Good Book Design

This past weekend I bought The Wild Things by Dave Eggers, the novel that expands on Maurice Sendak's original book and is the basis for the new movie that looks really good.

Besides being something that I want to read, the main reason why I bought this instead of checking the library is because it's such an interesting looking book (this picture really doesn't do it justice). All of the books that McSweeney's publishes always have such cool designs that I usually buy the hardcovers, something I rarely do.

You Shall Know Our Velocity is more subdued in terms of its design, but interesting because the story literally starts at the top of the front cover.


What is the What has a great cover too.

I love that none of these have jackets. That, plus the unusual designs, make me feel a tiny bit like how it must have felt back in the days of Dickens and Austen when people built libraries of first editions of novels.