Notable Book Covers for 2015

Back in 2014, there were signs that book cover design was maybe, just maybe, having a moment. Suzanne Dean was on the BBC. Peter Mendelsund was on… well, everything. But if 2015 has felt a little quiet by comparison, there were still plenty of reasons to be cheerful. This year’s list includes over 120 covers by 60 designers, and there is little doubt in my mind that this really is a golden time for book design.

Thank you to all the art directors, designers, and publicists who have supported the blog this year, and who make posts like this possible. Thanks too, to my local bookstore TYPE for letting me browse their shelves.



Act of God by Jill Ciment; design by Janet Hansen (Pantheon / March 2015 )

Also designed by Janet Hansen:

A Bad Character by Deepti Kapoor; design by Janet Hansen (Knopf / January 2015) Voices in the Night by Steven Millhauser; design by Janet Hansen (Knopf / April 2015) Empire of the Senses by Alexis Landau; design by Janet Hansen (Pantheon / March 2015)



Almost Famous Women by Megan Mayhew Bergman; design by Na Kim (Scribner / July 2015)



Angry Youth Comix by Johnny Ryan; design by Keeli McCarthy (Fantagraphics / February 2015)



Beatlebone by Kevin Barry; design by Rafi Romaya (Canongate / October 2015)



Beauty is a Wound by Eka Kurniawan; design by John Gall (New Directions / September 2015)



Boo by Neil Smith; design by Isabel Urbina Peña (Vintage / May 2015)



Book of Numbers by Joshua Cohen; design by design Suzanne Dean; illustration Carnovsky (Harvill Secker / June 2015)

(Oliver Munday’s cover design for the US edition of the Book of Numbers published by Random House is also great.)

Also designed by Suzanne Dean:

Boo by Neil Smith; design Suzanne Dean; illustration by Stephanie von Reiswitz (William Heinemann / May 2015) Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff; design by Suzanne Dean (William Heinemann / September 2015) Satin Island by Tom McCarthy; design by Suzanne Dean (Jonathan Cape / March 2015)



Boring Girls by Sara Taylor; design by David A. Gee (ECW Press / April 2015)

Also designed by David A. Gee:

Consumed by David Cronenberg; design by David A. Gee (Penguin Canada / September 2015) Why the World Does Not Exist by Markus Gabriel; design by David Gee (Polity / June 2015) Economics After Capitalism by Derek Wall; design by David A. Gee (Pluto Press / July 2015)



Bream Gives Me Hiccups design by Jean Jullien (Grove Atlantic / September 2015)



The Capitalist Unconscious: Marx and Lacan by Samo Tomšič; design Keetra Dean Dixon (Verso / December 2015)



The Complete Stories by Clarice Lispector; design by Paul Sahre (New Directions / August 2015)



Curiosity by Alberto Manguel; design by Sonia Shannon (Yale University Press / March 2015)



Dismantling by Brian DeLeeuw; design by Zoe Norvell (Plume / April 2015)

Also designed by Zoe Norvell:

Unabrow by Una Lamarche; design by Zoe Norvell (Plume / March 2015) Anything You Want by Derek Sivers; design by Zoe Norvell (Portfolio / September 2015)



Drinking in America by Susan Cheever; design by Rex Bonomelli (Twelve Books / October 2015)



The Double Life of Liliane by Lily Tuck; design by Abby Weintraub (Grove Atlantic / September 2015)



Early Stories of Truman Capote; design by David Pearson (Penguin / November 2015)

Also designed by David Pearson:

Karate Chop by Dorthe Nors; design by David Pearson (Pushkin Press / February 2015) Baddeley Brothers by The Gentle Author; design David Pearson (October 2015) Shooting Stars by Stefan Zweig; design by David Pearson (Pushkin Press / February 2015)



Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper; design by Gray318 (Penguin / January 2015)

Also designed by Gray318:

The Fishermen by Chigozie Obioma; design by Gray318 (Pushkin Press / February 2015) Making Nice by Matt Sumell; design by Gray318 (Henry Holt & Co. / February 2015) Laurus by Eugene Vodolazkin; design Gray318 (Oneworld / October 2015)



Fear of Dying by Erica Jong; design by Olga Grlic (St. Martin’s Press / September 2015)



Field Notes from a Catastrophe by Elizabeth Kolbert; design by Patti Ratchford; illustration by Eric Nyquist (Bloomsbury / February 2015)

Eric’s illustrated cover for The Best American Non-Required Reading 2015 is also spectacular.

