Beautiful Books
The value of making books people remember
As a kid, I got hooked on a book series called The Three Investigators. Similar to The Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew, but—to me, at least—cooler.
The Three Investigators books had something going for them besides fun, captivating mystery stories:
They looked good.
The covers for the original hardbacks were colorful, displaying a scene from the book that caught the eye of ten-year-old me. Scattered inside were full-page illustrations—not too many, but enough to keep your interest.
Even the end pages were designed to look cool. End pages are the ones you find just inside the front and back cover, often with a color that jumps out. In The Three Investigators, they were blue, with an image of our heroes trekking through a cemetery. The color and the graphics conveyed the sort of tension and mystery you’d soon be enjoying.
Books are objects, not just stories
These creators understood something important: story isn’t the only thing doing the work.
For years, publishers recognized that a book was more than just a collection of text. The weight of the book mattered, the paper stock, the feeling we got when we first cracked open the cover and immersed ourselves. Even the smell of that new book.
Then, economics reared its head. Yes, covers never lost their importance, and we still go through all sorts of trends regarding their design. But the importance of making beautiful books waned.
Occasionally, a publisher will put out something dazzling. In 2007, Brian Selznick’s book, “The Invention of Hugo Cabret”, set the bar high for both its cover and the combination of imaginative text and images on the inside.
Selznick himself described it this way: “Not exactly a novel, not quite a picture book, not really a graphic novel, or a flip book or a movie, but a combination of all these things.”
In other words, it was interesting and irresistible.
It proved readers would embrace hybrid storytelling, and forced the industry to rethink what a novel could look like. That the format itself could become part of the narrative.
Granted, the text still has to carry its weight. Wrapping a crappy book in a pretty cover doesn’t change the fact that it’s a crappy book.
But it’s nice to see some authors and publishers putting an emphasis on the visual appeal. And I’m especially proud to say that the indies might be leading the way.
The return of the complete package
More and more independent authors are taking advantage of printing companies that provide things like sprayed edges and full-color end pages. For some, a Kickstarter campaign might include gorgeous special editions with foil stamping and experiments with typography.
These are not gimmicks; they’re a way to show readers that they’re receiving a full-service reading experience. It’s not vanity; it’s respect for the reader, a sign that the book is, in essence, a multimedia project. That it has value.
If you need proof of that value, consider this: I haven’t read a Three Investigators book since I was maybe 13 or 14. And I still remember exactly how they looked.
And how they made me feel.
Dom Testa writes fiction and nonfiction, and he has turned down ugly fonts on principle.
Find most of his work at DomTestaBooks.com.