Tuesday, May 2, 2017

Top Ten Tuesday: Retro Book Covers

This week's Top Ten Tuesday is all about the book covers. One of my favorite themes the past few years have been retro-styled book covers. I've noticed that quite a few of them seem to reproductions of classic travel posters, or in a similar style. Here are some reprints from Virago by Winifred Holtby that I just love.




Then there's this one by Vita Sackville-West. I actually liked the cover more than the book.


And I am absolutely drooling over this new series of British Library Crime Classics. I want to buy all of them for the covers alone. I couldn't resist buying a couple of these on my recent vacation, though I've yet to read any of them yet. Not all of them are travel-themed but here are some highlights:






And how about these beautiful reprints of Angela Thirkell's Barsetshire series from Virago?




Not quite so travel-inspired, as I think they're all set in the same village, but they do have that lovely retro quality. I think these are modern illustrations but I still love them. I've picked up quite a few Thirkells at library sales and used book shops, though I've yet to read any of them (I want to finish the Pallisers and the Poldark novels before I start the twenty-nine books in Thirkell's series!) 

Most of my Thirkells are Moyer-Bell editions but it's tempting to buy all the Viragos! Which I suppose is their intent, isn't it? I think publishers are working harder to create beautiful books to collect, maybe to offset the ebook sales? Bloggers, what book covers can you just not resist? 

16 comments:

  1. Which covers can't I resist? All of the above! I also love the original VMCs with the paintings, Katie Fforde's first novels when she was with Penguin, lots of the new OUP classics etc etc.

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    1. I absolutely love the green VMCs! I can hardly resist them if I see them in a used bookshop. I wish they still printed them with the nice artwork on the covers. The OUPs and Penguins also have nice covers, I especially love the new Zola editions, I think a lot of them have covers by Caillbotte who is one of my favorite Impressionists.

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  2. Retro book covers are so pretty. Thanks for sharing some of your favorites. I especially liked The Land of Green Ginger.

    Here is my TTT.

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    1. I love that cover! It makes me want to plan a trip to England.

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  3. There should be a museum devoted to book covers, I think! This would make a nice exhibit.

    https://readerbuzz.blogspot.com/2017/05/book-covers-made-ya-look.html

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  4. The british crime classics look amazing! I love their graphic, yet vintage style. I'm not much of an art-critic, so I can't say much else about it, other than that I really look forward to reading them!

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  5. I absolutely love those 1920's era, art deco-inspired travel posters. I am a sucker for them as postcards and have a few sets on hand plus I always pick up the National Parks version, and have a bulletin board of them. So, it comes as no surprise that I'm a sucker for book covers that use this style to hook me.

    South Riding was great, but I forgot that Winifred Holtby wrote other novels that I'm sure I will like also.

    Lovely post--made me smile just to see those lovely covers.

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    1. Thanks! I had a lot of fun choosing the covers. They definitely have that between-the-wars-era feel. I have a bunch of similar postcards which are reproductions of Chicago travel postcards and I just love them.

      I did like the other two Holtby novels but not as much as South Riding. There's also Poor Caroline which I still haven't read.

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  6. Those are amazing covers! I now want to read them all! :D

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    1. I know! Those British Crime Classics are so tempting, I want to buy all of them!

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  7. Love all of these! The Maisie Dobbs mystery series also has eye-catching retro covers (I like them better than the books).

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    1. I read the first Maisie Dobbs and was underwhelmed. I know they're quite popular but I agree, the covers are better than the books.

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  8. I spent ages trying to find the Virago 'Cheerfulness Breaks In' paperback, and eventually found it was only available as an e-book, which was very disappointing. It does seem a bit misleading to give them paperback-style covers.

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  9. I like the classic travel poster style at the beginning of your post.

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