The First Book by Jesse Zuba; design by Amanda Weiss (Princeton University Press / November 2015)

Also designed by Amanda Weiss:

Terrified by Christopher A. Bail; design by Amanda Weiss (Princeton University Press / January 2015) The Little Big Number by Dirk Philipsen; design by Amanda Weiss ( Princeton University Press / June 2015)



The Fox and the Star, written, illustrated and designed by Coralie Bickford-Smith (Particular Books / August 2015)

Also designed by Coralie Bickford-Smith:

Seven Brief Lessons on Physics by Carlo Rovelli; design by Coralie Bickford-Smith (Allen Lane / September 2015) Seneca: A Life by Emily Wilson; design by Coralie Bickford-Smith (Allen Lane / March 2015)



Generation by Paula McGrath; design by Harriet Sleigh (JM Originals / July 2015)



Hall of Small Mammals by Thomas Pierce; design by Grace Han; cover art by Kate Bergin (Riverhead / January 2015)



Hausfrau by Jill Alexander Essbaum; design by Gabrielle Bordwin (Random House / March 2015)



Hotels of North America by Rick Moody; design by Keith Hayes (Little, Brown & Co. / November 2015)



How to Run a Government by Michael Barber; design by Barnbrook (Allen Lane / March 2015)



I Am Sorry to Think I Raised a Timid Son by Kent Russell; design by Peter Mendelsund; hand lettering by Janet Hansen; photography by George Baier IV (Knopf / March 2015)

Also designed by Peter Mendelsund:

Satin Island by Tom McCarthy; design by Peter Mendelsund (Knopf / February 2015) New American Stories edited by Ben Marcus; design by Peter Mendelsund (Vintage / July 2015) Building Art: The Life and Work of Frank Gehry by Paul Goldberger; design by Peter Mendelsund (Knopf / September 2015)



The Italians by John Hooper; design by Nicholas Misani (Viking / January 2015)

Also designed by Nick Misani:

World on a Plate by Mina Holland; design by Nick Misani (Penguin / May 2015)



KL by Nikolaus Wachsmann; design by Alex Merto (Farrar, Straus & Giroux / April 2015)

Also designed by Alex Merto:

Earth by Hubert Krivine; design by Alex Merto (Verso Books / April 2015) The Art of the Publisher by Roberto Calasso; design by Alex Merto (FSG / November 2015) Written in the Blood by Stephen Lloyd Jones; design by Alex Merto (Mulholland Books / May 2015)



A Manual for Cleaning Women by Lucia Berlin; design by Justine Anweiler; photography Jonathan Simpson (Picador UK / September 2015)

Also designed by Justine Anweiler:

All This Has Nothing To Do With Me; design by Justine Anweiler; illustration Daphne van den Heuvel Don’t Let’s Go To the Dogs Tonight by Alexandra Fuller; design by Justine Anweiler (Picador / January 2015)



The Mare by Mary Gaitskill; design by Oliver Munday (Pantheon / November 2015)

Also designed by Oliver Munday:

Negroland by Margo Jefferson; design by Oliver Munday (Pantheon / September 2015) American Warlord by Johnny Dwyer; design by Oliver Munday (Knopf / April 2015) The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi; design by Oliver Munday (Knopf / May 2015)



Mislaid by Nell Zink; design by Allison Saltzman (Ecco / May 2015)



Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari; design by Jay Shaw; photograph by Ruvan Wijesooriya (Penguin / June 2015)



Motorcycles I’ve Loved by Lily Brooks-Dalton; design by Rachel Willey (Riverhead / April 2015)

Also designed by Rachel Willey:

Barbara the Slut by Lauren Holmes; design by Rachel Willey (Riverhead / August 2015) Discontent and its Civilizations by Mohsin Hamid; design by Rachel Willey (Riverhead / February 2015) Witches of America by Alex Mar; design by Rachel Willey (Sarah Crichton Books / Ocotber 2015)



Munich Airport by Greg Baxter; design by Anne Twomey (Twelve Books / January 2015)



Muse by Jonathan Galassi; design by Gabriele Wilson (Knopf / June 2015)



The Musical Brain by César Aira; design by Rodrigo Corral and Zak Tebbal (New Directions / March 2015)

This is actually a rather special lenticular cover that imitates the effect of flashing neon.

Also from Rodrigo Corral:

Home is Burning by Dan Marshall; design by Rodrigo Corral (Flatiron / October 2015) Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff; design by Rodrigo Corral and Adalis Martinez (Riverhead / September 2015 )



Of Beards and Men by Christopher Oldstone-Moore; design Isaac Tobin (University of Chicago Press / December 2015)



One Day in the Life of the English Language by Frank L. Cioffi; design by Chris Ferrante (Princeton University Press / March 2015)



The Only Street in Paris by Elaine Schiolino; design by Strick&Williams (W.W. Norton / November 2015)

Also from Strick&Williams:

Safekeeping by Jessamyn Hope; design by Strick&Williams (Fig Tree / June 2015) Among the Ten Thousand Things by Julia Pierpoint; design by Strick&Williams (Random House / July 2015)



