High Stakes Cover

Yesterday and last week I wrote about what i'm reading right now (see HERE). The week before that I wrote about the first line from that book, as I often like to do (see HERE for all my first lines and why I catalog them). As anyone who follows this blog knows, I am currently in a phase of liking to see all the different varieties of covers that go along with the books I read (see HERE). 

This first one is what I like best about Dick Francis books. This style. this is what I was trying to mimic with my first series of covers for my own books. I failed. I do still like this style though. 

This one, the axe. I haven't gotten to a point with an axe. I think I'm almost to the point where the hero figures out the two horses, . . . I think. I'll let you know.

This one is a bit more prosaic and generic. Don't see much about it and truthfully, I don't like it. It's a nice image, but for this book,  . . . meh.

This one reminds me of a art project I had in high school. It was to support a local Houston drug council program. I drew an arm, with a syringe in the vein at the inside of the elbow. Everything from the wrist down was in teh process of becoming a skeleton. It's like this one where the horse is jumping over the skeleton hand. I won second place in the art contest. 

I mentioned the other day that the hero was an engineer and toy maker. This cover is showing that. One of his first toys is a merry go round. Merry go rounds are huge imagery for mysteries. The up and down and round and round, seemingly never ending, simple but complex, the relationships to carnivals and circuses. This is so 70s.

This is the same as the above. I like the above more than this one. 

I just got to the part where the hero is drugged using a syringe. He is pumped full of gin intravenously. I think that's what this is trying to inspire. It fails. This could be the most boring of the bunch. Whoever designed this cover should be fired.

We were talking about designers being fired. This one too. Horrid cover.

Same as the last one with the skeleton hand, but this one is much better. I love the font. Very 60's.

Dick Francis makes a big deal about the hero's car. A Lamborghini. I mentioned he's rich. The car plays a big part in the book so far, but no big enough to rank being on the cover. I almost think this is a boring enough cover that it to should be a career ended for the designer.

Might be a fave. I love the axe again. The hollow box where the killer's head should be? No idea. Still I like this one.