Cover comparison: Half-Blood Prince | 25th March 2010, 16:49

This is an interesting one because, while I don't think either are particularly appealing, my preference is for the US version on the left, over the UK children's edition of the sixth Harry Potter book: "... and the Half-Blood Prince". I think that Bloomsbury, the UK publishers, have shot themselves in the foot a little with the covers. When the first book originally appeared, Bloomsbury was almost a nobody in the industry, and so probably didn't have endless pots of cash to spend on designers and artists, and so the cover of Philosopher's Stone ended up with a very basic, blocky design, and they have had to continue with it despite the popularity of the book to avoid annoying readers. Scholastic, the US publisher, came into things much later, knowing that they were already on to a winner, and so could invest in a cover design that would give them a lot more freedom for the sequels. In fact, the logo (the words Harry Potter) seem to be the only aspect that is carried over on the US covers, and is helpfully the same logo that has been used in the film series. The second half of the title on the US edition is an odd choice of typeface though, and doesn't particularly appeal to me as it is rather difficult to read. As regards the image, this is the main part where I feel the US version wins. It depicts a scene that is definitely identifiable from the book, and although the characters look a little cartoon-esque, the rest of the scene appears fairly realistic. It's clear who the characters are meant to be, and evokes a sense of mystery as to what they are doing, leading the shopper towards the book. The UK version's image is just of the two characters surrounded by a horribly unrealistic and over-bold attempt at fire. The characters themselves look horrible, almost as if they've been deliberately drawn to be grotesque. They remind me of Ponder Stibbons, a wizard from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series, more than Harry Potter. No attempt appears to have been made to produce a picture that will sell the book - it almost seems as if Bloomsbury have realised that the book will sell on title alone and not bothered to invest in the cover. Bloomsbury have chosen to promote themselves on the cover (as a small publisher why wouldn't you?) but Scholastic seem to have made the fantastic decision not to plaster accolades all over their design - but then they don't need to - everyone knew it would be good in advance. My only issue with the US design is that it's one of the 'not-want-to-be-seen-reading-on-the-train' designs, but so is this UK version. And that's the reason I bought the UK 'adult' cover instead.

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