The whole vibe is a bit off-putting. [The cover for the paperback is not half-bad – not sure why they went in this direction for the Kindle cover.]

Sarah: Did he break her neck?! She was having a great hair day, too, poor thing.

Elyse: Their boobs are touching

Amanda: Nip to nip. I wonder if they took the time to line them up.

Shana: It looks like he’s about to bite into her throat. I can definitely understand why he’s so angry…I’d be mad if I had cute teeny T-Rex arms, and someone forced me to walk around with my shirt around my belly all day.

The Longing of Lone Wolves by Lana Pecherczyk. A lot going on here. The upper half of the cover has frost detailing at the edges while the bottom has flames. The hero has long silver hair, a beard, and pointed ears. He's shirtless, obvi, with a flaming, tribal chest tattoo over one pec.

From Lils: Whoa. This is just too much. Strange tattoo? Flesh eating bacteria?

Sarah: There’s a whole bunch of cover art that imply a paranormal dermatology practice will be needed very soon.

Kiki: I’d read a book about a paranormal dermatologist

Sarah: Me too!

Lara: Ditto!

Sarah: “Sir, I recognize you are a night walker of the undead but yes, you still need to wear sunscreen.”

“Well, you see, depilation on that scale comes with some risks. I wouldn’t recommend waxing as a financially sound option, nor an effective one, unfortunately.”

Sneezy: Mmm. Yes, gimme that paranormal competence porn.

Dirty Toe Rag by Toni Aleo. A shirtless man in a sports locker room is holding up a pair of women's legs. The legs have high heels. Who knows if the legs are attached to anything.

From Dee: This book is in my recommendations and the cover’s just…I don’t know how to describe it. Especially since it looks like he’s either holding a mannequin legs up or about to spank someone for wiggling too much. And I am afraid to Google the meaning of “Dirty Toe Drag”.

Sarah: Poor person looks so bewildered.

Amanda: Excuse me what

Sarah: The longer I look at this image, the less sense it makes.

Tara: Definitely don’t google that title. That way lies regret.

Sarah: No no nope nope nope no nuh uh no thanks.

Carrie: Mannequin 3: The Sequel No One Wanted

Tara: This reminded me of a photo I have of my kid when she was a toddler and tried sitting on an upside down chair. She had that same look on her face and everything, asking “Am I doing this right?”

Comments are Closed

  1. hng23 says:

    If I *never* see another obviously fake, poorly photoshopped tattoo it won’t be soon enough. Marketing depts have a lot to answer for (see previous rants about cartoon covers).

  2. Escapeologist says:

    Paranormal dermatology, just yes so much yes

  3. LKF says:

    Wow! Fantastic cover snark today. On the second cover, it looks like his arm and his back have merged into one gigantic, mutated muscle. The last one’s title is very off-putting, even if you know that “toe-drag” is an ice skating term and this book is part of an ice hockey series.

  4. Star says:

    No, no, Cover Woman #2! You’re supposed to bend out of your upper back, not your lower back! Oh no that’s not ending well at all.

  5. Merle says:

    Seducing Destiny: Her elbows look weird, and her arms over all look very plastic/Barbie. I agree that she’s tearing his head off, which seems like it would be difficult from that position.

    She’s Everything: Her hair is clearly a solid chunk of something, rather than individual strands.

    Longing of Lone Wolves: Henna art on his chest– unusual. Don’t like how his arms are disappearing. Never heard of a werewolf who could shift just the tops of his ears.

    Dirty Toe: How would that work? Only his thumb appears to be supporting her left leg. His unenthusiastic expression does not suggest romance, or even sex.

  6. HeatherT says:

    On that first cover, all of their arms look like snakes. Lots and lots of snakes.

  7. OuchOuchOuch says:

    Exactly how many assassins can Nashville, population 700 000, support?

  8. Camny says:

    The cover and name of Dirty Toe Drag implies a foot fetish or sexy shoes figure prominently somehow, but the fact that it’s part of a long running series called Nashville Assassins brings up even more questions. But, ya know, I’m ok with just letting them remain questions.

  9. TinaNoir says:

    That Dirty Toe Drag cover just strikes me as really wrong. It is the legs that are bothering me. They are just hanging there — disembodied parts, like he just ripped them off her torso and is staring at us robotically as if asking, ‘Ok I ripped off her legs, now what?’ It is really rather repulsive.

  10. SusanK says:

    Why would you name a professional sports team Ass-ass-ins? It seems like it would be great for fans of the opposing team though.

  11. Louise says:

    Seducing Destiny:
    <tangent>
    Hm. What does it say about the Bitchery that Self-Harm requires a trigger warning, while sober discussion of cervical dislocation (yup, that’s the technical term) is fine and dandy?
    </tangent>

    She’s Everything:
    Woo hoo, it’s the Four-Font Festival, with bonus points for using two of them in the title. But what the heck is the series title? I can’t make it out to be anything but “cowboy crase”, which is, er, not English. Craze? Erase? I must say it’s thoughtful of him to position the hickey where she can just barely get away with claiming she’s a violist.

