Ms. Brummel's letter addressed the current trend used by many publishing companies to decapitate their heroes heads. Considering all of the novels I've read -I once read over 200 the summer before my senior year in high school -I never really thought about this. But Ms. Brummel surely did and she was particularly ticked off by what she called a publishing gimmick.
Even though I loved the heroes on everyone of Johanna Lindsey's novels back in the early 80s(I've collected all of them), which were painted by cover illustrator extraordinaire Robert Mcginnis , it really doesn't matter to me if I can see the heroes face or not.
(Covers like this ruined me to ordinary love)
A hot male model body is still a hot body with or without the body. But of course, I'm not the type of reader who makes their buying choices by the cover. In fact, I hardly notice a cover since I immediately turn the book over to read the blurb. If the blurb doesn't draw me, then the book remains on the shelf or in my case it isn't downloaded to my computer.
Ms. Brummel's desire to see the hair, eye color, and lips of the hero must have intrigued the RT magazine's editors as well because they wrote a feature story called "Decoding Book Covers" to address the issue. They interviewed Janice Rossi, artistic director for Kensington to get the down low on the creation of a romance book cover.
According to Ms. Rossi, publishers only have 3 seconds to catch the reader's interest. And supposedly there are certain non-verbal cues on every book cover that places it in a particular genre. For example in paranormals, publishers use the moon, foggy streets, or mist.
But why are publishers putting their hero's head on the virtual chopping block?
Even though I would love to spill the beans, especially since the answer is rather simple, I will have to defer to Elissa Petruzzi who did all the leg work for this article:) Romantic Times magazine can be found in most bookstores.
In the future, I hope a reader will write in and ask why the heroine's backside is always front and center.
9 comments:
While the headless men does sort of annoy my inner photographer/designer, I do see it's benefits - especially when the hero pictured doesn't match the written word what so ever. And with the NY tendancy to use one male cover model for a number of years (and ePub's choice of only so many half naked men stockphotos)it, in many ways makes sense.
I have to agree, the beautiful painterly stepbacks and the like of historicals are lovely. Quite evocative often - although, they have their moments ROFL!
That's funny you should mention the use of one or two models because that's precisely the reason why NY does it:)
When friends post photos of men they find gorgeous, there's huge differences. Young, old, blond, dark, full lips, firm lips...etc. Most women can agree on a 6-pack abs, but faces? I like the headless style. :-)
I do too especially when the hero on the cover doesn't match the description of the hero in the story:) That always threw me off.
Wow! I can't believe the headless hero is leading in votes.
I really don't want to see the full faces of either heroes or heroines. They guys don't need to be headless but if I can see the full face, then they are unlikely to be MY hero. I'm very picky. I know what I like and I don't like much! It doesn't really influence my purchase if the face is of a guy I don't fancy BUT I'm more likely to pick up a book with a guy who I do fancy on the cover. Even if its just his biceps. For my own books - no faces please!!
:)
It really depends on the cover for me. I've seen some headless ones that have made me wonder and others that are "Wow."
I can definitely see the reason for the trend.
I would prefer peopleless covers rather than having covers give me a preset expectation of the people only to find they are nothing like the cover people. It's a let down.
And quite frankly, there are so many overused men and women on covers, that they can't possibly fit the descriptions of the heros and heroines of all those stories.
There's no guy on the cover of my first book because a fan of the hero asked me not to ruin him for her.
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