Some authors seem to have a hotline to the cover fairies. You know the ones – they do a cover reveal of
their new book and you sigh, your fingers stroking the screen as you drink in the rich colours, the curves of the heroine and the rock hard muscles of the hero. You’d buy that darned book even if it wasn’t written by one of your favourite authors.
Today’s blog is full of wonderful images from Anna Campbell’s collection of covers in her newly released bundle of e-books. You don’t need me to introduce you to this mega star! I’ll just hand you over to a true cover Diva! (And there’s a giveaway – Yay!!)
Hello, Helene! Even more important, HELLO, ZEUS!!!
Helene, thank you so much for having me as your guest today to talk about SINS AND SEDUCTIONS, my latest threefer e-book bundle released in Australia and New Zealand through HarperCollins Australia.
I love the idea of three full-length novels bundled together at a bargain price. Last year, Harpers experimented with THE COURTESAN COLLECTION which covered CLAIMING THE COURTESAN, TEMPT THE DEVIL and MY RECKLESS SURRENDER. Now they’ve just released SINS AND SEDUCTIONS, an e-bundle of UNTOUCHED, CAPTIVE OF SIN and MIDNIGHT’S WILD PASSION. I should actually call this bundle the ARRA trio – all three books won the Favourite Historical Romance Award from the Australian Romance Readers Association!
Details of the stories and buy links are on my website: http://annacampbell.info/books.html
I thought it might be fun today to look at some of the covers these three books have had across the world. I love looking at the various takes each country has on the same story!
Let’s start with my second book UNTOUCHED, which features a hero locked away as a madman and a heroine presented to him for his ‘amusement’. Hmm, gothic, much? My particular faves are the Spanish and French covers for this book.
Australian release
German
Russian Version
Norweign cover
Thai cover
Turkey cover
Italian Cover
French cover
Indonesian Cover
Spanish version
Japanese Cover
Next, we’ll move onto my fourth book CAPTIVE OF SIN. This one features another knight in shining armour hero who marries the heroine to save her from her awful stepbrothers.
Japanese Cover
Australian Cover
German Cover
Turkish Cover
Finally, here are the covers for MIDNIGHT’S WILD PASSION, a book that has a special place in my heart because it’s my take on the classic Regency romance. When a rake sets out to revenge his sister’s ruin, he encounters trouble in the form of frumpish and mysterious governess Antonia Smith.
I hope you enjoyed this whirlwind journey through covers of the world (I’m waiting on Russian covers for COS and MWP – looking forward to seeing those!). So what do you like to see in a romance cover? Pretty dresses? A clinch? A symbolic item that interprets the story like a locket or a ribbon or a shoe? A setting like a house? A hero? A heroine? With heads or without heads? I find romance covers endlessly fascinating so I’ll be very interested to hear your thoughts. I’ve got a download of my Regency Ghost Romance, THESE HAUNTED HEARTS, for two people who comment today.
Lol, Heroes without heads! Oh puleese… I’m not a fan of discombobulated body parts, no matter how gorgeous they may be, Anna!
Thanks for sharing all those wonderful covers. Look forward to hearing what other people love in a cover. And meanwhile I’m waiting, waiting, waiting impatiently for your next novel, ‘A Rake’s Midnight Kiss’ due out in September 🙂
Thanks once again to Anna for visiting and to everyone else for dropping by for a chat!
The winners of a download copy of ‘THESE HAUNTED HEARTS’
are Amy Faulkner and Susanne Bellamy. Please email Anna at anna@annacampbell.info so she can organise your prize!!
Happy reading and I’m looking forward to Anna’s new release -“A RAKE’S MIDNIGHT KISS’ in September!!
Thanks for dropping by Linda. You’re right about Kylie’s wonderful cover. Vengeance Born is stunning!
Linda, the Vengeance Born cover is great – it recently won a major cover design contest and well deserved! I love how the covers reflect each culture and yeah, I like a good clinch too!
Wow! Pretty (pun!) awesome covers. Interesting that the covers are different for different countries; I would have thought they the covers would be the same with only the language being different.
I like the clinch; but some of my fav covers have featured only one protagonist. Has anyone seen Kylie Griffin’s Vengeance Born? That is my all time fav cover.
Kat, thanks for dropping by. Have to agree that the clothes have to match the era in general terms. Sadly I have to admit to not necessarily knowing the difference between a Regency gown or a VIctorian one. I love the stories but am not such a stickler for facts. Having said that I’d probably spot a 1920s gown on the cover 🙂
Thanks so much, Kat! Interesting thoughts indeed. I must say I don’t like seeing a Regency dress on a Victorian book either. One of the things I love about that Japanese Untouched cover is that it’s such a gothic story and the cover really reflects that!
The cover gods (or godesses!) have truly blessed you! It’s often more about what I don’t like than what I do. I loathe the headless, hairless masculine chests on covers. And if the woman is wearing a poufy dress, I want it to match the era of the book–no medieval gowns on regency heroines, and no Regency gowns on Victorian ones. Avid readers KNOW that stuff, and will pass right by a book with the “wrong” dress. The cover should provide solid visual cues. And if a book is a gothic romance (my *most* favorite), I love seeing a house/castle/mansion somewhere on the cover, since the setting truly is another key character in gothics. Best of luck with these bundles!
Thanks, Suzi, I’m such a cover nut I figured everyone else would like to see them too!
Hi Suzi! It was a great idea of Helene’s to share all these covers, wasn’t it? I hadn’t looked at a lot of them for ages – they’re so pretty!
