Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Right? We have had such a difficult time selecting
the cover for our book. Way more
frustrating than writing it.
Of course you ask for opinions … and you get them. All favouring a different one.
Before all this started I actually went on a fishing
expedition and had gone to Chapters to look at and check out the current covers
for books. Most have bright coloured
jackets and words. No photos.
And I can tell you why.
It is near impossible to find a photo that accurately depicts
a) what your book is about or
b) who you want to pick it up and buy it.
I know because we tried.
We really tried. Too young. Too
old. Not diverse enough. Too diverse.
Looks depressing and this is a book about improving your life.
We had one with a gorgeous child on the cover but that
bubble was quickly burst when both my daughters said that it looked like a
parenting book and they wouldn’t buy it.
We tried all sorts - flowers, swans, the sea, just an arm
reaching out, a girl at the subway - you name it. Then when we gave up on that,
we started to explore designs, backgrounds but that raised the question – what
colour?
We had one that was pinkish – too girly was the
conclusion. We tried turquoise but actually it is a popular colour for book
covers these days and we wanted our book to stand out. So that was nixed.
Eventually we settled on a cover, but next… what are the tag
lines. Another round of
deliberation. Each word carried a
certain weight, a certain nuance.
So here is the latest favourite. What do you think? And if you don’t like it… I don’t want to
know. This was way too painful a process
to start over and repeat. Besides, the
book is weaving its way to be printed as we speak.