If Book Cover Designers Used Stock Photos

How do book designers decide what to put on the cover of a book? What if they didn't have a huge budget for a photoshoot? What if they were just damned lazy? Inspired by Rico Monekon's entertaining record covers from stock photos, we've been wondering how some well-known books might look if the cover designers had resorted to stock photo libraries for inspiration:

You can play this game too! Find an online photo library and type the title of your favourite book into the search field.

Mum's the word

This year for Mother's Day we decided try and collect a few of our favourite fictional mums. This proved to be harder than we thought. After all, how many novels do you remember where the fun only starts once the parents have been removed? Perhaps Mum and Dad are working abroad, or they are in quarantine with some mystery disease; in James and the Giant Peach a runaway rhino has gobbled up both of James' parents before the story has begun!

Here is our selection of fab fictional mothers including Kanga, Marmee March, Molly Weasley, Moominmamma, Missis Pongo, Caroline Ingalls, and many more. We included Mrs Bennet, although there was much discussion in TLGCHQ office about whether she really was a good mum or not - whatever you think about Mrs B's parenting skills she threw everything into thinking about her daughters' futures.

What a Carry On

Earlier this year Charlie Brooker suggested that it really was time to stop printing 'Keep Calm and Carry On' onto things. He is right and for all the right reasons; as he points out "it's time we, as a species, ceased to be impressed by this sort of thing. We're better than that."

I sometimes like to imagine that somewhere there is a house which contains every Keep Calm product somewhere inside. There must be enough variations to fill a maybe larger than average semi: duvet covers, teapots, clothes, rugs, doormats, kitchenware, chairs, key-rings, etc.

After a recent visit to one of the larger gift trade fairs I can reveal that maybe the torrent is lessening. There were definitely fewer products, and perhaps the end is in sight. Not exactly dead yet, although the arrival of Keep Calm... toilet paper may (and probably should) prove to be the final nail in the coffin. Unless, of course, someone is currently putting together a range of Keep Calm coffins? Keep Calm and er...

National Libraries Day: 4th February

The Literary Gift Company is delighted to be launching a new range of bags which celebrate our passion for libraries. We are donating 50p to the National Libraries Day campaign for every bag sold. The bags feature original hand-lettered designs by our artist Geoff Sawers who says:

“It probably helps that my mum is a librarian, but I have always thought of libraries as magical places. I remember childhood days when I had to go into work with my mum; I’d wander around, pulling out big picture books to look through and make drawings from (it was a medical library), always imagining that there would be more unknown treasures down the next aisle. So, I was delighted to get involved in the campaign to raise awareness about public libraries by doing the artwork for these bags. We chose three quotations to begin – Borges’s ‘paradise-as-a-kind-of-library’ image is a perfect one to start with, we thought, redolent of the secret library scene in the film of Eco’ “The Name Of The Rose,” all impossible curves and angles, and books, books, books hidden around every corner. Virginia Woolf’s line “I ransack public libraries & find them full of sunk treasure” comes from her diary for August 1921; “I want nothing but quiet & an active brain” she went on. Finally, we chose a more modern line, Germaine Greer’s patient defence of the value of libraries and reading. I hope you’ll all enjoy these bags. What’s more, they are the perfect size for dragging home a dozen or so battered hardbacks with you on the bus. “

Map Llenorion Cymru / Literary Map of Wales

If the Literary Gift Company did holidays, I don't think we could do better than offering people a stay at St. Deiniol's Library in North Wales. It's Gladstone's personal Theological library, and you can stay in the rooms; I had a few days there last week working on our forthcoming Literary Map of Wales. My old boss Ieuan had recommended it to me years ago, saying 'if you ever need somewhere to work quietly', and I did feel it had the most beautiful, relaxing atmosphere for working I've ever found. I had a conversation with a woman one lunch-time about a retreat she had been on at a monastery somewhere. It was lovely, she explained, but everyone was so jolly, and chatty, and the meals were so huge, the monks all like Friar Tuck, and in the evenings in the visitor's part, they had a little bar open... 'I had a great week," she said, "but it wasn't at all the week I expected. St. Deiniol's is much more like what I'd expected of a retreat than the monastery was!"

So anyway, I got a lot more work done on the map in three days than I'd expected. It's been running over time slightly, as my collaborator Gwyn Tudur Davies keeps e-mailing me, saying 'here's a dozen more names it'd be great to include, and can you fit them in to the most crowded part of the map...'; I am just starting on the final artwork now (Ynys Mon, above) and if I forget to sleep or eat I might just have it ready by Christmas. Seriously, though, Gwyn's knowledge of the literature is far deeper than mine and I have learnt a lot as I've worked on this. And in a way, Wales is perfect for the format: this applies to both the UK and USA literary maps too, but I can't think of anywhere in the world where the connection between many writers and their own particular patch is so strong and so deeply imbued as it is in Wales.

Hwyl fawr, hwyl am y tro, as we always used to say whilst tripping over the step on the way out of the Brunswick Arms in Abertawe.
- Geoff Sawers (Him Indoors)

Bookends

In my quest to familiarise myself with our stock I found vinyl bookends, they may not technically be literary related but I have fallen in love with them! As someone who loves vinyl records, has a record player and actually listens to records this makes me smile! And no I am not particularly old!

I love the idea that old abandoned vinyl LPs have been given a new purpose in life and it’s to prop up the other love in my life, books. I passionately loath those ugly metal monstrosities that you usually find caressing bookends. Now I can have something funky, unusual and far more attractive stopping my beloved books falling to the floor.

