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Friday, May 30, 2008

Let’s Judge Some Books By Their Covers

By: Sarah Cohler at 4:45 pm

Seriously!

Summer is here. The heat is here — for those of us still in the tri-state area — and that means it’s time for summer lounging and summer reading. Let the book lists begin!

But instead prattling off “Top Ten Books You’ll Never See At the Beach” (next week’s posting, perchance?) or “My Favorite Books Of All Time That Everyone Should Read,” I decided to go with something more on the conventional side … A completely arbitrary list of books with interesting covers.

Now, who would buy this clearly inspiring piece of literature? Who is this book geared towards anyway? According to its delightfully feminine cover, I’m guessing women. The font screams early pre-teen … but what ten-year-old is so crunched for time that she needs to read a book about how to save it? And this is of course ignoring the greater question of how someone who would need to save time would have the time to read this literary classic.

I have two issues with this Iron Angelcover. One: Doesn’t it look like the death angel just let one rip? Like a really big one? Completely poor planning on the artist’s part. This image does not exactly scream “Lord of the Underworld” or really much of anything. Two: This guy’s name (campbell) is spelled like the soup.

When will people learn that Jack Bauer is infinitely superior to Chuck Norris? And see that tiny text at the top? That says New York Times Bestseller. I wonder what books were not purchased in favor of this one. Think about that. And cry.

Okay, I must admit, this is a very cute cover. Girly and lovely. The publishers know what they’re doing. Right on. But since when did pincushions become such a commodity? I typed in the word “pincushion” into amazon.com, and a whole flurry of posts jumped out at me. In addition to Pretty Little Pincushions, other books of note include: Making Fabulous Pincushions,Warm Fuzzies,Pincushions, The Pincushion Book,Needlepoint Designs for Pincushions, etc.

My question is: What do you stick your needle in while you are designing your pincushion?

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Tags: books, summer '08

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