Random Thoughts at iRandomBlogger( 2)

This week to discuss our topic I have an excellent group of bloggers with me. They are: Alex from More Than Just a Book, Kare from EpicBookNerd and  Kreag from iDevourBooks. Make sure  to check out their blogs!

This week's topic is:

FIRST:

 Is the answer of Alex

Short (but confusing) answer: Yes, and no.Let's say I am browsing the store or Goodreads.com (to add to my to-read list) and I stumble upon a book whose cover looks like this:

or like this:

You can be sure I will be taking a look at the book's synopsis.
There are many factors that influence what book I am likely to pick up at a bookstore. The cover is one of them.The cover attracts my attention, so in a way it does have influence in my book selection. I did have one book that the cover was beautiful , but the book was frustrating to read and all together hard to finish. I saw a friend with said book, and they asked me what I though of it. When I told them that I didn't like it, they were surprised, they said it had such a pretty cover that it couldn't be that bad. Long story short, they didn't like it.
So yes the cover grabs my attention, but if the synopsis is not as attractive as the cover you can be sure I will not be reading it. In the case of the books with the covers above, I did like both (cover and summary) and ended up loving the books!
There are also the books that have non-extravagant covers, simple and nothing exotic about it.
Example:

The Hunger Games is one my favorite books ever. I will admit I hesitated at starting it because of the cover, it looked like a boys book and three years ago the only books I read where the girly kind. I want to slap my 13 year old self now, because this book was pretty much amazing. It wouldn't matter what kind of cover this book had, I would re-read it the same amount of times I have re-read it now.
There are many of amazing books out there with covers not as impressive as other books. The story inside the book is what matters, a beautiful cover is just a bonus.

NEXT IS THE ANSWER OF KARE!

Whether you mean to or not you can end up using the book cover to judge the book. For me it is rare if I don't judge a book by it's cover. There are certain exceptions that do apply, you know books so good that frankly it could be a picture of turd and would read it anyway. *cough* Harry Potter *cough*. If I can find symbolism or metaphors with in the cover that relate to the book it means that much more to me. Which is awful that I judge a book by it's cover before reading it.
We, as humans, use our eyes first (unless you are blind but especially if you are Deaf). We are inspired by works of art and masterpices. I think some book covers prove that. Publishers have one chance to catch those pretty little eyes of ours before we dismiss a book. So they use flashy photography and epic graphics to lure us in. This could account for why as soon as I saw the covers for Putting Makeup on Dead People, The Addoration of Jenna Fox, or even Shiver that I knew I had to read them. Sure a good description and an epic story are essential for a book but first we need something to pull us in. We need to be captivated before the story starts. Who is that girl? Why is that boy there? Why is her hair pink? Why does he have wings? What are they doing on that road?
The cover is a hook and I, like a fish, am caught.

;)

LAST BUT NOT LEAST IS KREAG

I really don't think book covers have a say in my book selection. I do think they may lead me to a book- if I see an amazing cover; most likely I will pick up that book and read the summary. If the summary sounds interesting, I might buy that book. Just because I see a pretty cover, it doesn't mean I'm going to like that book, so it really doesn't make the deal for me. I may love a cover, but I may hate what the story sounds like, or it may be something completely opposite of what I like to read. A lot of the time, I think people overlook books with "bad" covers. Honestly, a lot of books with "bad" covers end up being amazing books. The quality of the cover doesn't determine what's inside the book. Another thing- I often hear people criticize self published book covers. I don't think it’s fair. When I hear something along the lines of 'one look at the terribly constructed cover and I knew it wasn't worth my time."- This angers me. I don't see why I hear this more about self published covers than traditionally published book covers. I have seen some really awesome self published book covers, some have even made me desperate to read the book. Either way, covers don't have anything to do with the content, really. While a cover may attract me, it does not make the decision for me.

THANK YOU FOR READING . Also Thank You to Kare, Alex, and Kreag for your input.  

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