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Behind-The-Books Blog
Articles by Wednesday Cover Story
Wednesday Cover Story: Picador’s 40th Anniversary editions
Wednesday, February 1st, 2012
Tomorrow, Picador will be celebrating their 40th Anniversary with the reissue of 12 fiction titles with specially designed covers - all black and white. Those who follow this blog know that I love looking at these ’sets’…to be honest, it doesn’t mean I will buy them, but I enjoy the aesthetics of looking at all [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Hardback v Paperback
Wednesday, January 25th, 2012
There are some covers which are lovely pieces of design in themselves, but don’t actually “sell” the book to the reader. One example I came across recently was the hardback cover to The Art of Fielding, by Chad Harbach. I had seen the book on a table in my local bookstore but it would never [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: A cover that mirrors the content
Wednesday, January 11th, 2012
I am in the process of culling the number of books in my house as a cathartic (and sensible) clearout before moving flat. And amongst my sagging bookshelves I found a copy of Little Bird, by Camilla Way - which I remember picking up many years ago when HarperCollins was having their own clearout of [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: The Super Matt Finish
Wednesday, January 4th, 2012
As Chiara mentioned in her blog yesterday one of my Christmas books (a wee pressie to myself for being such a good girl all year) was The Hare with Amber Eyes by Edmund de Waal. The book has been a genuine word-of-mouth success and that should surprise no-one once they start to read it - [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: What do you think the next colours will be?
Wednesday, November 30th, 2011
On the train home last night I spotted a man reading The King’s Evil, by Edward Marston. He was actually right on the other side of the carriage but I clocked it immediately - possibly because I’m predisposed to sighting any of our books, but more probably because the design really jumps out at you. [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: First peek at The War of the Dragon Lady
Wednesday, November 16th, 2011
We’re very excited to be welcoming author John Wilcox to the A&B list, and we will soon be releasing The War of the Dragon Lady (out January 2012) - his new book in the highly acclaimed Simon Fonthill series. And now we have finalised the cover which I think is fab!
And here’s an insiders secret: [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Mo’ Moustaches Please (there’s a prize in it!)
Wednesday, November 9th, 2011
We would love to join in the spirit of Movember, but neither I, nor my colleagues in the A&B office will be sporting a moustache this month. As an all-women office, we’re more inclined to go to great lengths to hide any hint of facial hair, let alone show it off. So, who could we [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: The Canons
Wednesday, October 19th, 2011
I have mentioned many times before that I am a sucker for book “sets” - where various titles have been collected and given special cover designs that follow a similar pattern. And hence not only do they usually provide great reading (there’s usually good reason for publishers to bother revamping such books) but they look [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Monsieur Pamplemousse gets a makeover
Wednesday, October 12th, 2011
Michael Bond is adored by millions as the creator of Paddington Bear. I have a particular soft spot for the man as the creator of my favourite childhood guinea pig, Olga da Polga. And he is of course adored by us all at A&B and by his legion of fans for creating the inimitable Monsieur [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Two Paris Wives…
Wednesday, October 5th, 2011
As mentioned in my blog yesterday, one of the books I bought here in Camden, Maine was The Paris Wife, by Paula McLain. Now, I already own a UK copy of the hardback, with its very simple but very striking design (the smooth metallic foil on the silhouette image contrasts nicely with the rough [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: That woman again…
Wednesday, September 21st, 2011
Last year we posted a blog about this image of a woman from a picture library that almost found her way on to one of Rachel Moore’s books, and did get used on both the cover of The Island and The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. These copycat covers were highlighted by Horace [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Triple delight from the printers
Wednesday, September 14th, 2011
We’re always a little excited when a new book comes in from the printers. It’s a bit like Christmas. The box arrives, everyone gathers round, there’s a hint of trepidation as the box gets opened (will we like what’s inside?) and then usually, luckily more often then not, there’s a collective “Oh, lovely - that [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Art Noveau
Wednesday, September 7th, 2011
I saw this book, Art Nouveau, by Norbert Wolf, advertised in The Bookseller and I had to admire the cover. I am a fan of book cover designs that break the mould - not adhering to the usual format where the title, author name and image take up all the available space on the cover, [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: More than just a pretty pattern
Wednesday, August 31st, 2011
This month Virago has launched a collection of six Modern Classics with gorgeous pattern textile covers by various designers.
They reminded me however of something, and then it finally hit - they reminded me of a Persephone book. A Persephone book cover features that same square box including the title and author name, and whilst the [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Revisiting La Foce
Wednesday, August 24th, 2011
BBC4 is reshowing Francesco da Mosto’s Italy Top to Toe (Tuesdays 8pm). It is a wonderful series and last night saw Francesco in Tuscany, meeting Iris Origo’s daughter Benedetta at the family’s magnificent estate La Foce, immortalised by Iris’s wartime memoir War in Val d’Orcia - a modern classic and one of A&B’s perennial bestsellers. [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Sneak peak of the next crime sensation…
Wednesday, August 17th, 2011
If you thought Scandinavia might not be able to produce any more brilliant crime writers, well think again. There’s a new rising star on the horizon by the name of Kjell Eriksson. His first book in the acclaimed Ann Lindell series, The Princess of Burundi, won the Swedish Crime Academy Award for Best Crime Novel [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: The sadness and madness of riots
Wednesday, August 10th, 2011
It is not surprising that today I have chosen to feature the cover to A Bespoke Murder, the first book in Edward Marston’s upcoming new crime series set in the First World War. The book opens just after the sinking of the Lusitania which sparked a wave of anti-German riots and arson attacks in London [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Sneak peak of The Dragon Diaries series…
Wednesday, August 3rd, 2011
Our Art editor, Christina, has finalised the covers to the first two books in The Dragon Diaries series by Deborah Cooke: Flying Blind (out October 2011) and Winging It, and without a doubt they can be filed under my very official list of “Favourite A&B Covers”. Here they are:
I seem to be regressing to my [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Sell-Out Book Cover Poster
Wednesday, July 27th, 2011
We’ve showcased The LIterary Gift Company on this blog before - and rightly so, as it presents such a lovely array of inspiring gifts for book lovers. One of the things they offer are posters of book jackets, and amongst them the very stylish poster (so stylish that it was actually spotlighted in Stylist magazine’s [...]
Wednesday Cover Story: Don’t you just Love (Inc.) It?
Wednesday, July 13th, 2011
Following on from the huge success of the Morganville Vampire series, we have been searching for other worthy addition to our YA list. So I’m delighted to announce that we have recently signed up the brilliant writing pair of Yvonne Collins and Sandy Rideout! We will be publishing the hugely entertaining LOVE INC. in September [...]
Currently we are...
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...Reading
West End Front, by Matthew Sweet. Lesley: A look at what was going on behind the dazzling exteriors of the grand London hotels like the Ritz and the Savoy during WW2. Chock-full of interesting details.
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