Coverage

The first book jacket I remember that inspired me to buy a book outright was Underworld by Don Dellilo (as a hard cover!). At the time, I had no idea who Delillo was, and, sadly, to this day, still haven’t read it (outside of an excerpt in an anthology), even though I have managed to read other books by him (hey, it’s really long!). Below I’ve listed the best cover induced buys, along with links to the best place to glimpse the covers. I’ve split the list into two categories: Authors I Was Familiar With When I Bought the Book and Authors Who I Had Never Knowingly Heard Of at the Time. Many of these books I still haven’t gotten to, so I invite comments from others who may have bought a book based on one of the covers mentioned and would save me the effort. I’d also be interested in other examples of covers that you found particularly compelling, and, of course, any examples of the rope-a-dope.

Authors I was Familiar with When I Bought the Book:

1. The Inferno of Dante, by Robert Pinsky
2. The Secret History, by Donna Tartt
3. Arctic Dreams, by Barry Lopez
4. The Sweet Hereafter, by Russell Banks
5. All the Pretty Horses and The Crossing, by Cormac McCarthy
6. Them (as well as the rest of The Wonderland Quartet), by Joyce Carol Oates
7. The Ice Storm, by Rick Moody
8. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, by Haruki Murakami (and, seriously, any of the Vintage Paperbacks)
9. V. and Gravity’s Rainbow, by Thomas Pynchon
10. Selected Fiction and Selected Non-Fiction, by Jorge Luis Borges
11. The Early Stories, by John Updike (Hardcover, only. A friend pointed out the binding of the hardcover, and he was right—beautiful.)
12. The Simple Art of Murder, by Raymond Chandler
13. Metamorphoses, by Ovid, translated by Charles Martin
14. The New Testament, by God and Jesus, translated by Kevin Lattimore (if you can find the Chip Kidd designed hardcover, get it. Absolutely beautiful and chilling.)
15. The Koran, by Mahomet (with help from God), translated by A. J. Arberry

Authors who I had Never Knowingly Heard of at the Time of Purchase:

1. Riders of the Chariot, by Patrick White
2. the dis-inherited, by Han Ong
3. Afterburn, by Colin Harrison
4. Cloudstreet, by Tim Winton
5. The Town that Forgot How to Breathe, by Kenneth J. Harvey (extra points for the texture of the cover)
6. Out, by Natsuo Kirino
7. The Intuitionist, by Colson Whitehead
8. Blindness, by Jose Saramago
9. The True History of the Kelly Gang, by Peter Carey
10. Number 9 Dream, by David Mitchell
11. Provinces of Night, by William Gay (one of my most inspiring finds)
12. Gould’s Book of Fish, by Richard Flannigan (one of the best books I’ve ever read. never would have found it had it not been for the great cover)
13. Various Antidotes, by Joanna Scott
14. Life and Fate, by Vasily Grossman
15. Headlong, Michael Frayn
16. Gulag, by Anne Applebaum
17. Winter’s Tale, by Mark Helprin
18. The Spider’s House, by Paul Bowles
19. Natasha’s Dance, by Orlando Figgs
20. Titan, by Ron Chernow
21. A Dance to the Music of Time, by Anthony Powell (I’m talking about the entire University of Chicago Press set. It was a graduation present, and it is stunning)

There are some heavy-hitters on that second list. It’s depressing to think that I may not have added these books to the library if it weren’t for their covers. God bless, advertising.