Paperbacks, Bumpy and Shinny

Tobias Buckell also gives us some kudos. That makes the day go by with a smile.

It's a good excuse to talk about why paperback back books look different then their hardcover littermates. Basically, a tremendous amount of paperback books are not bought in bookstores. They are bought in supermarkets, pharmacies, airports, or, as the ads say, "wherever books are sold." People don't often go to these places to seek out a particular book, they go there to buy toilet paper, aspirin, and to catch a plane. So, we need to grab someone's attention away from their primary task...being toilet paper, aspirin, and death defying air travel. Anything with a bit more glitz has a better chance at this. The type gets bigger, the quotes get more emphatic, and if it's a book we are really trying to push, the type gets, as Toby put it, bumpy and shinny...otherwise known as foiled and embossed. Occasionally we will even do what's called a die-cut. That's when you print two covers, the outer one with a little hole in it to reveal a detail of the inner cover. I find the popularity of die-cuts comes and goes, they are very costly and often get damaged in shipping.

Of course, we will occasionally do a more radical redesign and change all of the artwork. Typically this means we either missed the mark on the hardcover or we feel that the design was fine for a hardcover but simply cannot compete against other paperback books.

I should have been singing the praises of Tor's paperback team, Seth Lerner, Mass Market Art Director, and his assistant (and The Art Department reader/commentator) Pablo Defendini. They do an awesome job. Tor has been producing more and more paperback originals with the start of our paranormal romance line. Their job keeps getting harder and they keep rising the challenge. I'll make a point to show off some paperbacks soon.

Cover art by Todd Lockwood