[hildea]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The way I look at it is there are many books and not so much time. If a book I do not know the author and the cover is one that makes me think it may be something I won't like, I won't try it without a recommendation from someone I can trust enough.

The saying to not judge a book by it's cover is wrong. We do judge by the cover as it's the first thing we see if it's a book by an unknown author.

I don't care for steamy romance type books and the covers with half-naked men and maybe holding some woman cries out steamy romance. If that's not the case, then the cover is doing the book a disservice. But I'm not going to take that chance.

I'm not going to say that someone is not to read any books that I don't or may not like. You have the right to read what you want.

Here I was gearing up to a magnificent rant, and you have to ruin it by being reasonable

Originally Posted by Catlady

As far as indicating awfulness, well, the covers indicate awfulness to me. A well-written romance is still a romance, and I simply do not like the romance genre.

That's, of course, completely reasonable. The reason I became annoyed enough to start this thread was what I read as a claim that half-naked men are an implication of low quality books, instead of just a (sub)genre which some readers want to avoid.

Originally Posted by issybird

You agree that the cover’s terrible; you’re willing to suspend judgment but as with Catlady, I’m not. Next!

Makes sense. To clarify: I think that specific cover is terrible because it doesn't fit the book, not because the man is half naked. If it had shown a half naked man in his forties with greying hair, and an overall mood that fit the book better, I'd have no objections.

Originally Posted by kandwo

But what is up with that font? I feel dyslexic just looking at it.

That reminds me of a funny and informative post Courtney Milan wrote: How to suck at typography

Originally Posted by Apache

Authors usually have very little input on the covers. At least the ones that are not self-published.

I remember reading about Trudi Canavan having to fight the publisher who wanted to put a dragon on the cover of one of her books. To the publisher, a dragon would say "fantasy" in much the same sense that a half naked man says "romance", but there were no dragons in her books. She told them some readers care about dragons, and would be very disappointed and leave angry reviews if they were misled. They finally agreed, and replaced the dragon with a pegasus (no, there are no pegasi in the book either).

For self-published authors, I've read about the challenges of finding stock photos that fit the book if the protagonists aren't white and slender. Milan has written about this too: Can we talk about black women in stock photos? (Although that was in 2014, things may be better now?)

Originally Posted by Paperbackstash

Well, sometimes great books just have cheesy covers. Ilona Andrews has the excellent series published by Avon books now, but these covers, this is hideous lol

That cover reminds me of Jim Hines' cover pose project, looking at the difference between men and women in (some) SFF cover art. It's really, really worth reading it all. I've attached one of the samples here. The cover which inspired that pose is an example of a cover that would make me nope out at first glance, without giving the book a chance!

Originally Posted by hobnail

Not a lot of traffic but this forum on reddit has some funny excerpts:

https://www.reddit.com/r/WomenWritingMen/

There's more traffic at https://www.reddit.com/r/menwritingwomen/

Originally Posted by Paperbackstash

I love KJ Charles, mainly some of the older stuff, especially Think of England and the Magpie series. I liked this one too and Silas was awesome - as was Cyprian!

This thread made me think about what I like best about romance, and I find that what really appeals to me is good dialogue. So I'll end this (overlong) post with one of my favourite quotes from A Seditious Affair, with the protagonists in bed engaging in one of their favourite activities

Silas shoved him, not hard, and the Tory sat up a little, making space. Silas moved to lie alongside him, feeling the heat of his bare skin.
“I finished the book,” the Tory said.
“Oh, aye? What’d you think?”
“Good. Terrifying. Strange. I can’t understand why you like it.”
“Why would I not?”
“I wouldn’t have thought you’d agree with it.” The Tory gave him a wry smile. “After all, its burden is the need for man to keep in his place—”
“What?” said Silas incredulously.
“The overreaching man dares to play God and pays a terrible price. Abuses the natural order and creates a monstrous thing.”
“Bollocks,” Silas said. “That ain’t what it’s about.”
“It’s what happens.”
“No. What happens is he creates, he’s responsible for, something that should be”—Silas waved his hand—“great and strong, something that he owes a duty to. And he says to it, The hell with you. Go die in a ditch. I’ll have my big house and pretty wife. And it says, You don’t get to live in a grand house and ignore me. Do your duty or I’ll tear you down. Treat me like I’m as good as you, or I’ll show you—”
“That I’m not,” the Tory interrupted. “The creature murders—”
“Because he ain’t given a chance to live decent,” Silas interrupted right back. “You treat men like brutes; you make ’em brutes. That’s what it says.”
“No, you create brutes when you distort the rules of nature and the order of things,” the Tory retorted. “That’s what the book’s about. It’s obvious.”
“It’s not.” Silas snorted. “You think its author meant that?”
“Oh, do you know the author?” The Tory looked intrigued. “Who is he?”
“She.”
“A woman? A woman wrote Frankenstein?”
“A girl,” Silas said with some satisfaction. “Mary Wollstonecraft and William Godwin’s girl.”
The Tory’s mouth dropped open. “That—female who married that appalling poet?”
“Mary Shelley,” Silas agreed smugly. “Aye.”