Erik Bergstrom's Grimmer Tales turns fairy tale favorites on their heads and erases all the happily ever afters in hilarious ways. He's the author and the illustrator of the book, so his Cover Story is pretty unique. Here's Erik:
"I was probably about two-thirds through the book when Penguin asked me to design the cover image. Before then I really hadn’t thought about it at all, which strikes me as kind of odd now. When they asked for an image it hit me that the book was going to be real and not just something made out of duct tape and old photocopies of Donahue. Not that that’s a problem. Publishing is pretty new to me and I was focused on the interior. But this was a slightly different case where the cover design was going to be a collaboration between me and Penguin’s art department. I had done all of the interior art, so they needed my illustration, but they were going to add the title and such. So I went to a diner, had enough coffee to ensure an ulcer in my future, and drew out about a dozen ideas. I wanted something that would catch the eye while reflecting how delightfully bleak the situations for these characters were. Here are some of my initial ideas:
"We ended up going with the cracked Humpty on the wall with his brains pouring out. I think of Humpty as the naughty narrator throughout the book (he makes several appearances), and Penguin really liked the king and his horses eating his runny brains. This illustration offered the most room for the text -- title, author name, etc – which was something that I hadn’t originally thought about as I usually create my work for a completely different purpose. It was interesting adapting my artistic choices to the needs of the format. Here is the full front/back cover that I created.
"I feel like there were two first times when I saw the cover. One digital and one printed. When they e-mailed me the first digital version it was with the title. The title’s font was nice, but it had an odd cuneiform look which didn’t seem quite right. I suggested that we try something more Renaissance styled and they gave me three font options, which was very nice of them. I picked the one I liked the most and I think we ended up something that works pretty well. It gives it an authentic fairy tale book look.
"When I saw the printed physical version my first thought was that the blue was a little more green and subdued than I thought it would be. Which I liked. Then I flipped the book over and saw that they removed the image from the back cover, which meant part of the Humpty joke was nixed. Turns out that they needed the space for barcodes and price info. Still, it is always surprising to create something and then have someone else change it for technical purposes. It makes sense, books have limited real estate. Now the back cover is a lovely description of the book with some nice design work that also adds to the authenticity.
"One thing I noticed later is that since the G and T in the title look different than the other letters I sometimes read it as 'rimmer ales'. I can’t tell if that’s gross or not. I don’t think so, but a few people have gotten a chuckle when I’ve pointed it out. I like the cover a lot. I think that our collaboration created some terrific work!"
I agree, and I'm also laughing at "rimmer ales"! It's rare that an author has such cover control, though when the author's an illustrator it makes sense, of course.
What do you guys think of this cover?
Melissa Walker is the author of four Young Adult novels, including the Violet trilogy and Lovestruck Summer. She is co-creator of the popular teen newsletter I Heart Daily, and her author blog, where Cover Stories originated, is melissacwalker.com.
