“Don’t judge a book by its cover.”

I didn’t fully grasp how much utter bull-pucky that phrase is until just this moment.

And I design book covers for a living!

I am currently teaching a book covers design class, all about how to communicate with readers so when they look at a cover they know exactly what your book is about. Plus grabs their attention, tells the reader it’s a professional author based on certain elements of the books, and, and and—I could go on and on—

But then I would be teaching the class to you, which is not my intent.

But isn’t that—

Isn’t all of that—

Judgement?

As in, here is what and how you put things on a book cover so a reader can—what?!?

JUDGE THE BOOK BY IT’S COVER.

*sigh*

There is some personal forehead smacking, head-to-desk application (gentle tapping, or maybe just settling there as I *sigh* some more).

How did I NOT know this?!?

Now, I guess that whole quote has been spun into a “we are more than what’s on the surface” type of soliloquy. We are more than the recent clothing trends and hairstyles we tend to liberally apply to our bodies and lives.

What are we telling people around us with our external choices, about our internals.

Is our cover matching our story?

Or if it doesn’t, are we doing that for a purpose?

A good purpose? A healthy purpose?

It’s interesting, because this past week I just taught about how important it is to set realistic expectations to readers with a book cover.

We don’t want to say “happy romance” on the front and then have a Romeo & Juliet ending. (Spoiler alert: They died at the end.) A reader spending so much time with a story, engaging, getting involved, caring about the characters and the world…then oops! Old Yeller gets bit by a rabid wolf and must be shot to death by the young boy that loves him. Hi Disney! Not the story I was expecting when I was a child. With a cover of a young boy and his happy dog. Nope!

But maybe that was bad on me. I judged the story by its movie poster.

So where does the responsibility lie?

I think on a deeper level it is shared. But there is a greater responsibility to the cover maker.

You started it!

You started the communication. And you lied.

Maybe you didn’t mean to.

Maybe you didn’t realize what you were saying.

Maybe you didn’t know how to say this a beautiful story worth reading, with a deep meaning, but deals with some hard truths we often don’t want to face. Because we think no one would pick it up, watch it, open the cover and brave the pages if we told the truth.

Maybe we don’t know how to say we are a beautiful person, worth knowing. But is imperfect with hard truths that we are trying figure out. But not quite there yet. And will make mistakes. Like lying to you about myself, because I am not even telling my truth to myself yet.

Maybe I’m not brave enough.

Maybe you aren’t either.

Can we meet somewhere in the middle?

Can we try?

…?

I think I will stay with the phrase “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” But as less of a cautionary tale and more of a call to strive for truth. In ourselves. In each other.

In our book covers.

What will you find between my pages?

I think there is a reader out there for all our stories.