I am admittedly shallow about book covers and will frequently buy books (or at least give them a serious look) just because of a beautiful cover. Marcia at The Printed Page hosts Cover Attraction, a weekly occasion to post an eye-catching cover. Here is mine:
Kingdom of Ohio by Matthew Flaming
Publisher’s Weekly Review:
Flaming’s debut mixes time travel, historical grit and an alternate history of the American frontier in a romance with a fantastic bent. A contemporary antiques dealer, after coming across an old photo, unspools the story of Peter Force, newly arrived in 1900 New York from Idaho, as he joins a crew of laborers toiling in grim conditions to build the subway system. A chance encounter throws Peter into the path of Cheri-Anne Toledo, a troubled woman who claims to have traveled seven years into the future from the Lost Kingdom of Ohio, a small frontier kingdom over which her father reigned. Cheri-Anne’s plight, and his feelings for her, drags them into the orbits of a crusty J.P Morgan and of dueling inventors Thomas Edison and Nicola Tesla. As Peter and Cheri-Anne evade the powerful forces invested in Cheri-Anne, the moment when their lives and the contemporary narrator’s intersects looms closer and closer, creating palpable suspense. The journey through the seedier side of New York’s Gilded Age, with reprisal killings for labor agitators and nights spent in drunken dance halls, is an arresting contrast to classic time-travel themes. This is a real crowd-pleaser. (Dec.) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
I have a weakness for type-centric covers, and this one is especially striking, with a very readable calligraphic typeface, bright on the dark parchment-like background, and good use of ornament to completely frame the text. While the text imparts a medieval flavor, the stopwatch indicates a story with a steampunk feel. The whole cover has impact while letting the reader know what they’re in for.
That font… is FANTASTIC.
They nerfed the “K” a little, but I do believe it is P22 Kilkenny http://new.myfonts.com/fonts/ihof/p22-kilkenny/
P22 also developed Arts & Crafts Hunter, the font in the masthead above. ;)
Wow, clearly P22 is a foundry of taste and refinement! Gorgeous stuff.