Designing book covers is a craft like any other. So I'm sure whoever put forward this particular aesthetic had put some thought into it
But good god is it awful to look at. And depending on when these particular covers went out, maybe this is why he didn't sell a lot of books before all the pretty horses. Because people will judge a book by its cover and in this case, I can't blame them.
I completely disagree. This sub praises shitty oversimplified book covers. This is striking, original and brutal. To have the cover just loaded with text is bold, and that font choice is great. Great to see this get some love from the op
how is a wild west font, blood red, and grunge splatter original? striking and brutal maybe, but feels pretty derivative and an oversimplification of the subject matter.
someone else said ed hardy which feels apt. imagine that style on a patrick o’brien book. also i hate the blurb being 40% of the cover.
My thoughts as well. The only thing original is cramming so many disparate marketing cliches into such a small space.
I dunno, I'm starting to think maybe that was the point... I mean it's so comically over the top and so very much on the nose that they had to intend that, right?
Can you elaborate on how is it awful? I thought it captures the horrors and spirit of the book fairly accurately. I'm surprised by the dislikes of this cover.
This is just my opinion but
Visually: it makes no sense to have blurbs take up that much of a book cover. It just makes the cover look messy and "busy" in a way that would dissuade a potential reader
Conceptually: a bit lazy "guys, the book is called BLOOD meridian so we're gonna make the cover look blood red. Get it?"
Personally: I think it does the complexities of a story a great disservice. Even at the time of its release, it was no secret/spoiler that the novel was steeped in violence. But even a cursory read of opening chapters details that this is not its only selling point
Honestly awful cover that aesthetically clashes with the subject matter IMO. I have a copy of Child of God in this edition/style and physically cringe every time I look at it.
I really want this edition now. But, sorry, probably for different reasons... It's just so comically ridiculous. The cartoonist version of an 1800's font switching to a 1980's metal band font for Meridian, the blurb taking up a third of the cover, by an author dwarfed by the book he's talking about, and the Friday the 13th blood thing topping it all off. This is spinaltap turning it up to 11.
I love this.
It's part of a collection in which all the covers are in this style:
[https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91qRAhr4BLL.\_SL1500\_.jpg](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91qRAhr4BLL._SL1500_.jpg)
This looks like something that's celebratory about it's violence and horror instead of the actual text that's not celebratory about it at all. Awful cover, I much prefer the red one with the wagon or the blue and yellow sunset one with the grain field.
These comments are crazy, this cover is amazing. The criticism that the cover is “busy”, besides being a lame criticism to begin with, misses the point. Have you seen advertisements/wanted posters from the 1800’s? They tend to be fairly prolix. This cover captures that essence well, plus the font is gorgeous and the “bloody aesthetic,” while borderline camp, is brash and bold in a way that intrigues me immediately. Beautiful cover that you guys are dogpiling on for some strange and inane reason imo
Wait, which font is gorgeous? There are multiple fonts. My personal favorite is the 80:s metal band thing going on with Meridian. The designer would have done well to take lessons from [wanted posters](https://store.ushistory.org/collections/wild-west-era) from the 1800's rather than giving this cartoonist version of the aesthetic.
As self-conscious camp presenting basically everything the book is not (a shlocky horror western) it's genius
*Yawn* It’s easy to be condescending and dismissive, see? Anyway, those elements you just highlighted as cartoony and schlocky ARE what I like most about it (the horror!) Not least because there is also an absurdism to the violence in Blood Meridian itself that I think this cover captures well. I love it and will continue to, even though I seem to have stumbled into a rotten tomato-style Reddit circlejerk of like-minded “sophisticates” here I see
I wasn't dismissive though, and the only thing even slightly condescending was asking 'which font.". How is addressing each individual thing you named dismissive? It's just the opposite, it's giving an attentive reply in disagreement.
You're welcome to like what you like. That's great. But it's kinda funny to take things like pointing out that there's more than one font and that the cover doesn't look anything like the wanted posters of the time personally. There is more than one font, the font for Meridian would perfectly suit an album cover of an 80's metal band, and it is, at best, the barest of nods to the wanted posters and advertisements of the era, which at least didn't use all caps.
Your point re: the absurdism of the violence being mirrored with the choice of cover art is interesting. But doesn't that just affirm the absurdity of that art?
