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Welcome to Dungeon Farm, the only place where cows, crops, and cleavage all battle for narrative dominance. If you’ve ever wondered what would happen if a demon girl cosplayer wandered onto the set of Little House on the Prairie, wonder no more — the cover delivers...
The roaring twenties gave us jazz, speakeasies, and Gatsby. Summers Slain gives us… clipart horses and a confused cocker spaniel. Let’s start with the leading lady. Our flapper heroine stands front and center, drawn in a flat cartoon style that looks less “glamorous...
Every now and then a book cover doesn’t just confuse — it actively misleads. Enter Changing Woman’s Hair, which, from the title alone, sounds like it could be a memoir from your local stylist, a self-help guide to “finding yourself through bangs,” or maybe a cheeky...
The title promises a Storm of Secrets. The cover promises a quiet evening cruise with complimentary Chardonnay. Somewhere between intent and execution, this design hoisted the wrong sail and drifted straight into the land of forgettable covers. Let’s start with the...
When you hear World War 3.2, do you think of epic battles, desperate humanity, and the march of history reshaped? Or do you think… software update? Because this cover has all the excitement of “please restart your computer to finish installing.” Let’s start with the...
Some fantasy covers exude mystery and magic. Shifter and Shadow exudes hairspray and regret. Our heroine arrives center stage with hair that deserves its own novel. It’s not flowing dramatically in the wind — it’s rebelling against gravity itself, exploding outward...
Here we have Self Discipline, a book that promises Spartan-level toughness but delivers design choices that look more like they were lifted from a corporate PowerPoint template titled “Motivation 101.” The title itself is less a phrase and more a punishment. “SELF” is...
What happens when you combine apocalyptic city warfare, helicopter crashes, ancient occult mysticism, and clipart yoga poses? You get The Immortal Revolution, a cover so wildly overstuffed it looks like the designer clicked “all of the above” in a chaos generator....
Some covers whisper mystery. Some covers suggest tension. And then there’s Pandemic Hacker, which screams “I Googled every image associated with Covid and hacking, stacked them on top of each other, and hoped for the best.” Let’s start with the title treatment:...
Ah, the noble fantasy epic — swords, armor, fog, and… ribbons. So many ribbons. Of Deeds Most Valiant has gallantly charged onto the scene in full regalia, only to trip over its own codpiece and land face-first into the Horrible Covers Hall of Fame. First, let’s...
Here we go—when your cover tries to be everything at once, it often ends up being nothing but a glittery digital stew. Mate Tracker: The Complete Series looks like someone threw in every urban fantasy trope they had, stirred with a neon spoon, and called it a...
Ah, the romance genre: a place where biceps and beasts are forever bound, and subtlety was banished long ago. Grey rides gallantly into that stable of clichés, proudly waving a banner that reads, “I am abs. I am horse. That’s enough, right?” Spoiler: it is not. Let’s...
A Note to Authors Featured Here
The purpose of Horrible Covers is not only to critique but also to highlight how much cover design matters to a book’s success. Many authors set out with the best intentions but end up with covers that don’t reflect the quality of their writing — sometimes because they tried to do it themselves, sometimes because they relied on someone who wasn’t a professional cover designer.
We understand how frustrating that can be.
Our aim is simple: to help writers put their best work forward with cover art that does justice to the story inside. If you’ve been featured here and are ready to level up your presentation, reach out through our contact form and mention “Horrible Covers Author.”