Looking through the bookends I thought that they would all be the unpopular records, I found one by the 'Choir of the Russian Church of the Metropolitan of Paris' sung in Russian, recorded in Britain! Personally I have never heard of them, but I am sure they were popular at the time. However, the classics of Nat King Cole and Elvis are also in our collection of recycled vinyl's which I have to admit was a tad shocking. I know that everyone has iPods and download music now, but a few years ago vinyl made a retro comeback and it suddenly became cool again. Maybe the cool kids don't listen to Elvis. Ironically, HMV still sell vinyl records of modern bands, they don't sound the same as the really old vinyls that have that authentic 'recorded in my garage' sound, but who knows maybe in a few years Rihanna and Justin Bieber's vinyl records will be recycled into quirky bookends?!

New Recruit

I am the newest recruit to the book loving cult that is the Literary Gift Company and I decided to say Hi to all our customers and tell you the story of a young lady’s first week at her new job….

Arriving bright and early for the first day at her new job, Charlotte (the heroine of this tale), was greeted by Dani and Matthew who although smiling and very welcoming, informed her that they “are not morning people, so please don’t feel like you have to be chipper!” After this Charlotte felt far more relaxed, for although she tries to be jolly at all times, she finds mornings have never agreed with her, and in actual fact make her feel quite unwell. (As a side I would like to add that Charlotte aka me decided to be all healthy for this new job and walk to work every morning, however, once I realised that driving meant that I could spend longer in bed this idea sadly died a sudden death having only lived a day).

Now back to the story, which I will now seamlessly change as I skip through the fields of genres (sorry! I may have got a little carried away and over excited when I was told I could write on the blog! OOPSY!)…

Having arrived at work, on foot, on time AND without getting lost I was given a cup of tea and a tour of our little building. I say little but this gives the wrong impression. We have three rooms on the ground floor, all of which feature stunningly high ceilings, and two that have marble fireplaces, that are unfortunately non-operational! Otherwise in the depths of winter you would find me huddled in front of the open fire sneakily reading a book!

One thing that has astounded me in my first week is the amount of tea and coffee my new colleagues drink! Now I am a tea drinker, or at least I thought I was, compared to these guys I am an amateur! I have maybe 3-4 cups of tea a day and no coffee. I thought this was a lot… how sheltered my life has been until now!

One of my first jobs was to learn and find all our products. Whilst sifting through the stock room familiarising myself with everything an eerie silence fell upon me. A blinding light suddenly shot from above, piercing the growing darkness. Trembling I struggled to move my increasingly heavy legs, propelling my body towards the light. Blade runner was its destination, Blade runner I must see. The aliens above obviously love that book and so must I. I must discover the ever alluding answer to: ‘Do Androids dream of electric sheep?’ (WALLETS COMING SOON!)

After my alien encounter I was not expecting any more excitement, however, the greatest surprise of all was about to slap me round the face…

Gazing through the shelves my heart began to flutter as our eyes met. Never had I felt, so instantaneously, so whole-heartedly, so strongly. It was simply love at first sight! My life would not be complete until I possessed him, my love, my life, my other half. He completes me.  My squashed bookmark man!

So thus my first week ended, I packaged, weighed, drank tea, fell in love and had an alien encounter!!! Shocking! Hopefully next week will be slightly more sedate.

But my tale does not end there as luckily for me my new colleagues had their priorities firmly in line with mine, the first thing on the agenda … work drinks! Having moved to the area and not knowing anyone this was the perfect welcome! The mixture of a good pub, alcohol and laughter was the ideal ending to my first week.

But still my story does not end, there is still one more piece to this puzzle that must be told…

As the clouds brewed on a chilling Saturday morning the silence of the Literary Gift Company was shattered by the piercing cry of broken glass. Long bony fingers crept over the windowpane as droplets of red stained the jagged edges. Attached to these disgusting fingers was a body, small and grotesque, the crimes of its life etched on the face. Slithering through the window the body skulked around the hallway deciding which door to violate and destroy.

Having gone to all the trouble of breaking not one but two windows in completely different areas of the building (one in the little under the stairs cup washing room we have and the other in the stock room), and the effort of squeezing themselves through the smallest window possible, the trusty burglars made a disappointing discovery… The room they had imagined their riches to be kept was full of tea towels and mugs! I can imagine their little faces as they surveyed the spoils of all their hard work only to be welcomed by bright yellow rubber duckies reading books.

The clues had been laid and now it was time to introduce ‘The Detective.’ He may not have been dressed in tweed, have his trusty companion Dr. Watson, or smoke a pipe, but I have total, ok maybe partial faith, in our very own Sherlock Holmes. He will be able to find the deviants who broke into our bat cave! The size of the window that they squeezed through helped him in his deduction that the culprits were not fat, round or even slightly chunky. Instead the villains of this piece were positively skinny, if anything they probably needed a good pie! Following our trusty detective was his side-kick, the CSI guy. Unfortunately not dressed in a blue jumpsuit but instead casually in jeans and a t-shirt, he opened his forensic kit to reveal the staple item that completes any CSI … a torch. Inspecting all the door frames, broken glass, corners and mugs (just in case our robbers got thirsty) with his trusty torch, he began work. Gently rubbing his brush of black powder over every possible entry point, he began his quest for fingerprints…

The saga of the broken window is an ongoing investigation so I shall keep you all informed of our trusty detectives progress. Until next time…..