Judging a book by its cover
It’s hard not to judge a book by its cover.
For my first writing class in college, I wrote an essay analyzing book covers of my beloved Sweet Valley High series: one from the 1980s and another from recent years.
Before that I hadn’t thought much about what impression the illustrations, photographs and summaries of the stories. I cannot remember my exact arguments from the essay, only that the covers emphasized characteristics of the stories, such as the importance of boys in teen girls’ lives.
Now, nearly seven years later, I am still in the trap of judging a book by its cover.
Our book club at work selected “Middlesex,” a Pulitzer prize winner, for our summer reading. I bought the novel almost immediately but delayed starting it, partly because I wanted to finish the Twilight saga, partly because, well, the cover didn’t make the story look appealing.
The cover is mostly black, with gray wisps of smoke and white illustrations depicting points from the story: a spoon, two girls (one of whom is smoking), a city skyline and a ship.
In a word, depressing.
Added to that was the story’s back-cover description: The protagonist discovers a family secret while tracing his family history to his grandparent’s journey from Turkey to Detroit and his immediate family’s lives in 1960s Detroit.
I’m put off at times by stories that take me to a time I didn’t live, especially if it deals with heavy issues like racism.
My judgments were wrong, though.
I was soon sucked in to the story.
Not only was the plot engaging, but the language was beautiful. The author’s use of similes and metaphors was superb, making me wish I had an imagination that would let me write like that.
The paperback version is more than 500 pages long, so it took me about a week to finish.
And now the cover, curved slightly from use, tells another story: someone enjoyed this book.
