Surveillance
Cover designed by Brian Barth
In the not-too-distant future, national identity cards are mandatory, and America has become obsessed with intelligence-gathering. The government’s scrutiny is omnipresent, civilians freely indulge their curiosity on the Internet, journalists pursue their investigations with relentless determination, and children both snoop on their parents and manipulate new technologies.
And if you guessed that Seattle and the Northwest is the location of the action, you're right.
This is wonderfully claustrophobic and really feels right to me. I'm dying, though, to know why there is different sized type used in the title.
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6 comments:
This is one of those books where the cover and the blurb have me sucked right in- I've got to have it.
I agree: I need a new book to read and I think I've found it.
The gash in the trees looks like a lightning bolt, forcing the eye down onto the car. And the "V" in the title is aligned right inside the bolt, in parallel with the gash. (The "V" functions as a kind of arrow too). In addition, the "A Novel" tag has been quietly tucked away in the foliage in the upper right corner. Good cover.
The different size type makes my eye pan from side to side. Maybe that's the intent?
Actually I didn't notice the change of the type size until you mentioned it, but my guess is that the subtle perspective of the letters make it it look like it's reaching out for you, it's going to snatch you, thus making the cover look more claustrophobic. Nice work, pretty simple and effective; not my favorite in the artistic side, but then again, sometimes conventional and predictable designs just work.
I think that the different type sizes create a shape that mimics and emphasizes the headlights of the car below. As anyone who has been "caught in the headlights" knows, the sensation of being unexpectedly blinded by light is a bewildering one--all at once confusing and violating. The car's headlights and the type turn the reader into the person under surveillance. The cover makes the reader realize that though he is outside of the woods, he is gradually being pulled into it. The pull is inescapable--like the omnipresent societal surveillance we undergo daily.
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