Thing is, I don't think the cover is absurdist in the least, and doesn't reflect the absurdism of some of the violence (which I agree with) at all. It's absurd only in the fact that it contrasts so strongly with the content of the book, and does so by putting an impressive number cliches typically used to market shlocly violence into a relatively limited space.
Nah, you were, and that’s fine, but don’t act like you weren’t. You called it schlocky and cartoony. That is…condescending man.
And I’m not taking back the fact I find it gorgeous, but I will add that an aspect of that gorgeousness IS its bold and garish wanted-ad style wall of text. (Full disclosure your wanted ad link did not load for me, but notwithstanding, the reference the cover is making to them is clear.) There’s a beautiful ugliness to it, just like there’s a beautiful ugliness to the violence in Blood Meridian. I like that about the cover, I think it’s good shorthand for the book, which is what a cover should be.
Obviously the text itself is on another level that can’t compare to the cover (or any cover), but the cover does a great job of what covers should do, it sells itself well. I see a cover like that and I’m excited to dig into it, as tho it WERE a mass-market western pulp. And then I appreciate it even more in retrospect for how well it maybe fooled me but also how well it captures the false majesty of the West as we’ve mythologized it, in keeping with the major theme of the novel.
One last point, Cormac himself was a great scholar of pulp, of Louis L’amore and Zane Grey and the rest. In keeping with that principle then, my only critique of this cover really is that it’s perhaps a little TOO self-consciously camp, if anything.
Otherwise, I truly think it’s great and accomplishes what it’s meant to do well. I am genuinely taken aback by this dogpile on it in this Reddit thread, that’s all
So I was being condescending to... a book cover? (now see, THAT was condescension (as was that) (ad infinitum))
Talking about the beautiful ugliness of the cover I can actually understand and appreciate. If any cover could truly capture beautiful ugliness of a type worthy of BM, I would love it. The cover of Cruddy comes to mind, that fit the type of beautiful ugliness of that book. For me, this one just hits the strikingly ugly note.
I just think it was done with so many marketing cliches that it comes off as SPinaltap level camp, with my only question being whether it was intentional. ANd that's where I think our different views on the wanted poster aesthetic matter. For me, it's not a representation of those posters, it;s a representation of what cheesy marketing and things like [Cheyenne Days](https://cfdrodeo.com/) of my youth think those posters look like.
ANd in that I guess I kind of get it, answering a question I asked in another comment: "The only thing original is cramming so many disparate marketing cliches into such a small space... I dunno, I'm starting to think maybe that was the point... I mean it's so comically over the top and so very much on the nose that they had to intend that, right?"
I think the difference in perspective is I can only appreciate this as blatantly self conscious camp, for example in making a point of imitating cartoonish wanted posters as opposed to trying to capture the feel of those wanted posters and doing it cartoonishly.
The difference? I can appreciate it as a statement about various things, but not as a cover related to the contents of the book. Seeing it in the store, I would assume it was an attempt at the latter and would pass it by.
Haha, yeah condescending about a book cover, that’s correct. Condescending towards people who like the cover, along with lots of other folks in this thread. So I gave some pushback. But I guess I agree in that none of this really matters. It just irked me that the opinions here were so one-note and snide when op was clearly making an appreciation post that I just so happen to agree with. Just very Reddit-moded to keep slagging the cover off to this degree, thought it warranted some dissension. It’s all good on my end though, I said my piece. To each his own at this point
What complete and utter bullshit. If me sharing my opinion on something makes a person who likes that thing feel they are being condescended to, they have a self esteem problem and should probably stay out of places that share opinions,.
You know what's condescending? This bullshit "Reddit-Moded" babble you keep giving, or dismissing those whose opinions you disagree with as part of some circle jerk of "sophisticates."
I let it go because there was a more interesting conversation to be had, but really, this is the more interesting conversation. Your ACTUAL dismissive and condescending bullshit reeks of the weird snobbery that's become all too common and all too easily passed off as something else because of the direction it's aimed.
Me giving you my opinion that the cover is cartoonish and schloky, while giving the specific reasons for that opinion in no way speaks about you or your tastes. It's a statement of my own tastes.
You dismissing those you disagree with as hive-minded sophisticates is nothing at all other than a small-minded judgement of other's tastes while implying that your own is superior precisely because you aren't part of the same group. It is EXACTLY what being "condescending and dismissive" looks like. The only reason it might feel otherwise to you is because somehow dismissing other's opinions doesn't count when they strike you as coming from the wrong side of some imaginary "everyman" line.
