Font book and rightfont6/13/2023 ![]() Designers and publishers are getting more ambitious nowadays and starting to create new trends, so if in doubt, get advice from a professional designer to steer you in the right direction. There is no hard fast rule about these, but it’s a place to start if you’re unsure. These are very broad matches, but Creative Indie has a fabulous resource which gives you a nice list of actual font names and which genres they are commonly used for.Īlso, some really enlightening information about font psychology can be found here, which can be very useful for nonfiction and branding. Handwritten: Romance, Chick Lit, Literary, Contemporary, Memoir.Decorative: Fantasy, Paranormal, Historical, Sci-Fi. ![]() Script: Romance, Women’s Fiction, Historical.Sans serif: Contemporary, Historical, Thriller, Sci-fi, Nonfiction.Slab Serif: Literary, Sci-Fi, Horror, Thriller.Serif: Literary, Historical, Contemporary, Women’s Fiction, Nonfiction, Memoir.Here are some common font classification matches ( a nice description of these font classifications can be found here ): Various psychological thriller bestsellers on Amazon which all use Sans Serif fonts. As with common design elements, such as dark houses with lit windows on psychological thrillers (also notice the colours!) there are specific fonts (and font styles) that are commonly matched with various genres. If there is a specific genre of book that you are a big fan of, you may have noticed that similar fonts are consistently used on their covers. Where was I supposed to start with this design? Old American comic? Sci-fi/Fantasy? (Even those two can differ drastically.) Manga?īest to be clear about your genre before launching into the design of your book cover. Of course, it can end up reaching a wide range of audiences, but it also needs to start somewhere solid first. But choices need to be made regarding who you intend to market the book to. I was once asked to design a book cover for an “old American comic book sci-fi/fantasy manga mix graphic novel.” There’s absolutely nothing wrong with writing multi-genre books. Genre leads to target audience and target audience leads to design. The importance of genre in book cover design (and therefore font choice)Īs a designer, it’s not really my place to be offering advice on book content (though I could since I’m an author and a publisher too), but it is my place to be commenting on target audience. You need to compete with all the traditional publishers who have huge budgets to play with, and all the authors who believe you are ruining their reputation because you decided to take shortcuts and skimp on quality. Well, you can, but the result will more often than not resemble something an author put together quickly on Canva, which unfortunately screams all the negative things people have to say about self-published books. You cannot just grab an image and slap text on top of it. This is why it’s a challenge (and usually more expensive) to approach a designer with a ready image or illustration that was not originally produced by someone who is familiar with book cover design. See how the text is a part of the design, and not just on top of the image? Here’s an example of what I mean: Leaving the Safe Harbor by Tanya Hackney, designed by Jessica Bell Design A good cover designer will design imagery and text simultaneously so that they complement each other and seamlessly combine with each other. You also need to consider the placement of your text. These are the five serious offenders in my opinion, but if you search for “fonts to never use on a book cover” you’ll find many more offenders and opinions about them. There are a few other fonts that designers believe you should avoid if you want to be taken seriously, and those are: Have you ever heard indie authors laughing and joking about Papyrus, and how it screams amateur? It’s been labelled: failed cover design because the imagery might actually be worth keeping. Sometimes font choice is the only thing standing between a successful vs. More often than not the issue is with the typography. ![]() I’m pretty sure you’ve seen covers on which you just “know” something is not working and you feel that the design looks amateurish, but you can’t put your finger on it. Choosing the right font takes skill by Jessica BellĪ good designer will know exactly what style of font suits your design and genre, but if you intend to design your book covers yourself, there are some things worth knowing about fonts before you get started.
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