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Feature

When Book Covers Go Bad

by Nina L. Diamond

Few things in publishing are as instantly gut-wrenching as bad book covers.

And, yet, they persist.

Lately, we've been reading and hearing a lot about book covers, both good and bad, as their designs are adapted by publishers for e-books, and as the multitudes who are self-publishing print or e-books are either attempting to design their own covers or have to choose covers created by professional book designers.

When a publisher sends a bad cover design to an author, it's often accompanied by an e-mail or note that says some version of: "We're thrilled with this cover and hope you like it as much as we do."

Translation: "We know this is the worst cover in the history of publishing, but you're damn lucky we're publishing your book in the first place, we're very busy, we have other books to tend to, we're not going to challenge the design wisdom of the person we paid to create this mess, and so that means we're not going to change the cover. Live with it."

And, kids, that's how bad book covers are born.

They're not gifts from heaven, they're not brought by the Book Stork, and you're usually stuck with them.



Even if you have cover approval in your contract, which is rare, you and your agent will have little luck getting a major publishing house or an independent press to make anything but the smallest changes. Publishers know that you're not going to stop the presses or sue them because you don't like your book cover.

That doesn't mean you shouldn't make some noise anyway. Your noise should actually begin during contract negotiations when your agent lets your publisher know that you value a good cover design as a key to book sales.

If you end up with a bad cover anyway, which is fairly common, you and your agent should come up with a plan for your agent to negotiate that cover out of as much ugliness as possible.

Some covers are just plain bad. Some are mighty bad. And, some look like they were intentionally created specifically to win the Wretched Book Cover of the Century Award.



If you and your agent can make a good sales, marketing, and promotion case for why the cover is bad, and even offer specific suggestions for improvement, you'll increase your chances of rescuing your book from the very real sales-impairing fate of Bad Cover Hell.

Good luck, and may the sales force be with you.

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As a journalist, columnist, essayist, and media critic, Nina L. Diamond's work has appeared in many publications, including Omni magazine, The Los Angeles Times Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, and The Miami Herald.

She was a regular contributor to a number of "late, great" national, regional, and newspaper Sunday magazines, including Omni; the award-winning South Florida magazine; and Sunshine, the Ft. Lauderdale (now South Florida) Sun-Sentinel's Sunday magazine.

She covers the arts and sciences; the media, publishing, and current affairs; and writes feature articles, interviews, commentary, humor/satire/parody, essays, and reviews.

Ms. Diamond is also the author of Voices of Truth: Conversations with Scientists, Thinkers & Healers (Lotus Press) and the unfortunately titled Purify Your Body (Three Rivers Press/Crown/Random House) , a book of natural health reporting which has been a selection of The Book-of-the-Month Club's One Spirit Book Club and the Quality Paperback Book Club.

For its entire run from 1984-1998, she was a writer and performer on Pandemonium, the National Public Radio (NPR) satirical humor program, which aired on WLRN-FM in Miami.

She has appeared on Oprah, discussing the publishing industry, but, in a case of very bad timing, that appearance was two years before her first book was published.

She has written her Much Ado About Publishing column for Independent Publisher since 2003.

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