Do judge a book by its cover

I love pretty covers. Sometimes more than the books themselves. So, every time I see a gorgeous book cover, I HAVE to buy that book, even if it is crappy, just to have the pretty cover on my bookshelf.  And then, when I read these books and they are actually really GOOD, and sometimes AMAZING, that’s definitely an added bonus!  After all, this describes what happened when I bought Hush, Hush by Becca Fitzpatrick, Fallen by Lauren Kate, Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy and Unearthly by Cynthia Hand (which I will be reviewing in my next post!)

So, yeah, admittedly I am a massive “judge-a-book-by-its-cover” reader.  This has happened on so many occasions, and yes, all the books I read have amazing covers. Except for a few.  Like (it is so painful to say this, trust me!), the Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. I KNOW!!! DON’T KILL ME, HEAR ME OUT!  And after you’ve heard my side and you disagree then, fine, you can kill me (but I’m hoping you won’t!).  I don’t know what the American Hunger Games books look like, but my chances are they match, and they have a recurring theme through them, yes? Well, the Australian covers. Nope, they are bad.  They could have done so much better for such an amazing series.  For those of you that live outside of the US, here their Hunger Games book covers which complement each other perfectly:

               

And those of you who live outside of Australia or haven’t read these books yet, this is what they look like:

See what I mean?  Now the first cover, yeah, love it! Then the second book came out. Ummm?? Is this right? Third book. Okaay? I think they mixed up the colour schemes of the second and third books here. I mean Catching Fire is purple! I don’t know what fires they were keeping in mind when designing this book cover. 

But don’t get me wrong, I LOVE the Hunger Games! It’s right up there on my “Favourite Series” list.  But for such great books the covers don’t do them justice.  I mean, THEY JUST DON’T MATCH! I hate it when covers don’t match, or books aren’t the same size in a series.

I don’t know if any of you Americans know this, maybe you do, but hey, I’ll say it anyway!  Here in Australia we don’t have hardback releases first and then paperback releases of that same book a year later.  Here we have paperback.  The majority of all the books here are released paperback and they are huge! And then around about when you Americans get your paperbacks, we get our paperbacks downsized.  Here are some photos of two of my favourite series.  Vampire Academy by Richelle Mead and The Mortal Instruments by the magical Cassandra Clare.  Spot the differences:

So, yes it kinda sucks.  The reason why Spirit Bound is in hardback is because I ordered it online and thought they were delivering it paperback but I guess I thought wrong.  Now it’s just made that section of my bookshelf ugly.  (Oh, and the reason why I'm missing a couple of my glorious Vampire Academy books by the great Richelle Mead is because I've loaned them to my cousin who has returning issues.)

So, that ends another blog post!  My next one will be a review of Unearthly by Cynthia Hand (which defies the general rule of American covers being awesomer than their Australian counterparts. I mean, take a look at that amazing dress and the glorious embossed swirls!)

How about you guys?  Do you share my pet hate of mismatching book sizes and covers? Or do you have some of your own?