Hey! Hey you! Ever read Anne of Green Gables? If you didn't then TOTAL SPOILER ALERT but remember when Anne's adoptive parents, Marilla and Matthew Cuthber think they have a boy winging its way to them but instead get little orphan Anne? They decided to make do with that little plot change in their fictional lives. Anne Shirley wins everyone over with her imagination and talkativeness. Everybody, eventually, wins in spite of the original disappointment over the orphan boy order.
So perhaps we need to calm down over the recent Amazon CreateSpace platform's decision to interpret Montgomery's description of Anne as “She wore a faded brown sailor hat and beneath the hat, extending down her back, were two braids of very thick, decidedly red hair” as a young woman with tumbling blonde locks. BUT GUYS, is that really such a pivotal part of the plot? Anne might be quite happy considering she believed that: “Red hair is my life long sorrow.” Problem SOLVED Anne. After we made our peace with the situation (not really, one of us is very cross – guess which one) just like Marilla and Matthew we wondered what we might change about some book covers to make them more aesthetically pleasing...
So perhaps we need to calm down over the recent Amazon CreateSpace platform's decision to interpret Montgomery's description of Anne as “She wore a faded brown sailor hat and beneath the hat, extending down her back, were two braids of very thick, decidedly red hair” as a young woman with tumbling blonde locks. BUT GUYS, is that really such a pivotal part of the plot? Anne might be quite happy considering she believed that: “Red hair is my life long sorrow.” Problem SOLVED Anne. After we made our peace with the situation (not really, one of us is very cross – guess which one) just like Marilla and Matthew we wondered what we might change about some book covers to make them more aesthetically pleasing...
1. I have never read Anne of Green Gables, I saw a bit of it on TV once as a little girl and found the idea of a “bosom friend”, which is what Anne proposes to Diana Barry, hilarious. BOSOM! So it might have been slightly beyond my maturity level on my first encounter. I think Jean Rhys books would sell far better if publishers would give her books the chick lit treatment. Come on, her characters drink and sleep around – sooo Bridget Jones. Let's get a lady smiling on those covers, glass of wine in her hand and Manolos on her feet. Squeamish Kate
2. Cujo by Stephen King features a slavering demon dog on the front cover. It is most disturbing. I can’t help but feel it would sell better if a cuter dog was on the cover. Everyone loves a Pug. Possibly wearing a hat at a jaunty angle, or maybe a sailor suit. I can pretty much guarantee that at least one member of the Squeamish Bikini team would buy a copy. Gareth
3. I'd go back to the children's classic The Twits. Mr and Mrs Twit were disgusting, dirty looking people, quite possibly even uglier then they were stupid. I can see why readers would find their lives amusing but why would they want to look at a couple so hideous? It may affect book sales. I'd slim down the pair of them, give them tiny little straight noses and have Mrs Twit's jaw reshaped. I'd insist Mr Twit had hair plugs inserted. They would then resemble a bearded indie boy and a slender brown fringed pretty hill walker that would appeal to not only kids but the Urban Outfitters generation, they could THEN read about their inner ugliness. Squeamish Nicola
4. This might not be the most cost-effective way to increase character appeal, but I would replace their clothes with real folding paper money. Buy this book and get cash back RIGHT NOW! As a writer I just can't destroy an author's vision for cash. It's one of the reasons I fled the publishing industry once it stopped being the book trade. F1 Kate
5. Literature needs MORE redheads, not less. That is a scientific fact, and in no way based upon my intense love of the Anne of Green Gables books and strong identification with the central character. And apparently it doesn't matter what the textual description says. So I vote we just start putting lots of redheads on book covers. Emma, Alice, Jane Eyre, Heidi, Dorothy, Maggie Tulliver... I can picture all of them with flaming locks, and I think everyone else should too. Squeamish Louise
Any suggestions or designs you have send them over for our Pinterest page where we have realised some of our publishing visions...
2. Cujo by Stephen King features a slavering demon dog on the front cover. It is most disturbing. I can’t help but feel it would sell better if a cuter dog was on the cover. Everyone loves a Pug. Possibly wearing a hat at a jaunty angle, or maybe a sailor suit. I can pretty much guarantee that at least one member of the Squeamish Bikini team would buy a copy. Gareth
3. I'd go back to the children's classic The Twits. Mr and Mrs Twit were disgusting, dirty looking people, quite possibly even uglier then they were stupid. I can see why readers would find their lives amusing but why would they want to look at a couple so hideous? It may affect book sales. I'd slim down the pair of them, give them tiny little straight noses and have Mrs Twit's jaw reshaped. I'd insist Mr Twit had hair plugs inserted. They would then resemble a bearded indie boy and a slender brown fringed pretty hill walker that would appeal to not only kids but the Urban Outfitters generation, they could THEN read about their inner ugliness. Squeamish Nicola
4. This might not be the most cost-effective way to increase character appeal, but I would replace their clothes with real folding paper money. Buy this book and get cash back RIGHT NOW! As a writer I just can't destroy an author's vision for cash. It's one of the reasons I fled the publishing industry once it stopped being the book trade. F1 Kate
5. Literature needs MORE redheads, not less. That is a scientific fact, and in no way based upon my intense love of the Anne of Green Gables books and strong identification with the central character. And apparently it doesn't matter what the textual description says. So I vote we just start putting lots of redheads on book covers. Emma, Alice, Jane Eyre, Heidi, Dorothy, Maggie Tulliver... I can picture all of them with flaming locks, and I think everyone else should too. Squeamish Louise
Any suggestions or designs you have send them over for our Pinterest page where we have realised some of our publishing visions...
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