    The Longing of Lone Wolves: Or is it ’Lone with apostrophe? Alone Wolves? Clearly “fae” is the word of the week: here a Fae Chronicles, there a Fae Guardians. And cervical dislocation is the visual theme, since it appears that someone removed his head and then couldn’t figure out if it was supposed to go forward or backward.

    Dirty Toe Drag: Although it looks painful, I can certainly understand why he’s gripping her legs so tightly. Loosen his hold for but a moment, and one of those spike heels goes right through his eye. That’s assuming for the sake of discussion it’s a she; I decline to look it up, but Kinky Boots does come to mind.

    @OuchOuchOuch: Note that it’s The Next Generation of assassins. Would it be unkind to speculate about what happened to the first generation? Maybe they weren’t as qualified as they thought they were to displace the Predators.

  12. Ren Benton/Lena Brassard says:

    Short-Sighted Person Naming the Team: This is a name that tells our competitors they cannot escape defeat.

    Legions of Drunken, Jeering Sports Fans Clapping in Unison: Ass Assassins! Ass Ass Assassins!

  13. chacha1 says:

    The preview for this post featured the Dirty Toe Drag cover and I literally LOL’d. Who on earth thinks being dragged around by your knees while wearing stripper shoes in a locker room is sexy? Thanks for that on a Monday morning. 🙂

  14. AtasB says:

    My problem with Dirty Toe Drag (besides the title and also everything) is that her ass should be showing, but since they couldn’t do that they just added more thigh. Her femurs go on forever. I wonder if the original shot had a tight skirt or something?

  15. EC Spurlock says:

    These all feel more like abuse than romance to me: decapitation by snake arms/decorative self-harm; She’s Everything is showing an iconic threat pose by the way he’s grabbing her shirt; and Mr Toe Drag is dropping that woman on her head. (And let’s not get into the fact that toe drag, also known as foot drop, is a symptom of stroke paralysis.) Meanwhile our poor paranormal puppy has drowned in a winter lake and is slowly being iced under.

  16. DonnaMarie says:

    I know it’s the name of a sports team, but I keep thinking it’s what happens to Blake Shelton’s under performing Voice contestants.

  17. Courtney M says:

    Not PNR, and not a dermatologist, but the first thing that I thought of when “paranormal dermatologist” was mentioned: https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/comments/qau0jo/when_on_an_alien_planet_go_to_a_veterinarian/

  18. Katy L says:

    Okay, I can’t resist – the first thing I thought of when I saw the Toe Drag cover was how I used to hold up my nephews’ legs to clean their butts when I changed their diapers (although I only used one hand). I’m not sure what that says about me …

  19. Jazzlet says:

    The Toe Drag guy has fallen in love with a legs only tights/stockings display mannequin, his confusion is due to knowing there ought to be more body, but not knowing where to find the rest of his true love.

    Is it only me seeing the Lone Wolves guy as having an additional tatoo of blue numbers on his right bicep? Which is relly not cool.

  20. Jaws says:

    Amanda, I’m afraid that you’re ridiculously, hilariously off in one comment on She’s Everything. TRexBoy has no nips to touch to hers; dinosaurs are/were not mammals. Unless nips no longer have anything to do with the entire order of Mammalia, which starts moving us perhaps a bit too close to the paranormal dermatologists.

    (If you’ve got TRex arms, isn’t it reasonably to have the rest of TRex there too? Wait a minute… those are really, really excessive teeth…)

  21. Kris Bock says:

    She’s Everything, including at least three extra vertebra in that ridiculously extended neck.

  22. denise says:

    The covers and comments are so entertaining.

  23. Dee says:

    Covers #1 and 3 creep me out with the questionable ink. If it looks like a rorschach test or proof of self inflicted harm…that’s a no.

    Cover #2 are we sure this isn’t a kinky chiropractor visit gone wrong?

    I submitted 4 and it makes me laugh every time I see it in my recs. The comments had me LMAO.

    I believe this site is the only place on the internet where it is safe to read the comments section.

  24. Rachel says:

    In the caption for Dirty Toe Drag, did anyone else read “GENTRATION” before realizing it was actually “GENERATION”?

  25. Steph K says:

    I’m with Katy L on the Dirty Toe Drag cover. My first thought was that is the look I have when I have to change my daughter’s diaper and trying to hold her legs still.

  26. StaceyIK says:

    On the Longing of Lone Wolves, at first glance I thought there was a Yorkshire puppy on the guy’s chest. Now, I think I see that every time I see the cover.

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