Somewhere deep in a snow-covered mountain range, two skiers are locked in a high-speed race—not down the slopes, but straight into the uncanny valley of bad book design. Mara J. Ova’s The Crash Course promises thrills, romance, and maybe a few broken bones, but all we’re getting from this cover is motion sickness and a deep sense of artistic whiplash.
Let’s start with the illustration. It appears someone fired up a decade-old drawing app, selected the “awkward anatomy” brush, and went to town. Our fearless duo on the slopes have all the dynamic energy of department store mannequins flung from a ski lift. Their limbs are stiff, their stances defy physics, and their expressions range from “mildly concerned” to “thinking about what’s for lunch.” The woman’s ski outfit comes with a luxurious fur collar, which is perfect for either a high-speed descent or a villainous monologue—unclear which.
The background features a few sad, scribbled-in mountains that wouldn’t look out of place in a middle school geography project. The snow is represented by random blue dots and faint swooshes, as if the illustrator gave up halfway and decided “that’s enough winter.” It’s not scenic—it’s scene-it-before in every bad romance movie involving snow and underwritten female leads.
Now let’s shred into the typography. The title The Crash Course is styled in a bouncy, hot pink handwritten font that looks like it came straight off a mall boutique gift bag. It screams “teen rom-com,” which would be fine if the rest of the cover didn’t scream “instructional pamphlet for ski safety.” The author’s name is floating at the bottom in a default serif font that’s giving all the energy of “this was typed in Microsoft Word and left there.”
But wait—there’s more. “Prequel to the Carve Series” is hovering awkwardly at the top like a lost snowflake, contributing absolutely nothing to the hierarchy or design unity. It’s just… there. Kind of like the entire cover.
The whole thing lacks cohesion, polish, and purpose. It’s a bizarre blend of retro ski poster, amateur illustration, and YA wattpad energy all wrapped in the aura of a rushed holiday special nobody asked for.
The Crash Course isn’t just a clever pun. It’s a warning label. And based on this cover, it looks like the design team skipped the safety briefing altogether.