Tag Archives: book recommendations

Judging a Book – The Cover Edition

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After reading Adam’s latest post, I just had to get in on the book-judging action, with my own little twist. Now, I know that the age-old adage is to not do what I’m about to do, but let’s face it. So many of us do judge a book by its cover, especially when choosing what to pick up next, and, as it turns out, publishers have made it increasingly easy to guess what you might get out of a book just from the cover (at least in terms of the genre). New romance books love slapping on that bright, vibrant-colored illustration style onto their covers, and it’s easy to spot a historical fiction book from a mile away (if there’s a woman facing away and an easily recognizable landmark in the background, you know exactly what you’re holding). But playing a game of “Generic Book Cover” isn’t very fun, so, while we will be breaking one of the oldest rules in existence, we will be doing it in a rather unconventional, non-generic way. And by unconventional and non-generic, I mean a pop quiz! Trust me, it will be more fun than it sounds because you will be the ones judging the covers here. After extensive research (aka, a deep dive through our catalog), I’ve gathered what I can subjectively say are some rather genre-nonconforming book covers, and it will be up to you to guess what genre they really belong to. So, get your thinking caps on. Are you ready? Let’s go! 

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Judging a Book by its Title: Romantasy/Sci-fi Edition

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The cover of A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas

It’s possible I had too much fun with the last one of these, so I’m back with another one. The original intent was just to keep it to pure fantasy books because I read a lot of fantasy, but many of those titles don’t strike me as silly or on-the-nose enough to run with for my fake blurbs. I suppose I could pick many of Sir Pterry’s books, but they’re invalidated by the fact that I’ve either read it or know enough of his style to potentially have a decent guess as to what he was getting at. Branching back into romance got me marginally closer to the kinds of titles I need to really make a post like this work. Also, full disclosure: I picked a sci-fi book because it has the exact style and title I’m looking for. Also, unless it’s hard sci-fi, there are a lot of similarities between fantasy and sci-fi anyway.

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A Belated Celebration of Art for World Art Day

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Here’s a small fact about me: before I threw myself into the wide world of books, blogging, and binge reading there was one thing that had an iron grip around my off-school and off-work life: art. From the time little me could figure out how to hold a crayon with semi-proficiency I was art-ing on most things I could get my hands on (thankfully I was never a wall-drawer but unfortunately our kitchen chairs did not escape my creative eye). I spent my weekends in art classes and summers at arts camps, and when it was finally time to leave the trenches of high school, OCADU was where I went. While I don’t draw as much as I should anymore, I still enjoy dragging my friends and family to art museums and niche galleries to play my favorite game, Is It Art?, and I can still spout off random art history facts on command (which makes for an odd but sometimes useful party trick).

Now, why am I sharing all this with you? I might be a little late to the party, but it was World Art Day (on April 15th)! This UNESCO-recognized celebration aims to promote the development of art and spread it so that it can be enjoyed by everyone. Considering the recent string of post-secondary arts program cuts by “budget savvy” administrations and the concerning effects AI-generated imagery has had on art communities across the globe, I think it’s more important now than ever to highlight World Art Day and what makes this form of expression so special.

So, if you’re ready to reach into the untapped depths of your creativity or you just want to read some things about pretty pictures and the people who make them, I’m going to get on my little soapbox to hawk the good word of art, with some of my favorite artsy things you can pick up at your local VPL branch.

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