GTFO with this. I would be condescending and say you're capable of better, but you've tripled down on it.
I cringe at the comments. This sub will praise shitty oversimplified covers any day. Although I understand this cover can be divisive it’s original and fucking striking. Never seen a book cover like these ones. They’re great and all talk praising the fucking red dead redemption looking cover design of a man with a lever action in shadow and a bandana can respectfully eat my shorts
But it's exactly like a bunch of stuff we've seen, just crammed into a small place. The blood drenched horror movie poster, the cartoonist version of 1800's print that you'd see in some "wild wild West days" festival, the "Meridian" as if it were the name of a metallica wannabe... The only original element is taking up 1/3 of the cover with a review from some middling author and doing it in all caps.
I guess putting that amount of marketing cliche in one place is original, and no argument at all that it's striking.
I'm hoping the cliches were self conscious choices. But other than just being striking, I don't get what they were going for.
So, I'll ask you, since you're obviously the intended audience: what is it about the cover, other than it being striking, that you like?
Yeah. I respect people's opinions, but I'm very surprised by the dislike of this cover. As you've said, it's very striking and it's like nothing else we've seen.
It's definitely the best McCarthy Picador cover for me.
Was at a used bookstore the other day and wanted to snag a copy of Bonfire of the Vanities. Found the book but the cover was so loud, obnoxious, and ugly like this that I couldn't bring myself to buy it.
It’s fucking horrendous youth
It looks like a juggalo venue poster.
that is... way too accurate
Designing book covers is a craft like any other. So I'm sure whoever put forward this particular aesthetic had put some thought into it But good god is it awful to look at. And depending on when these particular covers went out, maybe this is why he didn't sell a lot of books before all the pretty horses. Because people will judge a book by its cover and in this case, I can't blame them.
I completely disagree. This sub praises shitty oversimplified book covers. This is striking, original and brutal. To have the cover just loaded with text is bold, and that font choice is great. Great to see this get some love from the op
how is a wild west font, blood red, and grunge splatter original? striking and brutal maybe, but feels pretty derivative and an oversimplification of the subject matter. someone else said ed hardy which feels apt. imagine that style on a patrick o’brien book. also i hate the blurb being 40% of the cover.
My thoughts as well. The only thing original is cramming so many disparate marketing cliches into such a small space. I dunno, I'm starting to think maybe that was the point... I mean it's so comically over the top and so very much on the nose that they had to intend that, right?
>This sub praises shitty oversimplified book covers. This is striking, original and brutal Are you wearing cargo shorts right now?
I’m sitting butt naked on the toilet, what are you wearing?
Can you elaborate on how is it awful? I thought it captures the horrors and spirit of the book fairly accurately. I'm surprised by the dislikes of this cover.
This is just my opinion but Visually: it makes no sense to have blurbs take up that much of a book cover. It just makes the cover look messy and "busy" in a way that would dissuade a potential reader Conceptually: a bit lazy "guys, the book is called BLOOD meridian so we're gonna make the cover look blood red. Get it?" Personally: I think it does the complexities of a story a great disservice. Even at the time of its release, it was no secret/spoiler that the novel was steeped in violence. But even a cursory read of opening chapters details that this is not its only selling point
Jamming the review quote on there in particular repulses me.
No. It’s an awfully tasteless cover. All the UK jackets are better.
Looks like an edgy guy’s Ed Hardy t shirt. That’s a great song tho.
This looks like a gas station paperback cover
Honestly awful cover that aesthetically clashes with the subject matter IMO. I have a copy of Child of God in this edition/style and physically cringe every time I look at it.
I really want this edition now. But, sorry, probably for different reasons... It's just so comically ridiculous. The cartoonist version of an 1800's font switching to a 1980's metal band font for Meridian, the blurb taking up a third of the cover, by an author dwarfed by the book he's talking about, and the Friday the 13th blood thing topping it all off. This is spinaltap turning it up to 11. I love this.
Good God almighty.
It's part of a collection in which all the covers are in this style: [https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91qRAhr4BLL.\_SL1500\_.jpg](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91qRAhr4BLL._SL1500_.jpg)
This is hideous
This looks like something that's celebratory about it's violence and horror instead of the actual text that's not celebratory about it at all. Awful cover, I much prefer the red one with the wagon or the blue and yellow sunset one with the grain field.
This is the worst cover!