Nicky,I had to laugh – it hadn’t occurred to me but clearly Japanese covers are where all those heads divorced from their bodies go, LOL!
Ooh, I’m in love with some of those covers. Gorgeous.
Thanks so much to Helene and Anna for sharing some yummy covers.
Lol, Nicky, head only is perfectly acceptable and there is something so dreamy about the Japanese cover. I’d pick it immediately!
Thanks for the congrats, Anna, delighted and a little gobsmacked as there were so many wonderful stories released this year. Love rubbing shoulders with such talented authors and will be there to celebrate the winners on the night!
Anna, I do remember that beautiful pink cover of Christine’s! Sumptuous albeit part headless…
Anna, you have been blessed by the cover deities (headless men notwitshstanding – what is he – The Headless Horsemen moonlighting??).
I find it so fascinating how different interpretations of the same thing can be.
Out of the views listed above, I think the Japanese Captive of Sin is my favourite. May have something to do with the fact it is the only one with an ocean in view (head only btw is a different story to headlessness 😉 ).
Hi Susanne! Seeing such a lot of lovely familiar faces swinging by today. It’s great! Oh, I love your description of why a subtle cover works so well. I have a good friend who has lived in Thailand and she made a point that it’s not a society that likes to have raunchy covers on show. That’s why I got that lovely lace-brocade one (not sure it came out in the picture, but it’s very pretty).
Squeeeee! I just saw that Helene has finaled in the Romantic Book of the Year Award through Romance Writers of Australia. Congratulations, Helene! I loved BURNING LIES. You can see the complete list here: http://romanceaustralia.wordpress.com/2013/06/26/rby-finalists/
Helene, I love Christina’s covers too. Do you remember the beautiful pink one for Heiress in Love. I didn’t even mind that she was doing the Anne Boleyn act as so many cover heroines do! Or perhaps the implication was that an heiress in love loses her head!
Hi Cathryn! That Turkish cover is lovely, isn’t it? Love the one for Captive too – so romantic! Isn’t it interesting to see a heap of covers lined up like this?
Ha ha, Amy! I do all my giveaways with passion! I stick a little plastic bag of passion in with the prize! Snerk! Amy, I love the covers you describe – the Sons of Sin series have involved exactly that pattern and I couldn’t be happier. I love the lush colours of those covers too!
Effie and Helene, I fondly (kind of!) remember a historical cover where the girl’s bare legs poked out of a bed. Unfortunely something about everything else in the picture suggested that her legs were all that was left of her. Like she’d met a serial killer with an axe and he’d hidden the other bits elsewhere. Was creepy rather than sexy!
Susanne, that’s an excellent point you make about the slightest bit of reveal being sexy and wanton in that era. Interesting that the Japanese covers still convey passion while being so elegant and restrained. Thanks for dropping by 🙂
Cathryn that Turkish cover caught my eye too but more because of the very modern haircut for a regency lass! The acres of silky satin are certainly sensuous and lush 🙂
Gorgeous dresses, partially undone to reveal silky smooth skin, a bared shoulder…the removal of clothing is symbolic and, in an age when so much was covered up, is suggestive of passion, wildness, daring. Cultural attitudes are different and it’s fascinating to see these reflected in the variations of the same novel: more or less skin, higher/lower neck lines, a little or a lot of thigh, heroine with/without hero–these details say much about the cultures.
I love your covers, Anna, but then, you are beloved by the cover gods. Looking forward to September’s release.
That is so cool to see Anna’s covers listed that way. The differences are amazing. Love that sexy red Turkish cover for Mahrem. That’s a cover as lush as the contents!
Hi Amy, thanks for visiting. Your idea of a fabulous cover pretty much matches all of Anna’s!!
Another historical writer who’s covers are always very lush is Christina Brooke. I think the UK version of ‘London’s Last Scoundre’l is stunning – not that I don’t like her Australian one with that wonderful bloke on the front 🙂
Efthalia, I think you’re spot on about a lousy cover being detrimental to sales! Luckily for Anna her covers never seem to misfire.
I impulse buy on the basis of a cover. Obviously if I love the author then it wouldn’t matter if they put it in a brown paper bag but for a new author it’s always the cover that grabs me first.
Thanks for visiting 🙂
Why thank you, Anna 🙂 I’m fascinated by the different interpretations of covers so loved putting this together with you.
May, Anna’s covers certainly have more than their fair share of beautiful dresses! Thanks for visiting 🙂
Brenda, they are all gorgeous! I think the Japanese covers have a lovely delicate feel to them.
I love the heroine in a fabulous dress, that I would love to own myself, tangled with a topless hero with an awesome chest and abbs.
Thank you Helene for letting Anna show is the covers of her world. And Anna for a give a away with passion.
Hi Helene,
Anna does have some amazing covers.
I have a secret, I love looking at covers. All covers across all genres. Have I ever bought a book based on a cover….well yes I have. So I think a cover can be detrimental to your book sales.
Colour and tones are the first thing I notice in a cover then the elements around it.
I know what you mean about he headless bodies….lol.
Smiles,
Efthalia
May, it’s interesting, isn’t it? A bit of a cultural tour of the world. Yeah, I’m with you on dresses. A pretty dress gets me every time.
Hi Brenda! Thanks for swinging by. It was Helene’s idea to include all these covers and I must say, I think it was so clever. Don’t they look pretty all together like this?
Such different interpretations of the books… I love seeing pretty dresses on cover!
It’s amazing to see how other countries picture the same book. But they have one thing in common…they are all beautiful. Congrats on your new release.