LITERARY ORIENTALISM

The origin of Literary Orientalism is in the various military, religious, diplomatic, political and socio-cultural encounters between and Christian West and the Islamic East. Major works of Western literature and art contain references to Oriental cultures often emphasizing cultural differences in a hostile manner. Literary Orientalism: A Companion is a systematic compilation of the instances of Literary Orientalism in English literary and critical texts.

The cover I designed also has the influence of Islam in it. I used different colourful Islamic floral patterns for background and divide them with thick white straight lines. As am using different colour patterns in background I use a solid black box for all the text details to complete the cover design. The best thing is that the cover come out very well in printing and author also appreciated the design. A job well done. Let me have your comments on design.

PURPOSE OF A BOOK COVER

The purpose of a book cover (and I think it works for lots of Products)

I believe that the saying ‘Don't judge a book by its cover’ is no longer valid. In today's world of tough competition the First Impression is always the lasting one.

Just like any marketing tool, the book cover design is very Important. The design of the book cover plays a role, often a critical one in the sales of the book. It is the 1st thing what a buyer would see and catch their eye. I feel that a highly creative book cover design is more likely to be viewed by every customer rather than one without a book cover. You have less than 3 second to grab someone’s attention with a book cover in a sea of other books. That is the job of the book cover design, it needs to stand out, yet be relevant to the market, subject matter, and the content of the book. The main job of the cover is to get the customer to pick it up. It needs to present the title well and organize the other information so that it is clear to the customer if they decide to pick it up, and possibly inform the viewer of the content of the book.

Most of the time while people browsing in a bookstore mainly look at the book covers and titles. If the cover doesn’t interest them they almost never pick up the book and have a second glance at it. For example If you are a boy/girl of age 15, what grabs your attention would be very different from a man/woman who is 40. So, once the book is published, the only thing that will get it to sell, is its cover. This is because if you write a brilliant book for a 40 year old man/woman, but the cover is designed to attract a 15 year old boy/girl, there is a very slim chance that any man/woman of 40 will pick it up thinking that the book is for him/her and that is how a book cover helps in selling and marketing as well, as the cover must be designed to attract the target audience of the writer.

At the end of the day,  I feel that a cover design is a important feature of a book. The main features a book cover should have to grab the attention are:

1. Catch the book reader's eye while on the shelves or displayed and attract them to pick it up.
2. Main bold title, graphic and color are important.
3. While in hand - Provide first glance insight into the content.
4. Sub title, fly-leaf and back cover content is important.

If you got the book reader interested at this point they will probably look at the table of contents to view the chapter headings to see if the content is interesting. If that all goes well they buy it

So you can say that the purpose of a book cover is:

• Attract the reader
• To accurately describe what's in the book
• To sell book
  

I don't know about you, but I judge books by their cover every day.

Displaying here some of my designed covers. Would like to know your views on the post and my cover designs both.

Brand Failure

The Truth About the 100 Biggest Branding Mistakes of All Time

This book provides an insight into the biggest brand failures of all time and inevitably provokes a few chuckles. This book provides very useful and serious advice to any business worried about preserving its brand. Unlike the typical boring how to style business book this makes very refreshing reading.

I changed the cover design of this book for Indian market. though I liked the original design and idea but we changed it to give it a new look with some more colours as well as a direct and more clear message. I am sharing here both the original and changed Indian design. Let me know your view which one you like more.

Original design

Changed design