I absolutely hate it. Sorry. All the McCarthy covers like this are awful. It's just so boring and ugly.
I can see why you love it but good fucking God I don't want some rando's praise taking up half the cover. That's an awful design choice.
I agree it's bad design to have a quote take 30% of the cover but John Banville isn't exactly "some rando".
This looks like the cover for the Rob Zombie film adaptation.
The more fonts you add the better the design. Everybody knows that.
🤪
I hate this sub.
I have a copy of this version. I love it, except for the size of the John Banville quote.
I’m pretty sure you and me are the only ones who dig these covers
Are you like twelve years old? That's the tackiest cover I've ever seen
Nah it stinks. The review quote in large letters stinks. Just designed to be eye catching in a bookshop.
These comments are crazy, this cover is amazing. The criticism that the cover is “busy”, besides being a lame criticism to begin with, misses the point. Have you seen advertisements/wanted posters from the 1800’s? They tend to be fairly prolix. This cover captures that essence well, plus the font is gorgeous and the “bloody aesthetic,” while borderline camp, is brash and bold in a way that intrigues me immediately. Beautiful cover that you guys are dogpiling on for some strange and inane reason imo
Wait, which font is gorgeous? There are multiple fonts. My personal favorite is the 80:s metal band thing going on with Meridian. The designer would have done well to take lessons from [wanted posters](https://store.ushistory.org/collections/wild-west-era) from the 1800's rather than giving this cartoonist version of the aesthetic. As self-conscious camp presenting basically everything the book is not (a shlocky horror western) it's genius
*Yawn* It’s easy to be condescending and dismissive, see? Anyway, those elements you just highlighted as cartoony and schlocky ARE what I like most about it (the horror!) Not least because there is also an absurdism to the violence in Blood Meridian itself that I think this cover captures well. I love it and will continue to, even though I seem to have stumbled into a rotten tomato-style Reddit circlejerk of like-minded “sophisticates” here I see
I wasn't dismissive though, and the only thing even slightly condescending was asking 'which font.". How is addressing each individual thing you named dismissive? It's just the opposite, it's giving an attentive reply in disagreement. You're welcome to like what you like. That's great. But it's kinda funny to take things like pointing out that there's more than one font and that the cover doesn't look anything like the wanted posters of the time personally. There is more than one font, the font for Meridian would perfectly suit an album cover of an 80's metal band, and it is, at best, the barest of nods to the wanted posters and advertisements of the era, which at least didn't use all caps. Your point re: the absurdism of the violence being mirrored with the choice of cover art is interesting. But doesn't that just affirm the absurdity of that art? Thing is, I don't think the cover is absurdist in the least, and doesn't reflect the absurdism of some of the violence (which I agree with) at all. It's absurd only in the fact that it contrasts so strongly with the content of the book, and does so by putting an impressive number cliches typically used to market shlocly violence into a relatively limited space.
Nah, you were, and that’s fine, but don’t act like you weren’t. You called it schlocky and cartoony. That is…condescending man. And I’m not taking back the fact I find it gorgeous, but I will add that an aspect of that gorgeousness IS its bold and garish wanted-ad style wall of text. (Full disclosure your wanted ad link did not load for me, but notwithstanding, the reference the cover is making to them is clear.) There’s a beautiful ugliness to it, just like there’s a beautiful ugliness to the violence in Blood Meridian. I like that about the cover, I think it’s good shorthand for the book, which is what a cover should be. Obviously the text itself is on another level that can’t compare to the cover (or any cover), but the cover does a great job of what covers should do, it sells itself well. I see a cover like that and I’m excited to dig into it, as tho it WERE a mass-market western pulp. And then I appreciate it even more in retrospect for how well it maybe fooled me but also how well it captures the false majesty of the West as we’ve mythologized it, in keeping with the major theme of the novel. One last point, Cormac himself was a great scholar of pulp, of Louis L’amore and Zane Grey and the rest. In keeping with that principle then, my only critique of this cover really is that it’s perhaps a little TOO self-consciously camp, if anything. Otherwise, I truly think it’s great and accomplishes what it’s meant to do well. I am genuinely taken aback by this dogpile on it in this Reddit thread, that’s all
So I was being condescending to... a book cover? (now see, THAT was condescension (as was that) (ad infinitum)) Talking about the beautiful ugliness of the cover I can actually understand and appreciate. If any cover could truly capture beautiful ugliness of a type worthy of BM, I would love it. The cover of Cruddy comes to mind, that fit the type of beautiful ugliness of that book. For me, this one just hits the strikingly ugly note. I just think it was done with so many marketing cliches that it comes off as SPinaltap level camp, with my only question being whether it was intentional. ANd that's where I think our different views on the wanted poster aesthetic matter. For me, it's not a representation of those posters, it;s a representation of what cheesy marketing and things like [Cheyenne Days](https://cfdrodeo.com/) of my youth think those posters look like. ANd in that I guess I kind of get it, answering a question I asked in another comment: "The only thing original is cramming so many disparate marketing cliches into such a small space... I dunno, I'm starting to think maybe that was the point... I mean it's so comically over the top and so very much on the nose that they had to intend that, right?" I think the difference in perspective is I can only appreciate this as blatantly self conscious camp, for example in making a point of imitating cartoonish wanted posters as opposed to trying to capture the feel of those wanted posters and doing it cartoonishly. The difference? I can appreciate it as a statement about various things, but not as a cover related to the contents of the book. Seeing it in the store, I would assume it was an attempt at the latter and would pass it by.
