And the Winner is the Red Carriage Cover!

This summer, I finally warmed up to the idea of self-publishing.  Having been through the long process of pitching my first novel, Blind Girl’s Bluff, to scores of literary agents, I lacked the energy to court such rejection again with my second novel, Au Pair Report.  Several conscientious agents had expressed interest in Blind Girl’s Bluff only to conclude that it was not marketable enough.  Because Au Pair Report had a natural primary audience—moms who read fiction—it seemed more marketable to me until I began subscribing to the Publishers Marketplace email service listing all book deals made each day.  It became clear to me that publishers are not purchasing debut fiction unless it promises to be the next Hunger Games or Fifty Shades of Grey.  They make exceptions for celebrities and well-connected graduates of MFA programs (particularly the Iowa Writers’ Workshop), but since I fall into neither category, I decided to overcome my desire for the publishing industry’s stamp of approval.

It has taken me a few months to get over the logistical hurdles of self-publishing, but I expect to make Au Pair Report available as an ebook via Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing and Smashwords by the end of the year.  I took the past week off from my “real job” to move the project forward, and hired a designer from ebooklaunch.com to create a cover for me.  The designer, Dane Low, presented me with three designs and I polled a number of friends to find out which was most appealing and what each cover conveyed about the book.  The process was fun and the results were fascinating.

The winning cover was this stylized collage with a woman and a red carriage.  Interestingly, while it had the greatest number of votes in favor of it, it also had a fair number of detractors.  Opinion was divided about its earthy aesthetic that recalled Soviet socialist realism for one person and folksy needlepoint samplers for another.  However, what matters most is that the cover communicated to prospective readers that the book is about the world of moms, children, and caregivers. 

The second most popular cover was this elegant multi-textured image with the silhouette of a woman’s head.  The swirling hair appealed to almost as many people as the “red carriage cover,” but it led them to expect the book would have romance or mystery as its focus.  Au Pair Report includes a romantic subplot, but it is by no means a romance—nor is it a mystery in spite of its protagonist’s fondness for garden variety internet sleuthing.  It also bothered me that the woman depicted did not resemble any of the characters in the novel, while the woman on the red carriage cover is generic enough to represent the protagonist, the antagonist, and most of the other female characters in the novel simultaneously.

 

The least popular cover was this simple line drawing of a woman holding a child’s hands.  Several people appreciated the simplicity and intimacy of the image, while others found it ominous.  The strong negative reactions of a handful of people who thought of kidnapping, cancer, and other bad things that could befall children convinced me that this cover could be a serious liability.

This process reinforced for me the old cliché that you can’t please everyone.  And of course it disproved that cliché about how you can’t judge a book by its cover.  I think we all know that we do judge books by their covers, but I hope that those of you who voted for the less popular covers will still consider reading my book.  Thanks to everyone for taking the time to provide valuable feedback! 

 

Comments

[Eka]

It`s also very exciting to see my illustration on the cover of the winner!
Soviet socialist realism?))) I was born in the USSR.
Good luck!

[Donna]

Great post Kelly. As someone who is about to jump, book first, into the same self publishing waters, I appreciate you sharing your exciting journey from writer to published author. Keep the posts coming and let us know when we can purchase AuPair Report!