Do you tend to pick up books based on the covers of other books?

I dunno what goes on subconsciously but I don’t think I have. Maybe the penguin modern classics but that’s because I’m on the hunt for that print series anyway.

I look at the local interest shelves whenever I go to a bookshop. I tend to pick up relatively big names for some reason. Fiction is harder to find than local history/ geography/ naturalist books

Daphne DuMaurier’s Jamaica Inn on a trip where I visited the real Jamaica Inn, Cornwall, Devon Mysteries Series by Stephanie Austin, a special copy The Hound of Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle (I live in Devon), a special edition of To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf when I was living my best café-writer life in Bloomsbury, London, Dollar Bahu by Sudha Murthi and The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy on trips to Bangalore & Mumbai, India, Celestial Bodies by Jokha Alharthi in Muscat, Oman, Woman of the Ashes by Mia Cuoto on holiday in Porto, Portugal. Apparently Mia is from Mozambique :man_shrugging: big whoops on my part but at least it was translated from Portuguese

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I don’t really notice/remember tbh. I do kinda like a particular style of cover, which is classy sparkly antique-ish cursive, but that’s in line with my general preference for historical fiction :joy:

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I’m back again. :rofl: Hi. There is a certian style of cover that I really gravitate towards and it’s a for sure way to make me read the blurb. Black and white covers with red roses (or petals, however the roses are on the cover). I’m a sucker for those. [glances over to the first novel she published] There’s no explanation as to why… ahem. I’ll post some examples below.

Summary

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And I know this has a person which doesn’t bother me much (I much prefer females on the cover over males, as well as over both male and females, even though I love romance. Doesn’t make sense I know :sweat_smile:).
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This is a cover I will IMMEDIATELY flock to. Drop everything and research all about the book.

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Welcome back :wink:

Those are really nice covers :grin:

It’s the splash of color trend in a different kind of format. Do you think you’d be attracted to those same covers if it was green leaves instead of roses? Or a blue or green dress instead of the red one?

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Honestly, maybe but not as much. Im really attracted to red covers. Its the color i have most on my shelf. A cover has to be really pretty if its not red, to be able to cpature my attention.

When it comes to color schemes for the books I buy, I usually stick to dark but contrasting colors. Though too intense colors I avoid them like the plague. Usually, I stick to pastels (with Romance books, etc, or lighter stories) or with a gradient that is gentle to my eyes. I’m light sensitive, that’s why even reading on Kindle, I normally have a darker hue on. Otherwise, I get migraines. Or they physically hurt my eyes.

It is something I’ve noticed as a trend as well, same for fonts and even titles of the book. I mean, once a few books of similar titles/covers kicks up the sales, it becomes a trend because publishers know what’ll sell. Kate Cavanaugh did a video on this about titles where she creates titles based on those that are trending. Like in fantasy, there’s “the blank of blank and blank” kind of title.

For covers, it’ll have a similar trend like for contemporary romances, there’s the cartoon couple trend like Book Lovers by Emily Henry, If the Shoe Fits by Julie Murphy, the Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood, etc. Or there’s the fantasy or thriller trend I’ve noticed where it’ll be large title fonts with little (or sometimes, big) objects around it that tie into the story similar to These Violent Delights by Chloe Gong, the Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes, Ninth House by Leigh Bardugo, etc. And I can see why they’ve all become trends because they do have pretty covers. But I’m also unlike many who actually like a lot of various covers of all kinds. The only covers I truly hate are the very, very simplistic ones (the type you’ll see in adult fiction where it’s pretty much the title on a bold-colored background… as if they did it on Paint), the ones with half-naked people on it (I’m looking at you romance!) and the ones where it looks very old looking (not like “Oh, this is a classic novel from Jane Austen,” but like, “This book had to have been made before graphic design was a thing.”) When it gives me the vibe of how the graphic artists may have been new to technology or only know how to appeal to people in their 50s, I’m not gonna look at it.

I try not to judge a book by its cover, but in all honesty, I rarely reach for adult novels for this reason. The titles, covers, and summaries scream “I was written for middle-aged and retired folks” so… it becomes a no for me. :sweat_smile:

Now, personally, I don’t pick up books where the cover is similar to another one I’ve read or bought. I will admit I’ve picked up books because I liked the cover, but if I didn’t vibe with the summary, I put it back. I never buy a book I don’t think I’d like even when the cover is super pretty. And I’ve found a lot of books with similar covers to others I have or others I’ve read from or others I’ve seen that I didn’t like and I may like that one, but the cover isn’t why I picked it up. I picked it up because the title intrigued me. And then the cover lured me in a bit more. Then the summary got me to buy it.

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