I have two amazing authors here today, Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl. Since they're both talking, I'm going to Q&A this Cover Story. Their book is the very-buzzed-about Beautiful Creatures. I haven't read it yet, but I can't wait!Here's the story behind that gorgeous cover:
MW: Did you have an idea in mind for your cover as you were proposing/writing the book?
Margie: We did. My sister-in-law, who is a graphic designer, even mocked it up. It was a black and white image of an enormous moon, with iridescent green lettering that said Sixteen Moons. I had nearly forgotten about that.
Kami: We had pretty much forgotten about that by the time we got to Little, Brown. We were so overwhelmed that the book was being published, we didn't think much about it.
MW: Did your publisher ask for your input on the cover design before the art dept started working?
Margie: I don't remember if they did, but we were all so excited that Dave Caplan was going to be our designer, because we loved everything he had done, that we had a lot of faith in Little, Brown to get it right. And actually, Amazon has just nominated the Beautiful Creatures cover as one of the six best in Children's and Teen fiction of the year, so we were right to trust him! (Go vote on it at Amazon until December 17th!)
Kami: They told us Dave was the designer, and that he would show us a concept when he came up with something. The "something" was the BC cover. That was his first try.
MW: What did you think the first time you saw your cover? Truly!
Margie: We flipped out. When we saw the image of the tree, with the lettering and the foil, we just freaked. We know how important the cover is for a YA debut novel, and we've felt so lucky Beautiful Creatures turned out to be such a, well, beautiful creature!
Kami: I couldn't believe how dead-on it was. The trees look exactly the way we envisioned the road leading to Ravenwood, and we LOVED the purple. The hand lettering is what we refer to as "the sparkly font."
MW: Did the cover change much from the original version you saw?
Margie: Not that I remember. We saw it once without the wonderful font, and then finally with the font and the color and the foil all mocked up. It was stupendous, even then.
Kami: Dave tweaked the purple a little before printing, but that was it.
MW: Do you know if your cover was from a photo shoot or still life, or if it is a stock photo that the art department found that could capture the feeling of the book?
Margie: I don't know where Dave found the central image of the tree on the front. I'd love to find out.
Kami: I have no idea. I know the tile was hand lettered by Si Scott.
MW: How do you feel about your cover, in the end? Have you found any hidden meaning in it or anything you didn't notice at first glance?
Margie: I still love it. I love the way the road opens to draw the reader into the world of Gatlin. It's perfect for our book.
Kami: It is so amazing -- from the way it captures the feel of the book to its graphic and artistic qualities. As far as I'm concerned, Dave Caplan is the rock star of cover design!
I'm with Kami and Margie. Love this cover. It's almost like the negative of a photograph, no? And that font is like liquid text--lovely! Plus, the reviews are raaaaaving. (Check out Hope's Bookshelf, The Compulsive Reader and The Story Siren.)
What do you guys think of the cover?