Welcome back to Cover Snark!
From Syntha: This dude’s face.
Sarah: He looks so…bored?
How is he both creepy AND bored?
Elyse: What is the situation with his hair? Is it glowing?
Sarah: So many people wanted Instagram filter faces, and now the trend has moved into Photoshop Outer Glow Hair.
Amanda: I’m full on guffawing at 8am.
Sarah: Omg that guy’s face
Amanda: I know!
His bottom half is a gargoyle and I’m picturing this like a Beauty and the Beast transformation where he’s really disgusted and bummed out by his human form.
Elyse: Pulling magic out of Gargoyle Jesus’s butt
Sarah: “OH NO I’m like…That Guy”
Elyse: Reminds me of this.
Amanda: Elyse, thanks I hate it.
From Anonymous: I can’t get past the cover to read the blurb, so the why will remain forever a mystery.
Elyse: That ray is feeling itself though.
Sarah: Is Wine Mom Font the new Scriptina? I’m not sure I’m ready for that.
BE FREE RAY BE FREE
From MegCat: It might be just in the thumbnail for this cover, but the guy in the top left looks like he’s already seen what everybody else is staring at and it’s horrified him.
Amanda: Personally, I want less people around me during the holidays. Not more. Also the top right man has Hugh Jackman vibes.
Elyse: love that the guy in the upper left is oblivious and is just like “want to see my favorite nipple?”
Sarah: Top Right Hugh is so DONE with all these people, and clearly wants to leave the holiday party and go put on his sweats, shove his hand down his pants, and watch tv. Top Left Hair Dude looks like he forgot how buttons work?
All of them have Soap Opera hair, too, so you know the product selection in their bathroom is exceptional.
The combination of a secret baby and a reverse harem sounds exhausting. I hope at least some of those gents know how to change a nappy.
Top Left Guy on the “Her Holiday Heartthrobs” cover looks a little like his face is mid-swerve.
Also, this wasn’t in Cover Snark, but since I have Felice Stevens’s BAD IDEA appearing right alongside: *that* cover model has the eyes of an African Grey that’s deciding whether to rip off part of your hand.
The gHost guy looks too much like Elon Muskrat, especially first thing in the morning.
gHost: Is this a new service from Google? Aren’t there already enough web hosting providers?
I too don’t know what it is about the dude’s face, except that my first thought was Elon Musk. (@LisaM I see we are not alone.) My second thought was that the publisher is Changolin Press, and I couldn’t figure out if this is something akin to a pangolin, only with more sound effects.
Geis of the Gargoyle: I know Xanth is all about puns (courtesy the author, Pier Xanthony) but wtf is a geis? A cross between a geas and a flock of geese? And is that twisty thing meant to be an aura, or is it a translucent snake, solid enough for Snarky-Looking Adolescent to take hold of it? It can’t be both.
Free for Adventure: The eternal question: wtf is the series title? Betas In Waiting? Must say, it doesn’t sound very inviting. In any case, I hope she is not planning on swimming in that outfit.
Her Holiday Heartthrobs: I give up. Just how many plots can be squeezed into the series “Age Gap, Secret Baby Reverse Harem”? And how did a startled Trae Crowder get dragooned into the said harem?
Louise a geis is a magical compulsion. I first encountered the word lo these many years ago when reading an Andre Norton
@Louise
In English, geis seems to be basically an alternative spelling for geas.
I remember when Piers Anthony was someone I read, and the original cover of GotG back in 1995 was done by a professional artist. Then I read a specific one of his books, looked back on all his commentary about pretty young girls and charming nubile maidens and 13-year-old girls planning to seduce 30-year-old men, and stopped reading him. He deserves the most terrible covers heaped on him.
Of all the weird things in the beach cover, why did I first notice that she’s wearing high heels to walk on a sandy beach in the path of a wave?
Lara, I had pretty much the same thought as you when I saw this: “Oh, good to see Anthony is finally getting the quality of covers he deserves.”
Can’t believe my otherwise pretty protective Christian parents let me start reading his books when I was a 13-year-old girl (or maybe even younger). These are the same parents who wouldn’t let me play Magic: The Gathering or Dungeons & Dragons, but somehow pervy Piers Anthony was fine.
@SusanE: Holy ### I didn’t even notice the heels. Another entry in the category of “I was so distracted by {horrible design choice A} that I didn’t see {horrible design choice B}”.
And thanks all; I didn’t know “geis” was a variant spelling.
Has Piers Anthony fallen to self-publishing for ebook only? Please don’t tell me that’s a TOR (or equivalent) paper cover?!?
(Yeah, I read him too until the lack of agency of the females started to but me)
Bug not but
Drat, I was hoping “Betas in Waiting” indicated a Siamese fighting fish shifter romance, but apparently they are spelled “betta”.
GHOST guy definitely looks like Musk. I’m not convinced his partner’s head is actually attached to her body.
HOLIDAY — is it Keanu the top right guy is reminding me of? Top left guy’s face is a completely different shade from his body. I’m still not sure if that’s why his face looks so mannequin to me or if there is some other reason why he looks so much more like plastic than the other 2. The string of tags sort of suggests that the secret baby has a reverse harem, which would certainly be an age gap…
gHost: he’s got the glowing hair, and she has the glowing body
Geis: the swirl seems to start at his feet
Free: Barbie-like feet on the beach and Polly Pocket clothes (the legs are crossed in an awkward way for standing on the sand)
Holiday: I thought upper right was Justin Hartly, but they definitely all have the soap hair, and it’s almost like a soap promo.
GhOST: His mind is elsewhere because his boyfriend dumped him. She’s bothered by the armpit aimed at her but is saying nothing for now because she knows what he’s going thru. The structure in the distance behind her is a large soft drink (fast food drink size inflation has continued unabated in the future).
GEIS OF THE GARGOYLE: “Geis” — pronounced “Jeez!” — is the reaction of the blond man upon learning that Piers Anthony’s books really are like that (thus his expression). “I told you so,” says the woman in purple. Meanwhile, their friend is not letting this discussion derail his magic trick. They came to this beach to have FUN, dammit!
FREE FOR ADVENTURE: She has to let the manta go to live its best life. But will she ever find a love as true as the one they had? The butterflies reassure he she is doing the right thing…but are they real? Find out in FREE FOR ADVENTURE, the world’s first seapunk romance!
The upper HOLIDAY HEARTTHROBS are her quality control team. The right ‘throb stares intently into her lover’s head to determine his sincerity, devotion, etc. The left one primarily provides a reference torso.
Argh, I should have said that his boyfriend GHOSTed him!
Ct–yeah, he is (somehow) still writing Xanth novels, but the last several new ones have been self-published or solely online. I guess he or the online publisher is also re-releasing older titles, and can’t get the original covers from Del Rey or Tor.
The Other AJ–My also-very-Christian parents were OK with Xanth, since it was mostly casual fun and puns. I picked up other books and series by him and just didn’t tell my parents they weren’t further Xanth novels. As I got older, the treatment of women and the focus on teenage girls with older men started to bother me…and then I read “Firefly” and realized how deep the rot went. Threw out all the Xanth novels I had kept out of nostalgia and haven’t touched an Anthony book since.
It’s been years since I read Geis of the Gargoyle – the version I read had a much nicer cover than this weirdness. The terrible puns are what I remember best about the Xanth novels; the Phase ones and the others were pretty forgettable. Not worth re-reading.
Free for the Adventure: How is that bra staying up, or does she have purple skin on her boobs? And is that waterfall cascading into the sea? Nice skirt, though, even if it looks like it’s been photoshopped on.