On the left we have FLIRTING WITH BOYS by Hailey Abbott, published by Harper Teen in April 2009, and on the right is THE SECRET LIFE OF PRINCE CHARMING, published by Deb Caletti, Simon Pulse - in April 2009. Oops.
GIRL MEETS GOD, by Lauren F. Winner, a memoir, (Random House, 2003) used the same cover photo as the paperback edition of Andrew Trees' novel ACADEMY X (Bloomsbury 2007).
I found these on Pop Culture Junkie, by Alea, pointed out to me by the sharp-eyed, ever-researching SO. There are more:
BUNCO BABES TELL ALL (2009) and CUTTING LOOSE (2008) used the same photo of three "babes" running into the surf, but it's not as egregious because the covers have other elements besides the photos. And DISCOVERING PIG MAGIC by Julie Crabtree (Milkweed 2008) uses the same kids-on-dock photo as Judy Blume's HERE'S TO YOU, RACHEL ROBERTSON (Laurel Leaf, 1995) - but in a different format, and 13 years apart. (You can see Alea's comparisons here and here.) And Popsicles with one bite gone are apparently hot, and no less than three book covers used the same shot of hands loosely clasped.
If my young adult paperback came out the same month as a certain other young adult paperback, with essentially the same cover - I wouldn't be exactly thrilled. Yikes.
Note: See my new post about authors Persia Walker and Dianne McKinney-Whetstone ending up at a book signing side by side with nearly identical covers.
10 comments:
I agree I would be really upset if I found out my book had a similar cover as another book that came out at the same time. Especially if it was the same genre as mine!
The big one last year, in my opinion was North of Beautiful and Evermore using the same cover image. But in that case both covers sort of made them their own because at first glance they are so different (Evermore changed the coloring and had another element on it's cover). But I believe both authors spoke about it and how they embraced it, it was nice to not see the hard feelings between them. But I agree with you, it would frustrate me as well!
Stock photos are used because they are so cheap and easy to get time wise compared to photo shoots. The only times I've heard of photo shoots happening if is the concept couldn't be executed using a stock photo! Speaking as a graphic designer, I use a lot of stock photography! Thanks for talking about my Lookalikes feature!
I've noticed this, too. I know the publishing industry is struggling these days, but you'd think they could afford to hire a photographer once in a while!
I suspect publishers no longer have in-house design departments and/or are turning more and more to free-lancers. Even if covers are designed in-house, I'd bet they're cutting costs by using stock photos.
I can understand saving money by using stock photos - but there's absolutely nothing telling you where the photo has been used previously? So in theory zillions of books could come out with nearly identical covers? Yeesh!
Yup! It's a risk for sure! There is one site I use istockphoto.com that shows how many times an image has been purchased and sometimes I see some with a "hot" symbol so those are the big sellers currently! But you don't know when and for what they were purchased.
Wow. That is, erm, disconcerting, to say the least, and I would think an embarrassment for some of the larger publishers?
Thanks for sharing, Sara.
Ya see, this is why I love my covers so much and the art company that my publisher uses. They're created for me! Which is how I thought it was for everyone...
Until I noticed when scanning through mobipocket how many covers are similar. Either in design, color choice or picture - there are few that stand out.
That happened to me. We used a rather famous painting for the cover of Harlem Redux. Up to that point, the painting had been used for non-fiction, but not fiction. Subsequently, however, a number of books came out with the same artwork.
Then it happened that I had a double signing with an author. She and I sat there with our duplicate book covers side by side. Readers thought it was hilarious!
I don't think anything can top Persia Walker's double-signing story, but I just discovered another set of duplicate covers: David Cristofano's "The Girl She Used to Be" and "Illegally Blonde" by Nelsa Roberto. It was the first time I'd seen the phenomenon, and found your blog post in googling to see how common this was. I guess it will become more and more common as the use of stock photos for cover images grows, but it's something I'd be really uncomfortable with as a writer if it happened to me!
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