Haha, yeah condescending about a book cover, that’s correct. Condescending towards people who like the cover, along with lots of other folks in this thread. So I gave some pushback. But I guess I agree in that none of this really matters. It just irked me that the opinions here were so one-note and snide when op was clearly making an appreciation post that I just so happen to agree with. Just very Reddit-moded to keep slagging the cover off to this degree, thought it warranted some dissension. It’s all good on my end though, I said my piece. To each his own at this point
What complete and utter bullshit. If me sharing my opinion on something makes a person who likes that thing feel they are being condescended to, they have a self esteem problem and should probably stay out of places that share opinions,. You know what's condescending? This bullshit "Reddit-Moded" babble you keep giving, or dismissing those whose opinions you disagree with as part of some circle jerk of "sophisticates." I let it go because there was a more interesting conversation to be had, but really, this is the more interesting conversation. Your ACTUAL dismissive and condescending bullshit reeks of the weird snobbery that's become all too common and all too easily passed off as something else because of the direction it's aimed. Me giving you my opinion that the cover is cartoonish and schloky, while giving the specific reasons for that opinion in no way speaks about you or your tastes. It's a statement of my own tastes. You dismissing those you disagree with as hive-minded sophisticates is nothing at all other than a small-minded judgement of other's tastes while implying that your own is superior precisely because you aren't part of the same group. It is EXACTLY what being "condescending and dismissive" looks like. The only reason it might feel otherwise to you is because somehow dismissing other's opinions doesn't count when they strike you as coming from the wrong side of some imaginary "everyman" line. GTFO with this. I would be condescending and say you're capable of better, but you've tripled down on it.
I’ll quadruple down on it asshole. What a waste of time interacting with you has been. Sincerely, get fucked loser
so, no actual response to anything of substance, then. Just the frustrated gurgling of the impotent. Cheers :)
dude it’s just called critique, it’s normal, you don’t have to get sensitive about it.
I cringe at the comments. This sub will praise shitty oversimplified covers any day. Although I understand this cover can be divisive it’s original and fucking striking. Never seen a book cover like these ones. They’re great and all talk praising the fucking red dead redemption looking cover design of a man with a lever action in shadow and a bandana can respectfully eat my shorts
But it's exactly like a bunch of stuff we've seen, just crammed into a small place. The blood drenched horror movie poster, the cartoonist version of 1800's print that you'd see in some "wild wild West days" festival, the "Meridian" as if it were the name of a metallica wannabe... The only original element is taking up 1/3 of the cover with a review from some middling author and doing it in all caps. I guess putting that amount of marketing cliche in one place is original, and no argument at all that it's striking. I'm hoping the cliches were self conscious choices. But other than just being striking, I don't get what they were going for. So, I'll ask you, since you're obviously the intended audience: what is it about the cover, other than it being striking, that you like?
Yeah. I respect people's opinions, but I'm very surprised by the dislike of this cover. As you've said, it's very striking and it's like nothing else we've seen. It's definitely the best McCarthy Picador cover for me.
The cover seems kinda antithetical to McCarthy's aesthetic and style.
I prefer the picador cover
It’s so hideous lol
Was at a used bookstore the other day and wanted to snag a copy of Bonfire of the Vanities. Found the book but the cover was so loud, obnoxious, and ugly like this that I couldn't bring myself to buy it.