Book cover typography tips for indie authors – SelfPubBookCovers Blog

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Book cover typography tips for indie authors
  • By : Shoshanna Gabriel

This month’s newsletter is by SelfPubBookCover’s Creative Director and Co-Founder, Rob Sturtz.
Hi Dear Authors!
As many of you know, one of the best features of our site (besides the great selection and author support) is that you can customize and work on the typography of your cover as often as you wish — for free! Here are some handy tips on how to make your book cover stand out with great type!Font Choice
Fonts have a personality and the fonts you choose impacts the look and feel of your book cover.

A script font like Great Vibes can convey a romantic mood to your cover as shown in cover #1. The shattered font called Broken Glass used on cover #2 lets your readers know that your book is more of a mystery while the font Nova Square, in example 3 has a more futuristic, sci-fi look. To add a mysterious, magical mood, a font like Inkedgod in example #4 does the trick!
Don’t mix too many fonts together on your cover — simple is strong!

Contrast Your Typography

Your cover and title will attract your readers — make your title stand out by using contrasting colors or put a glow or shadow behind your title to make it POP!
Dark type with a shadow will look blurry. Use light colors against a dark background for better readability. As you can see in example #2, a dark font against a dark background is hard to read.Small Can Have A BIG Impact
You don’t always need to have your title large to grab your readers attention. A smaller title in the right colors will grab attention to your book too. As long as your background is simple and you have the space, a smaller title can grab as much attention as a larger title. Experiment with using different colors for more attention.

What to Look for When Choosing Your Cover

Make sure your cover is genre-appropriate. If you’re writing a historical romance but the cover looks like a gory horror thriller (or vice-versa), your readers’ gaze will sail right past your book and you lost a sale. Certain covers scream their genre, which is a good thing. It shows the reader they’ve found the sort of book they’re looking for!

A note from SelfPubBookCovers’ co-founder Shoshanna Evers Gabriel:
“Remember that a cover’s job is to grab the readers’ attention, and to show them at a glance what mood and genre your book is. A book cover’s job is not necessarily to be an exact, specific replica of what’s in the story (although sometimes that’s fun, ala Harry Potter— but that’s what more expensive, custom covers are for). Find the cover that calls out to you… it will call out to your readers as well.”

Good news in the Self-Publishing world!

Over 1 million self-published novels were published last year!  Click the image below and read all about it.

Most-searched Images in September

Lots of new image words were searched last month.  Perhaps your next story idea is right in this list.

  • Planet
  • Red hair
  • Woman gun
  • Brick building
  • Mirror
  • Tower
  • Rose
  • Contemporary romance
  • Cross
  • Hope
  • Lake
September’s Top-Selling Designers
We wrote the book on customer satisfaction.
Search for your perfect book cover now!
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