Friday Face-Off: Black & White
Welcome to The Friday Face-Off, a weekly meme created by Books by Proxy! Each Friday, we will pit cover against cover while also taking the opportunity to showcase gorgeous artwork and feature some of our favorite book covers. If you want to join the fun, simply choose a book each Friday that fits that week’s predetermined theme, post and compare two or more different covers available for that book, then name your favorite. A list of future weeks’ themes are available at Lynn’s Book Blog.
This week’s theme is:
“Checkmate”
~ a cover featuring a BLACK & WHITE DESIGN
Mogsy’s Pick:
The Rook by Daniel O’Malley
Interesting that today’s theme is accompanied by a chess-related quote, because appropriately, my pick for this week also has a chess-related title and cover(s). The book’s protagonist is Myfanwy Thomas, who begins this story with no memory of who she is, but thanks to a letter she finds clutched in her hand, she is able to piece together enough of her identity to work out what to do next. Thomas (the name she has taken to calling her pre-amnesic self) was something called a Rook, a high-ranking member of a clandestine government organization known as the Checquy—kind of like MI5 except they are charged with protecting the United Kingdom against all kinds of supernatural threats. Many of the Checquy’s agents are super-powered as well, including Myfanwy, who eventually discovers that she is endowed with a rare but potentially dangerous talent of her own. Soon, she learns that someone in the Checquy had betrayed her, and in order to find out who the traitor is, she must reintegrate herself in the organization and hope that no one would suspect her memory loss.
So that’s the story, now let’s take a look at the covers:
First row, from left to right: Little, Brown and Company (2012) – Head of Zeus (2012) – Back Bay Books (2012)
Portuguese (2016) – French (2014) – French (2015)
Czech (2012) – Chinese (2014) – Turkish (2015)
Winner:
For such an entertaining and eccentric novel, I was rather disappointed to find that most of its covers were pretty standard and unvarying. Most of the designs I found played on the same two themes of either the rook piece or the checkered motif. So after some waffling, I decided to go with Head of Zeus as my winner, followed closely by the 2015 French edition. In my eyes, those are the only two that come closest to capturing the tone of the story, but ultimately, I think the eye-catching splashes of red give the HoZ version the edge.
What do you think? Which one is your favorite?
The BiblioSanctum 
I think you’re right, the Hoz version is the best.
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Yep, the clear winner for me! 🙂
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Your choice is the most eye-catching design, but I quite like the 2014 French edition as well as the Chinese version. It’s the symbols on the chessboard that drew my eye, and the colour-scheme of the Chinese cover.
Now to have a look at your review:)
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I do like the use of the color gold in the French versions, and in fact they would have been my second choice!
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I like the Little, Brown and Company cover and the Back Bay Books covers the best- they have that heraldic look I kinda like. I would say those are my favorites.
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Agreed, the heraldic look brings a certain classy vibe to the covers.
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I’m with Greg.
I just with the hardcover came in the red variant…
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I agree, if I had to choose, I would go for the red variant over the black too. It just draws the eye.
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I prefer this one as well but I have the French pocket one
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That’s a very pretty one! I think that would have been my second choice!
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Not the greatest book covers. I don’t think any of them would make me want to grab it!
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Yeah, they’re not the best, and it’s a shame because this was a really entertaining, quirky book. None of the covers reflect that!
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Automatically that was my fave too. I tend to be drawn to black, white and red covers anyway and that one is almost perfect!
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Same here, red-black-white is the best combo, I love it!
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Good choice of cover and…. THANK YOU for reminding me of this intriguing book!
(adding it to my “wanted list”…. 😀 )
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It’s excellent! I also waited forever to read it, wasn’t until the second book was about to come out that I finally got to it. I kicked myself for waiting so long!
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This is a great choice of book, Mogsy:). I also think you’ve chosen the best cover and you’re right – there is quite a strong similarity across the covers. That said, none of them are bad – the other one I really like is the Czech offering, which is also a bit different.
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They are all quite strong, though my one regret is none of them really reflect just what a fun, entertaining story it is! That’s why I went with my winner, because it came closest to showing off that quirk 🙂
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Eh, all kind of boring, but I would go with the one you chose too
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It’s probably the one with the most spirit!
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My favourite is definitely the second and I was kind of scrolling down wondering whether something would beat it but no – so it made me smile that that was your favourite too. This book is on my wishing – I should get to it.
Lynn 😀
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It is very good! You should the audio version, that’s the format I went with because it was the easiest way for me to catch up – and I’m glad I did! It was a fun listen.
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I love the cover you picked! The others are all appealing to varying degrees, but this one is actually one that stands out from the crowd.
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I agree, I chose it because of all the covers I thought it had the most “life” 🙂
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