#coverflip

[thegreatmayhaps]

I really like the cover design of turtles all the way down AND I wish more women authors got to have their work presented in covers like tatwd

[fandomforward]

Wanna rack up some last minute Cup points for your house? Design some Coverflipped jackets for your book donations! More info here.

[oxymoron0-o]

I discovered my coworker's secret big hot button issue today when he asked me whether Cloud Atlas was shelved under regular fiction or science fiction, I told him regular fiction, and he said, under his breath, "Is it too good for sci-fi?"

[exit-into-the-light]

"...author Maureen Johnson had a great idea. She tweeted "I do wish I had a dime for every email I get that says, "Please put a non-girly cover on your book so I can read it. - signed, A Guy" - and so came the idea for a challenge for her 77,000 followers. A challenge that she called Coverflip."

[youngadultescent]

maureen johnson's coverflip project

[ladygeekgirl-and-friends]

The saying “don’t judge a book by its cover” has been around for eons, but Maureen Johnson’s Coverflip challenge (back in May of this year) made the point that yes, we do judge books (and books’ readers) by their covers. As covers are the first thing anyone sees about a book, it’s easy to formulate an (often incorrect) idea of the author’s intent from a graphic and a name. Does the cover feature half of a smiling girl’s face, two people kissing, or generally have a lot of bright colors? Probably written by a girl. Check the name. Does it sound like a girl’s name? Okay, I’m not in the mood for chick-lit romance today, I’m going to go for that book over there with a dragon on it! It looks like it’s written by a guy, so it’ll probably have a lot of action and adventure!

Or is that what we really think? 

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[perpetualgoodbyes]

Meet the new(ish) LEGO Friends.  They live in Heartlake City and ride horses and play with puppies and horses and go to high school and drive cars.  Notice that not only is everything pastel and pink, but these girls don't even look like LEGOs in the most traditional sense. 

So, I happen to work with kid's books at my job and happened to pick up one of the LEGO readers - this is nothing new, as there tend to be a bunch: ninjas, DC Comics, jobs around town. But even the illustrated version of these LEGOs still look like LEGOs. Even Batman and Superman still have claw hands and blocky legs with a serious lack of knees:

  However LEGO Friends don't get the same treatment. They are essentially Barbie teenagers: 

You can barely see it in the picture but only their surroundings are LEGOs. Not only do they have joints, but they look human. They drive cars. They meet boys. They sing karaoke and find lost pups. 

A good point was brought up by a co-worker: at what age group are these targeted? The LEGO website sells the high school for $50. But the years I played with LEGOs (or Barbies or Polly Pocket, for that matter) were the years I was still mostly blissfully ignorant of what high school was like. Why would I go out of my way to pretend I was already.  

I've been reading more about coverflipping, via John Green and Maureen Johnson. The most terrifying part of this is that this is no supposition of what it might be. These are published titles. You can go out and buy them. I promise the inside of these books are cookie-cutter stereotypical teenage girls. 

I understand LEGO is trying to extend it's fan base to girls - particularly "girly" girls. But this just perpetuates bad cycles. As a kid, I had boxes of LEGOs. I can see how they might be a tad masculine - they were mainly white, blue, red, black and grey. But I mean, add a few more pastel colors or some more female LEGO people. Honestly, the best one for me was (at the time) the Harry Potter sets, such as the Hogwarts Express or Diagon Alley. They were bright, there were male and female characters and they already had a story attached.  Maybe I am making a big deal of nothing. But honestly, I can't wrap my mind around Heartlake City. I would love for a toy aimed at young girls that was not (a) only a world painted in pastels, (b) with "story" lines only revolving around friendship and singing and cute animals (I love those things I promise - I just think that we underestimate the story of the stereotypical teenage girl. Because #storyflip for boys would feature a lot of farting and video games but I don't see that many products with that sort of background story) (c) that also did not perpetuate how girls are concerned with how they look (THEY'RE IN MINISKIRTS. I don't even wear skirts that short. And even if I did, I know what it is those skirts are trying to sell. Don't subliminally sell them to younger generations). I wish that toys just lacked gender - I mean that's why stuffed animals always appealed to me more than dolls. They weren't too feminine nor too masculine. They were just fuzzy and lovable - and you dictate the story. 

Maybe we should not be so concerned with marketing a stereotype to get people to buy something but find something that allows the child to dictate the story for themselves (or, you know, they can always read a book).

tl;dr: LEGO is marketing to girls and it's unsettling just how clueless they remain after being the beacon for slightly less "girly" girls for some cool toys. Stop ruining LEGOs and the idea of being girly. Stop pandering and do it right. 

[neil-gaiman]

A long time ago, Avon books was going to bring out a paperback of Stardust. The plan was to do three covers, each looking like a different kind of book, although if placed next to each other they'd make one long image.

When the book was going to press, Barnes and Noble told Avon they only wanted the Fantasy cover (the middle one here) and they wanted another cover over it with a window in it. Avon did this, and the windows ripped when the book was put on and off shelves and the whole print run was pulped...

I just ran across these going through my blog archives.

And the reason I put it up here was that I was amused how close the first of our intended covers was to many of the gender swapped "Coverflipped" versions that followed Maureen Johnson's coverflipping suggestion...

I still wish B&N had let Avon go with the original plan.

More background and info at http://journal.neilgaiman.com/2007/07/million-words-more-or-less-argh.html