On the Way by Cyn Vargas; design by Alban Fischer (Curbside Splendor / April 2015)

Also designed by Alban Fischer:

Ohey! by Darby Larson; design by Alban Fischer (CCM / May 2015) American Meteor by Norman Lock; design by Alban Fischer (Bellevue Literary Press / June 2015) Every Living One by Nathan Haukes; design by Alban Fischer (Horse Less Press / March 2015)



Paulina and Fran by Rachel B. Glaser; illustration Kaethe Butcher; typography Nina LoSchiavo (Harper Perennial / September 2015)



PawPaw by Andrew Moore; design by Kimberly Glyder (Chelsea Green / September 2015 )

Also designed by Kimberly Glyder:

Unbuttoning America by Ardis Cameron; design by Kimberly Glyder; illustration by Al Moore (Cornell University Press / May 2015) Worthy by Denice Turner; design by Kimberly Glyder (University of Nevada Press / April 2015)



The Poser by Jacob Rubin; design by Will Staehle (Viking / March 2015)

Also designed by Will Staehle:

A Darker Shade of Magic by V. E. Schwab; design by Will Staehle (Tor / February 2015) I Am Radar by Reif Larsen; design by Will Staehle (Penguin / February 2015)



Pretty Is by Maggie Mitchell; design by Lucy Kim (Henry Holt / July 2015)



Real Life Rock by Greil Marcus; design by Rich Black (Yale University Press / October 2015)



Racism by Mike Cole; design by Daniel Benneworth-Gray (Pluto Press / November 2015)



The Racer by David Millar; design by James Paul Jones; photograph by Nadav Kander (Yellow Jersey / October 2015)

Also designed by James Paul Jones:

No Such Thing as a Free Gift by Linsey McGoey; design by James Paul Jones (Verso / October 2015) How Music Got Free by Stephen Witt; design by James Paul Jones (The Bodley Head / June 2015) The Rise of the Novel by Ian Watt; design by James Paul Jones (Vintage / October 2015)



The Secret Chord by Geraldine Brooks; design by Jaya Miceli (Viking / October 2015)



So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson; design by Matt Dorfman (Riverhead / March 2015)



The Sphinx by Anne Garréta; design by Anna Zylicz (Deep Vellum / May 2015)

Also designed by Anna Zylicz:

The Mountain and the Wall by Alisa Ganieva; design by Anna Zylicz (Deep Vellum / June 2015) The Indian by Jón Gnarr ; design by Anna Zylicz (Deep Vellum / May 2015)



Syriza: Inside the Labyrinth by Kevin Ovenden; design by Jamie Keenan (Pluto Press / September 2015)

Also designed by Jamie Keenan:

Trust Me, PR is Dead by Robert Phillips; design by Jamie Keenan (Unbound / June 2015) Wake Up, Sir! by Jonathan Ames; design by Jamie Keenan (Pushkin Press / May 2015)



Trans by Juliet Jacques; Design and illustration by Joanna Walsh (Verso / September 2015)



The Utopia of Rules by David Graeber; design by Christopher Brian King (Melville House / February 2015)



The Vegetarian by Han Kang; design by Tom Darracott (Portobello / January 2015)



The Veiled Sun by Paul Schaffer; design by David Drummond (Véhicule Press / January 2015)

Also designed by David Drummond:

Wall Flower by Rita Kuczynski; design by David Drummond (University of Toronto Press / August 2015) Young Babylon by Lu Nei; design by David Drummond (AmazonCrossing / September 2015)



Weathering by Lucy Wood; design by Greg Heinimann (Bloomsbury / January 2015)

Also designed by Greg Heinimann:

Girl in the Dark by Anna Lyndsey; design by Greg Heinimann (Bloomsbury / February 2015) Thirteen Ways of Looking by Colum McCann; design by Greg Heinimann; photograph by Julio Gamboa (Random House / October 2015)



Whisky Tango Foxtrot by David Shafer; design by Richard Bravery (Penguin / June 2015)

Richard’s white, black, and orange cover for London Overground by Iain Sinclair published by Hamish Hamilton is also fun.



The Woman Who Read Too Much by Bahiyyih Nakhjavani; design by Anne Jordan & Mitch Goldstein (Stanford University Press / April 2015)

Also designed by Anne Jordan & Mitch Goldstein:

Souffles-Anfas edited by Olivia C. Harrison and Teresa Villa-Ignacio; design Anne Jordan and Mitch Goldstein (Stanford University Press / November 2015) Capitalism in the Web of Life by Jason W. Moore; design by Anne Jordan and Mitch Goldstein (Verso / August 2015)



Why Information Grows by Cesar Hidalgo; design by Richard Green (Allen Lane / June 2015)

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